CRIMENETDAILY
Chandra Levy killed by illegal alien?
Jail informant tells police Salvadoran murdered intern for $25,000
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Posted: July 24, 2008
12:00 am Eastern
© 2008 WorldNetDaily
Federal Bureau of Prisons intern Chandra Levy
Seven years after Chandra Levy's remains were found in a Washington, D.C., park, a year-long investigation by the Washington Post offers evidence the congressional intern was murdered by an illegal alien.
As suspicion mounted that Levy's boss, Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calif., might be involved in her disappearance, the case became front-page news in the summer of 2001. But with the Sept. 11 attacks, law enforcement personnel in the capital quickly turned their attention to the the nation's security, and Levy's case became a distant memory for the public.
But the Post says that as authorities searched for Levy in Rock Creek Park they overlooked the July 2 confession of an illegal alien who had attacked two other women in the park.
Ingmar Guandique, 20, an illegal alien from El Salvador, was not questioned until after a jail informant told police in mid-September Guandique admitted to murdering Levy.
Guandique was taken to the U.S. attorney's office in Washington Sept. 21, where he was interrogated by police and prosecutors and given pictures of Levy. The Salvadoran said he had never seen her, except on television.
However, a Park Police detective, Joe Green, told the Post he showed Guandique a picture of Levy, and the illegal alien admitted he had seen her. According to the report, Green did not remember giving the information to police.
"I should have said something," Green later told the paper.
An informant comes forward
On Oct. 19, 2001, authorities questioned the informant claiming Guandique admitted to the murder. The informant told police the Salvadoran was depressed and confided in him one day in the jail yard. According to the informant, Guandique said he murdered a woman named Chandra Levy in the park – and that Condit paid him $25,000 to kill her.
The unidentified man said Guandique first got drunk and high on drugs, and then he found Levy jogging on a path in the place Condit told him to go. According to the story, the illegal alien hid, jumped out and stabbed her in her neck and abdomen. Levy stumbled to the ground, and Guandique buried her body in the woods, leaving the knife inside her body. The $25,000 was then sent to the man's relatives in El Salvador.
While authorities had some serious doubts about Condit's role in the informant's story, they did suspect that Guandique could have been involved in the crime, the Post reported. So, the informant, who spoke minimal English, was given a polygraph, but he failed. The FBI test showed the man was "deceptive" when asked if Guandique told him he stabbed Levy and if Guandique received $25,000 for committing the murder.
(Story continues below)
Only two months later, Guandique took a polygraph test, saying was not involved in the case. But the results were considered inconclusive until the examiner determined that his responses were "not deceptive."
However, as the Post reported, the informant and Guandique had difficulty speaking English, and the polygraph examiners were not able to communicate with them, so they used translators. According to the report, miscommunication between the examiner and translator might have skewed results.
"If I had my druthers, I would have wanted to get a Spanish-speaking polygraph examiner," Jack Barrett, D.C. chief of detectives, told the Post. "It's so much cleaner."
The questionable test results contributed greatly to eliminating Guandique as a suspect. Police ended their investigation of the Salvadoran at that point and did not question his relatives, friends or victims or search him for evidence.
Ingmar Guandique
A history of criminal behavior
Less than a week after the polygraph, Guandique was preparing to be sentenced for his attacks on Halle Shilling and Christy Wiegand. According to a report, he told a translator about his thought patterns before committing a crime:
"When I'm about to commit an offense, I tell myself to go ahead and do it, but afterwards, I feel bad about it," he said. "I feel good when I see someone alone and carrying something of value on their person because it makes it easy for me to take it from them. Then it crosses my mind, that after doing it so many times, I will eventually get caught. Sometimes, I cannot control myself when I see someone alone in a secluded area with something of value."
Prosecutor Kristina Ament explained to D.C. Superior Court Judge Noel Anketell Kramer that Guandique had cooperated with authorities and passed a polygraph test to clear his name.
"In other words, there's no suggestion that he is involved in the Chandra Levy case?" the judge asked.
Ament, referencing the polygraph, said, "There is no suggestion at this point now that he is involved."
"This is such a satellite issue," the judge said. "I never for a moment thought that … he had anything to do with Chandra Levy."
'Guandique will attack another woman'
Shilling, one of his female victims, said Guandique would harm other women if he were released.
"I reject the notion that he intended to simply rob me," she told the judge. "This attack was a physical one, pure and simple. He stalked me for a mile. He attacked me with a knife. We struggled on the ground. He left my valuables on the path when he fled. I do not doubt for a second that, given the chance, he would repeat this crime against another woman. I would request that this person be given the harshest possible sentence for his crime."
Wiegand, a second female victim, affirmed Shilling's testimony.
"Being attacked by Mr. Guandique was a terrifying experience, and it changed me, and it changed how I will view the world," she said. "I completely agree … that given the opportunity, Mr. Guandique will attack another woman."
According to the Washington Post report, the judge asked Guandique if he wanted to respond to the women's statements.
"Well, I would like to ask the judge for forgiveness," he said. "And also of the two people I assaulted. I am sincerely repentant for the two offenses I committed. And please give me another chance in order so that I would be able to work and help my family."
The judge then sentenced Guandique to 10 years in a federal penitentiary.
