On Aug. 2, 2006, emergency medical personnel responding to a 911 call found Robert Wone lying peacefully on a sofa bed in his friend’s town home on the 1500 block of Swann Street Northwest. But when officers stepped closer, they saw three stab wounds to Wone’s chest and a dribble of blood on the crisply folded, yet-unturned sheets underneath him. On a nearby table sat a 5-inch knife colored with blood.
The three housemates, all dressed in white bathrobes when the paramedics arrived, told police they suspected an intruder had murdered their guest.
Three years later, D.C. police have charged the Swann Street housemates with conspiracy, obstruction of justice and tampering with a crime scene. But Wone’s killer remains at large.
That doesn’t sit well with four Swann Street neighbors, who are making it their business to re-energizethe hunt for Wone’s killer.
In December 2008, Craig Brownstein, Doug Johnson, Michael Kremin and David Greer started whomurderedrobertwone.com, a Web site that links to documents, facts of the case and original reporting on the progression of Wone’s murder case.
None of the site’s editors knew Wone, legal counsel for Radio Asia. Johnson said they created the site because they thought the case deserved more buzz.
“It is the most shocking, alarming, complex and befuddling murder the District has seen — in anyone’s memory,” Johnson said. “We think people should know about this and should be talking about this.”
Medical examiners determined Wone’s stab wounds could not have come from the knife at the crime scene. Someone had obviously tampered with the scene by planting the knife, investigators said. And cadaver dogs sniffed out bloody remnants in the home’s clothes dryer and outdoor water drain, indicating that someone disposed of the couple pints of blood missing from Wone’s clean stab wounds.
“We don’t consider it our job or duty to convict or solve,” Johnson said. “We are here to explore and examine.”
Nearly nine months and 175 posts later, the site has amassed 5,000 visitor comments and its online traffic is still growing, Brownstein said.
Twice the site has uncovered information unknown to police — one piece of information is going to help the defense, and the other will help prosecutors in the case against the three housemates, Brownstein said. But the guys keep their ideas about possible suspects to themselves.
“We serve as a clearing house for the truth,” Brownstein said. “And the truth in this case appears very, very muddled.”
