She died at 100 and the case was cold. But new DNA test has led to arrest, CMPD says
Newly tested DNA evidence in an attempted rape case where an 83-year-old woman in Charlotte fought off her attacker has led to an arrest.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police on Thursday said the case is 28 years old but retesting of DNA evidence helped solve it. The attempted rape happened in 1991 when the woman was awakened in her home by an intruder who broke through a window, police say.
The woman died nearly a decade ago but officials say the case was never closed, just cold.
The man accused, 68-year-old Louis Brown, was arrested in Summerton, South Carolina, and remained in the Clarendon County jail Thursday pending extradition to Charlotte, officials said at a news conference at CMPD headquarters.
CMPD officers traveled to the Clarendon County jail and served warrants on Brown charging him with first-degree burglary, attempted rape and attempted sex offense.
The woman who was attacked died at age 100, “but we are moving forward with prosecution, and we have witnesses we feel can help” with the case, said Sgt. Darrell Price, who leads the CMPD homicide and sexual assault cold case unit.
Brown is a registered sex offender who was convicted in South Carolina in connection with a 1992 burglary and sexual assault of another elderly woman, according to a CMPD news release.
Before he was charged in the 1991 case by CMPD, Brown was free on bail on a charge of sexual misconduct with a minor, stemming from an arrest in 2017 in South Carolina, police say.
DNA evidence in the Charlotte case was initially tested in 1991, and again in 2018, police said.
Price said CMPD’s sexual assault cold case unit has cleared “hundreds of cases” since its creation in 2006.
This story was originally published October 24, 2019 at 3:28 PM.