Former Duke football player Brandon Braxton has been arrested and charged with the 2024 murder of his former high school friend and North Carolina real estate agent Whitney Hurd.
Braxton, 34, was charged with first degree murder and robbery with a dangerous weapon on Thursday, March 20, according to Mecklenburg County jail records reviewed by Us Weekly. He is currently being held without bond.
Hurd was found dead at her North Carolina townhome with her body wrapped in bedding on July 14, 2024. An autopsy determined she died as the result of “multiple stab wounds” and her death was ruled a homicide, according to documents obtained by Us.
Police at the scene discovered Hurd’s BMW and personal phone were both missing, and neighbors reported seeing an unidentified male driving the car away from Hurd’s residence on July 4. Friends reported her missing on July 11.
Braxton appeared in court the day after his arrest where Assistant District Attorney Madison Gladwell alleged he confessed to the murder.
Brandon Braxton Mecklenburg County Sheriff’s Office
‘I killed Whitney Hurd,” Braxton allegedly wrote in a grievance submitted to the Mecklenburg Sheriff’s Office on March 3.
Us has reached out to the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department and the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s office.
Braxton was reportedly friends with Hurd at Providence High School in Charlotte, which he attended in 2008 and 2009. According to an affidavit obtained by Us, the two lost touch over the years until Braxton began showing up at her house.
On one occasion, Hurd said she found Braxton asleep in her driveway and denied him access to her home. Another time, she told police that he had broken in. Hurd’s loved ones told investigators that in the months leading up to her death, Braxton had been trying to re-establish a relationship with her, according to WBTV-TV.
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The former Blue Devils wide receiver became a person of interest in the investigation when his fingerprints were found at the murder scene and in Hurd’s stolen car when it was finally recovered, according to the affidavit.
He was arrested on a separate charge later that month and denied ever being in Hurd’s car. He also allegedly “nodded his head up and down in the affirmative when asked if he knew what happened to” Hurd. He told police that Hurd appeared “petrified” the last time he saw her.
Braxton allegedly confessed to the murder in 2025 March while he was being held on a separate trespassing charge — one of his seven arrests in the months since Hurd’s death. He was also arrested and charged with assaulting a woman in October 2024.
Braxton, who played 43 career games at Duke from 2010 to 2013, is due in court again on April 9.
