The Trail Went Cold - Episode 452 - Ernie Brasier

The Trail Went Cold

Robin Warder

True Crime, Tv & Film

4.5 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 8 October 2025

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

December 19, 2006. Clayton, Missouri. 57-year old attorney Ernie Brasier is found shot to death inside a third-floor office of his law firm: Boggs, Boggs & Bates. Since Ernie was killed in an office belonging to another attorney, there is speculation that he may have been the victim of mistaken identity, but no evidence is found to support this theory. Over the next few years, there are a number of strange incidents involving other employees at the firm, including a bombing at the home of two of its partners, but they fail to shed any light on Ernie’s death and the crime remains unsolved. On this week’s episode of “The Trail Went Cold”, we explore the bizarre murder of Ernie Brasier, which took place at a law firm which was described as being like something out of a John Grisham novel. If you have any information about this case, please contact the Clayton Police Department at (314) 645-3000 or the St. Louis Regional Crime Stoppers at 1-866-371-TIPS (8477) Additional Reading: https://www.komu.com/news/police-need-help-in-murder-case/article_8d7c83aa-2c7b-5c5e-b395-ce7a2a1f416d.html https://www.komu.com/news/lawyer-found-dead-in-office/article_43b3b252-760c-5008-84c2-c803ea292554.html https://www.newspapers.com/image/151872790/ https://www.newspapers.com/image/151995160/ https://www.riverfronttimes.com/the-unsolved-murder-of-ernie-brasier-a-clayton-attorneys-death-nearly-two-years-ago-continues-to-mystify-police-and-colleagues/ https://issuu.com/chsglobe/docs/april_globe_2022_1_/s/15434096 https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/law_firm_mystery_second_lawyer_dies_at_young_age_slaying_of_third_unsolved https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/bombs_explode_at_home_of_2_partners_in_law_firm_that_was_site_of_unsolved_m https://www.courthousenews.com/big-problem-at-the-law-office/ https://www.businessinsider.com/lawyer-fire-bombing-lawsuit-2012-9 https://patch.com/missouri/kirkwood/accused-of-bombing-ex-partners-home-kirkwood-lawyer-fights-back https://molawyersmedia.com/2013/06/19/st-louis-lawyers-settle-with-ex-partner-in-bombing-case/ “The Trail Went Cold” is on Patreon. Visit www.patreon.com/thetrailwentcold to become a patron and gain access to our exclusive bonus content. The Trail Went Cold is produced and edited by Magill Foote. All music is composed by Vince Nitro.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	December 19th, 2006. Clayton, Missouri. Fifty-seven-year-old attorney Ernie Brazier has found
0:09.1	shot to death inside a third-floor office of his law firm. Since Ernie was killed in an office
0:14.7	belonging to another attorney, there is speculation that he may have been the victim of mistaken
0:19.0	identity, but no evidence
0:20.8	is found to support this theory.
0:23.4	Over the next few years, there are a number of strange incidents involving other employees
0:27.3	at the firm, including a bombing at the home of two of its partners, but they failed to shed
0:32.2	any light on Ernie's murder, and the crime remains unsolved.
0:36.7	After that, the trail went cold.
0:39.3	The trail went cold. I'm not going to be. I'm going to and the I our latest episode of The Trail Went Cold. I'm your host
1:21.0	Robin Werder, and this week we're going to be covering a bizarre cold case involving an attorney,
1:26.8	the 2006 murder of Ernie
1:28.8	Brazier.
1:30.3	I originally received a request to cover this case nearly two years ago from a listener named Alex,
1:35.6	and while I had never heard of it before, it turned out to be quite a rabbit hole.
1:40.3	At the time of his death, Ernie Brazier was a civil litigator and partner at Bogs, Boggs and Bates,
1:46.5	a law firm that specialized in defending insurance companies and personal injury cases,
1:51.3	and while that might not sound too dramatic, Ernie was shot to death in one of the firm's offices while working late one night.
1:58.4	Since Ernie was a very well-liked and well-respected family man who did not
2:02.2	appear to have any known enemies or skeletons in his closet, no one could figure out the motive for this
2:07.5	crime. Well, the speculation that he might have been a victim of a mistaken identity, this was
2:12.7	never conclusively proven, and no one reported seeing or hearing anything unusual.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Robin Warder, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Robin Warder and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.