Authorities investigating the 1991 killings of four adolescent girls at a North Austin “I Can’t Believe It’s Yogurt” business think they have solved the case using newly accessible DNA testing, putting an end to one of the city’s darkest crimes, the American-Statesman has discovered.

Top Austin police officials and cold case detectives expect to announce Monday that they have linked the fatalities to a serial killer who committed suicide eight years after the incident. Three officials familiar with the matter confirmed the development to the Statesman.

Austin’s Yogurt shop 4 Girls murders

Amy Ayers, 13; Eliza Thomas, 17; and sisters Jennifer and Sarah Harbison, ages 17 and 15, were bound, gagged, and shot in the head at the “I Can’t Believe It’s Yogurt” store where they both worked. The building was then set afire.

Throughout a 34-year inquiry, the suspect, Robert Eugene Brashers, was never targeted as a possible murderer. Brashers had no connection to Austin other than the heinous crime. Investigators have identified a suspect in a Texas triple murder cold case dating back more than three decades.

Austin police said Friday that DNA evidence linked Robert Eugene Brashers to the 1991 deaths of four teen girls at a yogurt business. According to the Austin American-Statesman, Brashers committed suicide in 1999 and was suspected of being a serial predator at the time.

In 1985, he was convicted of attempted murder after shooting a woman in the head, and he received a 12-year sentence. He was freed from prison in 1989 after spending only three years, according to the Statesman.

Case solved after 34 years by DNA

He killed himself during a police standoff at a motel where he was hiding with his wife, daughter, and two stepdaughters after releasing them. Following his death, DNA evidence tied Brashers to three rapes and murders in Missouri and South Carolina, including that of a mother and daughter, as well as a rape in Tennessee.

Robert Springsteen and Michael Scott, both teens at the time of the murders, were accused and convicted of the crimes in 2001 and 2002.

During the first six years of the inquiry, Austin police pursued thousands of leads, questioned countless people, and got multiple confessions that detectives ultimately disregarded. With great fanfare, Mexican authorities stated two months after the murders that they had apprehended two men and that both would be prosecuted with the Austin murders after one confessed. He later recanted his confession.

In 1999, a newly formed cold case task team focused attention back on Pierce, Welborn, and two associates, Michael Scott and Bruce Springsteen. Springsteen and Scott confessed, but then recanted, claiming they were pressured by police.

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