Attorneys for the man accused of killing Chandra Levy called witnesses against their client “unbelievable, self-serving informants” and “jailhouse snitches” at his arraignment in D.C. Superior Court on Thursday.
“We look forward to trying the case before unbiased jurors who will not rush to judgment,” said Santha Sonenberg, one of the lawyers representing Ingmar Guandique, who made his first court appearance in the District after being charged with first-degree murder in the May 2001 killing of the former federal intern.
Guandique, 27, looked gaunt Thursday in his baggy orange jumpsuit. With his head bowed and hands cuffed in front of him, he spoke only to confirm that he understood the proceedings and the charges against him.
Guandique was brought to the District from California, where he is serving a 10-year sentence for attacking two other women around the same time that Levy disappeared in Rock Creek Park. Last month authorities obtained an arrest warrant in Levy’s slaying, based on an affidavit containing testimony from Guandique’s other victims and unidentified witnesses who say the Salvadoran day laborer described in prison how he attacked, sexually assaulted and killed the 24-year-old Levy.
At the time of his 2002 conviction for sexual assault, Guandique was believed to be behind a series of attacks on women in Rock Creek Park.
Sonenberg said Thursday the government’s case was based mostly on evidence that had existed since 2002, and the few new accounts contradicted the old statements and each other.
“There is not a single witness to ever having seen Mr. Guandique and the decedent together,” she said.
Judge J. Dennis Doyle ordered Guandique to remain jailed until a preliminary hearing May 27.
