Chandra Ann Levy (April 14, 1977 - c. May 1, 2001) was an American apprentice at the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Washington, DC, who disappeared in May 2001. He was assassinated after his bones were found at Rock Creek Park in May 2002. This case attracted the attention of the American news media for several years.
Due to miscommunication, the Metropolitan District Police Department of Columbia (MPD) failed to follow its own search parameters at Rock Creek Park, leaving Levy's body to rot for a year. Furthermore, the MPD has been notified, but immediately rejected the information, that Ingmar Guandique, who had been arrested for attacking a woman in Rock Creek Park, had admitted to attacking Levy. MPD instead put a lot of focus on the revelation that Levy had an affair with Congressman Gary Condit, a married Democrat then serving his fifth term representing California's 18th congress district, and a senior member of the Permanent Committee Select House on Intelligence. Condit had a remarkable alibi (he was in a meeting with the Vice President), never referred to as a suspect by the police, and ultimately relieved of involvement in disappearance. However, due to a cloud of suspicion aroused by an intense media focus on the lost intern and subsequent revelations of the event, Condit lost his bid to be re-elected in 2002.
Following a series of investigative reports by the Washington Post in 2008, the MPD followed up and finally obtained a warrant, on March 3, 2009, to arrest Ingmar Guandique, illegal immigrants from El Salvador identified and dismissed. by MPDC eight years earlier. He has been convicted of attacking two other women at Rock Creek Park around the time of Levy's disappearance and is still in jail for their conviction when an arrest warrant for Levy's death was issued. Prosecutors allege that Guandique has invaded and bound Levy in a remote area of ​​the park and let him die of dehydration or exposure. In November 2010, Guandique was convicted of killing Levy; he was sentenced in February 2011 to 60 years in prison. However, in June 2015, Guandique was given a new court. On July 28, 2016, prosecutors announced that they would not continue the case against Guandique and would, instead, attempt to deport him.
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The levy was born in Cleveland, Ohio, to Robert and Susan Levy; his family moved to Modesto, California, where he attended Grace M. Davis Middle School. Her parents are members of the Congregation of Beth Shalom, a conservative Jewish synagogue. He attended San Francisco State University, where he earned a degree in journalism. After an apprenticeship at the California Bureau of Secondary Education and working in Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan's office, he began studying at the University of Southern California for a master's degree in public administration.
As part of his final semester of study, Levy moved to Washington, D.C., to a paid internship with the Federal Bureau of Corrections. In October 2000 he started his apprenticeship at the headquarters of the bureau, where he was assigned to the public affairs division. His boss, a spokesman for the Dan Dunne bureau, was impressed with Levy's work, especially his handling of media questions about the impending Timothy McVeigh execution, convicted of bombing the Oklahoma City Federal Building. Levy's mansion suddenly ended in April 2001 because his academic eligibility was found to have expired in December 2000. He has completed the requirements of his master's degree and is scheduled to return to California in May 2001 for graduation.
Maps Chandra Levy
Murder case
Disappearance and search
Levy was last seen on May 1, 2001. The Columbia District Metropolitan Police Department was first notified on May 6, when Levy's parents called from Modesto to report that they had not heard from their daughter in five days. Police called the hospital and visited Levy's apartment in Dupont Circle that day, found no indication of fraud. On May 7, Levy's father told police that his daughter had an affair with a US congressman, and said the next day that he believed the congressman would become United States Representative, Gary Condit. Aunt Levy also called the police and told them Chandra had told her about the affair. Police obtained a warrant on May 10 to conduct an official search for Levy's apartment. Researchers found credit cards, identification and cell phones left in his bag, along with a partially packed suitcase. The answering machine is full, with messages left by his relatives and two from Condit. A police sergeant tried to check Levy's laptop computer and accidentally destroyed internet search data, because he was not a trained technician.
Computer experts took a month to reconstruct data to determine that the laptop was used on the morning of May 1st to search for websites related to Amtrak, Baskin-Robbins, Condit, Southwest Airlines, and weather reports from The Washington Post His final search at 12: 59 pm was for Alsace-Lorraine, a province in France. A specific search at 11:33 am is for information on Rock Creek Park on The Washington Post Entertainment Guide, then at 11:34 he clicks on a link to bring up a park map. The detective then theorized that he might have met someone at Pierce-Klingle Mansion who became the headquarters of the park headquarters. On July 25, 2001, three police sergeants D.C and 28 police cadets searched along Glover Road in the park but failed to find any evidence related to Levy. Later, the second attempt did not find anything.
Levy's parents and friends held numerous vigil and news conferences in an attempt to "bring Chandra home".
Relationship with Condit
The controversy surrounding Levy's loss attracted the attention of the American news media. Condit, a married man representing the congressional district where the Levy family lived, initially denied that he was having an affair with him. Although the police claimed that the Condit was not a suspect, Levy's family said they felt Condit was being evasive and might be hiding information about the issue.
Unidentified police sources alleged that Condit had admitted to having an affair with Levy during an interview with law enforcement officers on July 7, 2001. Condit described him as a vegetarian who avoids drinking and smoking. He thinks that Levy will return to Washington, D.C. after his graduation and was surprised to learn that his apartment lease has ended. Investigators searched Condit's apartment on July 10. They questioned the stewardess Anne Marie Smith, who claims that Condit told her that she did not need to talk to the Federal Bureau of Investigation about her personal life. Federal officials began to investigate Condit for possible obstruction of justice, since Smith was also involved in an affair with him. (He does not know Levy.) Upset with leaks to the media, Condit refuses to submit polygraph tests by police D.C.; his lawyers confirmed that Condit passed a test run by a privately hired inspector on July 13. He avoided answering questions directly during a television interview on August 23, with newscaster Connie Chung on ABC News program PrimeTime Thursday. Intensive coverage continued until news of the September 11 attacks replaced media coverage of the Levy case.
In a national Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll of 900 registered voters made in July 2001, 44 percent of Americans thought that Condit was involved in Levy's disappearance and 27 percent felt he should resign. Fifty-one percent of respondents believe that he acts as if he is guilty; 13 percent felt that he had to run again for the office. The poll samples taken from the Condit congress district have a better view of Condit. On March 5, 2002, Condit lost the Democratic primary election to his seat of Congress to his former aide, who later became a member of the Assembly Dennis Cardoza, with Levy controversy cited as contributing factors. He was called in to appear on April 1, 2002, before a District of Columbia judge investigates the disappearance. The secret kept date is heavily guarded to avoid any further leakage. Condit left Congress at the end of his term on January 3, 2003.
Discovery remains
On May 22, 2002, at about 9:30 am, the skeletal remains corresponding to Levy's dental records were found by a man walking with his dog and looking for a turtle at Rock Creek Park, near Broad Branch Creek. Detectives found bones and personal belongings scattered, but not buried, in wooded areas along steep slopes. Sports bra, sweat shirts, leggings, and tennis shoes are one of the found evidences. Although the police had previously searched for more than half of the main part of the park area of ​​1,754 acres (2.74 mi 2 , 7.10 km 2 ), the wooded slopes where the remnants of Levy finally found that has never been searched. The police commander ordered the search perimeter to 100 meters from every street and trail but the miscommunication the officers did was only looking within 100 meters of each street. The remains are found about four miles (6 km) from Levy's apartment.
After the initial autopsy was done, Columbia District police announced that there was enough evidence to open a murder investigation. On May 28, medical examiner Jonathan C. Arden officially declared Levy's death as a murder, but said, "It's less work here than I want, maybe we'll never know specifically how he died." Arden finds damage to his hyoid bone, indicating the possibility of strangulation, but does not regard it as conclusive evidence of the cause of death. On June 6, after police completed their search, private investigators hired by Levy found his shins with some twisted wires about 25 yards (23 m) away from the rest. Police chief Ramsey said, "It is unacceptable that these items are not found."
Warning service
On May 28, 2002, the Levy family held a memorial service at the Modesto Center Plaza which attracted over 1,200 people, some from as far as Los Angeles. Speakers at a 90 minute ceremony include Levy's brothers, grandmothers, aunts and friends. In a speech delivered in Hebrew and English by Rabbi Paul Gordon, Levy is described as "a good man who is taken from us too soon". About a year later, on May 27, 2003, Levy's remains were buried at Lakewood Memorial Park Cemetery in Hughson, California, near his hometown of Modesto. Attended by about 40 friends and members of the Levy family, the private ceremony concluded with the release of 12 white pigeons.
Identify main suspect
In September 2001, D.C police and federal prosecutors were contacted by an informant lawyer, who was detained in D.C prison, claiming to have knowledge of Levy's killers. The informant, whose identity is protected for his safety, said that Ingmar Guandique, a 20-year-old immigrant from El Salvador was also held in jail, telling him that Condit paid him $ 25,000 to kill Levy. Investigators â € <â € Guandique denies attacking Levy. On November 28, the FBI told his informants to take a polygraph test, which failed. The polygraph test on Guandique, held on February 4, 2002, returned an unconvincing result that was officially considered "not cheating". Since neither the informant nor Guandique is fluent in English, the D.C. Jack Barrett said that he would prefer a polygraph test that had been given by bilingual testers, which was not available at the time. When Judge Noel Anketell Kramer was asked about the possibility of Guandique's link with Levy's murder, he replied, "It's a satellite problem. To me it has nothing to do with the case." Kramer sentenced Guandique to 10 years in prison for his attack on two other women at Rock Creek Park. Guandique was sent to US Prison, Big Sandy near Inez, Kentucky, and then transferred to the US Penitentiary in Victorville, California. Retribution killings remained listed as "cold cases" until 2006, when Cathy L. Lanier replaced Ramsey as police chief of D.C. Lanier replaces the lead detective in the case with three veteran investigators who have more murder experiences. In 2007, the editor of The Washington Post commissioned a team of new reporters to take a year to re-examine Levy's case. The series of articles produced, published during the summer of 2008, focus on past police failures to fully investigate Guandique's relationship with the attacks on Rock Creek Park. In September 2008, investigators searched Gualdque's federal prison cell in California and found a photo of the Retribution he had kept from a magazine. Police interviewed Guandique acquaintances and witnesses to other Rock Creek Park incidents. On March 3, 2009, the Columbia District High Court issued an arrest warrant for Guandique. He was returned to custody of the District of Columbia Department of Corrections on April 20 through the Federal Transfer Center in Oklahoma City. Two days later, Guandique was indicted on D.C. with Levy's murder. He was charged by a grand jury for six counts: kidnapping, first-degree murder committed during the kidnapping, first-degree sexual violence experiments, first-degree murder committed during sexual offenses, robbery trials, and first-degree murder committed during robberies. Guandique pleaded not guilty to his indictment, in which the date of the hearing was originally set for January 27, 2010. His lawyers argue that Guandique's federal jail cell is outside the court-ordered jurisdiction of the court. After errors in processing were contaminated some evidence collected with DNA from the prosecutor's employees, the start date of the trial at H. Carl Moultrie Courthouse was moved to October 4, 2010. Guandique Trial
On October 18, 2010, jury selection began in Columbia District High Court before Judge Gerald I. Fisher. Assistant US Attorney Fernando Campoamor-Sanchez presented the names of potential witnesses to the trial, including FBI agent Brad Garrett and two women who Guandique was convicted of assault. At the start of the trial, prosecution cases are expected to take about four weeks and the defense is expected to take a day. On October 25 and 26, Halle Shilling and Christy Wiegand testified about being attacked by Guandique while independently jogging at Rock Creek Park. Wiegand recounts that Guandique caught him from behind, dragging him to a cliff and holding a knife in his face.
On October 26, 2010, his 64-year-old father, Robert, took the stand and refuted a statement about his suspicion of Condit in the past. Robert Levy testified that he alerted authorities during the initial years of investigation that his daughter, Chandra, would be too careful to jog in the woods alone, but said that he no longer believed this to be true. He said that he also told police that his daughter and Condit had a five year plan between them to marry. In retrospect, Robert Levy admits: "I just say whatever comes to mind just to show him as a villain." Levy added that he believes that Condit is "guilty until we learn about this character here," referring to Guandique. On November 1, Condit testified at the trial and was asked at least three times if he and Chandra Levy were involved in a sexual relationship. He replied, "I will not respond to that question from privacy for myself and Chandra." FBI biologist Alan Giusti testified that the semen found in lingerie from Levy's apartment contains sperm that matches the Condit DNA profile.
Prosecuting witness Armando Morales, who shared the cell with Guandique at the US Penitentiary in Kentucky, testified that Guandique was concerned about being transferred between prisons in 2006 over the violence of detainees against suspected rapists. Morales stated that Guandique, a fellow member of the Mara Salvatrucha gang, confessed to him that he had killed Levy while trying to rob him, but said that he had not raped her. Prosecutors rest their case on Nov. 10, while dropping two of six charges against Guandique: sexual assault and murder related to the attack. On November 15, the plea handed over his case without calling Guandique to the stands. The other prison witnesses summoned by the defectors disputed Morales's testimony. Jose Manuel Alaniz said that Guandique did not mention rape or murder while sharing a cell with Alaniz and Morales in prison in Kentucky. Alaniz admitted under cross-examination that he "did not want to be too nosy" and often fell asleep in prison while recuperating from gunshot wounds. The prosecutor dropped two more charges because the statute of limitations has passed: kidnapping and attempted robbery. During the closing debate over the alleged first-degree murder committed during the kidnapping and during the robbery, prosecutor Amanda Haines argued that Guandique tied and gagged Levy after attacking her, leaving her dead due to dehydration or exposure in the park. Defense lawyer Santha Sonenberg responded with a lack of DNA evidence linking Guandique to the scene. Calling the case of the "fictional" prosecutor, Sonenberg suggested that Levy had been murdered elsewhere, with his corpse dumped in the park.
The jury started deliberation on 17 November 2010. The hearing process was scheduled due to a delay due to increased security at the courthouse. After two days of consideration, all but one judge has chosen to punish Guandique. On the third day, the jury asked Judge Gerald Fisher to clarify the definition of the attack. Fisher replied that any physical injury could legally be regarded as an attack, regardless of how small it is. On November 22, 2010, the jury found Guandique guilty of both the first remaining murders. After the trial, a jury said Morales' testimony was crucial in reaching the verdict. This belief is called a "miracle" because it has been achieved only with indirect evidence. Gladys Weatherspoon, who previously represented Guandique in the 2001 attack cases, stated that he was distracted by the jury verdict: "I just thought they were going to punish him.... They feel bad for that woman, his mother, he sits there every day. "At a post-court press conference, Susan Levy said," There will always be feelings of sadness, I can certainly tell you, it's not closed. " Since the conclusion of the trial, Susan Levy has acted to keep photographic evidence of her remaining sealed daughter from the news media.
Punishment and appeal
On February 1, 2011, Guandique's lawyer requested a new trial on the grounds that the verdict was improperly reached. The 17 page submission claims that the prosecutor has filed an appeal to the jury's emotions, using "reference to facts not in evidence". The motion also alleges that a jury, who did not record, violated the judge's instructions not to be "influenced by other jury records". The prosecution opposed the re-trial, arguing that the issue of the record was nothing more than technical which did not have a significant impact on the verdict.
Guandique faces a minimum sentence of 30 years for life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. In seeking maximum punishment, the prosecutor stated that Guandique "can not control himself and thus, will always remain a danger to women". A memo filed by the prosecutor in February 2011 cited Guandique's abuse of female staff in the prison, including asking a nurse and masturbating in front of the guard. Assistant US Attorney Fernando Campoamor-Sanchez revealed that he had traveled to El Salvador with a detective to investigate allegations that Guandique had escaped from his home country for alleged attacks on local women beginning in 1999. During a conviction hearing on February 11, Guandique say. to the Levy family, "I'm sorry for what happened to your daughter", and insisted she was innocent. Before Judge Gerald Fisher reminded Susan Levy to speak in court rather than the defendant, Levy said to him, "Do you really take his life? Look at my eyes and tell me." Fisher denied Guandique's actions to retrial and sentenced him to 60 years in prison, stating that Guandique "will be a danger for some time." He is a sexual predator.
Guandique repeated his innocence during his sentence. He has maintained his innocence in the years since the trial.
On February 25, 2011, public defender James Klein appealed Guandique's conviction with the District Court of Appeal Court of Columbia. According to the court's annual report, appeals require an average of 588 days to reach a resolution. In December 2012 and January 2013, a set of secret checks is announced to the public, but the subject of the meeting is sealed by a judge. After the third trial in February, the judge in a transcript case that was not closed from the previous hearing revealed that Klein was seeking a new court based on new evidence in this case. The fourth trial is scheduled for April 2013.
Lowered charge
On May 22, 2015, prosecutors rejected their opposition to a new trial. This was largely due to a defense claim that witnesses of the prosecutor's star, Armando Morales, had sworn to himself in the pulpit. The defense argued that prosecutors failed to disclose that Morales was a prison informant with a reputation for being unreliable. Morales has denied ever being an informant. The defense also argues that Morales made Guandique's admission to increase his stake with prosecutors. On June 3, 2015, the defense said a new witness, a neighbor, called 911 at 4:37 am on the last day, Levy alive to report hearing 'blood-thickening screams', possibly coming from Levy's apartment. On June 4, 2015, Judge Gerald Fisher gave a motion for a new trial. On June 12, 2015, Judge Robert E. Morin set up a Guandique re-trial for March 1, 2016 but in March, the date of the trial was moved to October 11, 2016.
In November 2015, the prosecutor told the court judge D.C. that their office failed to submit documents to the defense before the first trial of the defendant. In December 2015, defense lawyers argued in a new court filing that the indictment should be dismissed because of a prosecution mistake.
On July 28, 2016, prosecutors announced that they would not continue the case against Guandique and would, instead, attempt to deport him. According to The Washington Post, prosecutors lost confidence in the case after learning that Morales, now living in Maryland, secretly recorded claiming to be lying in the witness chair during the 2010 trial. Babs Proller, the woman who made the recording, hand it over to the police. The US Attorney's Office only states that based on new information revealed during the previous week, there is not enough evidence to go forward with retrial.
Media coverage
The loss of Chandra Levy became a national topic of the news media in the summer of 2001, with 63 percent of Americans following the case. Media flooded Levy's parents since they decided to go to Washington, D.C., to search for their daughter. According to Condit, there were about a hundred journalists camped in front of his apartment on the morning of September 11, 2001, but they all left after news spread about the terrorist attacks that day in New York and Washington. Media critics and cable news executives cited Levy's case, as well as the simultaneous sensational coverage of a series of shark attacks, as a reflection of the way news coverage in the United States before the September 11 attacks became a priority.
In 2002, the newspaper D.C. Roll Call first reported the possibility of Ingmar Guandique's relationship with the case, with little effect on the news media's focus on Condit. Conservative commentator Michelle Malkin notes the lack of headlines that an illegal immigrant has been questioned in Levy's case. He said that in his review of 115 news from the Lexis-Nexis database, none of the Guandique references refers to his status as an "illegal criminal". He calls the "blatant negligence" of his status "the act of negligence that is newsworthy". He writes that only the very conservative Human Events are reporting that the Immigration and Naturalization Service has approved its work legally while proposing a temporary protection status. The application was eventually denied, but not before he attacked two other women at Rock Creek Park.
In 2005, investigative journalist Dominick Dunne told Larry King Live that he believes Gary Condit knows more information about Levy's case than he discloses. Condit filed two lawsuits against Dunne, forcing him into an undisclosed financial settlement on one of them. In 2008, US District Judge Peter Leisure dismissed another allegedly slanderous lawsuit, for "The context in which Dunne's statement was made suggests that they are part of a discussion of 'speculation' in the media and inaccurate media coverage."
During the summer of 2008, The Washington Post ran 13 parts of the billed series, in part, as "a tabloid story and mainstream press journalism that helped thwart the investigation". The two investigative journalists behind the Post series, Scott Higham and Sari Horwitz, wrote a book detailing their investigation. The book, Finding Chandra , was published in May 2010. Commentators, including The Robert Post reporter Metro Pierre Pierre, wrote that the emphasis on victims of glamorous white killings, when " about 200 people die in this city every year, most of them black and men ", is" totally unreasonable and dare I say, racist, in essence ".
The media was criticized for "hasty judging" in suggesting, sometimes blatantly, that Condit was guilty of the killing, especially in the early days of the investigation. Some reporters who camped in front of Condit's apartment house in Washington were quoted as saying that they would remain there "until he resigned". When Ingmar Guandique was convicted in November 2010 for killing Levy, Condit's lawyer Bert Fields said, "This is a complete justification but it is a little late. Who gave him his career back?"
Impact
Levy's death has a lasting impact, partly because of the efforts of his family and friends. The disappearance of Levy occurred after a number of other high profile cases leading to the creation of resources for lost young adults. For example, Levy's parents quickly requested assistance to Karangan Praise Foundation Carole Sund/Carrington, a nonprofit group founded in Modesto after three female climbers disappeared from a 1999 trip to Yosemite National Park and were later found murdered. The foundation, which offers Levy staff support and contributes to cash prizes for information about Chandra's disappearance, is incorporated into the Drawer & amp; Conner Search and Rescue Fund in 2009; Susan Levy had previously participated in the effort to find Laci Peterson, another missing woman from Modesto. In 1997, when Christian Modafferi mysteriously disappeared from the San Francisco Bay Area just three weeks after his 18th birthday, his parents turned to their congressman for help in order that they were not eligible to receive from the National Center for the Prodigal Son and Yang Exploited. As a result, Congress enacted a "Christian Law" in October 2000, which established the National Missing Center for Adults (NCMAs) within the US Department of Justice to coordinate cases of missing persons. By the time Levy disappears, the institutions are in place to give his family support and to help nationwide search to find him. Although Levy's family moved quickly to mobilize all available resources, including offering cash rewards for information, hiring their own investigators, and seeking media attention, attempts to locate Chandra Levy or find his killer overshadowed by speculation about his possible relationship with Condit. Susan Levy later joined Donna Raley, the mother of another young woman who disappeared in 1999 from Modesto, to form "Wings of Protection", a support group for people who lost loved ones. Company Mary Ann Liebert, publisher of the Journal of Women's Health and Gender-Based Medicine, awarded their May 2002 annual Criteria to Susan Levy for her work with "Wings of Protection".
Newsweek magazine stated that the media may become more skeptical of the "herd mentality" and open to alternative suspects after Levy's case. Police D.C. claiming that they would find Levy's body early, if not for miscommunication regarding the scope of the search. The commander had ordered a search within 100 meters (91 m) of each trail and trail in Rock Creek Park, but the search was focused only within 100 meters of the road, so the remaining body was not found for a longer period of time. Both Detective Chief Jack Barrett and Chief of Police, Charles H. Ramsey, have since left troops at D.C. Ramsey became head of the Philadelphia Police Department; Barrett, who became an analyst for an intelligence support company in Arlington, Virginia, stated behind that the media had imposed "huge pressure" on police D.C. Morales, who served his time for a conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and crack cocaine, is scheduled to be released on August 5, 2016. Condit retired from politics and moved with his wife to Phoenix, Arizona, to manage real estate and open two Baskin-Robbins franchises, closed.
See also
- Crimes in Washington, D.C.
- List of people who mysteriously disappear
- Unsolved death list
References
Further reading
- Daugherty, Ralph (2004). Murder on the Horse Path: The Removal of Chandra Levy . Lincoln, Nebraska: iUniverse. ISBN 978-0-595-31847-6. OCLCÃ, 57542114. < span> Ã,
- Higham, Scott; Horwitz, Sari (2010). Looking for Chandra: A True Washington Murder Mystery . New York City: Scribner. ISBN 978-1-4391-3867-0. OCLCÃ, 430842090.
External links
- Chandra Levy in the Search of the Mausoleum
- Chandra Levy's murder case at truTV
- Chandra Levy case chronology (2000-2002) at ABC News
- Chandra Levy case chronology (2000-2010) at The Washington Post
- Murder investigation - Chandra Ann Levy at Wayback Machine (archived August 2, 2008) by Metropolitan Police Department D.C. (mirrored by Internet Archive)
- United States v. Ingmar Guandique documents in the District of Columbia High Court
- "Who Kills Chandra Levy?", the 13th part series of The Washington Post
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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