Thread: Cops Tried to Become Pen Pals With Chandra Levy Suspect

Cops Tried to Become Pen Pals With Chandra Levy Suspect
Updated: 8 hours 19 minutes ago
Hugh Collins
Contributor

AOL News (Oct. 15) -- Police seeking evidence in the slaying of federal government intern Chandra Levy wrote letters to their top suspect under a false name in the hope of extracting a confession, defense attorneys for the man said.

They argued that first-degree murder charges should be dropped against Ingmar Guandique because officers in Washington, D.C., wrote him several letters in the hope he would admit to killing Levy, The Washington Post said. Guandique was in prison on separate charges at the time.

The officers wrote under the alias "Maria Lopez" from 2004 to 2005, the defense said Thursday during a testy pretrial hearing. Guandique never responded to the letters, and it is not clear if he knew who was sending them.

Defense attorney Santha Sonenberg said police violated her client's rights because they contacted him without going through his lawyers.

"This goes to the antics, the shenanigans, the lengths to which they've gone to prosecute Mr. Guandique," Sonenberg said, according to The Miami Herald.

"Clearly the case was not sufficiently strong in the government's mind as to Mr. Guandique," Sonenberg said, according to The Associated Press.

Prosecutors argued that there was nothing wrong with their tactics.

Sonenberg "may not like it, but that doesn't mean it's improper or unethical," Assistant U.S. Attorney Fernando Campoamor-Sanchez said.

D.C. Superior Court Judge Gerald I. Fisher refused to dismiss the charges.

"This case is going forward to trial," the judge said.

Levy, 24, from Modesto, Calif., had just completed an internship at the Federal Bureau of Prisons in Washington when she disappeared May 1, 2001. Her skeletal remains were found a year later in the District of Columbia's Rock Creek Park.

The case drew national attention because during the course of the investigation it was revealed that she had been having an affair with a married congressman. Gary Condit, a Democrat from California, was never charged in the case, but the scandal ruined his political career.

Guandique, an illegal immigrant from El Salvador, came to authorities' attention because he was convicted of attacking two women in 2001 in Rock Creek Park. He was serving time in a federal prison for those attacks when he received the letters.

At least two witnesses told police that Guandique had told them about killing a girl in the park, The Associated Press reported.

Guandique was charged in 2009 with Levy's murder. He has pleaded not guilty.

www.aolnews.com

That's right! It's not unconstitutional for cops to lie to you. Sounds like a level playing field to me, since criminals lie to the cops.

Dixie