Raymond Rudolph MILESKI, Sr.
Raymond Rudolph Mileski Sr. was born about 1936. He served one hitch in the US Marine Corps in the 1950's. By 1966, he was married with small children when he and an accomplice were wounded and arrested during a breaking and entry of a home in Prince Georges County. A convictrd murderer, he died in prison in 2004 while serving a life sentence.
Mileski is linked to the Lyon Sisters, because of claims that he made on several occasions. Those stories had some varience to them, but basically he claimed to know who the abductor/murderer of the girls was.
A story about Montgomery County Police digging in the backyard of the Mileski home at 5816 Suitland Road was in the Washington Post in April 1982, but only briefly. It was only one of many momentary mentions of the Lyon Sisters in news stories over the years. At the time, nothing much came of it. The story told of police digging test holes for about three hours, and that nothing was found except some bird bones. That news story made specific reference to the address and to it being in response to a tip from Maryland Prison Inmates, but it does not mention Mileski by name.
On 19 November 1977, following an ongoing family argument, Raymond Rudolph Mileski Sr. shot his oldest son, Raymond Rudolph Mileski Jr. (age 18 at the time) with a high power rifle in the basement of their home. When his wife, Dolores, ran down the stairs into the basement room, he shot her too. The bullet passed through her, through a wall and into the mouth of their 7 year old son, Peter, who was running down the stairs behind his mother.
Mileski left his wife and older son for dead and transported Peter to Andrews Air Force Base for emergency treatment. Leaving him there, Mileski, drove to the home of a neighbor where his middle son Karl was visiting. He told Karl to stay where he was and then turned himself in to police.
Mileski, while in prison, evidently told a story to other convicts that he knew who had abducted and killed the Lyon Sisters, these convicts repeated the story to investigators. Montgomery County Police dug test holes in the former Mileski backyard for three hours and found nothing but bird bones.
It should be noted that the Mileski backyard was in open view of about 7 or 8 other houses in the little subdivision and that any activity such as digging graves would have been easily seen by neighbors.
In late 2000, a tip to a website named Mileski as having told others prior to his 1978 murder conviction, that he was in some way involved in the Lyon Sisters disappearance. Many elements of this tipster's story were checked out and found to be accurate. For example, the informant correctly described the Mileski home, family, and local area.
The informant also named several other persons - all of whom were located and their identities confirmed. These persons either (according to the informant) knew something about the Lyon Sisters, or were allegedly connected with their disappearance in some way. Some of those persons had extensive criminal records.
The informant's information was obtained in late 1977 or early 1978 from an acquaintance who lived in the Mileski Home at the time of the murders and who was allowed to retrieve his personal belongings from the home after the crime scene was re-opened. It was at this time that the informant (along with the acquaintance and two other friends) was admitted to the house and was shown the crime scene and bullet holes in the walls.
The gist of the informant's story was that this acquaintance - a man who was 18 years old in November 1977 - lived as a boarder in the Mileski home on Suitland Road. He worked for Mileski in his kitchen cabinet installation business. According to news reports at the time, this "Boarder" (or possibly another one) was the subject of some heated family arguments in the days leading up to the Mileski family murders.
The "Boarder" allegedly told the informant that he knew that Mileski , along with at least one other man, was responsible for keeping the Lyon sisters imprisoned in a rented house located in Prince Georges County.
The informant stated that according to the "Boarder", Mileski had "walked in on" the other man and caught him in the act of molesting one of the girls. Mileski reportedly claimed that he had not been involved in the actual abduction, but "joined in" after discovering the abductor with the girls.
The "other man" was identified and described by the informant. He was a very large man (born in 1945) with a criminal record and a violent nature. He moved around a lot, and had numerous residences in the Prince Georges County area, most in the vicinity of Mileski's home. According to the informant, Mileski had some sort of connection to this man, through the building or house that was used to keep the girls. They may have rented it together or one may have rented from the other.
It was also alleged by the "Boarder" that Mileski participated in the girls' murders and in the disposal of their bodies.
The "Boarder" thought that the bodies of the girls might have been buried at a place known as Andrew Jackson Pits, near what is now Andrew Jackson Middle School and a large housing development off Suitland Road. The basis for this theory was not specifically explained. It should be noted, however, that those gravel pits were very close to Mileski's Suitland Road home and might have been the source of a reference to the girls being buried in Mileski's "backyard".
The informant further claimed to have personally seen Mileski's place of business, where he made and stored kitchen cabinets, having been driven there by the "Boarder" when he was employed by Mileski. This place was described as a building located on or near Beech Road, just off Maryland Route 5 (also called Branch Ave.)
Additionally, the informant correctly described the intersection of Beech and Branch as being near a large Hechinger lumber/hardware store (That former Hechinger's is now a large Car Dealership). The location of Mileski's business was only a few miles west of Mileski's Suitland Road house.
It is known (from another source) that Mileski owned a large white van which he used in his cabinet installation business.
All of this information was passed in writing to Montgomery County Police detectives by way of the Chief of Police in 2000.
Mileski, contacted in Prison in 2001, admitted in two letters that he did in fact know who the abductor of the Lyon Sisters was. He did not name anyone, but gave a general description of the area in which the girls were buried. His first letter was rather brief and in it Mileski made general statements, but clearly wanted to negotiate for a prison transfer before he would speak with investigators.
Mileski, in his second, more detailed letter, referred to the girls' abductor as "C.D." and claimed to have met this individual "in the pen". The second letter was a long and rambling one and it contained a demand that he be moved from his Baltimore area prison to the Western Correctional Facility in Cumberland, MD.
The second letter also contained a separate letter to be delivered to his son Karl. In the letter to his son, Mileski states that the "Boarder" ( he names him, confirming his identity) did not come into their lives until after the Lyon Sisters disappeared. He implies that Karl knows something, but is mistaken about some details.
These letters were all forwarded to MCP detectives.
Mileski stated in his letters that the girls were buried in a remote area near a cabin or shack where one might go for fishing or hunting. He remained vague as to any exact location.
On 1 April 1975, Montgomery County Police released their first sketch of a "Tape Recorder Man" (TRM) who had been reported as speaking to Sheila and Kate Lyon at Wheaton Plaza the day they disappeared. This sketch was printed in all the newspapers and appeared on all TV stations in the Washington DC Metropolitan area.
That day, numerous calls were made to police, among them 15 mothers of young girls who had been approached by a man fitting the TRM description at Iverson Mall and at Marlow Heights Shopping Center on 22 March 1975.
Those sightings placed this mysterious Tape Recorder Man in the close proximity of Mileski, his home, his work place, and homes of his alleged associates , just three days before the Lyon Sisters disappeared. In fact, those malls are located on Maryland Route 5 less than a mile north of Beech Road.
The Washington Post - in their story about the PG County Tape Recorder Man also reported that from one to three PG County men were questioned, but that they were not considered suspects at the time.
It might be mentioned that on that very day, MCP questioned Lloyd Lee Welch, Jr. of Hyattsville, (PG County), Maryland and sent him away without any charges or arrest because they did not consider him a suspect.
Police most likely spoke with Mileski after receiving this information. He was transferred to the prison of his choice in Cumberland after 2001, and he died there in December 2004.
It is hard to determine if Mileski actually knew anything about the Lyon case, or if he just made it all up for his own advantage.
Mileski was the likely source of the 1981 tip from other convicts, and it may have been stories that he - or someone close to him - told prior to his 1977 arrest which surfaced in the 2000 website tip. He certainly claimed knowledge of it in his letters. But whether he actually had any first hand knowledge, or involvement in the girls' disappearance remains part of the mystery.
