Fronkensteen
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Richard, do you have a picture of the sketch? I tried locating it, but to no avail.Richard said:
Sheila and Katherine Lyon-sisters missing since 1975 - #1
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Fronkensteen
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If I provided you with my email, would you mind sending them to me, if possible?
Thank you,
Froderick
Thank you,
Froderick
Yes, go ahead and send me your e-mail address by way of a personal message in this website, and I will try to get the sketches scanned and sent. They are presently paper photocopies made from a microfilm of a newspaper. So the clarity leaves something to be desired, but since they were only black and white sketches to begin with, they don't lose too much. If scanning does not work, I can try to fax them. I have never seen these sketches on any of the websites which feature the girls, and I have never seen them in press stories after 1975.
Richard
Richard
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I grew up in Maryland and was 9 years old in 1975. I will never forget the case of the Lyon Sisters. My best friend and I walked to the 7-11 which was about 2 miles from our homes and saw their pictures hanging in the store. We were in shock. We had never seen or heard of missing children. I still remember that feeling when I walked home...looking over my shoulder for this kidnapper. In my world, Maryland meant my neighborhood. A little of my innocence was lost that day. It wasn't until I was in high school that missing kids started appearing on milk cartons. Was the danger always there or are we just more aware of it because of the media attention? I would never let my kids(not that I have any) walk two miles to a store at 9 years old or 12 years old for that matter. I am so thankful for the innocence I had in my childhood.
I do recall another young boy who was abducted from our area around the same time. He was located and returned to his family but as a child I remember a rumor that there was a connection between this case and the Lyon case....something like this boy had seen the Lyon girls...probably was just a childhood rumor...I have no facts to back it up.
I will always remember the case of the Lyon Sisters as a rite of passage for me....my first glimpse of a dangerous world.
BTW....Has anyone read any of John Douglas', FBI profiler, books? Fascinating. I also saw him speak locally. I have learned alot about profiling from him and wonder what his thoughts would be on the Lyon Sisters.
I do recall another young boy who was abducted from our area around the same time. He was located and returned to his family but as a child I remember a rumor that there was a connection between this case and the Lyon case....something like this boy had seen the Lyon girls...probably was just a childhood rumor...I have no facts to back it up.
I will always remember the case of the Lyon Sisters as a rite of passage for me....my first glimpse of a dangerous world.
BTW....Has anyone read any of John Douglas', FBI profiler, books? Fascinating. I also saw him speak locally. I have learned alot about profiling from him and wonder what his thoughts would be on the Lyon Sisters.
missing children were always there it wasnt till john walshes son went missing and then was turned up dead. did they really start to pay more attention to children john had to fight to pass a law for le to take missing childrens reports and eventualy they opened up the ncmec. prior to adam walshes murder. most le didnt really do much about a missing child they took the info down but little was done.. i hope they find the lyon sisters so they can be brought back to the family even though its an old case
Many missing persons websites exist today, and most of them "borrow" information, files, photos, and stories from other websites. A few of the earlier websites have become defunct, yet their files appear on other sites, sometimes altered slightly. I wrote the origional story about the LYON sisters that most of these sites copy, quote, misquote, paraphrase, and alter. Because many of these "edited" versions of my 2001 story have induced errors, or have left out bits of information in the interest of brevity, I decided to locate my origional story and post it here for all to read.
-------------------------------------------
Sheila Mary Lyon
Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance
Missing Since: March 25, 1975 from Wheaton, Maryland
Classification: Endangered Missing
Date Of Birth: March 30, 1962
Age at the time: 12 years old
Height and Weight: 5'2; 100 pounds
Classification: Endangered Missing
NCIC Number: M-6053299749
Distinguishing Characteristics: Blonde hair; blue eyes. Sheila wears eyeglasses.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Katherine Mary Lyon
Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance
Missing Since: March 25, 1975 from Wheaton, Maryland
Classification: Endangered Missing
Date Of Birth: March 29, 1964
Age at time: 10 years old
Height and Weight: 4'8; 85 pounds
Classification: Endangered Missing
NCIC Number: M-605329953
Distinguishing Characteristics: Blonde hair; blue eyes. Katherine has a birthmark inside her upper thigh. Her nickname is "Kate."
Case Details
Between 11:00 AM and Noon on Tuesday, 25 March 1975, Sheila M. LYON age 12, and her younger sister, Katherine M. (Kate) LYON age 10 left their home at 3121 Plyers Mill Road in Kensington, Maryland to walk to the Wheaton Plaza Shopping Center in Wheaton, located on the corner of University Boulevard and Veirs Mills Road, a distance of about half a mile from their home. The girls were on spring break from school and it was their intention to view Easter exhibits and to have lunch at The Orange Bowl Restaurant.
They were seen outside the Orange Bowl at about 1:00 PM by a 13-year-old boy who knew them. He described seeing them talking to a middle aged man in a brown suit who had a cassette tape recorder in a briefcase. The boy reported that other children were also talking to the man and into a microphone that he held. This boy's account to police investigators became the basis for a composite sketch and description of a possible suspect in the girls' disappearance.
The girls were seen in The Orange Bowl Restaurant about 2:00 PM by their own brother, Jay LYON age 14, who said that they were eating pizza together at the time.
Another friend of the sisters later reported seeing them walking west on Drumm Avenue between 2:30 PM and 3:30 PM near Devon Street. Drumm Avenue, a residential street, was part of the most direct route from Wheaton Plaza to their home. This was the last known sighting of the Lyon sisters.
The girls' mother, Mary LYON had told Sheila and Kate to be home by 4:00 PM, and when they had not arrived by 7:00 PM, she called the Montgomery County Police to report them missing.
The girls' father, John LYON, was an announcer for WMAL radio in Washington, DC. The radio station, area television stations, and the Washington Post newspaper gave the case much publicity. Many people in the Washington Metropolitan area were interested in the case and many were involved in trying to solve it. Rewards were raised and offered and many tips came in.
With the Washington Post's publication of the sketch of the "Tape Recorder Man" suspect, several people called to state that they had seen him at Wheaton Plaza on Monday, 24 March, the day before the girls' disappearance. Aproximately fifteen other callers recognized the sketch and description of the suspect as that of a man seen on Saturday, 22 March at Iverson Mall and at Marlton Heights Shopping Center, both in neighboring Prince Georges County, Maryland. This indivudal was reportedly approaching young girls with a request that they read an answering machine type message typed on an index card into the suspect's hand held microphone. Based on these witnesses, the first sketch was only slightly modified and reissued. A few Prince Georges County men were questioned, but none were considered viable suspects.
A massive search of the Kensington and Wheaton areas was conducted. The search involved tracking dogs, volunteers, National Guardsmen, Helicopters, and divers, but no trace of the girls was found.
In the days and weeks that followed, a few attempts at extortion were made by individuals demanding ransom payments. While most of these attempts were quickly considered crank calls, one was taken more seriously. This occurred on Friday, 4 April 1975, when a male caller demanded of John Lyon that he place $10,000 in a restroom at the Ann Arundel County Court House in Annapolis. John Lyon and Montgomery County Police officials left a briefcase as instructed, but no one came to retrieve it. The man later called back and said that there had been too many police in the area for him to get to the money. When told that he had to produce some evidence that he actually had the girls before the ransom would be paid, he said that he would call back, but never did. This was not made public until the following incident took place.
On Monday 7 April 1975, at 7:30 AM, a witness in Manassas, Virginia reported that he saw two young girls bound and gagged in the back of a beige 1968 Ford station wagon. This sighting was at the corner of Grant and Center Streets in Manassas. When the driver of the car (a man who the witness said resembled the composite sketch of the suspect) saw that he was being followed and watched, he accelerated, ran a red light, and drove west on route 234 toward Interstate 66. It was reported that the vehicle had Maryland plates, possibly with the following letter/number combination: DMT-6**. The last two numbers could not be seen because the plate was bent. That combination of letters had been issued in Cumberland, Hagerstown and Baltimore, Maryland. A search for all possible combinations of those plate numbers failed to produce any information.
With that last report, at first deemed credible, but later considered questionable by police, the case of Sheila and Kate Lyon gradually went from front page daily news to sporadic updates and then to anniversary articles.
Fred Howard Coffey Jr. was viewed as a possible suspect in the sisters' cases beginning in March 1987. Coffey is serving a life sentence in a North Carolina prison for murder and child molestation convictions. Authorities learned that he began working at a scientific firm based in Silver Spring, Maryland one month after the Lyon sisters vanished. Investigators have been unable to determine if Coffey is connected to the cases and he has never been charged in their disappearances.
Investigators considered Raymond Rudolph Mileski Sr. another potential suspect in the girls' disappearances. Mileski resided at 5816 Suitland Road in Suitland, Maryland (Prince Georges County) in 1975. He murdered his wife and teenage son inside their home after a disagreement in November 1977. Mileski's youngest son was wounded in the incident. He was convicted of the homicides in 1978 and sentenced to 40 years in prison. Authorities searched the yard of his former residence in April 1982 for material connected to the Lyon cases, but no evidence was discovered.
Although occasional leads have been given to the police over the years, the case remains open and unsolved to this day.
Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Montgomery County Police Department
240-773-5070
-------------------------------------------
Sheila Mary Lyon
Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance
Missing Since: March 25, 1975 from Wheaton, Maryland
Classification: Endangered Missing
Date Of Birth: March 30, 1962
Age at the time: 12 years old
Height and Weight: 5'2; 100 pounds
Classification: Endangered Missing
NCIC Number: M-6053299749
Distinguishing Characteristics: Blonde hair; blue eyes. Sheila wears eyeglasses.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Katherine Mary Lyon
Vital Statistics at Time of Disappearance
Missing Since: March 25, 1975 from Wheaton, Maryland
Classification: Endangered Missing
Date Of Birth: March 29, 1964
Age at time: 10 years old
Height and Weight: 4'8; 85 pounds
Classification: Endangered Missing
NCIC Number: M-605329953
Distinguishing Characteristics: Blonde hair; blue eyes. Katherine has a birthmark inside her upper thigh. Her nickname is "Kate."
Case Details
Between 11:00 AM and Noon on Tuesday, 25 March 1975, Sheila M. LYON age 12, and her younger sister, Katherine M. (Kate) LYON age 10 left their home at 3121 Plyers Mill Road in Kensington, Maryland to walk to the Wheaton Plaza Shopping Center in Wheaton, located on the corner of University Boulevard and Veirs Mills Road, a distance of about half a mile from their home. The girls were on spring break from school and it was their intention to view Easter exhibits and to have lunch at The Orange Bowl Restaurant.
They were seen outside the Orange Bowl at about 1:00 PM by a 13-year-old boy who knew them. He described seeing them talking to a middle aged man in a brown suit who had a cassette tape recorder in a briefcase. The boy reported that other children were also talking to the man and into a microphone that he held. This boy's account to police investigators became the basis for a composite sketch and description of a possible suspect in the girls' disappearance.
The girls were seen in The Orange Bowl Restaurant about 2:00 PM by their own brother, Jay LYON age 14, who said that they were eating pizza together at the time.
Another friend of the sisters later reported seeing them walking west on Drumm Avenue between 2:30 PM and 3:30 PM near Devon Street. Drumm Avenue, a residential street, was part of the most direct route from Wheaton Plaza to their home. This was the last known sighting of the Lyon sisters.
The girls' mother, Mary LYON had told Sheila and Kate to be home by 4:00 PM, and when they had not arrived by 7:00 PM, she called the Montgomery County Police to report them missing.
The girls' father, John LYON, was an announcer for WMAL radio in Washington, DC. The radio station, area television stations, and the Washington Post newspaper gave the case much publicity. Many people in the Washington Metropolitan area were interested in the case and many were involved in trying to solve it. Rewards were raised and offered and many tips came in.
With the Washington Post's publication of the sketch of the "Tape Recorder Man" suspect, several people called to state that they had seen him at Wheaton Plaza on Monday, 24 March, the day before the girls' disappearance. Aproximately fifteen other callers recognized the sketch and description of the suspect as that of a man seen on Saturday, 22 March at Iverson Mall and at Marlton Heights Shopping Center, both in neighboring Prince Georges County, Maryland. This indivudal was reportedly approaching young girls with a request that they read an answering machine type message typed on an index card into the suspect's hand held microphone. Based on these witnesses, the first sketch was only slightly modified and reissued. A few Prince Georges County men were questioned, but none were considered viable suspects.
A massive search of the Kensington and Wheaton areas was conducted. The search involved tracking dogs, volunteers, National Guardsmen, Helicopters, and divers, but no trace of the girls was found.
In the days and weeks that followed, a few attempts at extortion were made by individuals demanding ransom payments. While most of these attempts were quickly considered crank calls, one was taken more seriously. This occurred on Friday, 4 April 1975, when a male caller demanded of John Lyon that he place $10,000 in a restroom at the Ann Arundel County Court House in Annapolis. John Lyon and Montgomery County Police officials left a briefcase as instructed, but no one came to retrieve it. The man later called back and said that there had been too many police in the area for him to get to the money. When told that he had to produce some evidence that he actually had the girls before the ransom would be paid, he said that he would call back, but never did. This was not made public until the following incident took place.
On Monday 7 April 1975, at 7:30 AM, a witness in Manassas, Virginia reported that he saw two young girls bound and gagged in the back of a beige 1968 Ford station wagon. This sighting was at the corner of Grant and Center Streets in Manassas. When the driver of the car (a man who the witness said resembled the composite sketch of the suspect) saw that he was being followed and watched, he accelerated, ran a red light, and drove west on route 234 toward Interstate 66. It was reported that the vehicle had Maryland plates, possibly with the following letter/number combination: DMT-6**. The last two numbers could not be seen because the plate was bent. That combination of letters had been issued in Cumberland, Hagerstown and Baltimore, Maryland. A search for all possible combinations of those plate numbers failed to produce any information.
With that last report, at first deemed credible, but later considered questionable by police, the case of Sheila and Kate Lyon gradually went from front page daily news to sporadic updates and then to anniversary articles.
Fred Howard Coffey Jr. was viewed as a possible suspect in the sisters' cases beginning in March 1987. Coffey is serving a life sentence in a North Carolina prison for murder and child molestation convictions. Authorities learned that he began working at a scientific firm based in Silver Spring, Maryland one month after the Lyon sisters vanished. Investigators have been unable to determine if Coffey is connected to the cases and he has never been charged in their disappearances.
Investigators considered Raymond Rudolph Mileski Sr. another potential suspect in the girls' disappearances. Mileski resided at 5816 Suitland Road in Suitland, Maryland (Prince Georges County) in 1975. He murdered his wife and teenage son inside their home after a disagreement in November 1977. Mileski's youngest son was wounded in the incident. He was convicted of the homicides in 1978 and sentenced to 40 years in prison. Authorities searched the yard of his former residence in April 1982 for material connected to the Lyon cases, but no evidence was discovered.
Although occasional leads have been given to the police over the years, the case remains open and unsolved to this day.
Investigating Agency
If you have any information concerning this case, please contact:
Montgomery County Police Department
240-773-5070
smile22 said:
Many persons were questioned by police concerning the Lyon sisters, probably not many of them were photographed as a rule. Police are always careful to say whether or not someone is "considered a suspect". That always implies that they have some sort of evidence on a specific individual. In this case, there simply was very little physical evidence that a crime was even committed. The girls were known to be at the Mall, and were seen talking to the man with the tape recorder, then they disappeared within the next two or three hours. No one actually saw them abducted, and they have never been found.
Some of the possible suspects investigated over the years have been career criminals or convicts in prisons. In those cases, booking photos and official prison photos do exist. I do not know how many of those photos resemble the sketch. I have copies of both sketches, but do not know exactly how to post them in this forum.
Regarding what the Tape Recorder Man wanted recorded: No one stated specifically what he wanted from the Lyon Sisters, or any other children on the day the girls disappeared. At least it was not reported in the papers. Witnesses at two other malls (in Prince Georges County) stated that a man who matched the description and sketch of the Montgomery County Tape Recorder Man had been approaching young teen aged girls and he would say something like "Gee, you have a nice voice. I like the sound of a girl's voice. Would you read an answering machine message for me?" He handed an index card to some of the PG County girls and asked them to read from it, but the girls he approached stated that they refused to do so.
very intresting. how long was the man at the mall? does anyone know if he was there when the girls were on the way home maybe he was secretly following them from a distance and saw them walking home and deicided to follow them
smile22 said:
Here is what the Washington Post of Tuesday, April 1, 1975,(one week after the girls disappeared) had to say about the Tape Recorder Man Suspect when they ran the first sketch for the first time:
Quote: Last Friday, police said they were told that a man, described as a white male, about 6 feet tall, wearing a brown suit and carrying a brown briefcase, talked to the young girls at 1 p.m. outside the Orange Bowl Restaurant at Wheaton Plaza. The informant, police said, was a 13-year-old boy who knows the two girls well.
Police said the boy told them that he walked past the girls and the man and saw the girls speaking into a microphone attached to a cassette tape recorder inside the briefcase. After drawing up a composite sketch from the boy's description, police said they interviewed store officials and clerks in Wheaton Plaza and showed them the sketch, but did not come up with any leads. A WMAL spokesman said some people at the station also were shown the sketch before it was released, but that no one recognized the man.
"We're checking the sketch with known sex deviates and ... against everything we got," said Capt. Gabriel Lamastra, head of the county's juvenile section. "To be honest, I wouldn't tell you if we made a hit or not." Unquote.
(After the sketch was published, there were some store clerks who stated that they had seen the man at Wheaton Plaza on Monday, 24 March the day prior to the girls disappearance.)
The very next day, 2 April 1975, the Washington Post reported that: (quote) From more than 300 callers who responded to publication and televising of the sketch, police said they discerned a "pattern" emerging of a man with a tape recorder approaching young girls in suburban shopping centers. (unquote) and that further: (quote) Police... had received at least 15 phone calls from mothers of teen-aged girls who said their daughters had been "bothered" recently by an man with at tape recorder at suburban Maryland shopping centers. (unquote)
That is a lot of tips about the suspect. Unfortunately, there are no further reports of any sightings of the man past 1PM on Tuesday 25 March 1975. No person ever came forward to say "Hey, that was me, and I was only doing..." It was their last solid lead in the case.
Now what you have to wonder is this: Did this weird guy have nothing whatever to do with the girls disappearance, and another person or persons abducted them within the next two or three hours? Or was there a connection? Most logical thinkers would tend to see a connection. But not necessarily an immediate one. The girls were seen by their brother in the Restaurant at 2 PM and later by a 15 year old boy who knew them between 2:30 and 3:30 PM walking home.
The girls' mother stated at one point that she believed that someone in a vehicle may have come up to the girls and might have told them that their father had been hurt and that their mother wanted them to go with him to the hospital. She felt that such a ruse might have worked on them.
Such a person might have been the Tape Recorder Man, or perhaps an accomplice working with him. Perhaps his tape recording was done only as a way to interview potential victims and to build some rapor with them for the next encounter.
Subsequent police interviews with sales clerks and girls who had been approached led to a slight alteration of the origional sketch, and that new sketch was published on Friday, 4 April in the Washington Post. The accompanying article stated that Police spokesman Phillip Caswell said: "There are no new leads and no suspects have been developed in the case. We just continue to pound leather and wear out the tires on our cruisers". This was immediately after a paragraph that stated: "Montgomery police said they had checked out a number of tips yesterday, including one that led them to interview a man in Prince George's County, but that these had 'washed out' by early evening." So clearly the Montgomery County Police were making seemingly contradictory statements almost simultaneously.
The end of the article included some quotes from a Capt. Charles Goddard, who headed the 16 man security force at Iverson Mall. He stated that they had been looking for the suspect, but that they had detained no one. Interestingly, the last paragraph stated the following:
(Quote): Goddard added that Montgomery police had told him in connection with the Lyon search, to be on the lookout for a blue Falcon Station Wagon covered with stickers and slogans, including a bumper sticker from Walt Disney's Florida resort known as Disneyworld. (unquote)
This was the first time that any specific vehicle was mentioned, and there was never any further elaboration on it or why it was a suspect vehicle.
On July 24, 1975, 15 year-old Kathy Lynn Beatty of Aspen Hill/Rockville, Maryland was found badly beaten and possibly sexually molested in a ditch behind a department store in Silver Spring, Maryland. Twelve days later, on August 5, 1975, she died of her injuries at Suburban Hospital. Her assailant was never identified and the case has never been solved.
Aspen Hill is only a few blocks north of Wheaton Plaza, where the Lyon Sisters were last seen alive on March 25, 1975.
Could the two cases be connected?
In 1987, Montgomery County Police investigated a possible lead that Fred Howard Coffey Jr. might have been involved in one or both crimes. It was determined that Coffey had started working at a scientific company in Silver Spring only one week after the Lyon Sisters disappeared. Wheaton Plaza and Aspen Hill are both within one mile of that company's offices. the problem was that police could just not establish any evidentiary links between Coffey and the two cases.
In 1987, Coffey was serving 50 years for molesting three children in North Carolina, and was facing trial for the rape/murder of another little girl, Amanda Ray, age 10. Coffey was subsequently convicted of murder and sentenced to Death. While on death row, his conviction and sentence was appealed and sent back for re-sentencing. Again, he was sentenced to Death. Another appeal found that because subsequent misconduct (his sexual molestation of children) was introduced during the sentencing phase that this constituted an unfair, illegal procedure, because that misconduct had to have occurred BEFORE the crimes with which he was being charged.
Coffey's sentence was commuted to Life - and he has been up for Parole several times in recent years. Just the kind of guy we need back in society. See separate thread subject on Coffey and Check out the links below.
Offender Data Screen:
http://webapps6.doc.state.nc.us/apps/offender/offend1?DOCNUM=0081135
Coffey, FH. 704:
http://www.charmeck.org/Departments...ory+Committee/Fred+Howard+Coffey,+Jr.+704.htm
Text of Decision to disallow subsequent crime info at sentencing:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/nc-supreme-court/jun1794/coffey
Aspen Hill is only a few blocks north of Wheaton Plaza, where the Lyon Sisters were last seen alive on March 25, 1975.
Could the two cases be connected?
In 1987, Montgomery County Police investigated a possible lead that Fred Howard Coffey Jr. might have been involved in one or both crimes. It was determined that Coffey had started working at a scientific company in Silver Spring only one week after the Lyon Sisters disappeared. Wheaton Plaza and Aspen Hill are both within one mile of that company's offices. the problem was that police could just not establish any evidentiary links between Coffey and the two cases.
In 1987, Coffey was serving 50 years for molesting three children in North Carolina, and was facing trial for the rape/murder of another little girl, Amanda Ray, age 10. Coffey was subsequently convicted of murder and sentenced to Death. While on death row, his conviction and sentence was appealed and sent back for re-sentencing. Again, he was sentenced to Death. Another appeal found that because subsequent misconduct (his sexual molestation of children) was introduced during the sentencing phase that this constituted an unfair, illegal procedure, because that misconduct had to have occurred BEFORE the crimes with which he was being charged.
Coffey's sentence was commuted to Life - and he has been up for Parole several times in recent years. Just the kind of guy we need back in society. See separate thread subject on Coffey and Check out the links below.
Offender Data Screen:
http://webapps6.doc.state.nc.us/apps/offender/offend1?DOCNUM=0081135
Coffey, FH. 704:
http://www.charmeck.org/Departments...ory+Committee/Fred+Howard+Coffey,+Jr.+704.htm
Text of Decision to disallow subsequent crime info at sentencing:
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/nc-supreme-court/jun1794/coffey
joellegirl
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I wonder if police have compared a circa 1975 photo of Coffey with the sketch of the "tape recorder man". I remember reading some link (the Neal J Conway article?) where police have a strong suspect(who is in prison) in the Lyon case but certain laws keep them from questioning him about it? I think it is nuts that that this person can't be questioned but i don't understand all the laws etc. I wonder if that person is Coffey.
joellegirl
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Link to the Neal J Conway article on the Lyon sisters:
http://www.nealjconway.com/essays/whyweliketobe/lyonsisters.html
http://www.nealjconway.com/essays/whyweliketobe/lyonsisters.html
joellegirl said:
I am pretty sure that the police have compared their sketches with every suspect that has come to their attention. Although they probably could not (for legal reasons) state publicly their opinion of how close a match any of them are. One case officer did make some comments to the press in 1987 about Coffey's age being 30 in 1975, and how that differs from the "50 years-old" estimation of the boy who described the Tape Recorder Man. The officer also pointed out that sometimes children have a hard time estimating the ages of adults.
yes children do my godson has this really vivid imagination and will sometimes mistake things for what they really are.. did any of the witnesses go through hipnosis sometimes when ur hipnotized u rememeber some of the oddest things that you couldnt remember
LillyRush
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Not to say that the microphone-man may not have been the abductor, but it's possible that some other perp completely unrelated to the mall had been driving by when they were walking back home alone. There were other instances in the '70s of young girls disappearing while on their way back from shopping. Although I suppose pair and/or group disappearances are rare. most of the other cases were individuals (w/ the exception of a few cases). I'll have to look for the links somewhere. One of the websites that used to have very good descriptions of old cases is no longer up and running, unfortunately.
LillyRush said:
It is certainly a possibility that someone totally unrelated to the Tape Recorder Man could have been the abductor. It is pretty likely that the girls were abducted rather than lost or run aways. But the fact that no one could ever identify the man with the microphone, and the fact that he never came forward to clear things up does add to the suspicion that he was probably also the abductor or part of an abduction team.
The back roads that the girls took to and from the mall were a maze of loops and dead-ends in an older housing subdivision. All the houses on their path were checked and owners spoken with by police. Any one cruising those roads, looking for a victim of opportunity would have had to know them pretty well, and even then would have been taking quite a chance at being seen by someone.
Fronkensteen
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Coffey was described in a Charlotte Observer article of 10/17/04 (http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/news/9941209.htm) as a "gray-haired stranger" in 1979, even though he would only have been 34 at the time. It's possible that his hair was prematurely grey by 1975, and that a child could have mistaken the then 30 year old Coffey as a much older man. I had a friend who was going noticeably grey at age 18.Richard said:
The term "Cold Case" is usually used to mean that a case has been unsolved and that it has been closed due to lack of evidence, lack of suspect, or other reasons. With new technology and sometimes with the arrest of a serial killer, many Cold Cases have been reopened and solved recently.
It should be noted, that although the case of the Lyon Sisters appears on this website with the "Cold Cases", it has never been considered a Cold Case by Montgomery County Police. It is actually their longest running, continuously Open Case. It has always been regarded as active with an investigator assigned. This coming March marks the 30th anniversary of Sheila and Kate's disappearance. Their case is quite possibly the longest running Open Case in Maryland, and probably ranks among the longest running Open Cases US history.
It should be noted, that although the case of the Lyon Sisters appears on this website with the "Cold Cases", it has never been considered a Cold Case by Montgomery County Police. It is actually their longest running, continuously Open Case. It has always been regarded as active with an investigator assigned. This coming March marks the 30th anniversary of Sheila and Kate's disappearance. Their case is quite possibly the longest running Open Case in Maryland, and probably ranks among the longest running Open Cases US history.
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