The Lesbian Hikers’ Murder That Kept Me Off the Trail for Years [video]

Two women seen from behind, sitting on a mountaintop looking out at a forest of evergreens.

Earlier this month, I participated in a panel discussion for a true crime anthology I’m part if. If you get the newsletter or follow me on Twitter, you might’ve heard me mention it.

For the anthology, on unsolved crimes and mysteries, I wrote about the long shadow of a true crime I’ve been obsessed with since I first learned about it.

Two lesbians were murdered in Shenandoah National Park, a short distance away from the Appalachian Trail. I’d always dreamed of hiking the AT, but learning about the murdered lesian hikers made me believe I could never do something like that without a man to protect me.

In the video, I talk with anthology editor Mitzi Szereto and author Janel Comeau about the impact of gender-based violence and the ways intersectional identities play into the media reporting and general public’s reaction to violent crimes against women and queer people.

Here’s the video.

CW: not graphic, but discussion of the murder of Canadian First Nations women and lesbian hikers.

Below, a few highlights for those who don’t have the time to watch.

In 1996, two lesbian hikers were murdered in Shenandoah National Park. I’ve never been able to forget it.

In 1996, two lesbian hikers, Julie Williams and Lollie Winans, were murdered in Shenandoah National Park. Julie’s parents reported the women missing when she did not return home to start a new job. A massive search of the park was undertaken and eventually the women’s bodies were found, gagged and bound with duct tape.

My essay walks readers through the crime and talk about the additional difficulties of investigating crimes on public lands, when multiple parties have jurisdiction.

I talk about a related attack in the park where a female cyclist was run off the road, and how it lead authorities to the main suspect.

The two women were a couple, but they weren’t out publicly. This was the don’t ask don’t tell nineties. Family members first learned of their relationship in the aftermath of their death.

The lesbian angle sensationalized the media’s response. It led prosecutors to charge the lead suspect with a hate crime and request the death penalty. Ultimately the case fell apart when advances in DNA analysis determined that the DNA on the scene was not a match with the suspect’s.

What old true crime stories tell us about society – and ourselves

As a teenager, I’d gone backpacking in the White Mountains and I’d had the vision of myself doing an Appalachian Trail thru hike and having this community on the trail and with nature. And then I learned about the murder of two lesbian hikers and in an instant, I knew….oh, I can’t do that hike any more.

The author, a white person, standing on the top of a mountain with hiking poles, a yellow backpack, blue tank top and black shorts.
Spoiler alert: It didn’t keep me off the trail forever. Here’s me on the last mountain the lesbian hikers climbed.

I was starting to suspect I was gay but I was still in the closet, and I just thought – if something like this could happen to two women who look just like my camp counselors, who remind me so much of all these people I idolized, then of course it could happen to me too.

So the only logical conclusion is, I have to stay home.

In writing the story, I wanted to engage with the case and the questions that it asks us to consider about who gets to have grand adventures and at what cost – work I continue to do here!

Ultimately, I felt like for as much progress as women and queer people have seen in recent decades, we’re still afraid of the same core things.

We are still afraid for our public safety. We change our behaviors in the hope of staying safe when we as a society need to change the culture so that men don’t feel entitled to women’s bodies and attention, and lash out with deadly violence when they don’t get it.

The media frenzy around these sorts of cases tells society that it isn’t safe to be doing whatever the victim was doing when they were attacked. And this reinforces the idea that there are behaviors or rules that will keep us safe. But ultimately the attacker is the one who bears responsibility, not the victim.