The Case Against Gary Condit

self | 9-8-01 | dogbyte12

[dogbyte12]

He was having an adulterous affair with Chandra Levy. According to her friend Sven Jones, Chandra was pressuring Condit into leaving his wife Carolyn, and marrying her. Now more mistresses have come forward with the rule Chandra revealed to her aunt. She was not allowed to carry ID with her when she went out on a date with Condit. Condit's wife gets migraine headaches at time that are often triggered by high altitude airline flights, so she tries to avoid flying.

It had been a year since Carolyn Condit flew to Washington. She flies to Washington on April 28th, and stays there until May 4th, the exact time when Gary Condit's mistress dissapears. Congress was in session on May 1st, and Condit's wife was in town. To go outside without a cell phone would mean that Chandra Levy could possibly miss the 5-15 minute chance that day of Condit contacting her. She goes downstairs and buys a paper, if Condit calls her cell phone, she may have to wait another day until she gets another chance for a conversation with him. If everything was fine with Chandra and Gary Condit, there is no reasonable explanation for her to leave her cell phone home unless she was going out with him.

There are some who theorize that the no ID would be due to Chandra going down to the laundry room, or just grabbing change and buying a paper. Well since she read the papers online, skip the papers. If Chandra was going to spend an hour down in the laundry room, her cell phone would have gone with her, so she could talk with Gary or whomever decided to call her. She was also expecting return calls from Sven Jones and from Aunt Linda to find out what her "big news" was going to be. She would take the cell phone with her anywhere except a date with Gary. Aunt Linda and Sven could wait, only IF she was with Gary.

Gary Condit did not attempt to call Chandra Levy during the week she came up missing. The excuse that his wife was in town and couldn't find time to call his mistress is false, because he found a chance every single day that week to call Anne Marie Smith. In August, he reveals to Connie Chung that he may have tried calling her on the "31st of April (sic), but there is no proof of that attempted phone call being made. He also tells Connie Chung that he didn't really attempt to call Chandra because she was on a train. How ludicrous is that? For one, the woman has a cell phone. It even can work on trains. Even if she was out of range when he tried, there should be records of attempts being made. There are not. He did not inform the parents that Chandra was almost certainly going to be on the train. The parents thought it was one of several options, and certainly would not expect Chandra to take a train, without telling her when she left, or when they were supposed to pick her up at the train station. This excuse holds no water at all.

There is some speculation as to if Chandra and Condit had some other method of communication other than her home phone number or regular cell phone. Condit and Chandra's phone activity died out during the week or two before she vanished. Yet, originally Condit was claiming through aides, that he "broke off his friendship" with Chandra on the 29th (the day after his wife arrived in town), and that Chandra made a flurry of calls to him that day and the 30th, which he didn't return. No records of those calls. No record of the call he claims to have made on "the 31st or May 1st or 2nd"

Was there a hint of truth in this? Did Condit get Chandra a special cell phone? i.e. the type you can get at 7-11 for $89 with pre-paid phone cards. Knowing Condit's penchant for using fake names, he could have registered one in a false name, handed it to Chandra, and called her from pay phones. This is intriguing because either Condit was telling the truth earlier, about him dumping her, or there had to be another phone contact method. There aren't a pattern of calls from Condit to Chandra or from Chandra to Condit the last few weeks before she vanished. Yet Anne Marie and Condit were still talking nearly every day. What was going on? Chandra by Condit's own admission was overnighting at his Condo on April 24th, yet there weren't calls the day before, or the day before that between the two according to Chandra's cell phone record So did she just show up, or did she have another phone?

Condit finally releases a timeline on June 28th that is full of either mistakes or outright lies. It insinuates that Condit met with VP Cheney for 3 hours when the meeting lasted under 1/2 hour. You do not mistake those times. You might be confused if the meeting last 50 minutes or an hour, but not 25 minutes and 3 hours. He lied by omission. He said he met with Cheney at 12:30 and returned to the office at 3:30, hinting that he returned as soon as the meeting was over.

Condit also stated that he met with Rebecca Cooper from ABC news from 6:30-7:30PM. He actually met her around 2:30PM the next afternoon, not on the first for about 3 hours. It's funny... one day Condit is making a 25 minute meeting 3 hours, the next time he is shortening a 3 hour meeting to 1 hour and moving it up a day.

Condit on June 28th had his phone bills from May 1st. His office had a record of every meeting scheduled, every visitor who came in to meet with the congressman, every staff meeting, etc. They had full access to all the data needed to prove Gary Condit was in the office. The fact that they state he returned at 3:30PM tends to show that they had no evidence of him being at the office before then. Let's do a little logic here. If Condit met with Cheney til 1PM, went to his office immediately afterwards, and took phone calls, met visitors, staggered through out the period of 1PM to 3:30PM, why wouldn't they tell us? There is no reason to hide the fact that he was actually working. The ONLY reason that the staff, in receipt of all documentary evidence, would tell us that Condit didn't return until 3:30PM, is because he wasn't there.

Condit's timeline also keeps repeating that a staff member picks up Condit, or a staff member drives Carolyn Condit because Condit didn't have access to a car in Washington. This is what he told the police as well. The police find out in July, only through Anne Marie Smith that Condit actually took her out on dates in the red ford that he had a set of keys to, as well as his staff.

We know that the Levy parents arrive late on May 15th to Washington D.C. The next day, they meet with the police and hold a press conference. The local tv networks flash Chandra's picture all over the evening news casts that evening of the 16th. Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer meet with Bob and Sue Levy to help publicize their case, but Condit doesn't. While the Levy parents are still in town on May 17th, Condit does the morning roll call vote, then misses votes for the first time this session. 3 votes between 10 and 3PM are scheduled, and Condit doesn't participate. Anne Marie Smith in the meantime, checks into her hotel in D.C. after flying out there on an airline route. She calls Condit up on his secret phone line, and doesn't get a return call until Midnight from Luray, Va... 80 miles south and about a 2 hour drive from Washington D.C. She claims that he said "he might be in trouble."

Since then, Gary Condit has acted like a suspect. He has hired a criminal lawyer, when if it was just an affair he was covering up, it wouldn't be a legal matter, more a PR problem. He does hire a PR guru as well. Close contacts with Chandra Levy, such as Sven Jones, take police administered polygraphs. Condit refuses. The police leak that they are more than happy to limit the questions to Chandra Levy, and add no questions about Joleen Mckay/the watchbox/ and Anne Marie Smith. No dice. He takes a 4 question polygraph administered by an expert who is under no obligation to tell us if this was the first or the 21st polygraph that Condit took with him. This same expert also "cleared" Ron Carey, who is currently on trial.

There is "no proof" that Gary Condit did it. There is no proof he didn't either. You would think that 4 months later with all this scrutiny, he would have been cleared by now. If not by the police, if not by the media, at least by his lawyer. If Condit can prove his whereabouts during May 1st and 2nd, and can pass a police polygraph which shows he has no clue as to what happened to Chandra Levy, are we to believe that he is paying Abbe Lowell $400-$600 an hour, letting his career go down into tatters, just to do what exactly? The hiding affairs excuse doesn't fly anymore. EVERYBODY KNOWS.

Condit is hurting himself by acting this way. If he could prove his whereabouts and prove his truth through a polygraph, at least prove it to the police, he could make this almost all go away. The fact that he is destroying his career, when every single day there are about 50 lawyers, PR people spelling out to him, as if he didn't know, how to make this go away, and Condit still refuses to stop self-destructing his career tells us there is something there.

It's been a while since anybody has summarized the case in total about why Gary Condit looks guilty, so I thought I would give it a crack. Any feedback, or suggestions would be appreciated, I plan to fine tune this and email it to any folks in the media who feel bored and feel there are no angles left to cover. The media still haven't addressed clearly just the basics of May 1st. I have not seen one person other than Mike Dayton who has verified Condit's whereabouts the afternoon of May 1st after the Cheney meeting. I am incredulous that the media has not tried to get at least 1 person who showed up at Condit's office, an outsider, between 1PM and 3:30PM. In that 150 minute span, some outsider had to go to his office. So what happened when they got there?

[Vinomori]

DOGBYTE, You da man, dog. Great job.

[NautiNurse]

Terilyn, your post reminded me of Chad's odd afterthought during the LKL interview. He said, "I'm here to tell the American public Gary Condit had nothing to do -- or Carolyn Condit -- had nothing to do with the disappearance." As though he knows this? Right...

For months, I have believed that Carolyn's presence in D.C. was more than mere coincidence regarding Chandra's disappearance. I usually end up visualizing either a threatened, or real confrontation between Chandra and Blowdry/wife because Carolyn is in town.

In your usual fashion, Dogbyte12, you have presented a very plausible, and cohesive chain of events. Great work, and thanks again!

[dogbyte12]

I like your junk cell phone, fake names idea. Maybe Condit bought one for himself, too (with a fake name of course) Cash only tendered and no tracing of names through credit cards. Sounds interesting.

The fact that Gary Condit uses an alias to get his spa treatments. He actually has two... one is "Greg" the other is "Barry K." and the fact that he uses a fictitious woman's name for his girly line pager service, often paid 1 year in advance, makes me wonder about this issue.

I was at the 7-11 today, and they actually have an offer for now $49 after rebate, or $89 without a rebate for a cell phone that you buy phone cards for, and pay as you go.

Either Condit broke up with Chandra in early April, or he had to have had a way of contacting her other than her own cell phone that mom and dad were actually paying the bills for in actuality.

Mike Isikoff went over the records, and there is basically just a couple calls from Condit to Chandra or reversed the last two weeks before she vanished. There was no call recorded on the 22nd, 23rd, or 24th. So, I ask again, how did Chandra know to show up at Condit's condo and he would be there? Did they arrange the date 4 or 5 days in advance? Did she just show up unannounced, he let her in, and she spent the night? Or did she have a special phone from Condit? Could even explain why she left the apartment without her regular cell phone.

She gets a call from Condit on the secret cell phone at 12:20. "I am meeting with the VP for 20-40 minutes or so, and I need to see you afterwards. Wait out front for me, I will give you a call right as soon as I am about to pull up.

Chandra dissapears with no ID, and Condit disposes of the phone all in one fell swoop. Something was definately going on that day with her web surfing. She was not only checking on the agriculture committee's website, she also went to a site that tracked the status/progress of legislation.

Wild guess here, but perhaps she found out that Condit lied to her about being busy at times when he was busy with Anne Marie Smith or another girlfriend. Condit says, "No date tonight, I have to stay late at the office to finish work on the Dairy Support Bill. She is about to confront Condit on all she learns about his womanizing, with Jennifer Thomas, etc... and she checks the status of bills he claims he was working on, too busy to meet with her.

I do think we should fax/email/radio talk show bomb all and demand that the media fix the May 1st problem though before anything else. Where are the Woodward and Bernstein's these days?

The media can not find ONE person who went to Condit's office early in the afternoon of May 1st? It would at least make me less suspicious that Condit was physically involved with her abduction if they can nail down his whereabouts that afternoon. Still doesn't make him morally innocent, but still...

Is any reporter even trying, through a FOIA request to get access to Condit's meeting records, phone records for that date. These are calls/meeting logs from his taxpayer funded office. It's not like they want to get his home phone records. Just get a peak at his office schedule. He has to have the equivalent of a secretary, who has a nice shiny appointments calendar. If it exists, can't we see it?

Now, since Mike Dayton was verified to be at the Cheney meeting with Condit, was Dayton with him from 1-3:30PM too? Does any other staffer vouch that Dayton was in the office as well?

Both Dayton and Condit have not explained May 17th yet as well. We keep talking about Luray, Va at midnight, but Condit could have left D.C. at 10PM to get there. Where was Condit, where was Dayton from 10am to 10PM? I am so frustrated with the media for not asking these questions.

The media is about as bumbling as the police department. They could even get a source from the phone company to divulge the phone records for May 1st, and track down folks who called in, #'s placed out, and figure if any of the calls from Condit's office from 1PM-3:30PM were initiated by Condit himself.

Wouldn't it get us so much further to just get past that key period and know if Condit was in his office or not? Any media types reading this? How about investigating this instead of which congress member thinks Condit will resign or not. Let's figure out his alibi first, don't ya think?

[willyboyishere]

Kudos to dogbyte12 for illuminating with prolonged special focus another angle on the Condit case that, when turned over, reveals nothing but worms, just like all the others. You are exactly right in insisting that an innocent man would be able to account precisely for his whereabouts on any of those several critical days: Condit can't do that and will never get corroboration for a false timeline unless he's able to enlist some of his ever-dwindling pool of bitter-end defenders like staff or family. The timeline and his account of it is just beginning to show its seams now; give it real prosecutorial scrutiny and it will fall apart. Unless this case is settled in a court of law, though, and Condit is subjected to tough questioning, it will all go away and he will save his sorry ass the way it looks like he's planning to, simply announcing that he's considering not running again. His own disappearing will be the political payoff that will satisfy all those who want to see him go away. He's about as likely to be brought to justice as Chandra Levy's body is likely to be found. We are now in an uncharacteristically quiet and fallow period in this scandal. The public at large knows NONE of the details we know; they can barely remember or get straight a fraction of the facts that have come out in the mainstream media since mid-May, and hence there will be no "public outcry" for the very guilty Mr. Condit to get his just desserts.

[Retribution44]

This is just a theory, but lets have some input. Someone namely Condit or Mrs. Condit or hired help kills Chandra at her appartment in a way that left no blood evidence, such as strangling, or being shot up with something lethel. The body could not be removed at that particular time, so they take the keys to the place in order to either come back later to clean up the mess, or have someone else come back to clean up.

[dogbyte12]

You are exactly right in insisting that an innocent man would be able to account precisely for his whereabouts on any of those several critical days

One theory I toyed with for a while is that Condit was sleeping with somebody else other than Chandra between 1-3:30PM, that is why he can't tell us what he was doing. I don't know though, it doesn't fly after all the other women came out though. Is it better to be thought of as a murderer, or that he was doing just another in a long string of women?

Something is wrotten in Denmark though. Condit obviously was doing SOMETHING from 1PM to 3:30PM that he is too embarassed to let us know. I wish Larry King wasn't so hopeless and senile. I wish it were an act and "Super Larry" came out and whacked Mike Dayton during the interview.

If King whacked Dayton and pressed him for specific details of the days of the 1st and 17th it would have been a thing of beauty. My question is why Connie Chung, Newsweek, The sacramento reporter, Vanity Fair, The Merced paper, and Larry King didn't try to pin Condit and Dayton down when they had a chance.

Connie Chung was free to ask any question she wanted, so she asked the affair question about 5 gazillion times even though Condit wouldn't respond. If she just took a minute of those questions away and asked him to explain the false timeline, 1-3:30PM and May 17th it would have at least put him on the record and the FBI and DC police could have tried to verify.

[BunnySlippers]

If everything was fine with Chandra and Gary Condit, there is no reasonable explanation for her to leave her cell phone home unless she was going out with him.

Excellent point. No woman would leave her phone while waiting for a call from the person she most wanted to hear from.

[dogbyte12]

This is just a theory, but lets have some input. Someone namely Condit or Mrs. Condit or hired help kills Chandra at her appartment in a way that left no blood evidence, such as strangling, or being shot up with something lethel

Here is something weird that was in media timelines of events. Some timelines stated for a fact that some friends of Chandra were worried about her, entered her aparment on May 1st, and she wasn't there. I bet those timelines are still up, but it either was wrong, or not investigated. I always found that really odd, that anybody would worry that soon, and if they did, who are they, how did they gain entry to her apartment, etc... My guess is it was a false story like the 7-11 and the hardware store spottings.

[terilyn]

Something that John Walsh of AMW said would also point the finger at Condit. He was relating to when his son disappeared and he said the first thing he did was to go and allow the police to give him a lie detector test. He said that he knew he was innocent and didn't want the police to be wasting valuable time questioning him and suspecting him. We know that Sven Jones and two other former "suspects" (if we could call them that), have taken and passed police polygraphs. Jim Robinson has stated that when AMS was being interviewed by the FBI they offered to have her take a polygraph but the FBI thought she was very credible and declined to give her one at the time. So we have Condit that has refused to take a police polygraph. If this simple task could clear him of all suspicion, (in the minds of the investigators), and if he is as he says, completely innocent, then why the heck not - give it a whirl. He could have saved his congressional seat but chose not to. Reeks of guilt. BTW, Carolyn did not take one either.

[Chef]

"... and that Chandra made a flurry of calls to him that day and the 30th, which he didn't return. No records of those calls. No record of the call he claims to have made on "the 31st or May 1st or 2nd."

What's the proof that there were no records of those calls?? What are the records of Chandra's incoming calls May 1st right before she logged off -- and right around the time "Gary" left the Naval Observatory?

[terilyn]

"Some timelines stated for a fact that some friends of Chandra were worried about her, entered her aparment on May 1st, and she wasn't there. I bet those timelines are still up, but it either was wrong, or not investigated. I always found that really odd, that anybody would worry that soon, and if they did, who are they, how did they gain entry to her apartment, etc... My guess is it was a false story like the 7-11 and the hardware store spottings."

Or, Chandra really did disappear at 4:30 a.m. and the story was put out by Condit's camp not knowing that the security tapes would be erased over before police would bother to check anything out. Were those "friends" actually the clean up squad, logging on to the computer and cleaning up any sign of a problem? Later, if the security camera had revealed somebody entering the building and they had been tracked down, the story was already out about "friends" entering her apt. to check on her. Nobody could have entered her apt unless they had a key and we know that Chandra disappeared with only her keys.

Keep talking dogbyte12 - you keep reminding us of things that we didn't put together early on.

[dogbyte12]

What's the proof that there were no records of those calls?? What are the records of Chandra's incoming calls May 1st right before she logged off -- and right around the time "Gary" left the Naval Observatory?

Well, firstly, Condit actually met Cheney on capital hill. Cheney has an office there, he didn't meet Condit at the Naval Observatory residence. Secondly, there was no flurry of outgoing calls from Chandra's cell or home phone. The police have those records. If Chandra had another phone, or used a pay phone for some weird reason, she could have called him a flurry of times.

She lost her job on the 23rd, so she wasn't calling from work. Interesting that the last time Condit claims to have seen Chandra in person, April 24th, was the day after she was forced to pack up from her job.

Carolyn didn't fly in til the evening of the 28th. What exactly was Chandra doing from the afternoon of the 24th through the 28th? She had no job to go to, she was about to leave town for graduation. She had to kill time doing something. Do we know what exactly she was doing? I wish the police would reveal her web surfing records from those days in addition to the first. Remember, we don't even have all the web sites from the 1st. The police said they were releasing only part of the records, and that the ones they were withholding were "evidentiary".

What in the heck does that mean anyways? Why haven't reporters tried to find out. The DC Police leaks like a sieve. Maybe the reporters should find out the "evidentiary" web sites Chandra visited on May 1st. If Chandra surfed to the S&M pleasure palace, and bought Gary a pair of handcuffs that might be evidentiary ;)

[3D-JOY]

Do you remember the Thomas Capano investigation in Wilmington, Delaware in the mid-90's ?

My daughter just gave me the book by Ann Rule. Title is ...AND NEVER LET HER GO. The story is compelling reading and the similarities are astounding! Missing woman, multiple lovers, gifts, brothers of questionable character, and a truly Condit like personality on the murderer.

One of the main points to learn from it is the amount of information the police had and kept secret until they were ready to make the arrest. I hope this is happening now too!

Please, if history is repeating itself, lets have an arrest and conviction in less than 4 years this time!

[Helen]

According to Mike Dayton, he (Dayton) was with Condit all day on May 1. From the Larry King transcript of August 30 when Dayton and the four Modesto staffers were intervied:

DAYTON: On May 1, I was with him probably every day that week. We went over, we met with the vice president that day, I was with him then, I picked him up, and we went to the meeting together, the vice president was gracious, and it was the first time I got to meet the vice president. Then we went back to the office. So I was with him, you know, the whole day.

Someone needs to do some serious questioning of Dayton.

[BigBobber]

Thanks for the analysis. Some questions/observations:

One theory is that Chandra died during some kind of "risky sex", with Condit, who then had to get rid of the body. Your timeline does not seem to leave much time for any kind of lengthy romancing in the days around May 1--especially with Mrs. Condit in town. What do you think of this theory?

Why would Mrs. Condit want to get rid of Chandra, when she was just the latest of many mistresses? Surely she had known for a while her husband is not faithful? Maybe they even had an "open marriage" agreement? Her involvement does not make sense. She does not live in D.C. How could she murder/arrange for murder and dispose of a body while in unfamiliar territory?

Your theory that Chandra was checking Condit's whereabouts on the Internet is intriguing. It may tie-in with the watch. Maybe she found out an ex-girlfriend have given it to Condit, whereas Condit told her it was a "Special gift from me"? Could this have led to an argument where the watch was throw around the room and damagaged? Did she throw it away, or leave an "If something happens to me, Condit did-it note" with the watch attached to prove authenticity?

Perhaps Condit had been stringing Chandra along for a while, telling her he would leave his wife soon, but he wanted to break it to her in person "because she was not well". Condit's chance to tell her in person came with Carolyn's visit, but he didn't do it. Chandra finally has proof Condit is using her and will not break up with his wife. This leads to a confrontation in which Chandra is killed, or Condit realizes she must be silenced.

Your comments are appreciated.

[maestro]

?What does one need thumbs for?
It was reported that Mrs. Condit did not have any thumbs.
It appears that she has 'thumbs'.
Has the mainstream media ever verified this in 4 months?
?What doesn't one need thumbs for?
I still don't get it?
What kind of investigative 'press' do we have?

[BigBobber]

One other far-out idea to go along with the "Condit did it" note. One way to keep something secure for a few days is to mail it to yourself. My company clerk used to do this every Friday with paychecks that were not picked up. He put them in a stamped envelope and dropped them at the post office on the way home.

In the Chung interview, Condit said Chandra was interested in working for the CIA or FBI. Was she aware of such techniques and left a drop to herself? Maybe Condit even told her how to do it. It would go along with his other cloak-and-dagger stuff.

At any rate, someone would have to check her mail for a few days to make sure all was clear. This would require the use of her keys. The missing keys.

It would be nice to know if she got her mail in her apartment, or a common mail area with a separate mailbox key.

[dogbyte12]

My new question is why Condit hid the fact that Carolyn was in town, if he was innocent. If he is innocent, Carolyn in town gives him an alibi for his evenings, it gives him an excuse to not have contact with Chandra (at this early stage, LE was not aware of Anne Marie Smith or Condit calling her every day Carolyn was in town).

Law enforcement did not find out til mid-june that Carolyn was in town, until Condit's original lawyer, Joseph Cotchett revealed it, when he noted that Chandra couldn't have been at Condit's apartment that week unless she was on the sofa, because Carolyn was there.

That was the first the cops heard about Carolyn's visit to Washington. This brought two dramatic events into action. Cotchett within a week resigned, and the police began negotiating for Carolyn to fly back to D.C. to do an interview.

Why wouldn't Condit want Carolyn to vouch for his whereabouts? Think about it from the police point of view. Chandra vanishes sometime after 1PM, and Condit as far as they knew was home alone with nobody to verify if he went out with Chandra on a date that evening, or stayed home.

It has to raise Condit on the suspect scale that he had no alibi witness for the evening of May 1st. Yet Condit doesn't give it to them. He doesn't say to the cops, even lying about the nature of his relationship... "I was mentoring Chandra, blah, blah, blah... I didn't even talk to her the last week. Too busy with work, my wife was in town and we were busy together shopping, eating out, etc."

Carolyn needs a second interview I think.

[Sueann]

I have always thought it was Carolyn! My theory was she killed Chandra accidentally during an argument, and Condit cleaned it up for his wife.

[The Truth Will Make You Free]

Another mystery: What was in the closet?