Hi Park enthusiasts, I'm your host, Dilya DeAmbra.

And the story I have for you today is one that involves two young people in the prime

of their life who had all intentions of making a difference in the world.

They found a way to combine their love of the outdoors with their passion for helping

others, which I feel is a running theme for a lot of the cases and victims I talk about

on park predators.

Their stories stood out to me for a lot of reasons, and it'll probably be a case you

won't forget easily either, mostly because of how violent the crime was, and how brazen

the suspect was to commit such an act on one of the most popular hiking trails in North

America.

It takes place along the Appalachian Trail, specifically on a stretch of it that goes

through Cove Mountain, which is about a half hour northwest of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

According to the trail's Conservancy website, the AT as most people know it, spans roughly

2200 miles and crosses over 14 states along the east coast of the US.

For a typical backpacker, the trek takes on average about 5 to 7 months to complete from

beginning to end, thousands of hikers traversing each year, but only about one in four succeed

in completing the entire journey.

The victims in this story were two of those determined hikers to see it through to the

end.

They thoughtfully planned out their restops, lodging, and of course sightseeing.

But what was waiting for them at a trail shelter in the fall of 1990 remains one of the most

horrific crimes to mar the Appalachian Trail, and it forever shattered the lives of two

...