Suspect, 78, charged in 44-year-old Texas cold case kidnapping, murder of nursing student

A 78-year-old man incarcerated nearly 2,000 miles away has been charged with the 1980 sexual assault and murder of a 25-year-old Texas nursing student, Austin police said in a press release Friday.

Thanks to DNA technology, police say Deck Brewer Jr. — currently serving time in Massachusetts for an unrelated crime — allegedly kidnapped and killed Susan Leigh Wolfe a block from her home around 10 p.m. on Jan. 9, 1980, while walking to a friend’s house.

Wolfe had just enrolled at the University of Texas Austin School of Nursing that day and was just four days from her 26th birthday, when she was murdered.

A witness to the kidnapping said they saw a car stop and the suspect grabbed Wolfe off the sidewalk in a “bear hug” and forced her inside after throwing a coat over her head.

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Investigators found her dead from a gunshot wound in an alley the next morning with evidence of strangulation and sexual assault. The witness also thought he saw another person in the car, which could have been a second suspect. 

In the first year, investigators with the Austin Police Department followed up on dozens of leads and at one point had as many as 40 persons of interest, and interviewed at least six suspects. 

In April of last year, detectives with the department’s Cold Case Unit submitted crime scene DNA evidence to the Texas DPS Crime Laboratory and last February the results eliminated the six known suspects. 

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The evidence was entered into the Combined DNA Index System (CODIS), a national DNA database of convicted offenders, unsolved crime scene evidence, and missing persons.

In March, Brewer was identified as a possible match. Then last month, after a DNA search warrant, Brewer came back as a match. 

Brewer admitted to investigators that he had been in Austin and around the time of the murder, but wouldn’t say anymore without a lawyer. 

The APD said the chance Brewer’s DNA was incorrectly matched is one in 550.5 quintillion. 

“One quintillion is followed by 18 zeros,” police said. 

The case is still active and investigators want to identify the person the witness said they saw in the passenger seat when Wolfe was abducted.