Wed 23 Jul 2008
Today’s episode: Part XI — The Secret of Rock Creek Park Unveiled:
The Gist — This chapter focuses on how the body of Chandra Levy was finally discovered a mere 386 days after her disappearance in a park that the police had already searched once before and found nothing. The body was finally discovered not by police but totally by chance by another visitor to the park. It was completely decomposed — only bones and articles of clothing remained — but enough evidence exists to declare it a murder. The various law enforcement agencies involved responded by continuing to do a half-assed job with the investigation while trying to dodge or shift the blame.
The Story Lede — “Shortly before 9:30 a.m. on May 22, 2002, Philip Douglas Palmer, a 42-year-old furniture maker, walked his dog down a steep ravine off the Western Ridge Trail in Rock Creek Park. Palmer had been hiking trails in the park for 30 years, and he was looking for items to add to his offbeat collection of deer antlers and animal bones.”
What I Didn’t Already Know About the Story — Philip Palmer is better at finding and preserving a crime scene than DC’s finest:
“Beneath the brush, he saw a bleached-out object that he thought was a turtle shell. He swept away some leaves, uncovering a human skull. Palmer marked the spot by hanging a blue leash and a sweatshirt on nearby branches and left to call 911.
The Big News From This Installment — This episode’s revelation is that even after the crime scene was discovered, investigators managed to screw up the investigation not once, but twice more. Two subsequent trips to the scene after the initial post-discovery sweep managed to turn up evidence that had been missed before:
“The discoveries highlighted long-standing problems within the understaffed and under-budgeted Mobile Crime Unit. Training was inconsistent, and equipment was lacking. Some technicians used their own money to buy markers, cotton swabs and evidence bags. [Chief Deputy Terrance] Gainer, the department’s second in command, acknowledged that his police force was not ‘forensically oriented.‘
Makes you feel safer, doesn’t it?
Also the evidence that is discovered plus the location of the scene threw the suspicion back on Ingmar Guandique, who had previously been ruled out by investigators and prosecutors. Kim Rossmo, director of research for the Police Foundation in Washington, said, hmm, there seems to be a connection here:
”Rossmo noted that around the time of Chandra’s disappearance, the Salvadoran immigrant lived on the outskirts of the park and attacked two women with a knife on isolated trails that traversed steep inclines. Such serial attacks were rare in the park, and they had stopped after Guandique was arrested.
“To Rossmo, statistically, behaviorally and geographically, Guandique looked like he might be their man.
Well, thank goodness for experts …
The Ironic Twist — There was so little left of Chandra by this point that it was hard to discover much of anything from the crime scene. The investigators were not able to determine the precise cause of death, for example, though strangulation appears to be the leading theory.
In a particularly gruesome note, one problem was that Chandra’s remains were scattered around a rather wide area. At first police suspected Palmer had moved some bones when he found the scene. They later realized that the animals in the park had done it:
“‘It appears that department technicians did not pass over the bone during the original search,” the [DC police press] release said. ‘There appears to be a greater likelihood that the bone was reintroduced into the area by wildlife.’
The Tabloid-y Goodness — We learn what it was like for the Levy’s when they were confronted with the fact that their daughter was truly gone from them:
“In Modesto, Calif., that morning, Robert and Susan Levy taped an interview in their living room for ‘The Oprah Winfrey Show,’ which was doing another segment on Chandra’s disappearance. Afterward, Susan crawled into Chandra’s bed because it always made her feel close to her daughter.
“Later that morning, the phone rang. D.C. police told her they had found the remains of a woman in Rock Creek Park. It could be Chandra. In the hallway of her home, Levy fell to the floor, sobbing so hard she could barely catch her breath.
The Story So Far –Part I: The Search of Rock Creek Park.
Part II: Chandra’s Forbidden Romance.
Part III: The Congressman’s Harem.
Part IV: The Living Horror of the Levys.
Part V: The Congressman’s Unhappy Constituents.
Part VI: Something Wicked in the Park.
Part VII: The Congressman and the Scent of Scandal.
Part VIII: The Wrong Man and the Art of Denial.
Part IX: The Congressman and the Horror of Prime-Time TV.
Part X: A Jailhouse Bird Sings.
Part XI: The Secret of Rock Creek Park Unveiled.
Tomorrow’s Chapter — The Exciting Conclusion!
