Kathy Lynn Beatty, age 15, was abducted on the evening of 24 July 1975 from her Aspen Hill, Maryland neighborhood. She was brutally beaten and left to die behind or near the K-Mart Store near the intersection of Connecticut and Georgia Avenues, a distance of only 3 and a half miles from Wheaton Plaza, where the Lyon sisters were last seen.
Kathy never regained conciousness, and died on 5 August 1975 in Suburban Hospital of complications resulting from her injuries.
Her murder has never been solved. Although it has been discussed in this forum as possibly being connected to the case of the missing Lyon sisters, there is no solid forensic evidence which links the two cases. Circumstantial evidence, however, is hard to ignore. It is because of the possible connection between these cases, the close proximity in time and location, and because Kathy's case has also remained unsolved for 31 years that I am starting this thread as part of this featured topic - rather than as an isolated thread in the Cold Case section.
Kathy's case did not receive the press coverage and widespread interest that the Lyon sisters case did. There was a short article which mentioned the attack on her and that she was still alive and in a hospital. Another short article mentioned her death. A third, more detailed article, appeared in the Washington Post on 6 January, 1977 - 18 months after her abduction and murder. I will post those articles here for all to read.
!n 1975, Montgomery County Police focussed their investigation on neighborhood kids whom Kathy had last been seen with near Parkland Junior High School, only a block or two from her home. Her mother suspected that neighborhood boys might have been responsible, but nothing was ever proven, and no suspects were named.
In 1987, Fred Howard Coffey, Jr. came to the attention of Montgomery County Police. He had been charged and convicted of multiple child molestation counts in North Carolina and was on trial for the murder of 10-year-old Amanda Ray. He had previous convictions of crimes against children in Virginia, and was a suspect in additional child killings. It was learned that Coffey had been in the Wheaton/Aspen Hill/Gaithersburg area of Maryland in 1975, and police began an extensive investingation on Coffey in regard to his possible connection with the Lyon and the Beatty cases.
In my next posts to this thread, I will focus on the case of Kathy Lynn Beatty. Although her attacker MAY have been the same person who abducted Sheila and Kate Lyon, I would suggest that we concentrate posts in this thread on Kathy's case alone to avoid confusion and wide ranging speculation.
Kathy never regained conciousness, and died on 5 August 1975 in Suburban Hospital of complications resulting from her injuries.
Her murder has never been solved. Although it has been discussed in this forum as possibly being connected to the case of the missing Lyon sisters, there is no solid forensic evidence which links the two cases. Circumstantial evidence, however, is hard to ignore. It is because of the possible connection between these cases, the close proximity in time and location, and because Kathy's case has also remained unsolved for 31 years that I am starting this thread as part of this featured topic - rather than as an isolated thread in the Cold Case section.
Kathy's case did not receive the press coverage and widespread interest that the Lyon sisters case did. There was a short article which mentioned the attack on her and that she was still alive and in a hospital. Another short article mentioned her death. A third, more detailed article, appeared in the Washington Post on 6 January, 1977 - 18 months after her abduction and murder. I will post those articles here for all to read.
!n 1975, Montgomery County Police focussed their investigation on neighborhood kids whom Kathy had last been seen with near Parkland Junior High School, only a block or two from her home. Her mother suspected that neighborhood boys might have been responsible, but nothing was ever proven, and no suspects were named.
In 1987, Fred Howard Coffey, Jr. came to the attention of Montgomery County Police. He had been charged and convicted of multiple child molestation counts in North Carolina and was on trial for the murder of 10-year-old Amanda Ray. He had previous convictions of crimes against children in Virginia, and was a suspect in additional child killings. It was learned that Coffey had been in the Wheaton/Aspen Hill/Gaithersburg area of Maryland in 1975, and police began an extensive investingation on Coffey in regard to his possible connection with the Lyon and the Beatty cases.
In my next posts to this thread, I will focus on the case of Kathy Lynn Beatty. Although her attacker MAY have been the same person who abducted Sheila and Kate Lyon, I would suggest that we concentrate posts in this thread on Kathy's case alone to avoid confusion and wide ranging speculation.