A woman found strangled in Fort Worth four decades ago has finally been identified, but investigators are still trying to determine who killed her.<\/p>\n
The Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office announced Tuesday that the woman has been identified as Brenda Darnell McLerran Smith, who was born Feb. 23, 1950.<\/p>\n
Her body was discovered early on the morning of Feb. 24, 1986, in the 1300 block of Kuroki Street near Hillside Park in Fort Worth. The medical examiner’s office said she had been strangled.<\/p>\n
Despite investigators’ efforts at the time, authorities were unable to determine who she was, and her identity remained unknown for 40 years. Her killing also remains unsolved.<\/p>\n
The medical examiner’s office said advances in forensic technology allowed investigators to take another look at the case in 2025.<\/p>\n
Preserved biological evidence from the woman was submitted to Othram Inc., a forensic DNA company, for forensic genetic genealogy analysis. That research identified potential relatives and eventually led investigators to Floyd Ray McLerran, Brenda McLerran’s brother.<\/p>\n
According to the medical examiner’s office, Floyd McLerran told investigators his sister disappeared in the mid-1980s after leaving home to hitchhike to Dallas. He voluntarily provided a DNA sample to investigators.<\/p>\n
On July 29, the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification determined that his DNA sample and a blood sample from the unidentified woman showed a biological sibling relationship. Based on those results, the medical examiner’s office identified the woman as Brenda Darnell McLerran Smith.<\/p>\n
However, identifying McLerran does not close the case.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Her death remains an unsolved homicide, and Fort Worth police are continuing to investigate.<\/p>\n
Authorities are now asking anyone who may have information about McLerran or her death in 1986 to come forward. They’re asked to contact the Fort Worth Police Department’s Homicide Unit at 817-392-4330.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A woman found strangled in Fort Worth four decades ago has finally been identified, but investigators are still…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":410285,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[143330,143331,143333,143332,116,118,117,3737,17850],"class_list":["post-410284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-worth","tag-brenda-darnell-mclerran-smith","tag-brenda-mclerran","tag-floyd-mclerran","tag-floyd-ray-mclerran","tag-fort-worth","tag-fort-worth-headlines","tag-fort-worth-news","tag-fort-worth-police","tag-investigators"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=410284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/410284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/410285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=410284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=410284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=410284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}