Sheila and Katherine Lyon-sisters missing since 1975 - #1

[Richard]

.... He could have even drove the girls to a spot near his hotel.
I wonder how well this are was searched. I can't see him digging a grave, so I wonder how he could have disposed of them?

The fact that no trace of the girls has turned up in the past 30 years has frustrated police and investigators. There were some very intensive searches conducted in 1975 in the days, weeks, and months following the girls disappearance. The newspapers are full of stories about those searches, although they do not always specify what areas exactly were searched. Police files probably contain more detailed maps and reports of areas searched, but that in itself is speculation.

The Washington DC metropolitan area, which includes Counties in Maryland and Northern Virginia actually has many rural and remote wooded areas where someone could dispose of a body. The suburbs continue to expand and development is destroying much rural farm land, but there are still a lot natural wooded areas, wetlands, and parks throughout the area.

A look at many of the John/Jane Doe cases throughout the country indicates that most of those unidentified bodies were NOT buried, but rather simply left where they died, or dumped in remote areas. Some of them (but definitely a minority of the cases) were buried in shallow graves.

The case for which Fred Coffey was convicted involved a little girl whose body was left in the open in a wooded area, near a body of water. This was also the case in a few other cases in which he is the prime suspect. That, however, does not preclude the possibility that he might have buried other victims.

 

[mysteriew]

Richard, this is OT but you sound very experienced.

 

[Richard]

Here in Maryland, there is an advertising company called "Shopwise" which mails out postcards with advertisements on the back. On the front are featured cases of missing children. Yesterday, I received one which features Kate and Sheila Lyon.

This is rather unusual, as most other cases are much more recent. This is the first time that I have seen the Lyon sisters featured in this manner. The photos are of them at age 10 and 12, not the "age progressed" drawings seen on various websites.

 

[smile22]

weird that they didnt put age progressions, lisa white vanished from ct walking home from a friends house.. in the 70s her case was just recently added to do with age progressions. i was i my local walmart and saw her case. as well as andy puglise who also vanished in the 70s from ma.. janice pockett also had a age progression and im sure ill see her at walmart on the wall of cases

 

[Usher737]

Good question! I think they should be age progressed just in case they are alive. I just got one of those "Have You Seen Me" cards in the mail yesterday that had their pictures on it with stats. Only 2 pictures fit on the card so the girls would have to be done on separte cards instead of together like they are now to include aged photo.

 

[smile22]

or they could put the age progression pics and then say u can find older pics of when they went missing at age such and such at www. whatever the web adress is .com

 

[h0db]

Richard is right-- there are few incorporated towns in Mont. Co., MD, and Kensington, Wheaton, and Silver Spring overlap and run together-- for instance, my zip code is Silver Spring, but I can see downtown Kensington (which is incorporated) if I walk down my street about 200 yards. The streets the girls were last seen walking have a Kensington zip code, but if you walk 20 yards up a grassy slope from the circle at the end of Faulkner Pl. (Kensington), you are in Wheaton.

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Faulkner+Pl,+kensington,+MD&spn=0.020394,0.040525&t=h&hl=en

 

[Mike]

:twocents:

Fred Howard COFFEY, Jr. (see also Neely Smith thread this forum)

Fred Howard Coffey, Jr. is currently serving a life term in NC for the 1979 murder of a 10 year NC girl. He may have been involved in the Lyon Sisters abduction, and possibly in the July 1975 abduction/murder of 15 year-old Kathy Lynn Beatty, also of Montgomery County, Maryland.

Fred Howard Coffey, Jr. was born 03/20/45 in either Virginia or North Carolina. By his and his family's account, he was subjected to severe sexual abuse as a child by his father. An eighth-grade dropout, he attended some college courses later in life.

Coffey enlisted in the Navy at age 17 on May 19, 1962. He served aboard the USS Caloosahatchee AO98 (a fleet oiler), based in Norfolk, VA from 1963 to about 1966. He served his second tour of duty in VietNam, and then a third tour of duty - possibly again in Norfolk. Coffey served a total of 12 years in the US Navy and was honorably discharged as a First Class Petty Officer (E-6) on 12 Sept 1974.

It is quite possible and likely that Coffey had Navy contacts in the Washington/MD/VA area which helped him land a job with Vitro Laboratories.
Employment records from Vitro Laboratories (a Defense Contractor specializing in Navy weapon systems) in Silver Spring MD place him in the area between 1 April and 31 July 1975.

He is considered a suspect in several other murders/abductions, and reportedly confessed to a psychologist as having molested approximately 100 children. He was fond of using gimmicks such as a fishing pole, metal detector, and possibly disguises to lure children.

Coffey's criminal record includes:

- Convicted on two counts of child molestation in Virginia Beach, 1974. Not known whether or not the Navy knew about this, but he was allowed to get out with an Honorable Discharge at the end of his third enlistment - perhaps before the civilian courts had concluded the case.

- Convicted in 1986 and sentenced to 50-years for nine counts of molesting three children in Caldwell County, N.C.

- Coffey was considered a prime suspect in the August, 1986 death of an 8-year-old boy, Travis Shane King, in Bristol, Virginia. King was seen in the company of Coffey near Eastridge shortly before he disappeared, according to Bristol Virginia police detectives. Body found on shores of Boone Lake. He had been strangled.

- Coffey was married between 1978-1982. A friend of Coffey's wife testified that she called police in 1979, two months before Amanda Ray's death, after her 3-year-old described Coffey masturbating in front of her.

- In 1987 was convicted of 1st degree murder for the 1979 Abduction/murder of a 10 year-old girl, Amanda Ray. Amanda was strangled and found near water, in a rural area. Coffey owned a dog (its hairs, found in his van and on Amanda Ray, helped convict him in the Ray killing). Two juries sentenced him to death, but through legal maneuverings, a third jury sentenced him to life in prison with all sentences to run concurrently. Eligible for parole since 1995.

- In 1987, he was investigated by MCP as a possible suspect in the 1975 sexual assault and slaying of 15-year-old Kathy Lynn Beatty of Aspen Hill, which occurred less than a mile from where Coffey once worked. Kathy was found badly beaten and left for dead in a Silver Spring ditch. She lived for two weeks before succumbing to her injuries on 5 August 1975. Coffey quit his job and left town on 31 July 1975. Police had hoped to link Coffey to a set of keys found near the beaten body of Kathy Beatty.

- In 1987, he was considered one of the strongest suspects in the double abduction of the Lyon sisters in Wheaton, MD in March, 1975. Coffey was in the Maryland area around the time of the Lyons' disappearance. Coffey applied for a job at Vitro Corp. in Aspen Hill (then Vitro Laboratories in Silver Spring) as a computer data system employee and was interviewed on 1 April 1975. He worked for them from April 24, 1975, to July 31, 1975. MCP tried to pinpoint when Coffey first came to a Gaithersburg motel where he was known to have stayed. They also tried to get old motor vehicle records to verify reports that he had bought a car in Montgomery about the time of the Lyon girls' disappearance. Montgomery County Police looked at Coffey as a possible suspect in both the Lyon and Beatty cases in 1987, but could not conclusively place him at either scene.

- Police in NC are currently trying to connect Coffey to a 1981 murder of a 5 year-old girl, Neely Smith, from the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area. Coffey lived in the same apartment complex as the girl. Neely's remains found near water, in a rural area. She had been raped and strangled.

- A 17 October 2004 Charlotte Observer story about the 1981 Neely Smith murder stated: "Amanda Ray's mother told her not to go fishing with the gray-haired stranger". This suggests that Coffey, 34 in 1979, was either prematurely gray, or he was altering his hair color. Eyewitnesses in the 1975 Lyon disappearances described a middle-aged suspect with salt and pepper hair. It would not be unreasonable to assume that his hair could have been salt and pepper gray in '75, and that he may have looked much older to the child witnesses.

A current photo of Coffey can be seen on the North Carolina Prison System's On-Line Inmate Locator Service.

Link:

http://webapps6.doc.state.nc.us/apps/offender/offend1?DOCNUM=0081135&SENTENCEINFO=&SHOWPHOTO=yes&numtimesin=1http://

 

[Mike]

Richard you seem to know a lot about the Lyon girls. Can you tell me who is in charge of this case and how do I contact them

 

[mysteriew]

Did anyone ever show Coffey's picture to the girls and women who saw "tape recorder man"?

 

[Richard]

Richard you seem to know a lot about the Lyon girls. Can you tell me who is in charge of this case and how do I contact them

Montgomery County Police have been in charge of this investigation since 25 March 1975. It has always been considered an "Open Case" and has had a number of different case officers assigned over the years. It is Montgomery County's longest running continuously open case, and may well be the longest open case for the state of Maryland. The current case officer is Lt. Joe Mudano, (240) 773-5079.

 

[Richard]

Did anyone ever show Coffey's picture to the girls and women who saw "tape recorder man"?

I do not know if his photo was shown to any of the origional 1975 witnesses who had claimed to have seen Tape Recorder Man. Coffey did not become a person of interest until 1987, some 12 years after the Lyon sisters went missing.

Proper police procedure in an old case like this would be for them to show the witness a "photo line-up" of several people, including a picture of the suspect. Old cases have been tried and lost because of such errors as the police only showing witnesses the photo of the suspect.

One would also have to consider that the women claimed to have seen a man resembling the sketch of "Tape Recorder Man" Their identification of Coffey (or anyone else) would only mean that he resembled the suspect - because they did not see TRC speaking to the girls, and no one actually saw anyone harm or abduct the girls.

If the boy who origionally described Tape Recorder Man could positively identify a suspect as being the man he saw talking to Sheila and Kate on 25 March 1975 at Wheaton Plaza, then perhaps that would be admissable evidence.

 

[Kimberly]

Gosh, I remember this story like it happened yesterday! I was living in Wheaton, MD when the Lyon's sisters were kidnapped. It amazes me that they have never been found Because of this incident, I don't think I was able to go anywhere by myself for a long time!

 

[Richard]

Gosh, I remember this story like it happened yesterday! I was living in Wheaton, MD when the Lyon's sisters were kidnapped. It amazes me that they have never been found Because of this incident, I don't think I was able to go anywhere by myself for a long time!

I recently visited the Kensington - Wheaton area and drove the roads where the Lyon sisters traveled from Home to Wheaton Plaza. Except for some very recently built condominiums on Drumm Ave., most of the residential area looks pretty much as it did in 1975. It is likely that a lot of the current residents were living there at the time of the Lyon Sisters disappearance and the intense search which took place. Police had gone door to door searching for the girls in the days following their disappearance.

Wheaton Plaza shopping mall has been renamed and it is a completely enclosed Mall today. It occupies the same geographic space as the old Plaza occupied, however, and the entrances to the parking lot are in the same locations. Gone today are the woods that separated the housing area from the mall in 1975.

 

[smile22]

there was a poster who said she had pictures of that day but needed to find them did u have any luck in finding those pictures that you took all those years ago?

 

[marylandmissing]

there was a poster who said she had pictures of that day but needed to find them did u have any luck in finding those pictures that you took all those years ago?

I think MC is looking into this...

 

[mere]

I recently visited the Kensington - Wheaton area and drove the roads where the Lyon sisters traveled from Home to Wheaton Plaza. Except for some very recently built condominiums on Drumm Ave., most of the residential area looks pretty much as it did in 1975. It is likely that a lot of the current residents were living there at the time of the Lyon Sisters disappearance and the intense search which took place. Police had gone door to door searching for the girls in the days following their disappearance.

Wheaton Plaza shopping mall has been renamed and it is a completely enclosed Mall today. It occupies the same geographic space as the old Plaza occupied, however, and the entrances to the parking lot are in the same locations. Gone today are the woods that separated the housing area from the mall in 1975.

What exists where the woods were separating the housing area from the mall?

 

[Richard]

What exists where the woods were separating the housing area from the mall?

The end of Faulkner drive ends in a sort of loop where a few cars can park. A blacktop pathway leads from the loop to the parking lot. Looking around, you see shubbery, mowed grass, and a few small trees separating what houses now exist by the parking lot. I think that the houses, lawns, paved paths, etc. are where the wooded area existed in 1975. Basically, I think that the housing area just became more "developed" with houses and landscaping since that time. As someone else pointed out, the parkinglot of what was Wheaton Plaza is in Wheaton, while all of the housing surrounding it is in the incorporated town of Kensington.

 

[joellegirl]

My family and I just back from a trip to Maryland to see friends and they showed me what was Wheaton Plaza (different name and totally redone) and we went though the neighborhood, down Plyers Mill past the house, Drumm Ave etc. The area is just as Richard describes it, and it gives me a whole new insight to actually see where it all took place. We also drove though Cleveland, OH on the way and made the detour to see the park Beverly Potts(see thread below) vanished from and the home she lived in. One cannot realize what a small area she vanished in unless you go there. Other than those two stops our trip was a normal vacation but since we were in the areas I chose to see locations I have read about. I found both places quite haunting when thinking about what had happened years before.

 

[mere]

My family and I just back from a trip to Maryland to see friends and they showed me what was Wheaton Plaza (different name and totally redone) and we went though the neighborhood, down Plyers Mill past the house, Drumm Ave etc. The area is just as Richard describes it, and it gives me a whole new insight to actually see where it all took place. We also drove though Cleveland, OH on the way and made the detour to see the park Beverly Potts(see thread below) vanished from and the home she lived in. One cannot realize what a small area she vanished in unless you go there. Other than those two stops our trip was a normal vacation but since we were in the areas I chose to see locations I have read about. I found both places quite haunting when thinking about what had happened years before.

Any theories you want to share?