Chasing a Ghost: Robert Brashers - Chapter Five: The Yogurt Shop Suspect

A major breakthrough in the 1991 Austin Yogurt Shop Murders identified Robert Eugene Brashers as the prime suspect... linking the brutal killings of Amy Ayers, Sarah Harbison, Eliza Thomas, and Jennifer Harbison to a transient serial killer whose crimes stretched across multiple states. In Episode Five of Chasing a Ghost (“The Yogurt Shop Suspect”), veteran reporter Kathy Sweeney interviews Shawn and Angie Ayers as they process the shock of learning that DNA under Amy’s fingernails and ballistics evidence now point to Brashers. Cold case detective Dan Jackson and prosecutor Mindy Montford walk through the 2025 investigative dominoes: NIBIN shell-casing hits, Y-STR DNA matches to South Carolina, and new testing that strengthened the identification. The episode also reveals a crucial timeline detail: less than 48 hours after the Austin yogurt shop murders, Brashers was stopped at a Border Patrol checkpoint near El Paso/Las Cruces in a stolen car with an AMT Back-Up .380 pistol. It was the same make and model tied to the crime scene. If you’re following the decades-long push for answers in one of Texas’ most haunting unsolved cases, this chapter explores what “knowing” finally brings and what questions remain. Content warning: This episode contains references to murder, sexual assault, and disturbing crime-scene details.