A Texas boy has admitted to committing a murder that had gone unsolved for more than two years, but won't be charged in the case, according to police.
Brandon O'Quinn Rasberry was found dead in his RV at the Lazy J RV Park on January 18, 2022. He had a gunshot wound to the head.
The Gonzales County Sheriff's Office said all of the leads in the case had been dead ends until this month.
On Friday, April 12, 2024, the sheriff's office received a call from a Nixon Smiley Independent School District Principal that a 10-year-old student had threatened to assault and kill another student on a bus a day earlier.
School officials told a deputy who was investigating that the child made a statement that he shot and killed a man two years ago.
Investigators determined the boy may know about the murder of Brandon. The child was transported to a child advocacy center where a forensic interview was conducted. The boy described in detail that two years ago he shot and killed a man in a trailer in Nixon, Texas.
He said he was visiting his grandfather who lived in the same RV Park a few lots down from Rasberry.
The boy said he grabbed a 9-millimeter pistol from the glovebox of his grandfather's truck and then entered the RV belonging to Brandon.
The boy said Rasberry was sleeping when he shot him in the head before putting the gun back in the glovebox of his grandfather's truck.
He said he had never met Rasberry. The child was asked if he was mad at the victim or if Rasberry had ever done anything to him to make him mad but the child said that wasn't the case.
Police were able to track down the gun at a pawn shop in Seguin, Texas and forensic analysis confirmed it was the firearm that was used to commit the murder.
The boy was placed on a 72-hour emergency detention and taken to a psychiatric hospital in San Antonio for evaluation.
After his release, he was taken back to the Gonzales County Sheriff's Office to be booked in on charges relating to the school bus incident and placed in detention by Gonzales County Juvenile Probation to await his next court appearance.
At the time of the murder, the boy was one week shy of his 8th birthday. Because he was under 10 years old at the time of the killing, he can't be charged in that case under Texas law.
