Investigators say phone records, ballistics and lab testing tied Luis Fernando Benitez Gonzalez to cases from 2018 and 2024.
AUSTIN, TX — An Austin man arrested in Dallas last month has been charged with murder after detectives said DNA evidence tied him to a 2024 killing in southeast Austin and a 2018 killing in Bastrop County.
Luis Fernando Benitez Gonzalez, 26, is charged in the death of Alyssa Ann Rivera, 34, whose body was found in an abandoned house in Austin nearly two years ago. Investigators also said the same DNA profile linked him to the death of Alba Jenisse Aviles Marti, who was found dead in her car in Dale in 2018. The case moved forward after police investigated two later shootings involving women and recovered evidence that led them to Benitez Gonzalez.
Members of the Lone Star Fugitive Task Force arrested Benitez Gonzalez on April 27 at an apartment complex in Dallas. The arrest followed months of work by Austin police detectives, who were reviewing Rivera’s killing and two aggravated assault shootings from late 2025. After his arrest, Benitez Gonzalez was read his Miranda rights in Spanish and agreed to speak with investigators, according to the affidavit. Police said he first denied involvement in Rivera’s death but later said he had been with a woman matching her description near the Riverside and East Oltorf area in June 2024. Wendy Rivera, Alyssa Rivera’s stepmother, said the arrest brought back the shock of the family’s first loss. “The emotions were high,” she said.
Rivera’s body was discovered June 21, 2024, after Austin police officers were called to the 2600 block of Metcalfe Road about a deceased person. Officers found her face down in the entryway of an abandoned home. The affidavit said evidence showed she had been dragged into the house and had tried to escape. Investigators found blood evidence, drag marks and handprints at the scene. Surveillance video showed Rivera walking southbound on Metcalfe Road with a man at about 1:46 a.m. June 19, about two days before her body was found. An autopsy found that Rivera died from head trauma and blunt-force injuries. Her manner of death was listed as homicide.
The second case began more than six years earlier. Aviles Marti was last seen April 14, 2018, leaving Club Caribe, a bar on Felter Lane in south Austin, with an unidentified man. Her body was later found inside her vehicle on an abandoned dirt driveway at 378 Old San Antonio Road in Dale, a Bastrop County community southeast of Austin. An autopsy found she had been strangled and sexually assaulted. Investigators later found that DNA recovered in Rivera’s case matched DNA from Aviles Marti’s case through the FBI’s Combined DNA Index System. Police announced in 2024 that the two homicides were linked, but they had not named a suspect at that time.
The break in the case came through separate aggravated assault investigations in Austin’s Burton Drive and East Oltorf Street area in November and December 2025. Police said two women were shot in the right thigh in separate incidents. Ballistics evidence submitted to the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network tied the shootings to the same firearm, according to the affidavit. One victim also left behind a cellphone that police said belonged to the suspect. A search warrant on the phone led detectives to Benitez Gonzalez. Investigators also said metadata embedded in photographs on the device placed him about 700 meters from where Aviles Marti’s vehicle was found in 2018.
During questioning, investigators said Benitez Gonzalez described both killings as self-defense. In Rivera’s case, he said an argument over drugs turned physical and that he placed his hands around the woman’s neck from behind for about seven minutes before leaving after she stopped moving. In Aviles Marti’s case, he said a dispute over payment for a ride escalated near his mother’s ranch in Lockhart. He told detectives the woman used a seatbelt to choke him first and that he then used the same seatbelt against her for four to five minutes, according to the affidavit. Investigators wrote that the evidence contradicted his claims and showed a pattern of violent offenses.
The Texas Department of Public Safety Crime Laboratory confirmed May 6 that Benitez Gonzalez’s DNA was found on multiple pieces of evidence recovered from the Rivera homicide scene, according to the affidavit. He also faces two counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon tied to the 2025 shootings. It was not immediately clear whether he had an attorney who could speak on his behalf. It also was not clear whether Bastrop County authorities had filed a murder charge in Aviles Marti’s death. Austin police are expected to discuss the arrest at a news conference next week.
For Rivera’s family, the arrest ended one wait and began another. Wendy Rivera said the family had started to lose hope before learning Benitez Gonzalez was in custody. She described Alyssa Rivera as a person whose smile stayed with people. “If you met Alyssa once you would never forget her,” she said. “She lit up the room.” Family members said answers do not erase the loss, but they bring some measure of relief after almost two years of uncertainty.
Benitez Gonzalez remained in custody as investigators continued reviewing evidence in the two homicide cases and the 2025 shootings. The next public update is expected when Austin police hold their planned briefing next week.
Author note: Last updated May 10, 2026.