This is precisely what happened when the Washington Post editor Ben Bradlee’s sister in law Mary Pinchot Meyer was murdered, for no apparent reason, on the DC towpath, now bikepath, in Georgetown in 1964. In that case as well, nothing was taken by the murderer/thief and she had no known enemies. Bradlee hurried to her house and by his own later accounts, took away her diary which indicated her ongoing affair with JFK before the police could search the location. Bradlee admitted taking the diary 30 years later and giving it to James Angleton of the CIA who reportedly burned it. A homeless black man was arrested for murder which carried the death sentence in DC; Bradlee reportedly remained quiet (what a moral guy he was), but the arrestee was acquitted of the murder on a total lack of evidence.
Bradlee bumped into James Angleton in Meyer’s house looking for the diary and let him graciously have it.
*GASP*
Never hear of THAT one. WOW!