AUSTIN – After nearly three decades of investigation, DNA evidence was used to positively identify a now-deceased suspect who law enforcement believe raped several elderly women in Bastrop County between 1997 and 2005. The suspect, Emory Earl McVay, of Smithville, died in 2010 at 48 years old.
Back on March 27, 2004, an elderly woman was asleep in her bed when an unknown man broke into her Bastrop Co. home and sexually assaulted her. After reporting the assault to local authorities, investigators collected DNA and submitted it to a national DNA database. Later that year, in October 2004, the DPS Crime Laboratory in Austin notified the Texas Rangers of a possible DNA match between the 2004 case and another sexual assault from July 1997 involving a male suspect breaking into an elderly woman’s residence in Smithville.
The following year, DPS’ Crime Laboratory notified the Texas Rangers of a possible DNA match with a third sexual assault cold case with a similar narrative from July 2005. It was clear there was a serial rapist in Bastrop Co. Investigators continued to collect several DNA samples from potential suspects, but none yielded a positive match.
Then, in 2021, the Texas Rangers identified the case as eligible for testing and comparison through DPS’ Sexual Assault Kit Initiative (SAKI) program. On Aug. 11, 2021, Bode Technologies began conducting additional Advanced DNA testing and genealogy research on the samples obtained from the 1997, 2004 and 2005 sexual assaults.
Finally, in August 2025, after several years of advanced testing and research, Emory Earl McVay’s DNA tested as a positive match. It was later learned that McVay had been deceased for more than a decade, and no arrests were made.
McVay had a lengthy criminal history in Texas, including multiple convictions for burglary.