You're listening to the Mind Over Murder podcast. My name is Bill Thomas.
I'm a writer, consulting producer, and now podcaster. I am now trying
to use my experience as the brother of a murder victim to help other victims
of violent crime. I'm working on a book on the unsolved Colonial Parkway murders
and I'm the co administrator of the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook group together with Kristin
Dilly. My name is Kristin Dilly. I'm a writer, a researcher,
a teacher, and a victim's advocate, as well as the social media manager
and co administrator for the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner in crime,
Bill Thomas. Welcome to Mind Ever Murder. I'm Kristin Dilly and I'm
Bill Thomas, and we're joined today by Jim Clemente, retired FBI profiler and
writer, producer on CBS's Criminal Minds and host of Real Crime Profile. And
Laura Richards, behavioral analyst from New Scotland and host of Real Crime Profile and
Crime Analyst, here to talk about the FBI pressor on January eighth about the
new breaks in the Colonial Parkway murders cases. Jim and Laura, thank you
so much for joining us today. Great to be here. Thank you,
great to be here. If you recall we talked Bill back in twenty sixteen
about this case and about the murder of your sister and her girlfriend and three
other double homicides that happened along the Colonial Parkway back in the late eighties,
and we'll link to those episodes of Real Crime Profile. And we can't thank
the two of you enough for being here. We know your time is valuable
and your insight in particular, the two of you bring I don't know how
many years worth of law enforcement experience to the table, but we can't thank
you enough. This is one of those situations where our heads are spinning,
quite frankly. This past Monday, January eighth, twenty twenty four, the
Virginia State Police FBI and the Hampton, Virginia Police Department had a press conference.
We ended up with probably far more questions than we received answers, because
it felt like the presentation was very confusing. Both of you had a chance
to take a look at some of the press conference. What did you make
of it? I watched it and I tweeted about it immediately after texting you,
Bill and also looking for what you were saying about it, because I
have to say I was confused and it was a very confusing press conference.
I couldn't quite work out why they weren't referring to the Colonial Parkway murders.
They talked about the Isle of Wight murders and they were referencing David Nobling and
Robin Edwards, and then talked about another case that was linked to Alan Wade
Wilmer Senior. And that was a great development to hear that there was suspect
identified that he has he was deceased, So it wasn't that this is a
man hunt or a live investigation. It was we are confirming that there is
a suspect identified who was Alan Wade Wilmer Senior, age sixty three, but
he died in twenty seventeen, and he was responsible DNA confirmed for the nineteen
eighty seven attack and murder of David Nobling and Robin Edwards. And there was
a sexual component to the Robin Edwards' case. And in nineteen eighty nine he
strangled, raped and murdered Teresa Howell, who was twenty nine and that happened
in Hampton. So I hadn't heard of Teresa Howe before, so I was
very curious about that case. But given its strangulation, rape and murder,
my immediate question was about how many other victims are there? What about Kathy?
What about Becky? What about all the other cases that we've discussed as
part of the Colonial Parkway murders. It also made me think about what about
Lolly Winans and Judy Williams that happened ten years later that I've talked about extensively
on Crime Analyst and spoken to both of you about. But it was just
very confusing. I felt there was some distance by the FBI in calling it
the Isle of Wight murders, and it meant that people would be confused,
because if I was confused and I knew about the case, what would that
mean for the public. And it probably meant that other people didn't join the
dots, and it didn't get as much attention as it should because what they
were trying to call upon was for the public to help timeline this very prolific
perpetrator. So if your aim is to timeline someone, you put out accurate
information. You're very clear you want the public's help, so you have to
create trust and confidence. You can't have people sat there thinking, hang on
a minute, wait is this part of this other series or what's going on?
Because that's a distraction. So I was concerned, and I did want
to know about Kathy and Becky, and they did say the investigation is ongoing.
It's been ongoing for many decades. Jim, I don't know how you
We talked in the morning that it was coming, and what did you think.
I spoke to Bill before the press conference, and so I had an
idea of what was coming, and then what I saw of the press conference,
I didn't see it coming. What I saw was confusion and obfuscation and
actually some things that I thought we were outright wrong incorrect, like a statement
that was made that because there was no felonies on Wilmer's record, that they
couldn't legally collect DNA to test it against the DNA that was found in these
murder scenes, which is it's just an out and out bullshit lie. That's
just not true at all. You don't need anything of the subject's criminal record,
you don't need anything. He could be a stellar citizen, but you
can grab his garbage, because that's actually a band property, and you could
test items in his garbage, or you could follow him and when he discards
a coke can like they did in the Golden State killer case, you can
collect that and then get the DNA off of it, and then you can
get a warrant to actually collect his da officially by doing a bugle swab,
for example, and confirm it. But this is just that's just wrong,
that's just not true. They did not have to wait till he died.
That sounded like a flimsy, bullshit excuse to me. But the important thing
is that not only was he tied to the murder of Teresa Howell, but
also to the murder of two of the victims that have been classically identified as
Colonial Parkway murder victims, and that was Robin Edwards and David Noblin. But
there are still three other double homicides in that case. I don't know if
this was some they're obfuscating about the fact that the Nobling and Edwards cases were
related to the Colonial Parkway murders. I don't know if they were trying not
to mention it or harp on it because they didn't want to basically put words
in people's mouths or get people to who doesn't don't really know information to call
in. I don't know if they were afraid of the hype or something,
but it's just as you said, Laura, if you're actually looking for help
to solve unsolved homicides and they're in a series that everybody knows about in the
area and in fact probably the nation, why would you avoid it. It
just doesn't make any sense unless they're hiding something. Maybe they have more information
and they want to hold it back. I don't know, but I hope
that it's a legitimate law enforcement purpose and it isn't just in confidence at this
point, because, like you said, I left that press conference more confused
about what was going on than when I started it. Our listeners were the
same way. We have over twenty thousand followers on two different Facebook pages,
Colonial Parkway Murders and mind Over Murder this podcast, and our listeners were so
baffled they were like, is this part of the Colonial Parkway murders or not?
And actually the announcement that Alan Wade Wilmer Senior has been identified as the
killer of these three individuals confirms that the Colonial Parkway murders series is real,
and that this couple, Robin Edwards and David Knobling, we now have identified
their killer. People were asking us why are they calling this by another name?
Even my partner Pamela, who is not following the case as closely as
Kristin and I are, she finally watched the press conference with me about ten
pm that Monday night, and she said, why are they not calling this
case by its proper name, the name that hundreds of thousands of people in
the area. No press people contacted us afterwards, and they were like,
they didn't even make it clear what it was that they were going to talk
about, which actually held down reduced the number of press people who showed up
for the press conference because it wasn't very clear what the heck it was they
were going to be talking about that day. Yeah, it was a mistake,
and it is an anomaly to have a press conference led by a press
liaison officer rather than by the lead law enforcement agencies that are involved in the
investigation. I believe that they might have spoken later, but to lead off
with just by a press officer and then to refuse to answer specific questions about
the investigation. When you have a case that is clearly a deceased offender,
there's no reason to be hiding the ball anymore. When in solved cases they
said he would be charged if you were still alive, then there's no reason
to hide this stuff. That was my reaction to Jim, And I'm glad
you used that expression because I actually, when I finally got a chance to
watch the press conference hours later, for reasons that we can get into,
I said, why is the FBI playing hide the ball? M h there
deliberately, I believe, not being clear on what the heck it is we're
talking about. Well, Bill, I don't know if your conversations with the
FBI or these other investigatory agencies include more information about the case and the murder
of your sister and some of these other Colonial Parkway murders. And I know
if that's the case, and you're not allowed to share, you're not allowed
to share, and that's great, we'll certainly honor that. But the fact
that they did not notify you that this press conference was going to happen when
clearly it is related to the Colonial Parkway murders and your sister's case therefore is
an important part of this, and you as one of the surviving not only
one of the surviving family members, but as one of the leading liaisons between
law enforcement and the other families involved in the Colonial Parkway murders, you would
think that you would be put high on the priority list in terms of official
notification by law enforcement. We received no notification whatsoever. Now, I want
to be clear, the other families did receive notification. I pointedly did not.
So Kristin Dilly and I were not informed. The other families were informed.
And when you say other families, you're talking about David Nobling and Robin
Edwards. Their families were informed. They did know about what was coming.
And Teresa Howe and other Colonial Parkway murders families in addition, yes, yes,
in addition with the exception of yourself, which to me is just absolutely
outrageous. I cannot understand how that could be a decision that is taken and
then executed when you have been such a pivotal part, particularly being a spokesperson
across We spoke to you in twenty sixteen, we were the first to speak
to you on Real Crime profile about the case, and you always made sure
you talked about the other families as well, and I just cannot understand why
they would take that decision. And I'm horrified that you didn't know about the
detail of what was coming, because you have to psychologically prepare yourself as well.
It's not just about getting the information, it's about being psychologically prepared for
what you're going to hear, what's going out to the public domain, what
other people are going to hear, and what they're going to ask you about.
This very odd thing happened with our longtime case agent. I've been dealing
with this agent for ten years. I hold her in very high regard.
She texted me at I think it's about seven point thirty on Monday morning.
Now I knew the press conference was coming. Kristin and I had received advance
word from other media sources. From media sources, yes, but no one
in law enforcement contacted us. I actually knew about the content of much of
the press conference several months in advance, again from a media contact, so
I actually knew suspects names and some of what was going to be said in
January, as early as October, and Kristin and I share information. Of
course, we wanted to be respectful of the process and not interfere with an
active investigation, and no announcement was being made at that point, so Kristin
and I committed that we weren't going to say anything to anyone, and we
didn't. So we sat on this information for si several months. Moving back
to Monday morning, we received word and Kristin reached out to me and she
said, there's going to be a press conference on Monday. And then a
short while later, Kristin sent me some information and even Kristin Dilley, who's
an expert, she wrote to me a text and said, is this the
press conference we were waiting for? It doesn't even mention the Colonial Parkway murders
now, And so the confusion started from that point, and then back to
the outreach from my FBI agent. She reached out to me and texted me
and asked me if I would be available to speak to her at one point
thirty PM. At this point, Kristin and I didn't know what time the
press conference was. And the only reason I'm getting into this level of detail
is she then set a time to talk with me six hours in advance,
and we realized the press conference was going to be at the same time.
I actually texted the agent back and said, is your intention for us to
watch the press conference together? She set up this call for one thirty pm.
Kristen comes back to me and says, you know, it appears the
press conference is at one thirty pm. I texted the agent back and said,
is your intention were supposed to watch this together? And she said no.
So we had a fantastic, in depth private briefing. Some of the
information. Jim, you know that I can't share at this point as a
family member and the brother of a murder victim. I do try to be
respectful. I know they ding me on this every single time they can,
but I do actually try not to be a source of information before it's appropriate.
But we talked for two hours, the agent and nine. But that
was during the exact moment when the press conference is going on, And you
think to yourself later, huh, it's almost like they didn't want me to
watch the press conference. Laurie, you were saying you were trying to reach
me, or why was I radio silent during the press conference? You were
already texting about the conference. Yes, I found it very odd Bill that
I was trying to message you and putting stuff out on social media and seeing
your reaction, because for me, I just found it confusing. I posted
that on social media, just saying, somewhat confusing presser, but a suspect
has been identified. I wanted to get the information out there to help law
enforcement, but I was very confused. I was very distracted by what we
weren't hearing about and why it was being done in the way that it was,
And now hearing that you were asked to speak at the exact time,
it just feels intentional to me, and I feel really uncomfortable. I've been
grinding my teeth. I hope listeners haven't heard that on the microphone, but
just hearing you say those things have been grinding my teeth, and just I
find it maddening because you could have that conversation with her at any other point,
and you have been a trusted person across all of this time. You've
always been respectful, in my opinion, and when there are things that cannot
be discussed, you're very clear about that. So on the day that is
so important for you to hear information, you don't get the heads up about
what's coming out. But then your time is being monopolized at the exact time
the rest of the world hearing what's going on. I don't know, Jim.
It just feels really uncomfortable. It feels deliberate, and I think I
have some clarity on it based on what Bill said and what you just said,
Laura, and what Kristin said. I believe that it is probably a
deliberate attempt to keep Bill and Kristen from making any kind of public statements about
this case. That she was that this FBI agent was not authorized or didn't
want to say anything to Bill until it was actually made public, so that's
why she started the call at the same time as the press conference, and
that she did not she they singled out Bill as one of the family members
and didn't give him any advance warning of what was going to that the press
conference was going to happen, or that what it was going to contain.
They didn't want to give him any of that information in advance because they know
he does a podcast and he is he does speak publicly about this case.
He wants to keep it in public's mind so that it puts pressure on law
enforcement to continue working the case. But he's always totally respectful in terms of
what when they say this can't go out, he doesn't let it go out,
And so they shouldn't have put him in this category. They should have
treated him like the other victims' family members, and he should have been at
least given some advanced notice not only of the press conference, but advanced notice
of what it would contain, so that he would be able to prepare.
As you said, Laura, because this is a serious life event. This
is not just a game. And I don't like the fact that it appears
that she was playing games. The whole thing just feels very contrived and really
very manipulative. And as Bill and I were speaking, I was fortunately my
schedule at school allowed me to be off at a time when I could go
home and run this presser through my computer and then I could start doing all
the social media stuff that we do. And I called Bill as I was
speeding my way home to get here to watch this press conference, and we
were debating, do we maybe let the FBI agents call go to voicemail so
that he can watch the presser? Like, how are we going to deal
with that? And ultimately we decided it's better for him to take that call,
and I can always watch the press conference, which I did, and
record it and transcribe it to send it to him later. But I really
don't like the fact that Bill was put in that position, because, as
you said, Jim, it's a major life event for him and he needed
to be able to watch it in real time and process it and ask questions.
And I think the reason that she had him on the phone was so
that he couldn't watch it and couldn't ask questions at that point. And the
weird thing is, I've been dealing with this agent for ten years and normally
she texts me and we've talked I don't know hundreds, but it's probably we
talk a lot, and she's been incredibly helpful and hard working and dedicated.
Our usual mo is. She texts me and says, can we talk?
And I do my damnedest to stop what I'm doing and call her immediately,
a five minute turnaround kind of thing, because she's a very important person in
my world. She has information, not every single time, but she tells
me what's going on with my sister, Kathy Thomas, Rebecca Dowski, and
the other Colonial Parkway murder victims, what's going on, and especially with Kathy
and Becky, So for her to reach out to me the first thing in
the morning to set up a call at one thirty pm. Even at the
moment I received the text and I wrote back and said, yes, of
course, I thought to myself, since when are we setting up calls six
hours in advance? Bill. I just think it was deliberate. I think
that a decision was made somewhere. I don't know if it was her decision
or above her or another agency to keep you in the dark until that moment.
And that's why she called you, and that's why she spent two hours
on the phone with you so that you could get this information. But she
deliberately did not want or somebody deliberately did not want you to have any information
at all about this press conference or about what they were going to say in
advance. I think that's what it boils down to. Ill just weigh in
that you're not the enemy here, and I think that needs to be made
clear. You've never been the enemy. You've always been the person that's been
respectful everything I've seen of you over the years that i've known you, You've
always been very respectful of information and what goes out and when. And I
do think trust and confidence works both ways. That if you want to create
trust and confidence, you have to put it into that person too, and
I think that is unfortunately not the right way to do it. And to
put you in the dark of what other people are absorbing and understanding and put
you on the back foot. That really doesn't work well. And I think
the whole press conference unfortunately didn't really work well because the timeline you're trying to
get information out from the public. You want information from them to timeline this
individual. But there were just so many question marks. As to one of
the media people asked, can you explain how Alan Wade Wilmer Senior became known
to you? No, said the press officer. And it was an immediate
shutdown, and it was stark. And look, there are times when you
have to control information and the flow of information. But let's be clear,
this perpetrator is deceased. He is not alive. It's not about compromising a
man hunt or an investigation that's ongoing. At this point. They're trying to
rely on the public and on both of you the same as us. Why
we want to talk about the case is to amplify it, to make sure
that people know about Alan Wade Wilmerth Senior. They know about who he is,
that he was on the water, he was a waterman, he was
a hunter, he had a truck, and we'll go into all of that,
but we want to put that information out there. You don't want people
to be puzzled or distracted by these other things going on. But I sense,
my read of it, why this press conference happened in this way is
because there's some real ugly horror stories that lurk behind it. I e.
A man like Alan Wade Wilmerth Senor does not at the age of thirty three
just start attacking two people who are together, David and Robin and sexually assault
Robin. And that is never going to be the first offense. So there's
going to be lots of things that he most likely did before and lots of
things that And we know about one potential murder and of course there's information and
there's intelligence, but we do know about other cases that he was and one
in particular where he was the prime suspect, and if that's what they're guarding,
Unfortunately, they have to be more transparent being more transparent. Actually increases
trust and confidence from the public. It increases trust and confidence from the families.
This is my experience of twenty seven years working with families who say,
we know sometimes human era happens. We know sometimes you get things wrong right,
But if you try and hide it, if you cover things up,
that does not sit well, and the cover up is worse than the actual
event itself. That's my experience of working with hundreds and hundreds of families.
So I can understand that you might feel on the back foot of things,
and I'm really sorry that happened, because you don't deserve that. Actually,
Bill, you've been a really incredible and tremendous spokesperson for not just your sister,
not just an advocate for Kathy and Becky, but for all the families.
And I've always thought incredibly highly of you for that. You've been a
tremendous advocate. So I'm sorry that there seems to be some kind of strategy
to keep you in the dark and to monopolize your time. I don't think
that's helpful a tool in this case. I was on a conference call with
the FBI investigators a couple of years ago, and I get exasperated from time
to time, and I'm not proud of that, and my mom wouldn't be
terribly proud of me either, But I got so exasperated on one of those
calls. I actually said to this group of FBI investigators, since when does
the brother of the murder victim become the enemy? Because that's sometimes how they
treat me. Yeah, it shouldn't be, and that's why there should be
a liaison officer that has your well being and your information as one of their
priorities. And it's just it's irresponsible and not necessary. The thing is that,
obviously the information that you get from law enforcement isn't just information to you.
It isn't just news like it is to the general public. This is
your family, Your sister was brutally murdered, and you still don't have answers,
and they should. Every person in law enforcement should understand your need to
know. So it's just very unfortunate you're listening to Mind over Murder. Will
be right back after this word from our sponsors. We're back here at mindover
Murder. I want to focus on something positive, which Kristin and I are
trying to strongly support. They have put out some pretty good information about Alan
Wade Wilmer Sr. As Laura was saying, he drove a very distinctive truck.
He had a very distinctive boat, the Denny Wade. It was a
fishing boat with a big graphic on the side. He himself is a physically
very distinctive man. He's got average looks with a neatly trimmed beard. And
they had a really good age progression of photographs, which I think might be
a Virginia driver's license pictures, but they were really good. You could see
what he looked like back in the eighties, all the way back through to
age sixty three when he passed. One thing I think they missed, though,
was he's a very distinctively short individual. He's five foot five inches tall,
which I think is five inches less than the average man. He's very
muscular, so I almost picture a dude that looks like pop By the sailor
man driving this very distinctive truck. He's got a very distinctive boat, and
then he himself has these very distinctive physical characteristics. What Kristin and I are
trying to do on Mind Over Murder is really push out on our podcast but
especially on our social media media platforms mind of a murder and Colonial Parkway murders
on Facebook and other platforms, these photographs and this information, because the Virginia
State Police and the FBI now are asking for help, they're trying to timeline
this man, especially back in the nineteen eighties when these murders were happening,
and they're asking people to come forward. One of the things that Kristin and
I are trying to do is people are commenting and telling stories, including some
scary stories about Alan Wade Wilmer, Sr. And we're trying to push those
folks respectfully. Don't just talk about it to Bill and Kristen on a social
media page, or don't just post it on your own page. Please get
this information to law enforcement, call the FBI or the State Police Virginia State
Police hotlines. Well. Also, Bill, we should focus on the offender's
behavior because Laura and I this is what we do. This is our bread
and butter, and we would expect that this guy had a number of precursor
crimes that were committed in the late seventies early eighties, crimes like stalking and
peeping and maybe breaking and entering or harassing people. And these kinds of things
may many times be dismissed as unimportant by the public, but and they may
sometimes be dismissed as unimportant by the police, but they are incredibly important to
build the timeline of this guy and his offenses. As I think Lauras said
earlier, again, he didn't just start at the age of thirty three of
abducting, raping and killing people. He actually started earlier, probably in his
late adolescence, and he was probably committing these kind of precursor crimes. These
are things that are important. So if you have any history of interacting with
this guy, this five foot five guy named Alan Wade Wilmer Senior, and
whether it's in your neighborhood or in your in a business dealing, or on
the water, or in his tree service company or on the road, anything
you might have to tell the police about him and his behavior, all of
that is incredibly important. We would all encourage you to call the FBI tipline
or the state police email tip line so that you can put this information into
official records so that then they can build a better timeline. And even if
you've reported it, please re report it because often these things get lost,
and as Jim said, extensive experience of working these cases, oftentimes those who
are peeping tom's or loitering or standing near you leering at you, making you
feel uncomfortable, or obscene phone calls, exposing yourself. These sorts of things
can oftentimes be not just ignored by you, and you minimize it and think
it's not anything major, But it's a gateway crime to something much more serious.
And often it is minimized by law enforcement, and I will say particularly
male officers, because often it will not happen to them, and therefore they
don't understand how terrifying it is when you're a lone female and that happens to
you. And this guy being along the waterway. We did talk about Kathy
and Becky and did the perpetrator have a boat for example, we did discuss
that specifically, didn't we So again, it's really interesting how transient he was,
but he did have anchor points and he did use the boat. He
was a hunter, hunting equals stalking. He had a tree service business,
so that means he's part of the street furniture. He could be somewhere and
people don't necessarily think, oh, this guy. So it seems to me
that he used all of these things in the commission of his offenses, and
I think it's really important that people do put that information back into the FBI
or Virginia State Police. And the other thing to say is that when I
was listening to that press conference, yes, I believe that he had an
extensive history and he would have had contact with law enforcement. And then it
became known. I read Blaine Pardu's book blog that he recently put out about
the book and about him and his books A Special kind of Evil. I
know you know the book well, but page two oh four he talked about
Wilma being a prime suspect in the Cassandra Haley and Keith Call murders in April
nineteen eighty eight. That for me was just exactly what I see so often
in cases where a suspect is overlooked, even though there were some very important
behaviors and information about him. And one of those things and we talked about
this with Kathy and Becky how the perpetrator approached them. We heard from Blaine
Pardu that Alan Wade Wilmer, Senior was approaching couples in cars along the parkway.
He was aggressive, he was confronting them, He was banging on windows.
One particular event, he bangs on the window. He thinks it's two
women together, but it's actually a guy and a woman. The guy had
long hair, and he turns around, but he said, a you girl's
having fun, and then when he sees it's a bloke, he then backs
off. These are exactly the types of behaviors that we would expect as precursors,
and his truck was called in to law enforcement. These events were called
into law enforcement, and after Cassandra and Keith went missing, he was under
surveillance and there was drive by surveillance going on, and actually law enforcement turned
up spoke to him when he was spray painting his truck and vacuuming and cleaning
it out and painting it. They felt that he was a prime suspect.
They went off and got a warrant because they wanted to search his trailer,
and in the trailer they find weapons, handcuffs, pornography. These are all
things that Jim and I would see as absolute critical information, red flag behavior.
And a witness also placed him at the scene where Cassandra and Keith went
missing. So they've got a four pronged approach, if you will, and
approach and four pronged key behaviors about this individual, and they bring in a
polygrapher, an experienced polygrapher, who they say eliminated him as not being involved
in the murder. I just find that absolutely staggering, given all that we
know, and we can put ourselves back in time and say, maybe it
wasn't as well known about stalking and predatory behavior and sexual violence, serial killers
and so forth, But I got a saven on a basic level, Jim
of being a police officer or a detective, these things should have raised red
flags and it should never have been let's eliminate him based on a lie detector
test. I think, actually to credit the fbis at the time they actually
felt like he was a good suspect and continued to feel that way even though
he got washed out. But I will say this bill that behavior that Laura
just outlined with that one couple in their car where he banged on the window
and said, are you girls having fun? And then was startled to find
that one of them was a guy, and then he took off, I
think that's a direct tie to your sister, Kathy and Becky's case. The
fact that he would approach a car with two girls in it and then retreat
when he found out it was a girl and a guy. To me,
your sister and her girlfriend were in that car together, and they were in
their car together, and this could very well be how he approached at that
point, banging on the door. Your sister may have lowered the window.
It may have told him to get out of there, and that could have
been the beginning. And the fact that he had weapons, that he was
a hunter. We know that he had knives because he used a knife to
kill them. We also believed that he had guns because he was able to
control two adults who would have fought back. But by controlling one person in
a couple, you can then control the other. In other words, you
can threaten one person and if the other person doesn't anything, then that person,
the first person, will be killed, And that is a good way
to threaten a couple. He had weapons and handcuffs. Jim in handcuffs,
which, yeah, we all thought that at the point that during the course
of the murders of your sister and her girlfriend, that there was a high
likelihood that he had controlled one of them first and threatened her and then kept
got her tied up somehow, and then went after the other one. Obviously,
handcuffs are a way to do that, to accomplish that, and the
fact that he had those cuffs should have been incredibly important to the investigators and
may very well be why he was able to pull off these double homicides.
What shocking, though, in what was baffling to Kristen and me and the
other Colonial Parkway murders families was none of this was mentioned that the press conference.
As you mentioned, Laura, when a reporter asked, when did this
man, Alan Wade Wilmer Senior move on to law enforcement's radar, they refuse
to answer the question. Now, he was suspect number one, that's what
the agents called it in the disappearance of Keith Colin Cassandra Haley, and somehow
that was never covered in this press conference. So this is a situation where
those of us that are close to the details of the Colonial park rammerders,
which I know is not most people. Those of us that know some of
the detail, and we don't claim to be as expert as law enforcement.
We're all looking at each other after we finally have a chance to watch the
press conference, Who're like, what the heck was that and why don't they
mention the fact that Wilmer was suspect number one in Keith Colin Cassandra Haley's disappearance.
Well, Bill, all I can say is I hope. I just
hope that's because they have positive information about a connection and that they don't want
to release it yet, but they're going to plan on release it soon.
I just hope that's the reason, because if it's not, you know,
it's just irresponsible, because we do want to find out if they're connected,
and if people are out there and have information that we'd connect it to keep
call and Cassandra Haley's murders, then they should be calling for people to do
that. And it's just it's ridiculous to not call for people to do that
when we know that he was a prime suspect in that very double homicide,
and the murders were two years apart. We're not talking about in different parts
of the world, different countries. We're talking about in the same geographic region.
And that's what's staggering to me that it makes me feel uncomfortable that they're
hiding things. And if you say no, I'm not going to talk about
it, you can't be caught later on. You can't be caught out.
So that's how I felt about it. And I hope Jim in good faith
that they're holding things back because it's a key part of the investigation. I
really hope that's true. But let's not forget this guy is deceased. This
isn't about anything other than this guy's dead. Let's properly timeline him. And
they should be trying to create trust and confidence in the public that we're trying
to do our job and we need your help. And it should just be
straight up clear what's required, and they should be saying the truth. I
don't understand why they would hold that back. And this geographic area Bill,
when we've spoken before, you said that his house was in where he died,
was in his house in Lancaster County. I think you mentioned that it
was an hour and fifteen minutes away from the Colonial Parkway murders. But I
wonder what that would be by boat. I assume you were thinking by car
or were you thinking by boat? And could would it be easily accessible by
boat? It would still be a lengthy bit of travel by boat. We
understand now that Wilmer lived on his boat and docked it in Gloucester and Hampton,
Virginia, And as Kristen can tell you, these places are minutes away,
so he'd come down for the oystering season and he would park his boat
and then work that area. That's actually something Virginia State Police and FBI are
looking for information if anyone docked their boat near his. So that boat would
be the Denny D. E. N I. Wade Wade and it's a
wooden boat, so it would be distinctive, as well as his car,
which is the nineteen sixty six Dodge Fargo pickup truck that's blue green in color
with the license plate em raw. Anybody who was around that area at that
time or on the water at that time, who interacted with him in any
way, even if it was totally insignificant in your mind, it may be
important putting him in a particular place at a particular time, giving him access
to these victims that we know were murdered in cases that are still unresolved.
It's worth al say, just playing out that he was married, he had
two children and It's always a lot of my work has been centered around interviewing
the ex wives and understanding from the partners and ex wives, the children,
those who know that individual the best they can really add information into the case.
And it really concerned me when I heard from Kerry Rawson, who is
the daughter of Denis Raider. Jim when I was at the FBI, spent
a lot of time talking to the agents involved in the Denis Raider case.
People know him by his horrible monika, which I'm not going to use.
But Kerry, when I interviewed her, told me so much about what was
going on behind closed doors. And actually she told me the FBI never interviewed
her about what was happening in terms of the domestic violence, the coercive control,
all that they were victims too. And I remember distinctly asking the agents
at the time, does he have a history of domestic violence? What was
going on in terms of his wife, his children? And they said there
was no abuse, and Kerry couldn't believe it. That's what I was told.
So again, we now know about coercive control. We now know these
are power and control related crimes, and so it's really important that I hope
law enforcement are speaking to the family in order to find out more about the
timeline, specifically places Kerry told me all this information about Dennis Raider of places
she went with him, who now she thinks he was stalking other victims.
That intelligence and information is so important in the timeline, So it is worth
saying there may be other girlfriends ex girlfriends that we don't know about, but
they're really important of building a picture of this individual because I have no doubt
he would be prolific, absolutely prolific, because of the fantasy base of his
levels of perpetration. And I know it's not just him either, it's his
brother too, And there are some very key pieces of intelligence about Keith Wilmer,
the brother. So again there's been some confusion in some cases about which
brother might be involved. Therefore, if you know anything about Keith Wilmer or
Alan Wade Wilmer Senior, then please do make sure you forward that information to
law enforcement. Jim and Laura. While I have you here, I did
want to ask about an important, interesting piece of information that sac Brian Dugan
put forward at the end of his time at the podium. He did give
all of the information that they are looking for. With regard to Alan Wade
Wilmer Senior, he also gave all of the tip line numbers, but he
ended with an interesting coda, and I wanted to get your thought on it,
so I'm going to quote from sac Dugan here. He said, we
recognize relationships and loyalties change over time as to people and their perspectives. There
are occasions where people who may have had knowledge of a crime do not feel
comfortable coming forward with information. This may have been due to relationships with the
persons involved, or out of concer learned for their own safety, reputation,
or standing amongst friends. Even though mister Wilmer is deceased, we want you
to know it is not too late to come forward. Who might he be
speaking to. Would that be the brother, the ex wife? Who is
this so? Yeah, family members, relatives, the people that he was
in a relationship with, people who live next door to him who might have
been afraid of him, people who worked with him, people who just interacted
with him socially, everybody. What they're trying to say is, look back
in the day, maybe you had some kind of loyalty to him. He's
not around it anymore, and we know he is a serial killer, so
please come forward. That's I think what they're trying to say there. And
I think it's really important that anybody out there, especially people who were related
to him, who could help, would be doing the world a great service.
And if they don't help, they'd be won't doing the world a great
disservice. And the victims and their families and perpetrates is like him, a
frightening They are terrifying, and they terrify and terrorize the people in their intimate
lives too. So oftentimes when someone stays quiet, it's out of fear.
Actually, sometimes it might be loyalty, yes, but oftentimes I see with
domestic violence and coercive control, it's fear. And then unfortunately it gets into
being concerned about judgment. Why didn't you come forward earlier, and then feeling
like you might be blamed or judged? And I always say, absolutely not.
Why would you be blamed or judged? It's not your actions. You
won't be held responsible for somebody else's behavior. And I say that very clearly
because oftentimes people do hold women accountable for men's behavior. This is a very
prolific and dangerous man, and I have no doubt he would have used coercive
tactics on other people around him, and he would have been probably quite frightening
to be around. But maybe he has charm too, and the charm ability
we mustn't overlook that either. So yes, I would imagine family members do
know some things. They may not know all of it. And it sounds
like he died a lonely death in a house on his own where no one's
saying, oh, we miss him, or he didn't turn up for X
or why. So it sounds like there's some distancing in the family there.
I don't know why, but that could be part of the story here.
Kristin, do you mind giving that tip information before we go? Absolutely,
for anyone who has tips regarding Alan Wade Wilmers Senior, please call one eight
hundred car FBI. You can submit a tip online at tips dot FBI dot
gov. You can also contact the Virginia State Police via email at Questions at
VSP dot Virginia dot gov and we'll include that information in our show notes for
Mind Over Murder. Jim and Laura, it has been a real pleasure and
a privilege having you here on Mind Over Murder. Thank you so much for
joining us today. Thank you, yeah, thank you for your time.
And I hope that there's more good news to come because this is your life,
Bill, and I know you want your sister's case. I'm Becky's all
of them resolved, and I feel that the answers are there, So I
hope next time we talk there be better news for you as well. And
I am sorry about the way that you've been treated because even now you're trying
to get information to help law enforcement, and I applaud you for that.
So thank you, thank you, thanks so much for listening to this episode
of mind Over Murder. We'll see you next time. Mind Over Murder is
a production of Absolute Zero and Another Dog Productions. Our executive producers are Bill
Thomas and Kristin Dilley. Our logo art is by Pamela Arnoir. Our theme
music is by Kevin McLeod. Mind Over Murder is distributed in partnership with crawl
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You can also follow our page on the Colonial Parkway Murders on Facebook, and
finally, you can follow Bill Thomas on Twitter at Bill Thomas five six.
Thank you for listening. To mind over murder,