DNA evidence used to charge man in 1992 double homicide
Authorities have used DNA evidence to locate and charge a 45-year-old man with murder, more than 17 years after a brutal double homicide on the bluffs of the Mississippi River.
Brian Scott Poquette was charged with two counts of murder after a recent DNA analysis found blood from one of the victims on the defendant's shoe.
Cold case investigators located Poquette in Albuquerque, N.M., where he had been arrested on an unrelated charge. Police officials said he has confessed to the killings.
According to a criminal complaint, Poquette and three other men had been drinking on the river bluffs in Minneapolis on June 15, 1992, when a fight broke out.
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Poquette allegedly attacked one of the victims, Gregory Paul Anderson, and the two men rolled down an embankment into the bottom of a small cement shaft. Poquette then picked up a rock and hit Anderson in the head three times, according to the criminal complaint.
The other victim, Frank Bismark Brown, tried to intervene but was stopped by a fourth man, police said. Authorities have not released the name of the fourth man.
During the violent skirmish, Brown flipped over the unidentified man and fell into the cement shaft, police said. The unidentified man allegedly left the scene and did not realize that Brown had been fatally injured. He has not been charged in connection with the incident.
When officers arrived, they found both victims inside the shaft. Brown was pronounced dead at the scene. Anderson died 17 months later from injuries he received during the incident.
Before he died, Anderson told several people that he was hit on the head with a rock by someone who wanted his beer.
During the initial investigation, Poquette denied involvement in the killings. He admitted that he drank with the two victims that night, but said he left when the men passed out from drinking.
At the time of the incident, Poquette was identified as a suspect, but DNA analysis was not in widespread or consistent use, and he was never charged.
Poquette is being held in custody in New Mexico. Bail has been set at $750,000.