Police seeking information about man who married ‘Lady of the Dunes’ homicide victim

While investigators have recently revealed the identity for the victim of the longest unsolved homicide case in state history, the search for who killed “The Lady of the Dunes” is ongoing. State police announced Wednesday that they are seeking information about a man who they believe married the victim a short time before her death.

State Police are seeking public assistance to gather info about Guy Rockwell Muldavin, who they believe married Ruth Marie Terry several months before her naked body was found with her hands removed and her head partially severed on a Cape Cod beach in 1974.

According to MSP, Muldavin, who has died, was born on October 27, 1923 and was also known to go by Raoul Guy Rockwell and Guy Muldavin Rockwell. Additionally, police revealed that Terry was also known to use the names of Teri Marie Vizina, Terry M. Vizina and Teri Shannon.

The 48-year-old mystery came to an end on Monday after federal agents used investigative genealogy to identify Terry was the famous “Lady of the Dunes”. Terry, a Tennessee native, was 37-years-old when she was killed.

“This is, without a doubt, a major break in the investigation that will, hopefully, bring all of us closer to identifying her killer,” said Joseph Bonavolonta, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Boston field office said on Monday.

The long-unsolved case began on July 26, 1974, when a 13-year-old girl walking her dog along Race Point Beach at the Cape Cod National Seashore stumbled upon a gruesome sight.

Among the dunes, in a patch of scrub pine a mile east of the Race Point ranger station, was the naked, decomposing body of a woman. She was lying face down on a beach blanket, with her Wrangler jeans folded neatly and placed under her head like a pillow.

The woman, who had been dead for at least a week, had a large hole in her left temple where her skull had been crushed by a blunt object, FBI officials said. The killer had removed the woman’s hands, presumably so she could not be identified through fingerprints.

Her head was nearly severed from her body. According to Provincetown officials, the cutting weapon, which was never found, was believed to be a military entrenching tool or something similar.

“It was a brutal death, and for the last 48 years, investigators with the Massachusetts State Police and Provincetown Police Department have worked tirelessly to identify her through various means, including neighborhood canvasses; reviews of thousands of missing persons cases; clay model facial reconstruction, and age-regression drawings,” Bonavolonta said.

Terry’s body was exhumed in 2000, in an attempt to confirm her identity. It proved unsuccessful. In May 2010, a new composite was created using state of the art technology and computer analyses.

Terry was a daughter, sister, aunt, wife, and mother, Bonavolonta noted. Investigators have also determined that in addition to Tennessee, she had ties to California, Massachusetts, and Michigan.

Anyone with further information about Terry or Muldavin is urged to contact Massachusetts State Police at 1-800-Kapture or by email at MSPTips@pol.state.ma.us or by text message at 226787.

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