DNA match – Prosecutors say DNA testing linked a former Brockton resident to a 1991 murder and a 1993 rape. The man died in 2025, so charges won’t be filed.
A decades-old investigation in Brockton has produced a long-awaited DNA match, bringing new clarity to two violent cases that had remained unsolved for years.
DNA leads prosecutors to a decades-old link
The Plymouth County District Attorney’s Office announced it has identified the perpetrator of a 1991 murder and a 1993 rape in Brockton, based on DNA evidence that investigators say ultimately tied the same man to both crimes.
Prosecutors identified the suspect as Robert Carey, a former Brockton resident.. According to the district attorney’s office, Carey strangled Cherie Bishop to death in 1991 and later raped Donna Bell in 1993.. The announcement comes after more than three decades in which authorities said they were unable to match the DNA sample from the crime scene to a known individual.
The district attorney said no charges can be brought because Carey died in June 2025. Still, officials framed the identification as a step toward answering questions that lingered for families long after the investigations began.
How investigators connected the cases
Investigators had long believed the cases were connected. the district attorney said. but DNA testing at the time did not allow prosecutors to confirm a perpetrator.. Over the years, multiple agencies, including Brockton police and Massachusetts State Police, continued extensive investigative work as technology advanced.
Bishop’s case dates to June 25, 1991, when her naked body was found in Mulberry Park. Prosecutors said she had been sexually assaulted and strangled to death. Over the past 35 years, investigators kept working to identify the person responsible.
Bell’s case followed on April 4, 1993.. Prosecutors said Bell was walking on Annis Avenue when a man driving a van grabbed her.. They said he threatened to strangle her with an electric wire and then sexually assaulted her before reaching for a sharp object.. Bell, according to the district attorney’s office, grabbed the object to defend herself and cut her right hand.. She jumped from the van. screamed for help. and was eventually found by two Brockton police officers a few streets away.. Bell died in 2021.
DNA results from Bishop’s sexual assault kit produced what prosecutors described as a full but unknown male DNA profile. Later testing, the district attorney said, connected samples from Bell’s sexual assault kit to that same profile in 2016.
Genetic genealogy and testing renew an old case
The breakthrough, prosecutors say, came from forensic genealogical DNA work and additional corroborating tests.. In March 2023. the DA’s office said it obtained assistance from a Texas-based biotech company. Othram Research. to conduct genetic reference testing using forensic genealogical methods.. The process began with the Bishop homicide sample.
During further testing in 2025. genealogists identified a family tree and then narrowed to a specific profile. which prosecutors said was determined to be a statistical match to the DNA evidence.. The district attorney’s office added that testing of other evidence helped align with the theory that Carey was responsible for both crimes.
Investigators also said they determined that at the time of the attacks, Carey lived within about a mile and a half of both crime scenes. In the years leading up to the identification, prosecutors said Carey resided at the Brockton Veterans Administration Medical Center.
The DA’s office said Carey died of natural causes at age 64 in June 2025.
Why a DNA match matters even without charges
Even when a suspect cannot be prosecuted, DNA identifications can still change the emotional and practical landscape for families.. The Bishop and Bell families. according to the DA’s announcement. were left to live with incomplete answers while investigators continued to search.. Prosecutors portrayed the naming of Carey as a step toward closure—something criminal cases often promise but may not deliver for years.
For survivors and loved ones, closure is not just about a name. It is about the sense that evidence eventually turns into explanation, and that time does not erase what happened. After decades, a DNA match can confirm what investigators suspected long before they had the technology to prove it.
There is also a broader societal impact: advances in DNA testing can transform “cold” investigations into solvable ones. particularly when DNA was preserved from assault kits or crime scenes.. In this case. prosecutors said the path from unknown male DNA to a specific profile required both time and iterative testing—an increasingly common pattern as labs refine methods and genetic techniques evolve.
Still, the inability to charge Carey underscores one of the most frustrating realities of long-running cases: when the justice system moves slowly—or when evidence takes years to become actionable—accountability can become impossible even after the truth emerges.
The human cost of time—and the role of technology
Technology does not replace police work, prosecutors say; it builds on it.. Investigators had already pursued connections between the Bishop and Bell crimes. but the missing piece was a match they could confidently act on.. The district attorney’s announcement made clear that progress depended on preserved evidence. persistence by investigators. and newer genetic analysis methods that could be applied decades later.
That combination can be especially consequential for communities where trust in the system relies on follow-through. When a decades-old case reaches an identification, residents often see it as evidence that unanswered violence does not simply fade away.
At the same time. the case also points to the need for continued support for evidence preservation and modern testing pipelines.. DNA samples degrade, records get archived, and people die.. The longer the gap between a crime and a solvable match. the more likely it becomes that justice will be symbolic rather than legal.
A name, and the search for final peace
For now, prosecutors say the identification of Robert Carey ends one chapter of the investigation into a 1991 murder and a 1993 rape in Brockton, even as it leaves other questions unanswered by design—most notably, the fact that charges will not be filed.
In public statements. the DA’s office emphasized what families have been waiting for: the full story and a clearer sense of what happened to their loved ones.. After decades of uncertainty. the DNA match gives that story a specific center point—Carey’s name—along with the confirmation that investigators say the evidence supported all along.