Nearly 10 years after Chandra Levy was killed in Rock Creek Park, a D.C. jury is about to decide the fate of the man accused in her slaying.
The trial of 29-year-old Ingmar Guandique resumes Monday and will soon wrap up in D.C. Superior Court. Guandique is charged with first-degree murder, attempted robbery and kidnapping in connection with Levy’s May 1, 2001, death while she was jogging in the park.
Defense attorneys are scheduled to present their final witnesses early this week. Jury deliberations are expected to begin by Wednesday.
Over nine days of testimony, prosecutors presented witnesses who described similar attacks Guandique made in the park and scratches on his face around the time of Levy’s death.
But the only direct link between Guandique and Levy has come from Armando Morales, a 49-year-old who shared a cell with Guandique at Big Sandy federal penitentiary in Kentucky in 2006.
Morales testified that Guandique confessed to killing Levy during an attempted robbery.
One of the final defense witnesses scheduled in another of Guandique’s former cellmates, who is expected to offer testimony that rebuts Morales’ account. The cellmate is still incarcerated and will likely testify Monday via videoconference.
On Thursday, prosecutors dropped charges that Guandique had tried to sexually assault Levy. Morales had testified that Guandique denied raping the 24-year-old Federal Bureau of Prisons intern.
“I killed that bitch, but I didn’t rape her,” Morales said Guandique told him.
Other witnesses have underscored the lack of DNA and other forensic evidence in the case. FBI experts testified that no physical evidence implicates Guandique in the crime.
The jury panel of 12 women and four men also heard from former Rep. Gary Condit, D-Calif., with whom Levy was linked.
On the witness stand, Condit refused to admit that he had an affair with Levy, but an FBI expert later testified that his DNA was found on underwear recovered from Levy’s apartment in 2001.
When Levy disappeared that May, the case dominated national headlines, in large part because of her relationship with Condit. Her remains were found in Rock Creek Park by a man walking his dog in May 2002.
Guandique was charged with her death last year.
