Bill Richardson thinks he’s smarter than everybody, including Lew Wallace (who did, I have to admit, go back on his promise). Why is Richardson doing this? Billy the Kid has no descendants who are agitating to restore his reputation. Don’t the governor of New Mexico and that sheriff have anything better to do?
The current (or very recent) sheriff of Lincoln County, along with another individual, have gotten Richardson's ear on this. They've tried to get the body exhumed so a DNA analysis could be taken.
The idea is that "Brushy" Bill Roberts, or one of the other claimants to the Kid's identity, may well have been the Kid, which would prove he wasn't killed in Ft. Sumner in July, 1881.
True West Magazine did a piece on this recently. There are a lot of questions from both sides of the fence, and Richardson, should have thought twice, IMO.