Could Houston’s Bayou Bodies Mystery Be Connected to Austin’s Lady Bird Lake Deaths?

A sharp decline in Houston body recoveries, an unresolved triple homicide and confirmation that the unofficial suspect has relocated to Austin are raising questions.

For years, the number of bodies recovered from Houston’s waterways has fueled speculation about a serial killer. City officials have repeatedly rejected that theory. At a September 23, 2025, news conference about bodies recovered from Houston’s bayous, Mayor John Whitmire said, “We do not have any evidence that there is a serial killer loose in Houston, Texas.”

Most of the more than 200 deaths reported since 2017 have been attributed to causes including accidents, suicide and drowning, although some remain difficult to explain. The mayor continued, “If there were a serial killer, I’d be the first person to alert the public.”

Despite the denials, attention has turned to a more specific question: Could any of the Houston deaths be connected to an unsolved triple homicide near the city—and to a group of deaths in Austin’s Lady Bird Lake?

At the center of the theory is Carl Clint Ashworth, a former long-haul truck driver. The Tampa Bay Chronicle reported that Houston detectives examined him in connection with their bayou inquiries. Ashworth has denied wrongdoing and has not been charged in any of the Houston, Pearland or Austin cases. Authorities have not publicly identified Ashworth as a suspect in these deaths.

According to Gregg McCrary, a retired FBI profiler, “Gary Ridgway drew investigators’ attention years before his 2001 arrest, but suspicion alone was not enough to establish that he was the Green River Killer.” Detectives had to investigate other leads and build evidence that could tie him to the murders. Publicly naming him as a suspect before they could make that connection would have “alerted Ridgway to the investigation and complicated their work.”

“The breakthrough came when advances in DNA testing connected Ridgway to victims,” said McCrary. “That gave investigators the evidence they’d been lacking.” Ridgway was arrested in November 2001 and later pleaded guilty to 48 murders in King County. His case illustrates why authorities may investigate a suspect for years without publicly identifying him. As McCrary put it, “law enforcement needs strong evidence to support charges, not just a compelling theory.”

In early 2025, a homeless sex worker identified as “Kiki” told the newspaper he recognized Ashworth in a photograph investigators showed him during an interview. “He’s what we call a bear,” said Kiki. In the LGBTQ community, a “bear”generally refers to a gay or bisexual man with a larger or stockier build, body hair and often a beard. Kiki added, “He like boys and girls… I seen him messing with both.”

Kiki said he had seen Ashworth near homeless encampments, areas known for street prostitution and locations frequented by vulnerable populations. “I told the cops that, but they didn’t seem to care.”

Investigators declined to address Kiki’s account or say whether witnesses had been shown Ashworth’s photograph.

Kiki said he believes authorities have devoted too few resources to investigating deaths in and around Houston’s waterways.

“They ain't taking the killings serious ‘cause it’s mostly gays and homeless people,” he said. “If rich people were ending up dead in the bayous, it’d be all over the news.”

According to sources, Houston investigators last formally interviewed Ashworth in late 2025. Former neighbor Bobby Letch subsequently said he had not seen Ashworth in more than six months. “He packed up his stuff in the middle of the night,” said Letch, “and he just vanished.” The Chronicle reported that body recoveries from Houston waterways slowed considerably after Ashworth’s departure.

“I ain't sayin’ he’s responsible for them killings,” said Letch, “but it’s pretty strange that he just up and moved out like that.”

At least 208 bodies were recorded in or near Houston-area bayous from 2017 through February 23, 2026, according to a review of Harris County medical examiner records. The total includes 204 from early 2017 through late 2025—approximately 23 bodies per year. From Ashworth’s departure in November 2025 to date, fewer than a dozen bodies have been retrieved from the waterways.

The timing raises a question, but it does not answer it. A change in recoveries could reflect chance, weather, reporting or other factors. It does not connect Ashworth to any deaths.

Sources familiar with the Houston inquiry described biological evidence linking Ashworth to two women whose bodies were later found in waterways. According to that account, Ashworth acknowledged contact with the women and said it was consensual. Evidence of contact would not, on its own, show how either woman died or who was responsible. No charges followed.

A second thread leads to Pearland. In September 2017, Mark Hollis, his girlfriend Angela Ruiz and her son Miguel Ruiz were found dead inside a home. The killings remain unsolved. An anonymous tip later alleged that Ashworth knew details that had not been released publicly. However, the tipster stopped cooperating with law enforcement later in the investigation. No forensic evidence linking Ashworth to the killings has been publicly disclosed, and he has not been charged.

A confidential source within the Houston Police Department has confirmed that Ashworth reemerged in Austin following his departure from Houston. “Detectives within the department have spoken with Austin investigators regarding Ashworth… According to Austin’s people, he has ties to the LGBTQ community.”

It is unclear where in Austin Ashworth has relocated. The source also stated that “investigators have reason to believe that Ashworth has visited the area many times over the last few years.”

Is Ashworth’s presence a coincidence? An earlier Chronicle article focused on eight men whose bodies were recovered from Lady Bird Lake: Ricky Parks, Christopher Gutierrez, Kyle Thornton, Jason John, Clifton Axtell, Jonathan Honey, Christopher Hays-Clark and Mogga Dogale. Several had spent time near the Rainey Street nightlife district before disappearing.

The cases have prompted public concern because the bars, nearby trail and waterfront sit so close together. But proximity and similar circumstances do not establish that the deaths were homicides—or that one person caused them.

Austin police have rejected the serial-killer theory. A Texas State University analysis of a broader group of drowning cases likewise found no pattern supporting a single offender.

According to a source familiar with the inquiry, an employee at a Rainey Street bar identified Ashworth from photographs as someone the employee recalled seeing on the night Jonathan Honey disappeared in 2023. That account has not been publicly corroborated with a surveillance image, location record or other evidence placing Ashworth with Honey. A recollection made years later would also require careful verification.

Dr. Carole Lieberman, a forensic psychiatrist, offered a different interpretation: “thirty out of thirty-eight bodies recovered from the lake were men suggest the deaths could be the work of a predator who prefers male victims.”

She suggested that date-rape drugs could make men easy targets and that older men could be similarly vulnerable. Lieberman also noted that water speeds decomposition and can wash away evidence such as fingerprints and DNA, making bodies of water attractive disposal areas for killers. “The likelihood of a serial killer cannot be ignored.”

This is where the story stands. Three people were murdered in Pearland, and no one has been convicted. Houston’s waterways have been the sites of many deaths, but authorities continue to state that they have found no evidence of a serial killer behind them. Austin’s lake deaths have generated a separate theory that police and researchers do not support.

McCrary suggested that “investigators should, and probably are, comparing verified timelines, travel records and evidence from the individual cases.” Until such evidence emerges, the possibility that Houston’s mystery “moved” to Austin remains a hypothesis. “Statistically it doesn’t bode well for Ashworth,” said the retired profiler, “but law enforcement doesn’t run on rumors and coincidences… They need evidence.”