#513: Shenandoah Murders Update

Real Crime Profile

Real Crime Profile / Wondery

True Crime, Society & Culture, Exhibit C, Documentary

4.2 • 10.5K Ratings

🗓️ 10 July 2024

⏱️ 57 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Former FBI agent Kathy Canning Mello and Lisa Zambetti (co host emeritus!) are joined by Bill Thomas and Kristin Dilley of the Mind over Murder podcast to talk about the breaking news in the Shenandoah Murders case in which law enforcement believe they have finally identified a brutal killer’s identity in the killing of two young women.

In May 1996, Lollie Winans and Julie Williams were murdered at their campsite in the popular Shenandoah National Park in the middle of rural Virginia, not far from a busy tourist resort called Skyland. Many people, including park and resort staff, had seen the happy, friendly couple in the area and were alarmed when they were reported missing. As experienced outdoorswomen, Lollie and Julie knew how to take care of themselves and each other. When their bodies were discovered, despite the evidence that the women had been brutally tortured and killed, law enforcement decided to not alert the public that a murderer could be in the park, and in fact diverted attention away from the crime. Ridiculous theories were floated as to the cause of their deaths such as it was the result of a bear attack or perhaps a murder-suicide. One man was eventually wrongfully accused of their murders (never successfully prosecuted) while other suspects remained at large.

Kathy, Lisa, Bill and Kristin discuss the identity of the newly discovered killer, and any possible connection this killer has to the murder of Bill’s sister Cathy Thomas and her partner Becki Dowski.

To hear even more about this case, you go back and listen to Jim, Laura and Lisa deep dive the Shenandoah murders in Nov 2022, ep 401 when they interviewed Kathryn Miles, the extraordinary journalist who covered Lollie and Julie’s lives and horrific deaths in her book “Trailed: One woman’s quest to solve the Shenandoah murders”.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey Laura how you doing it's good to see you I know you've been running around a lot
0:09.5	yeah it's good to see you Jim it's been a while and the time has just clicked by and yes I had a little bit of travel which you know about but maybe our listeners and RCP didn't the at the time when Lisa was talking about leaving RCP etc I was jumping on a plane to go to I think it was the awards originally in London the true crime awards and then I came back and just for a short time,
0:35.0	then I jumped on another plane to go back
0:36.8	to London and Northern Ireland, or the opposite, actually.
0:40.6	I went to Northern Ireland first, spoke at an event there about Femicide in Northern Ireland and then spent a day in London filming a documentary and then came back to LA for a day and then jumped on another plane to go to CrimeCon.
0:55.0	So you're right, it's been, you know, a bit intense, even for my scheduling,
1:00.0	just juggling everything, but really good events, just a lot of time away.
1:04.8	Yeah I know and in that same time I ended up in the hospital and you know life can be
1:12.1	incredibly unpredictable.
1:15.0	Yes and you've been back in the hospital again.
1:18.0	There's just been a lot going on, hasn't there?
1:20.0	So I hope that you're feeling better now and you know I appreciate you holding it down on
1:24.9	real crime profile as well.
1:26.7	Thanks.
1:27.7	Well we yeah we've had some interesting times and recently been able to talk and interact with Bob Ruff, who obviously you remember as our first ever RCP interview and he's launching a new season and it's really intense and I thought it would be a good idea to help him out and so our listeners were treated to his pilot episode just last
1:58.1	week. That's awesome and yes I did listen to his first episode and you did you covered baby reindeer which is a case I've been very interested in from the stalking perspective and P did he puff did, whatever he calls in himself and his levels of violence to women.
2:16.1	So yes, I've been keeping up with things, but I know for our lovely RCP listeners,
2:21.9	there's been a bit of a gap of not knowing what's going on,
2:24.8	given that Lisa announced that she was going.
2:27.8	And for me, I've been trying to make decisions about the future and trying to make the right decisions because time
2:36.0	has always felt for me just as a mum and a toddler mum now I'm constantly battling time.
2:41.6	And we've been doing this for nine years and we've done
	...

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