The murder of Robert Wone remains the perfect crime. Whoever stabbed the general counsel to Radio Free Asia in the chest, pierced his aorta and stood by as he bled to death in August 2006 is still at large. It has to be the most bizarre unsolved murder in D.C. history. When police arrived around midnight at the row house on Swann Street, east of Dupont Circle, they found Wone in an upstairs bedroom, on his back on a pull-out couch with clean sheets; he was unblemished except for the three stab wounds, as if he had been freshly washed. Two of the three men who lived in the house were wearing white bath robes when they greeted cops. The third, a lawyer with Arent Fox at the time, was in his undies.
“Underwear guy,” one of the cops called him in her police report.
Detectives grilled the three — Joseph Price, Dylan Ward and Victor Zaborsky — and spent years trying to pin the murder on them. Prosecutors could charge them only with tampering with evidence, obstruction of an investigation and conspiracy. They were acquitted last summer.
Last week Wone’s widow, Kathy, settled a $20 million civil suit against the trio. For Kathy Wone, it was time to try and move on rather than go through what promised to be another agonizing court case. Price, Ward and Zaborsky declined to answer questions in deposition. They invoked the Fifth Amendment to avoid incriminating themselves.
Neither the three defendants nor anyone else has ever been charged with murder. The case is open and active.
“Prosecutors are very committed to filing murder charges in this case,” says Craig Brownstein, one of four writers behind the blog Who Murdered Robert Wone? “They are committed and passionate.”
Brownstein and his colleagues are committed to keeping their blog alive, despite the lull in official legal proceedings. The site has been essential reading for the past 2 1/2 years — for lawyers, cops and Wone groupies — and it will stay on the case.
“There is a lingering sense,” blogger Doug Johnson wrote Thursday, “that somewhere in here — hidden in the nearly 600 posts and nearly 50,000 comments — lives the truth. Someone, somewhere in these pages picked the lock. But its discovery will have to wait.”
Brownstein, a public relations executive, says all clues lead to one conclusion: “We agree with Kathy Wone that — more than likely — one or more of the housemates were involved, or knew who did it.”
The housemates, who were involved in a three-way relationship, have moved to Florida. Last week’s settlement was not disclosed, but it’s safe to say they will contribute handsomely to a memorial fund in Wone’s name. As for the murder, they are not off the hook.
It’s up to the D.C. police to break this case. The cops owe it to Kathy Wone, since their imperfect investigation has allowed her husband’s murder to become a perfect crime — until they solve it.
Harry Jaffe’s column appears on Tuesday and Friday. He can be contacted at [email protected].
