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A Journalist Reexamines 1996 Murders Near The Appalachian Trail

In the summer of 1996 in Shenandoah National Park, two women, Julie Williams and Lollie Winans, were murdered not far from the Appalachian Trail. The case remains unsolved today. Journalist Kathryn Miles recently wrote about the murders in a new book titled, “Trailed: One Woman’s Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders.” The book goes beyond true crime, and wraps in Miles’ personal experiences and the specter of violence in the outdoors.

This conversation originally aired in the March 19, 2023 episode of Inside Appalachia.

In the summer of 1996 in Shenandoah National Park, two women, Julie Williams and Lollie Winans, were murdered not far from the Appalachian Trail.

The case remains unsolved today.

Journalist Kathryn Miles recently wrote about the murders in a new book titled, “Trailed: One Woman’s Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders.” The book goes beyond true crime, and wraps in Miles’ personal experiences and the specter of violence in the outdoors.

Inside Appalachia host Mason Adams recently spoke with Miles.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Adams: For people who don’t know about the 1996 homicides, can you tell us what happened?

Miles: It was in Shenandoah National Park, just off of the Appalachian Trail. Lollie and Julie were both wilderness leaders. They had met the summer before at a really revolutionary outdoor program for women and fell head over heels in love.

I think it’s really important to remember that this was 1996. This was a long time before anyone really kind of felt comfortable coming out in a public way, especially somewhere like the Upper Midwest, which is where they were located. They had some challenges in terms of trying to figure out this relationship, whether or not they wanted to navigate a same-sex relationship, but they did really both commit to it. They spent the next calendar year in a long distance relationship getting to know each other, at the end of what had been Lollie’s last semester of her college experience. This is May of 1996. The two were living about five hours apart: Julie was in Vermont, Lollie was in Maine at Unity, the college that I would go on to teach at. The school year had wrapped up. They were both about to embark upon very busy summers.

They decided that what they really wanted to do was take an easy, breezy backpacking trip that would give them time to recommit, reconnect as a couple. They picked Shenandoah National Park, knowing that, first of all, the weather was a lot more reliable there than it is here in Maine in May, where snow is still a possibility. They also knew that not only did the Appalachian Trail run through the park, but there were also a lot of other trails that would allow them to have an experience where it wasn’t really about endurance. It really wasn’t about skill so much as it was about recreation.

About a week into their trip — we think five to seven days into their trip — they were brutally assaulted at their back country camp site. They were both murdered. We believe that Julie was sexually assaulted. Then that really led to this impossibly difficult and confusing and convoluted and flawed investigation that continues today.

Adams: Yes, the investigation has yet to conclude, in part, it seems because law enforcement authorities really singled out an individual early on and pursued a case against him. Your book suggests maybe they shouldn’t have been so quick to rush to prosecution. Can you talk a little bit about what you found?

Miles: In July of 1997, about 14 months after Lollie and Julie were murdered, a young man named Darrell David Rice was in Shenandoah National Park. His father lived right outside of the park, and he would regularly spend a lot of time cycling there. He had, by all accounts, including his own, several very severe psychological challenges and issues he was dealing with, most notably bipolar schizophrenia. His life had been completely unraveling. He was not getting treatment for the psychological disorders. He was at his wit’s end.

On one particular weekend in July, he had been up for two or three days straight, and was driving through the park. He saw a female cyclist. He drove past her several times.

He shouted obscenities at her, and at one point ran her off the road. She was understandably terrified about this, and got help, and rangers managed to get hold of him before he left the park. As soon as they apprehended him, the rangers were convinced that he had murdered Lollie and Julie the summer before. When violent crime occurs in national parks, those investigations are the dual purview of both the FBI and the National Park Service police.

Those two law enforcement agencies, which do not have a lot in common with each other and have very different cultural expectations, have to come together during these crimes. I think that’s part of what makes these crimes so difficult to successfully solve and close, are these culture clashes. Both the FBI and the Park Service began to focus on David Rice, and really began to shift their investigation exclusively to him at that point.

Adams: Darrell Rice was indicted in 2001. But ultimately, federal officials couldn’t gather enough of a case to really take him to trial. It was dismissed. And your investigation points in different directions. Can you talk a little bit about what you learned with your research?

Miles: In 2001, Darrell Rice was formally indicted. At that point, the attorney general for the U.S. was John Ashcroft under the George W. Bush administration. He saw in this particular case an opportunity to test out brand new hate crime legislation. It became the first official federal hate crime in the United States. At that point, it also became a hugely political and politically charged case. The FBI had one very small and very sort of strange piece of evidence that they thought might link Darrell David Rice to the crime, but they had no forensic evidence, no hairs, no DNA, nothing else. In fact, the DNA that they had taken from the crime scene had excluded Darrell Rice as a suspect in all of it, but had not excluded another known serial killer who was working in the area.

Eventually, faced with this mounting DNA evidence that continued to exclude Darrell Rice, they had no choice but to dismiss the case against him. What I should say, and this is very important, is that federal prosecutors used a not-very-well-known legal concept called “without prejudice.” Those are usually used in cases where prosecutors are convinced of the guilt of the defendant. They feel like they do have a strong case that could persuade a jury or a judge, but because of some sort of procedural error that occurred during the trial, they feel like they can’t get the conviction that they need to get. By dismissing a case in this way, the federal government basically reserves the right to bring the case back against a person at any time. In the case of Darrell Rice, they were on the eve of jury selection for his trial. At any point, the federal government can go, basically right back to that spot and continue the trial against him.

So he lives in the state of double jeopardy, which is how and why the Virginia Innocence Project became involved in the case. They saw this as a miscarriage of justice against an innocent person. And I was very fortunate to work with the Innocence Project reexamining this case and reinvestigating it from the beginning.

Adams: So you’re getting pretty deep into this research. I would imagine that stands in direct conflict with the view of wilderness and nature as a place for escape. It’s a place we go to get away from all of society’s troubles, and our personal troubles. What was that journey like for you?

Miles: Really difficult. I had started my tenure at Unity College in the fall of 2001, literally two days before September 11. I was barely 27. It was my first college teaching job. In the spring of 2002, when the formal announcement of this indictment took place, I saw firsthand how that indictment really impacted the Unity community. Lollie at that point had been dead for five years. But she was still very, very present on that campus. She was just such an extraordinary leader, and an extraordinary human.

My colleagues were her faculty members and professors, and her friends had become my friends. Seeing the residual trauma, not only of her very untimely death, but also how this indictment brought up all of that again, had made the case doubly personal for me. Not only did I really sort of identify with Lollie and Julie in very profound ways, and felt that impact as a secondary trauma as a female sexual assault survivor and backpacker, but then to see firsthand how this was impacting people who I had already grown to love really, really made this very real for me.

When I set out on the 20th anniversary to begin working on this as a magazine article, already the stakes and the emotions were pretty high. It does really feel like a personal story for me in some profound ways.

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Hear the entire interview on Inside Appalachia. Or click/tap the “Listen” button at the top of this story.

Featured Authors For 2022 West Virginia Book Festival Announced

The 2020 West Virginia Book Festival will be held on October 21 and 22 and will feature presentations from bestselling national authors, local and regional authors, writing workshops, family activities, a literary marketplace, and the annual Used Book Sale.

A reader’s favorite is returning to the Charleston Coliseum and Convention Center this fall. In-person activities have been canceled the last few years because of the pandemic.

This year’s featured speakers will be:

New York Times bestselling fantasy author V.E. Schwab;
mystery novelist C.J. Box;
novelist Elin Hilderbrand;
author, columnist, and public speaker Deesha Philyaw;
and children’s author and illustrator Marc Brown.

Victoria “V.E.” Schwab is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty books, including the acclaimed Shades of Magic series, the Villains series, the Cassidy Blake series and the international bestseller The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue. Her work has received critical acclaim, translated into over two dozen languages, and optioned for television and film. First Kill – a Young Adult vampire series based on Schwab’s short story of the same name – is currently in the works at Netflix.

C. J. Box is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 30 novels including the Joe Pickett series. He won the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel (Blue Heaven, 2009) as well as the Anthony Award, Prix Calibre 38 (France), the Maltese Falcon Award (Japan), the Macavity Award, the Gumshoe Award, two Barry Awards, and the 2010 Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers Association Award for fiction. Over ten million copies of his books have been sold in the U.S. and abroad and they’ve been translated into 27 languages. Box is a Wyoming native and has worked as a ranch hand, surveyor, fishing guide, a small-town newspaper reporter and editor, and he owned an international tourism marketing firm with his wife Laurie.

Elin Hilderbrand is the author of twenty-eight novels, including the forthcoming The Hotel Nantucket (June 14, 2022). Elin is the proud mother of three, a dedicated Peloton rider, an aspiring book influencer, and an enthusiastic at-home cook (follow her on Instagram @elinhilderbrand to watch her Cringe Cooking Show). She is also a seven-year breast cancer survivor.

Deesha Philyaw’s debut short story collection, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies, won the 2021 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the 2020/2021 Story Prize, and the 2020 LA Times Book Prize: The Art Seidenbaum Award for First Fiction and was a finalist for the 2020 National Book Award for Fiction. The Secret Lives of Church Ladies focuses on Black women, sex, and the Black church, and is being adapted for television by HBO Max. Deesha is also a Kimbilio Fiction Fellow and will be the 2022-2023 John and Renée Grisham Writer-in-Residence at the University of Mississippi.

Marc Brown is one of the most prominent names in children’s literature. Author of the bestselling Arthur books, as well as the creator of the six-time Emmy Award–winning animated Arthur series on PBS (with 25 Emmy nominations), Brown is a household name and has been entertaining generations of young readers with his relatable stories featuring Arthur the Aardvark. Over 65 million copies of his Arthur books have been sold, and in recent years, Brown has illustrated such award-winning and critically acclaimed picture books as Wild About Books, Born to Read, ZooZical!, and Wild About You! His latest book, In New York, introduces children to the city he now calls home.

The West Virginia Book Festival is made possible by its charter presenters, The Kanawha County Public Library, The Library Foundation of Kanawha County, Inc., The West Virginia Humanities Council and The Charleston Gazette-Mail. Sponsors for this year’s festival are West Virginia Public Broadcasting, The West Virginia Library Commission, The Center for the Book, The Marshall University Foundation, The Friends of The Library, and TC Energy Foundation.

All activities are free and open to the public. For more information visit www.wvbookfestival.org.

Following Daniel Boone’s Trail Leads To Appalachia Understanding In New Book

In 2013, Jim Dahlman, a journalist and professor of communications at Milligan College in Tennessee, set out to learn more about Appalachia by walking Daniel Boone’s Wilderness Road from Tennessee into Kentucky.

The walk inspired the recently published book “A Familiar Wilderness: Searching for Home on Daniel Boone’s Road.” It is a collection of history, modern observations and interviews with people Dahlman met along the way.

In March of 1775, trapper and explorer Daniel Boone set off from what is now Kingsport, Tennessee to blaze a trail through the recently purchased Transylvania Land Company tract. At the time, Kentucky was regarded as the wilderness. It was up to Boone to mark a trail for settlers to travel through the Cumberland Gap.

Dahlman explained he walked between 275 and 300 miles. He started at Sycamore Shoals State Park just outside of Elizabethtown, Tennessee and ended at Fort Boonesborough, Kentucky. He said his journey was very different than hiking the Appalachian Trail.

“About 90 percent of my mileage was along the sides of highways. I walked a lot of asphalt because this road that Boone traced back in 1775 became the basis of very popular travel paths,” Dahlman said. “And over time they grew up to be overwritten and became the basis of a lot of our road systems.”

The decision to walk Boone’s “trace,” as it is properly called, came from Dahlman’s journalistic curiosity. He wanted to understand what the 240-year-old path meant to the people living along it today. He added that he had lived in the area 13 years at the time, but still did not feel at home. He grew up in New York City and Tampa, Florida, and as an adult he lived in several states and in England.

“I don’t know what home was actually supposed to feel like but it felt like I wasn’t quite there yet,” he said. “And so the trip became, in part, a personal desire to get to know my adopted region better.”

He said he learned several lessons about Appalachia on his trip.

“Appalachia is more diverse than a lot of people give it credit for,” Dahlman said. “There’s a lot of diversity in the way people think — attitudes about everything from belief in God, to their attitudes about the land, a lot of diversity in economic situations.”

Fantasy Author Turns Out 70+ Books From W.Va Home

Swords, sorcery, other worlds and plenty of action are staples of the fantasy book genre. Craig Halloran, from Charleston, West Virginia, has written 70 books in 10 years, taking his readers to far-off lands.

He grew up reading books like Conan the Barbarian and playing Dungeons and Dragons. When he decided to start writing books, the choice for what to write was simple.

Still, he said, he has learned several lessons along the way. Like learning that his favorite genre is actually difficult to write.

“I’ve been doing it for a while not thinking about it, but it is complicated, because you’re having to describe a lot of things people haven’t seen before,” Halloran said.

Halloran also said he makes a clear choice to avoid foul language in his books, or at least only when it is appropriate.

“I don’t want to use any modern vernacular,” he explained. “Now, I do have some books that are in a modern setting, but I just don’t want to use that language. I’m kind of like Louis L’Amour. He never used it. And people don’t really miss it, unless you’re getting into a real gritty character, and you want to go that direction. You could do it that way. But it’s not me. I’m not the kind of guy who wants to do that.”

Next up, Halloran said he is planning a dragon-based series aimed at middle grade students and up. In the beginning of 2020, he plans to release the series all at once, so readers can read them without waiting.

Halloran said he never had the discipline growing up to create like he does today, but credits being in the military with helping him develop the focus.

“Every day I write, maybe in the morning, but mostly in the evening, and most of it on the weekends. That’s my process. People are amazed by that, but even if you did just 1000 words a day, and you did it for 10 years, you’re going to have a lot, lot, lot, lot lot, of books. It’s just the way it is. I just do it,” he said.

Even after writing so many books, Halloran said he loves to hear from his readers. He has some that tell him they have read all of them.

“People say I’m their favorite author. And, you know, it’s just great honor. It keeps me going. It really gives me that push I need to keep going,” he said.

Click on the play button above to hear the whole interview.

Christy Smith's Debut Novel ‘Killed It’ Comes With Surprises

Christy Smith’s debut novel “Killed It” is a thriller with a twist. Smith explained that the book is both a thriller and a dark comedy. It’s set in New York City and the protagonist is a young, failed female comedian who is working as a paralegal.

Pushed too far, the young woman goes on a vigilante spree. When someone finds out and blackmails her, she has to get herself out of trouble. The story is intended for younger women, but Smith discovered some older men like it, too.

“She’s young, she’s a millennial, and she has a foul mouth. I was thinking it would be mostly a female audience, but I have had a strange reaction from men over 50. They are like ‘I love this book,’” she said.

Smith, who writes under the pen name Lulu Smith, is a full-time lawyer. She said after she finished the first book, she took a break because work got in the way, but a new story is emerging.

“I work in opioid litigation space representing plaintiffs in the counties and cities. And so my world got completely shut up with work, but now she’s talking to me again,” Smith said.

She said the only issue is living up to the standard of the first story.

“Can I do this a second time? I mean, I have the idea. But the pressure, especially in a sequel is high, so that’s stressful.”

“I am in the outlining stage. I’m kind of an anal-retentive outliner, or just because of my background as a legal writer, because I write on the geek that writes the legal briefs, and I’ve gone back to the law,” Smith said.

This interview is part of a series of discussions with authors from the region.

Huntington Thriller Author Offers Advice for Writers

Best-selling author Sheila Redling, from Huntington, West Virginia, has written nine books under the pen name SG Redling. After losing her will to write, she is back on track and more books are on the way. In this interview she talks about the importance of protecting your ability to write and gives advice to writers.

Redling explained that after a fast start, writing several books, she burned out.

“I had taken a few years off writing; I’d gotten really burned out,” she said. “I had been writing when my mother was dying, and I wasn’t taking care of my writing process, which I think is something I wish somebody had warned me about that earlier.”

For Redling, the key was to find other ways to recharge her creativity. She branched out into art and even acting to find new inspiration.

“It’s just a lovely homecoming coming back to writing,” she said. “It is still my favorite thing to do in the world, which is both an important lesson for you to learn for yourself, but also for other writers to learn is don’t squander it. Don’t waste it.”

Redling’s first book, Flower Town is about a small mid-western town that is contaminated with a chemical spill. The residents are quarantined. Her other books include: The Dani Britton Series (“The Widow File” and “Redemption Key”) the Nahan series (“Ourselves” and “The Reaches”) along with stand-alone books like “Baggage,” “At Risk” and “Damocles.”

Asked to describe her favorite moment as a writer, she decided it was seeing her book in a library.

“My book was in a public library. I didn’t put it there. Anybody could come across it. Think about how many writers you came across as a kid just because you were at the library,” she said.

She explained that was the moment she felt like she had arrived as an author.