Suspect in Lisk/Silva murders confessed a homicide to his sister
Patty
Suspect told sister he'd killed
Police say Evonitz confessed to other crimes, but couldn't remember
them all
By CLIF LeBLANC
The State
Hours before he killed himself Thursday in Florida, Richard Evonitz
confessed over the phone to a sister that he had killed someone,
Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott said Monday.
Evonitz, 38, was sought in the kidnapping and rape of a 15-year-old
Lexington County girl.
In his phone call to a sister, after the abduction, Evonitz "confessed
to a homicide that we have not been able to identify," Lott said.
Evonitz did not name a victim or say exactly where or when the killing
might have occurred, the sheriff said.
"Right now, it's only a shot in the dark to try and tie this one
down,'' Lott said.
Evidence found in Evonitz's Columbia apartment makes him the leading
suspect in the murders in 1996 and 1997 of three girls from
Spotsylvania County, Va. The girls were asphyxiated, Spotsylvania
County Sheriff Ronald Knight said.
Evonitz also confessed to other violent crimes, a law enforcement
source said. Evonitz told the relative there were so many crimes he
could not remember them all.
Evonitz, who was born in Columbia and was graduated from Irmo High
School in 1980, has family in the Columbia area.
One sister, Kristin Weyland of Irmo, could not be reached Monday for
comment. But a family member at the house said only, "We feel remorse
for any other families that may be involved."
A man outside Weyland's home ordered journalists off the property.
Another sister, Jennifer Harris of Bradenton, Fla., could not be
reached Monday. His mother and wife were not at their Columbia homes.
Reached at his Arlington, Va., home Monday, Evonitz's father declined
to discuss the investigation and theories about his son.
"Police have not concluded that there is any evidence against him at
all in these matters, and I don't want to say anything until I know
for myself what they have concluded," Joseph Evonitz said.
As interest in the case spread, Lott downplayed media reports that
linked Evonitz to an unsolved 1996 homicide of a 25-year-old Baltimore
student. Lott said any connection between Evonitz and the death of
Alicia Showalter Reynolds is "very weak, almost nonexistent.''
The sheriff also said he knows of no evidence that would tie Evonitz
to the well-publicized disappearances of Columbia's Dail Dinwiddie in
1992 or Paula Merchant of Forest Acres in 1999.
A picture of Evonitz is slowly emerging.
He served in the Navy and also worked almost four years in telephone
sales for a machine tool company in the Fredericksburg, Va., area.
Evonitz most recently worked at Armstrong Compressed Air Services on
Wilson Boulevard in Blythewood. A three-year employee, he also had
worked at the company's Spartanburg office.
As an efficiency auditor, Evonitz analyzed compressed air systems at
large companies nationwide. His job required extensive travel.
He had no criminal record until 1987, Lott said. That year, Evonitz
was convicted in Florida for performing a sex act in front of
teen-agers, the Fredericksburg, Va., Free Lance-Star reported. At the
time, he was stationed aboard the USS Koelsch at the Mayport (Fla.)
Naval Station, about 50 miles away from the incident, and had been in
the Navy less than four years.
Evonitz was sentenced to three years' probation, after which his name
was removed from the state's list of registered sex offenders. Florida
changed its law in 1997 so sex offenders remain registered for 20
years.
Spotsylvania Sheriff Knight said he was unsure whether Evonitz had
been a suspect in the three girls' deaths until police learned of the
Lexington County abduction.
Knight called Evonitz "one of the hottest leads we've had in a while,"
but said he wasn't ready to call Evonitz a suspect.
The evidence police say ties Evonitz to the three Virginia slayings
was sent Monday to the FBI lab in Washington, Lott said. He said FBI
analysts will give the case priority, but it's unclear when the
results will be ready.
Despite thousands of leads and hundreds of DNA comparisons, police in
Virginia have been frustrated in trying to solve the slayings of Sofia
Silva, 16, and sisters Kristin Lisk, 15, and Kati Lisk, 12.
The girls were abducted from near their homes in a way that resembles
last week's kidnapping and rape of the 15-year-old Lexington County
girl.
Evonitz approached her posing as a magazine salesman and forced her at
gunpoint into a car. He took her to his St. Andrews apartment. She was
raped several times during the next 16 hours.
The handcuffed girl escaped from unit 301 in the Crossroads Apartments
complex when Evonitz fell asleep.
Evonitz had rigged a bed with two-by-fours and bolts connected to
handcuffs so he could restrain his victims, Lexington County Sheriff
James Metts said.
Staff writers Kimathi Lewis, Bill Robinson, Carolina Bolado and the
Washington Post Web site contributed to this report.
Jane Cactus
"Patty" <eartha...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:f0e77308.02070...@posting.google.com...
I wonder how the girl escaped with handcuffs on then. And didn't his wife
wonder about all this stuff in the apt? She was only 19, I know. He could
have told her anything I guess. And there were only married a few months
IIRC.
JC
Insomniatrix
"Jane Cactus" <jonesi...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:nFsU8.26297$Hj3....@newsfeeds.bigpond.com...
Didn't he have a house and an apartment?|
Jane Cactus
"Insomniatrix" <ClareMa...@netscape.net> wrote in message
news:m1uU8.37024$N8.36...@e3500-atl1.usenetserver.com...
-------snip--------
> | I wonder how the girl escaped with handcuffs on then. And didn't his
wife
> | wonder about all this stuff in the apt? She was only 19, I know. He
could
> | have told her anything I guess. And there were only married a few months
> | IIRC.
> |
> | JC
> |
>
> Didn't he have a house and an apartment?|
I don't know. Did he? That would sure make more sense. JC
Patty
By Maria Glod
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 3, 2002; Page B01
COLUMBIA, S.C., July 2 -- As he drove from his South Carolina home to
Georgia and into Florida last week, Richard Evonitz knew he was only a
few steps ahead of police trying to arrest him in the rape of a
15-year-old girl. Sensing that there was no escape, he began calling
relatives with cryptic confessions.
Evonitz, 38, said he had killed someone and that he had committed
"more crimes than he can remember," Richland County, S.C., Sheriff
Leon Lott said today. Evonitz mentioned only scant details about that
killing, but it was enough to determine that he was not referring to
the slayings of three Spotsylvania County, Va., girls, Lott said.
"He was somebody who felt everything closing in on him. The secret was
out, the monster exposed," Lott said.
As Spotsylvania detectives await results of DNA and other scientific
tests to determine whether Evonitz killed Sofia Silva, 16, in
September 1996, and Kati Lisk, 12, and her sister, Kristin, 15, in May
1997, investigators are just now beginning to piece together the past
of this seemingly normal man -- a husband who was twice awarded the
Navy Good Conduct Medal during an eight-year service career -- to see
if he really was a lifelong predator who kept his crimes secret.
"We're going to do his whole life's tale," Lott said. "We'll take it
from the time he was born and go forward. It's going to be quite
extensive."
Lott declined to say what details have led him to believe that Evonitz
was not referring to the Lisk slayings when he talked to his sister.
The conversation took place before he killed himself after a police
chase in Florida. But inside Evonitz's apartment, detectives found a
Fredericksburg, Va., newspaper from the day after the Lisk abductions
and notes about the girls, along with directions to a location near
their home. They have not said whether they found similar evidence
about the Silva killing, but they have previously said that scientific
evidence links the two cases.
The pursuit of Evonitz began when the 15-year-old he kidnapped at
gunpoint managed to escape from handcuffs and slip out of his
apartment in Columbia on Tuesday morning.
Two Richland County deputies and one FBI agent formed a team today
that will work full time to reconstruct Evonitz's life. In
Spotsylvania, Maj. Howard Smith said the Lisk-Silva Task Force --
composed of FBI agents, state police and Spotsylvania and King George
County deputies -- has been doubled in size and also will try to learn
"everything this guy has done in the last 10 or 15 years."
They will interview friends, co-workers and relatives and track
Evonitz's frequent travels from state to state in a search for links
to similar unsolved crimes in those areas.
Most details that have emerged about Evonitz's life show a man who
attracted little attention and was liked and respected by colleagues.
Law enforcement officials said he was born and raised near Columbia
and attended Irmo High School before joining the Navy. Neighbors in
Columbia said he was friendly and quiet.
"From what we've been able to discern, there were no signals, no
signs," Lott said. "He was someone who just blends in."
One exception that investigators have focused on is Evonitz's 1988
conviction for exposing himself to a teenager and her toddler sister
in Florida. Police records in Clay County say he "confessed both
orally and written to his guilt."
"Suspect stated he has a problem with masturbating in front of girls,"
the report said. "When he feels the urge he drives around looking for
a girl 18-19 years old short in height and has brunette hair."
Officials said he has no other known criminal convictions.
Authorities said Evonitz has lived or traveled in California,
Virginia, Florida and Texas. In the past few years, he returned to
South Carolina and recently moved into a small garden apartment with
his 19-year-old wife. No one answered the door today, and Evonitz's
sister and mother have declined to comment.
But authorities and former co-workers said even those closest to
Evonitz had no indication that he might have been hiding something.
From all accounts, officials said, Evonitz exhibited no violent
behavior in childhood, and he got along well in the Navy and at work.
He was honorably discharged and received medals, including the Navy
Achievement Medal, which is given for leadership.
"He was just a normal person on the outside," Lott said. "No signs of
the monster."
Evonitz may have gone on in his life if not for the 15-year-old he
spotted as she was watering flowers in a friend's Lexington County
yard June 24. Authorities said Evonitz pulled up in his mother's green
Pontiac Firebird and offered to sell her some magazines. As she looked
at them, he forced her at gunpoint into a green plastic storage
container in the car's trunk.
Evonitz took the girl to his apartment, where they were alone because
his wife and mother were vacationing at Walt Disney World, and carried
the container inside. Lexington County Sheriff James R. Metts said
Evonitz tied the girl up and raped her. He forced her to watch the
evening news to see if there was a report of her kidnapping.
After an 18-hour ordeal, the girl heard Evonitz snoring and was able
to escape, authorities said. Two men she stopped in the parking lot
took her to a sheriff's station. "She was so, so alert," Metts said.
"She was able to give us information down to the exactness of what was
in the apartment."
Metts said the girl led detectives to the apartment and picked Evonitz
out of a photo array. Inside a lockbox in the apartment, they found
the hints to the Lisk killings.
Law enforcement officials spent three hours today searching the house
where Evonitz lived in Spotsylvania in 1996 and 1997, Smith said.
Other houses in the area where he lived will also be searched, he
said.
Smith said detectives found evidence in their South Carolina searches
that Evonitz was stalking other girls in Spotsylvania. Members of the
task force have tracked down some of the tag numbers he mentioned in
notes and will be interviewing their owners to see if anyone remembers
seeing him.
"Obviously, we're all anxious and want to solve this, but we're also
very cautious," Smith said. " . . . We're going to take our time. We
don't want to rush things. We don't know if this is our guy."
But he added, "This is the best lead we've had out of the 12,000 leads
to come out."
Staff writers Patricia Davis and Josh White and researcher Bobbye
Pratt in Washington contributed to this report.
Patty
> > Evonitz approached her posing as a magazine salesman and forced her at
> > gunpoint into a car. He took her to his St. Andrews apartment. She was
> > raped several times during the next 16 hours.
> >
> > The handcuffed girl escaped from unit 301 in the Crossroads Apartments
> > complex when Evonitz fell asleep.
> >
> > Evonitz had rigged a bed with two-by-fours and bolts connected to
> > handcuffs so he could restrain his victims, Lexington County Sheriff
> > James Metts said.
> >
> > Staff writers Kimathi Lewis, Bill Robinson, Carolina Bolado and the
> > Washington Post Web site contributed to this report.
>
> I wonder how the girl escaped with handcuffs on then. And didn't his wife
> wonder about all this stuff in the apt? She was only 19, I know. He could
> have told her anything I guess. And there were only married a few months
> IIRC.
>
> JC
I don't know if I posted the article or not, but one article said his
wife had
multiple sclerosis, I didn't know it struck people that young.
Here's more on the girl's escape.
From the Bradenton Herald:
As the girl looked at different magazines he pretended to be selling,
Evonitz grabbed her and put a gun to her neck. He forced her to the
car, shoved her into a green plastic container in the trunk and closed
the lid, she said. He carried her - still inside the container - into
his apartment and repeatedly raped her, she told police.
The teen loosened her restraints when she heard Evonitz snoring and
escaped at about 7:30 a.m. Tuesday, she told officials.
snip
Investigators did not know how long he has been in Columbia, S.C., but
said Evonitz approached three girls before choosing his victim.
The car he used in the abduction, which belonged to Evonitz's mother,
was recovered at her home in South Carolina.
Patty
> > Evonitz approached her posing as a magazine salesman and forced her at
> > gunpoint into a car. He took her to his St. Andrews apartment. She was
> > raped several times during the next 16 hours.
> >
> > The handcuffed girl escaped from unit 301 in the Crossroads Apartments
> > complex when Evonitz fell asleep.
> >
> > Evonitz had rigged a bed with two-by-fours and bolts connected to
> > handcuffs so he could restrain his victims, Lexington County Sheriff
> > James Metts said.
> >
> > Staff writers Kimathi Lewis, Bill Robinson, Carolina Bolado and the
> > Washington Post Web site contributed to this report.
>
> I wonder how the girl escaped with handcuffs on then. And didn't his wife
> wonder about all this stuff in the apt? She was only 19, I know. He could
> have told her anything I guess. And there were only married a few months
> IIRC.
>
> JC
From the Washington Times:
"There was no doubt that he would have killed her," said Sheriff Lott
about the South Carolina victim. "His wife and mother were on vacation
and returning Thursday. He took a vacation from work and kidnapped a
girl he intended to kill before they returned. She not only saved her
life but others' as well."
Mr. Evonitz was raised in Columbia and returned there in April with
his teenage wife, taking a job selling air conditioner purification
systems. His parents divorced, and his father moved to Arlington. His
mother and one sister live in South Carolina, and another sister lives
in Florida. He was convicted in 1988 for sexual offenses involving
minors and placed on probation.
Now police are also cross-checking Mr. Evonitz's movements with
murders in Georgia, Texas, Florida and other places he lived while in
the Navy or working as a traveling salesman.
"There is no doubt he is a serial killer," said Lexington County.
S.C., Sheriff James Metts, who is one of the lead investigators and a
trained criminal profiler who captured two other serial killers. "This
wasn't his first by any stretch of the imagination. There is a good
likelihood we will find more."
Sheriff Metts said Mr. Evonitz was able to avoid detection
because he was "smart and very organized." He also may have stopped
killing for a period because of events in his life, something the
sheriff said wasn't unusual among serial killers. However, he
cautioned, "you don't rehabilitate serial killers."
And as other serial killers, Mr. Evonitz was prone to keeping
trophies, he added, in the form of notes and newspaper articles
detailing women he may have stalked.
snip
Police say they have a long road ahead to reconstruct Mr. Evonitz's
life but are relieved by the turn of events even as they predicted he
would kill himself rather than be captured.
"He has been stopped," said Sheriff Lott. "We wanted to apprehend
him alive. But at least no other girls will ever have to be subjected
to this."
The Silva home was adorned with purple ribbons, which was Sofia's
favorite color, a high school friend, Theresa Lambert, said. A note
outside the home expressed the family's "need for privacy" and added
they would not comment.
Yesterday (July 1) would have been Sofia's 22nd birthday.