More than three decades after the brutal killings of four teenage girls shocked Austin, a major breakthrough has been made in one of Texas’ most notorious cold cases. Fresh DNA analysis has identified deceased serial offender Robert Eugene Brashers as a key suspect in the 1991 Austin yogurt shop murders.
The killings took place on December 6, 1991, at the “I Can’t Believe It’s Yogurt” store, where two of the victims worked. Amy Ayers, 13; Eliza Thomas, 17; Jennifer Harbison, 17; and her sister Sarah Harbison, 15, were found bound, gagged, and fatally shot inside the burned-out store. The assailant had set the building on fire after the attack, leaving investigators with compromised evidence and a trail that went cold for decades.
Investigators believe the attacker entered the store through the back door near closing time, ambushed the girls, and executed them before starting the blaze. Personal items found during the autopsies — such as earrings, a Mickey Mouse watch, and high school rings — underscored both the innocence of the victims and the horrific nature of the crime.
In the late 1990s, four men were arrested and convicted, but doubts over coerced confessions and lack of reliable forensic evidence led to their release in 2009. New DNA testing, unavailable at the time of the original trials, excluded them and pointed to another male suspect.
Brashers, who died by suicide during a 1999 standoff with police in Missouri, has since been tied through DNA to several violent crimes across multiple states, including the 1990 strangulation of a South Carolina woman, the 1997 rape of a Tennessee teenager, and the 1998 shooting of a Missouri mother and daughter. His violent history, combined with the latest DNA evidence, now links him directly to the Austin murders.
Although Brashers is dead, the case remains officially open. Authorities are expected to share further details at a scheduled press briefing, as the new findings may help bring closure to the families of the victims and a community that has carried the weight of the tragedy for over 30 years.
