Chandra Levy case unsolved 25 years later, detective says search failed
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Twenty-five years after the disappearance of Washington intern Chandra Levy, the high-profile case remains unsolved and questions still haunt her about whether early missteps allowed a suspected killer to escape.
The case received national attention in 2001 with intense media coverage and scrutiny of Levy’s relationship with a sitting congressman. But the prime suspect turned out to be an illegal immigrant who was twice convicted of attacking other women at the time of Levy’s suspected murder and in the same park, according to federal prosecutors.
Ted Williams, a former Washington D.C. homicide detective and Fox News contributor who has followed the case for decades, said authorities did not thoroughly search Rock Creek Park early on, delaying the discovery of Levy’s remains and potentially weakening the case that relied heavily on circumstantial evidence.
Fox News Digital has reached out to city police for comment.
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A Washington Metropolitan Police Officer stands behind police lines at Rock Creek Park in Washington, May 22, 2002. A skull and other human bones were found in the park and were later identified as that of 24-year-old former intern Chandra Levy, who disappeared in May 2001. (REUTERS/William Philpott WP/HB)
Levy’s skeletal remains were found in a remote area of the park in May 2002, just a year after her disappearance.
“They did a grid search of parts of Rock Creek Park, but they never got down to the valley where Chandra Levy’s remains were found,” he told Fox News Digital. “And the only way these remains would have been discovered was if a man walking his dog came across the remains. If that doesn’t happen, we may still be looking for Chandra Levy.”
Had a more thorough search been conducted earlier in the investigation, investigators might have uncovered physical evidence linking the suspect to the crime, Williams said.
“Twenty-five years later, we are still left with a question mark about who killed Chandra Levy because of the way they conducted the investigation and their reckless behavior,” he said.
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Chandra Levy is seen in this undated photo from the Washington DC Metropolitan Police Department. (REUTERS/Metropolitan Police Department/Statement)
Levy, a California native, was a 24-year-old intern with the Federal Bureau of Prisons. He was last seen in public at a gym near his apartment in Washington, D.C., on April 30, 2001. Investigators tracked his internet usage the next morning and showed he was still alive at 1pm on May 1.
This photo shows missing Washington intern Chandra Levy. (Mai/Getty Images)
On May 6, his parents called D.C. police and members of then-Congress. Gary Condit, a California Democrat who was later alleged to have had an affair with the missing woman.
This incident ended Condit’s political career and led to him losing his district’s Democratic primary in 2002. Attempts to reach him for comment were unsuccessful.
“I don’t think the congressman really had anything to do with her disappearance,” Williams said.
Then-U.S. Congressman Gary Condit (D-CA) left the media behind after leaving his apartment in the Adams Morgan section of Washington on July 12, 2001. Condit admitted to police authorities that he was romantically involved with Chandra Levy before she disappeared. (Reuters)
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But Williams said the convention tie likely sparked a scandal that distracted investigators.
“It appears that because he was a member of Congress, law enforcement officials were afraid of his status and couldn’t get much information from him,” he said.
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Police later cleared him as a suspect and refocused on another man.
In April 2009, they arrested an illegal immigrant from El Salvador named Ingmar Guandique, also known as Ingmar Guandique-Blanco, who was attacking other women in Rock Creek Park around the time Levy was killed.
An undated photo provided by Immigration and Customs Enforcement shows Ingmar Guandique in federal custody. The alleged MS-13 member was deported to El Salvador when prosecutors refused to bring him to court for a retrial in the murder of Chandra Levy. (ICE)
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Guandique, identified by the government as a member of MS-13, was accused of following a woman in the park the day Levy disappeared. That year, he was convicted of attacking two more women with a knife in the park, one on May 14, two weeks after Levy’s murder, and the other on July 1.
He spent ten years in prison for knife attacks. Jurors later found him guilty of Levy’s murder after a 2010 trial, thanks in part to testimony from a fellow inmate who recounted a prison confession.
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ICE released this image of a deportation flight preparing to take off, along with an announcement that Ingmar Guandique was deported to El Salvador after prosecutors dismissed the case against him for the murder of Chandra Levy. (ICE)
But his lawyers persuaded the judge to order a new trial in 2016 due to concerns about the witness’s credibility.
In a surprise in the courtroom, prosecutors decided to dismiss the case due to “unforeseen developments” rather than try him a second time. So the case was dropped and Immigration and Customs Enforcement sent him back to El Salvador.
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“Maybe they deported a murderer instead of trying him a second time,” Williams said. “That too is a mystery.”
Although he still believes Guandique is a key suspect, the case remains officially unsolved after 25 years.
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“I am very clear that the family will never get over the death of this promising young girl who came to Washington as an intern,” Williams said.
Fox News’ Stephanie Nolasco and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
