It was a warm Saturday afternoon in Portageville, Missouri. A mother and her 12-year-old daughter were working in the yard. By nightfall, they were gone, and nothing in this small, tight-knit community would ever be the same.

On March 28, 1998, Sherri Scherer, 38, and her daughter Megan, 12, were found murdered inside their home. The crime scene was unlike anything local law enforcement had ever encountered. Within hours, 75 to 100 officers had mobilized across New Madrid County. They knocked on every door. They chased every lead. And they found almost nothing.

In Chapter Two of Chasing a Ghost, host Kathy Sweeney brings you inside the investigation through the voices of the people who lived it: the family members left behind, the first responders who can't forget what they saw, and the investigators who took this case personally and refused to let it go.

Ten days after the murders, a shooting 40 miles away in Dyersburg, Tennessee would crack the case open. It linked the same gun to a second crime committed the very same night, and gave investigators their first look at a suspect: a white male in a maroon van. But the man they were hunting was closer than anyone realized. Robert Eugene Brashers, a serial killer, was living just one hour away.

And somewhere in a sealed evidence envelope, a single saliva swab collected at autopsy was quietly waiting. It would sit untouched for six years, until investigators finally learned just how much was riding on it.

The trail is just beginning. And there's no going back.

⚠️ Content warning: This episode contains descriptions of a crime scene and references to murder and sexual assault. Please listen with care.