Dallas police say a DNA match from CODIS has led homicide detectives to a man already in state prison, now charged in the 1986 killing and sexual assault of Ruby Battee. Detectives Andrea Isom and David Grubbs traveled to Beeville earlier this month to collect a DNA sample and question Marvin Lee Holloway, who is serving time in the Texas prison system. According to the department, the break came after previously untested evidence was sent to a forensic lab and a partial DNA profile was entered into the national database.
In a Dallas Police Department post, investigators said they submitted swabs from the sexual-assault kit and other case evidence to the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification in January 2025. The department says a partial male DNA profile was developed and entered into CODIS on April 13, and that Detective Andrea Isom was notified of a match to Marvin Lee Holloway on May 5, according to DPD Beat.
Re-examining decades-old evidence
The Dallas Homicide Unit asked the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification to reanalyze previously untested items from the 1986 scene, according to the Center for Human Identification. The center reports that it performs STR, Y-STR, and mitochondrial testing and manages the state's missing-person DNA database, work that helps labs pull usable profiles from older or degraded evidence that once might have sat on a shelf indefinitely.
How CODIS produced a lead
CODIS, the FBI's Combined DNA Index System, can generate investigative leads even from partial or mixed profiles because forensic partial and mixture indices are searched at moderate stringency against offender indices, according to the FBI. The system is built to help solve unsolved cases by matching crime-scene DNA to known offender profiles in participating labs across the country.
Warrant, interrogation and charges
Detective Isom and Detective Grubbs traveled to Beeville on May 13 to collect a reference sample from Holloway and to question him. Isom later secured a murder warrant, and Holloway is being charged with capital murder, the department said. Chief Comeaux described the department's investigators as "meticulous, patient, and leave no stone unturned" in their cold-case work, according to DPD Beat.
Legal implications
Because DPD says Battee was sexually assaulted, prosecutors could seek capital murder charges if the killing is alleged to have occurred in the course of another felony, a circumstance spelled out in Texas Penal Code § 19.03. In Texas, a conviction for a capital felony carries only two possible punishments: death or life in prison without the possibility of parole, though prosecutors make the charging decisions and may decline to seek death.
What comes next
The case now moves into prosecutorial review and the court process. Dallas police have not released additional details about any arraignment or transfer. The department publicly thanked Detective Isom and the Homicide Unit for bringing what it called closure to Ms. Battee’s family and said the investigation remains active.
