Capital murder charges were filed last Thursday in the 1990 Potes murders, investigators with the Harris County Sheriff’s Office said. Andre Sloan, the suspect, is currently serving a life sentence in prison for a 1992 triple murder in the Houston area. Investigators now believe he was also among a group of men who broke into a home in the 9200 block of Lori Lane on Aug. 30, 1990, and killed one of the homeowners.
Investigators say the residents, Tamara and Wistong Potes, were asleep when the intruders entered their home. Tamara was raped and then shot in the back of the head. She survived. Her husband, who was also shot, wasn’t so lucky. He passed away. Investigators said Tamara Potes was killed in 1991 in a drive-by shooting.
21 years later, Andre Sloan was fingered as the suspect by the Harris County Sheriff’s Office Cold Case Squad. Dr. Roger Kahn, of the Harris County Institute of Forensic Sciences, said that in 1990, the DNA technology was just starting to take shape.
Fast forward 20 years, with the help of old evidence and a national database full of 7 million previously convicted offenders to compare samples with, cold cases are closer to being solved than ever before. As for Sloan, he was matched in the database.
Cold case investigators are still looking for the other suspects involved in Wistong Potes’ murder. Anyone with information on the case is asked to call Crime Stoppers at 1-222-TIPS.