But a DNA sample from a third branch included a link to the suspect’s DNA. The search eventually led to a Vancouver, Washington, woman. She evidently was a second cousin once removed of the still-unidentified suspect, but she had no current ties to Iowa. Further sleuthing led to a first cousin of the suspect, and eventually narrowed the likely identity of the suspect to three brothers who had been raised in Manchester, a town 40 miles north of Cedar Rapids. Police put the three under surveillance. And in October 2018, one of them, a businessman, casually sipped soda through a straw while having lunch with his son at a Manchester pizza restaurant. When the businessman left the restaurant, a Cedar Rapids investigator who had been tailing him — and monitoring who had drunk from which glass — grabbed the straw.