Justice denied
A failure to crosscheck forensic evidence leaves four local murders unresolved; could Evonitz have killed more than the three we know
Date published: 11/18/2007 Frederick Free-Lance Star
Behind every case is a victim--man, woman, or child--and the people who care for them. We dedicate our efforts, and the new FBI Laboratory building, to those victims.
--Inscription in stone outside the FBI Laboratory building
THEY HAVE NAMES, all of them: Alicia Showalter Reynolds; Julianne "Julie" Williams; Laura "Lollie" Winans; Anne Carolyn McDaniel; and, of course, Sofia Silva and Kristin and Kati Lisk. They were all young women or girls killed in our area between March 1996 and May 1997. They have left behind grieving family members, distraught friends, and a community scarred by violent loss. Four of their murders remain unsolved, justice in those cases muted by the very officials charged with prosecuting it.
The abductions and murders of Sofia Silva in September 1996 and Kristin and Kati Lisk in May 1997 left Fredericksburg-area residents dry-mouthed with fear. Parents held their children closer, and neighbors went on high alert. Then, in 2002, Richard Marc Evonitz, who had lived in our area, shot himself to death in South Carolina while being pursued by police for abducting and raping a young girl there. Two months later, forensic evidence positively linked him to the deaths of the three Spotsylvania County girls. Those girls, sadly, would never return, but at least a measure of justice prevailed.
The scales in the other cases remain unbalanced. Despite promises from then-Spotsylvania County Sheriff Ron Knight, the Virginia State Police, and the FBI, forensic evidence from Evonitz was not checked against other murders, including four in our immediate area. A serial killer, Evonitz, who claimed he'd committed "more crimes than he could remember," was ignored as a suspect in the murders of Ms. Reynolds, Ms. Williams, Ms. Winans, and possibly Ms. McDaniel. Why?
In a special report in today's paper--"Who killed my daughter?"-- reporter Pamela Gould details an 18-month-long investigation into the failure of the state police, the FBI, and prosecutors to cross-check key forensic evidence in at least three of those four murders with the Evonitz evidence. Instead, all three agencies single-mindedly pursued Darrell Rice as the perpetrator of the murders of Ms. Reynolds, Ms. Williams, and Ms. Winans, despite a complete failure to link him forensically to any of them.
Why did circumstantial evidence against Rice in the slayings of these three young women take precedence over testing Evonitz material to discover if he was the perpetrator? Was the quest for truth derailed by blind ambition, focused on the conviction of Rice? Did politics demand this single-minded pursuit? And why were the resources of the FBI Laboratory, hailed as "the best in the world" when it was dedicated in April 2003, not fully applied?
Some may ask, why bring up these very painful cases again? The women are dead, after all.
Justice and truth demand an answer to who killed them. Some "cold cases" are unsolvable--there is simply no hard evidence to link any suspect to them. But at least three of these four unsolved murders might well be resolved with a simple cross-check of evidence.
Law enforcement's mission is to uphold the Constitution, to expose the truth about violations of the law, to bring criminals to justice, to be the voice of victims and the community, and to do all of that while respecting the dignity and presumptive innocence of each individual.
When agencies falter in their most basic mission, there must be accountability. Sadie Showalter deserves an answer to the question, "Who killed my daughter?" So do we all.
Date published: 11/18/2007