DNA analysis leads to resolution of murders of 2 women in Shenandoah National Park after nearly 3 decades.
DNA analysis and a thorough investigation led to the identification of a suspect in the murder case, as per the FBI's Richmond Field Office's announcement on Thursday.
Laura “Lollie” Winans, 26, and Julianne “Julie” Williams, 24, were discovered dead at a campsite near the Skyland Resort on May 24, 1996, according to the announcement. Family members alerted the National Park Service when the women failed to return home.
Their bodies were located a week later after an extensive search by National Park Service rangers.
After so many years, DNA evidence positively identified Walter “Leo” Jackson Sr., a serial rapist from Cleveland, Ohio, as the suspect.
“Even though we had this DNA match, we took additional measures and compared the evidence from Lollie and Julie's murders directly to a buccal swab containing Jackson's DNA. These results confirmed our suspicions and allowed us to inform the victims' families that we had determined the culprit of this heinous crime,” stated Stanley Meador, the Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Richmond office, in the announcement.
The case regained traction in 2021 when a new FBI Richmond investigative team conducted an exhaustive examination of the case, revisiting hundreds of leads and interviews. Evidence from the crime scene was sent to a private lab, which successfully extracted DNA from some of the items.
Jackson, the man whose DNA matched, had a criminal record involving kidnapping, rapes, and assaults, according to the announcement.
He passed away in prison in March 2018 in Cuyahoga County, Ohio, according to authorities. Jackson was a residential painter and a passionate hiker who was known to frequent Shenandoah National Park.
However, in 2002, a different man was at the center of the case. A federal grand jury indicted Darryl David Rice, a Maryland man imprisoned for other offenses, on charges of capital murder and a hate crime in their slayings.
At that time, it was almost six years after the women’s bodies were found with their throats slit.
Rice, who appears to still be alive, was released from prison in 2011 due to some probation violations, according to public and court records.
However, the US Attorney’s office stated in a public filing 22 years ago that the forensic evidence did not incriminate Rice and the DNA materials found on crime scene evidence excluded him, said Christopher Kavanaugh, the US Attorney for the Western District of Virginia, at the news conference.
“It was in a retesting of the crime scene evidence that developed a profile that was uploaded into the national database, which led us to Walter Leo Jackson Sr., ultimately resulting in a finding that there was a one out of 2.6 trillion chance that it originated from someone other than Walter Leo Jackson, Sr.,” Kavanaugh said. “I have prosecuted many homicides and cold cases, and I have never witnessed statistics that high.”
Winans and Williams were members of the LGBTQIA+ community, Kavanaugh said. Although their murders were initially believed to be hate crimes, he found no evidence of this. The case was eventually dismissed due to a lack of forensic evidence.
“Let it be known, this crime was gruesome. This crime was inherently hateful,” Kavanaugh said. “However, we do not have any evidence that the victims were targeted or that Jackson had any knowledge of or was otherwise motivated by their membership in a protected class. If the evidence proved otherwise, I would say so,” he said.
Kavanaugh was confident in the strength of the evidence and would take action if the suspect were still alive, he said. The families of the victims were not present at the news conference.
“I would like to once again offer my condolences to the Winans and Williams families, and I hope that today’s announcement provides some measure of comfort,” Kavanaugh stated in a news release.
This report includes contributions from CNN's Braden Walker and Julie In.
Read also:
Despite the initial conviction of Darryl David Rice in 2002, further DNA analysis in 2021 led us to reconsider the case.The FBI and local authorities worked together to ensure that justice was served for Laura "Lollie" Winans and Julianne "Julie" Williams, ultimately identifying a different suspect based on the DNA evidence.
