Overview
- Police say male DNA recovered from a victim was reanalyzed with Y‑STR testing and genetic genealogy and linked to Robert Eugene Brashers using corroborating ballistics evidence.
- The identification shifted the case from long‑running suspicion to formal action and led a Texas judge to clear four men who had been accused decades ago.
- On September 27, 2025 investigators publicly announced Brashers, who died by suicide in 1999, as the likely source of the DNA and the breakthrough is presented in a new fifth episode of HBO’s series.
- The City of Austin has reached a draft agreement to pay $35 million to the exonerated men and the family of Maurice Pierce subject to City Council approval.
- Detectives have left the case open and say they currently have zero evidence of any accomplice while the documentary episode focuses on how the families and communities are coping after decades of trauma.