Home DNA Testing Kit Leads To Arrest Of Man in 1998 Rape Case

INDIAN ROCKS BEACH, FL — More than 20 years after a woman was brutally raped on Indian Rocks Beach, a home DNA testing kit has led to the arrest of her accused attacker.

At a press conference Monday, Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said his office has arrested Robert Brian Thomas, 61, of Niles, Michigan, in connection with the 1998 rape a 20-year-old woman.

On Oct. 9, 1998, the woman was walking alone on Indian Rocks Beach near the 12th Avenue beach access when a naked man approached her and asked for a cigarette. She said she began to run away but the man chased her down and raped her. He then forced her to wash herself off in the beach water; however, the Florida Department of Law Enforcement was able to collect and store DNA from her attacker.

Then, in May 1999, the department matched the DNA collected in the Indian Rocks Beach rape to a break-in and rape of a woman in a home in Venice. Unfortunately, authorities still didn't have a suspect to which the DNA could be compared. Detectives said they identified 90 possible suspects but none matched the DNA collected from the crime scenes.

In October 2018, however, the department began using a new genetic mapping system called GEDmatch. Similar to Ancestry.com and other home DNA testing kits, GEDmatch is available to the public with the option of allowing the results to be placed into the national law enforcement database.

A relative of Thomas from Ocala used the GEDmatch testing kit and agreed to have the results submitted to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. The woman's DNA sent up red flags at the department. It showed she had a distant relationship with the person who left the DNA at the scenes of the rapes.

“It was estimated that the person who loaded their DNA and the rapist were somewhere around fourth cousins,” Gualtieri said. He said detectives spent hours with the woman tracing her family tree before it finally led to Thomas, who shared a great-great grandparent with her.

"She was very cooperative, very willing to help us," he said.

Gualtieri said Thomas was a perfect match to the DNA recovered at both the Indian Rocks Beach and Venice crime scenes. The sheriff's office found him living in Michigan, where he was arrested Thursday.

"After all these years, I'm sure he thought he got away with it," Gualtieri said.

Detectives have kept in close contact with the rape victim, who was relieved to hear there'd been an arrest after more than two decades.

“It’s something that you never get over,” Gualtieri said. “It’s something that you live with; and as a victim of a crime, you certainly want to see justice and see someone punished for what they did.”

Thomas was being held in a Michigan jail awaiting extradition to Pinellas County.