The search continues for one of the most wanted men in America—William Bradford Bishop—who FBI agents say bludgeoned five family members to death in their Bethesda home and then lit their bodies on fire in a shallow grave in rural North Carolina in 1976.
Since the massacre, authorities have found no trace of Bishop, who would now be 79. At the time of the killings, he was working as a Foreign Service officer for the federal government. He is said to be fluent in four languages.
On Friday, the FBI announced it had followed up on more than 480 leads about Bishop in the last year. Those leads resulted in the testing of the DNA of a “loner” whose body turned up dead off the cost of Mexico; exhuming and testing the DNA of a body in Alabama; and even the arrest of a different fugitive.
Agents responded to a tip in December about a man living in Mexico who resembled Bishop only to later find out the 81-year-old man was actually a different fugitive—Robert Anton Woodring, who was wanted in Florida for failing to show up to jail on fraud charges from 1977. Woodring was arrested and extradited to Florida.
The FBI uses DNA from a cigarette butt left at the North Carolina crime scene to determine if the possible suspects are Bishop. The cigarette was left at the scene where investigators believe Bishop burned the bodies of his family members, including his wife, Annette, 37, his mother, Lobelia, 68, and his sons William, 14, Brenton, 10, and Geoffrey, 5.
When Bishop was last seen in 1976 he was 6-foot-1 inches tall, 180 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes. Last year, the FBI released new composite images—with silver hair and wrinkles—showing what Bishop may look like today.
In the past year, the FBI says it discovered through witness interviews that Bishop engaged in multiple affairs prior to killing his wife, something the agency said it had not previously known.
Bishop lookalikes have been spotted in bars, truck stops, grocery stores and even a bridge club, according to the FBI.
“The incredible amount of information we’ve received from the public has been great for this investigation,” Steve Vogt, the special agent in charge of the FBI Baltimore Division, said in a statement. “We can’t stress enough that the calls and emails from the public will eventually lead us to finding Bishop and solving this tragic case. We need people to keep giving us those tips.”
Police are offering up to $100,000 for information leading to Bishop’s arrest. He has been listed on the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted fugitive list since April 2014. Anyone with information can call the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI.
