ROANOKE TIMES 
                      Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times

DATE: Tuesday, June 4, 1996                  TAG: 9606040060
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL   PAGE: A-1  EDITION: METRO 
DATELINE: LURAY
SOURCE: From The Associated Press and The Washington Post 

FBI PROBES HIKER DEATHS NEAR LURAY NOTE: BELOW

The deaths of two women found off a Shenandoah National Park back-country trail are being investigated as homicides by the FBI and the National Park Service.

``It's a joint investigation, and we're looking at this as a homicide,'' Ron Fankhauser of the park service said Monday.

He said the bodies were found Saturday near the Skyland Lodge at the northern end of the park near the Appalachian Trail.

The victims were Julianne Williams, 24, of St. Cloud, Minn., and Lollie Winans, 26, of Unity, Maine, a law enforcement official close to the investigation said Monday night.

``It's clear this is a homicide,'' said Robert Marriott, a National Park Service law enforcement official in Washington. The women were not shot or stabbed, he said.

``These two individuals had not returned home Friday, when they were expected,'' FBI agent Stanley Klein said at a news conference in Big Meadows campgrounds.

Paul Pfenninger, another park service spokesman, said a search was begun Friday after Williams' father reported her late from returning from a trip to the park.

Both victims were affiliated with Woodswomen Inc., a Minneapolis-based group that provides outdoor adventure and education programs for women, said Denise Mitten, the group's executive director.

Klein said two rangers searching for the women found the bodies.

Police matched a camping plan the two women filed with a missing person report, Klein said.

Fankhauser said the park was sending extra rangers into the back country to contact hikers and let them know what had happened.

``We're preparing something on general safety for those people using the back country,'' he said.

Six years ago, two people were killed on the Appalachian Trial near Duncannon, Pa. In 1981, two hikers were killed on the Appalachian Trail in Giles County.

LENGTH: Short :   49 lines
KEYWORDS: FATALITY