Between October 1986 and September 1989 four couples were attacked at night in south-eastern Virginia, most of them parked in quiet spots along or near the Colonial Parkway, the scenic road linking Jamestown, Williamsburg and Yorktown.
Cathleen Thomas and Rebecca Dowski were found in a car pushed towards the York River in October 1986, their throats cut. David Knobling and Robin Edwards disappeared in September 1987 and were found shot at the Ragged Island refuge. Cassandra Hailey and Richard Call vanished in April 1988 and have never been found. Annamaria Phelps and Daniel Lauer were found in the woods off Interstate 64 in 1989.
The FBI worked it for decades. The case was badly damaged in 2009 when crime scene photographs were leaked, and the families spent years pressing for disclosure of a file they were told almost nothing about.
In January 2024 the Virginia State Police announced that DNA had identified Alan Wilmer Sr, a waterman from the Northern Neck who died in 2017, as responsible for the murders of David Knobling and Robin Edwards, and separately for the 1989 murder of Teresa Howell in Hampton. He was never a suspect during his lifetime.
That leaves three of the four Colonial Parkway attacks unattributed, and it raises the question the investigators had considered for years, which is whether the four cases were ever one offender. The remaining cases are open.