The Scenic Route

The Badge

Every crime scene told the same story: the victims complied. Windows down. Wallets out. No struggle. The law enforcement impersonation theory — how a badge is the most dangerous weapon a predator can carry.

Labor Day

September 5, 1989. Daniel Lauer and Annamaria Phelps were driving to Virginia Beach. Their car was found facing the wrong direction at a rest stop. Six weeks later, hunters found their skeletonized remains wrapped in a blanket a mile away. The last known case. Still officially unsolved.

First Date

April 10, 1988. Keith Call and Cassandra Hailey went on their very first date. Their car was found on the Colonial Parkway with his clothes in the back seat, his wristwatch on the dashboard. Bloodhounds tracked their scent to the water. Their bodies have never been found.

Ragged Island

September 1987. David Knobling and Robin Edwards — an eighth grader who snuck out at midnight. Found four days later on the bank of the James River. Both shot. Both execution-style. The FBI draws a line between this and 1986.

October 9th

The last night of Cathy Thomas and Rebecca Dowski. A Naval Academy graduate and a William & Mary student. The computer lab. The three days they were missing. The diesel fuel, the rope, and the FBI's private warning to Cathy's brother four days after her death: the killer may be in law enforcement.