In Chapter Four of Chasing a Ghost, Kathy Sweeney reveals how the 1998 murders of Sherri and Megan Scherer were linked to a 1997 Memphis home-invasion sexual assault... after an untested rape kit sat for years before finally generating a CODIS hit. As investigators race to identify the unknown suspect, the case becomes one of the early multi-state breakthroughs powered by investigative genetic genealogy. Genetic genealogist CeCe Moore’s work leads authorities to Robert Eugene Brashers, and a 2018 exhumation confirms the DNA match—finally naming the killer and opening the door to even more victims.

A double homicide in 1998 could have gone cold—but investigators in southeast Missouri refused to let the Scherer case fade. This episode follows the exhaustive, multi-state search for a suspect, the early warning signs of a traveling predator, and the breakthrough that finally came with new DNA testing and a CODIS match linking Missouri to a 1990 murder in South Carolina. The trail points to a violent criminal who disappeared in plain sight.... and whose story is only beginning to surface.

It was a warm Saturday afternoon in Portageville, Missouri. A mother and her 12-year-old daughter were working in the yard. By nightfall, they were gone, and nothing in this small, tight-knit community would ever be the same.

On March 28, 1998, Sherri Scherer, 38, and her daughter Megan, 12, were found murdered inside their home. The crime scene was unlike anything local law enforcement had ever encountered. Within hours, 75 to 100 officers had mobilized across New Madrid County. They knocked on every door. They chased every lead. And they found almost nothing.

In Chapter Two of Chasing a Ghost, host Kathy Sweeney brings you inside the investigation through the voices of the people who lived it: the family members left behind, the first responders who can't forget what they saw, and the investigators who took this case personally and refused to let it go.

Ten days after the murders, a shooting 40 miles away in Dyersburg, Tennessee would crack the case open. It linked the same gun to a second crime committed the very same night, and gave investigators their first look at a suspect: a white male in a maroon van. But the man they were hunting was closer than anyone realized. Robert Eugene Brashers, a serial killer, was living just one hour away.

And somewhere in a sealed evidence envelope, a single saliva swab collected at autopsy was quietly waiting. It would sit untouched for six years, until investigators finally learned just how much was riding on it.

The trail is just beginning. And there's no going back.

⚠️ Content warning: This episode contains descriptions of a crime scene and references to murder and sexual assault. Please listen with care.