After Murdering 2 Hikers in 1981, Man Fingered for Shooting 2 More in 2008
Sentenced to a 30-year prison term in a 1981 plea bargain for murdering two hikers on the Appalachian Trail in Virginia after sharing a meal with them in May of that year, Randall Smith served 15 years before he was paroled in 1996.
And then, in May 2008, he shot two more. Once again, the victims were two hikers on the Appalachian Trail, only a mile or so away from the 1981 murder scene, recounts the Washington Post in the first of two articles.
The similarity of the crimes, so many years apart, is what led to his capture: Tom Lawson, one of the investigators in the 1981 case, felt his gut wrench when he heard about the new shootings. “I just knew it was Randall,” he tells the newspaper. “Just knew it.” And he wasn’t the only one who recognized the similarity, the Post reports in the second article today.
But there was one big difference between what happened in 1981 and 2008: This time, both of the victims survived.
Shot in the head and chest with a .22, Sean Farmer managed to get behind the wheel of his truck and drive away. However, he was having trouble staying on the pitch-dark curving road. Scott Johnston, who was hit in the neck as he ran off into the woods, jumped into the truck as Farmer was pulling away. He couldn’t help much with the steering, though, because he had to keep a finger in the wound left by the bullet to keep from bleeding to death.
Smith, who claimed he shot the two men in self-defense, was soon spotted and arrested. But he never went to trial this time. He died in jail in May, at age 54. Autopsy results are expected in about 90 days.
“Randall had no marks at all,” says Lt. Jerry Humphreys of the Virginia State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation. “He just died. Quite possibly of natural causes.”
Additional coverage:
WSLS 10 (NBC): “Appalachian Trail killer suspect in Giles Co. double shooting”
Bluefield Daily Telegraph: “Survivors’ story”
Associated Press: “Suspect in trail shootings dead”
Updated at 11:43 a.m. to clarify a second reference to the 2008 shootings.
