From a Reliable Source

Much was made, but little seen, about early investigation reports about the contents of Joe Price’s computer at his old firm, Arent-Fox. In the immediate aftermath of Robert’s murder, DC Police and other law enforcement agencies conducted a number of physical and data searches looking for evidence.

Warrants were issued to search 1509 Swann, Price’ BMW and a number of computers. Word surfaced that Price’s work PC contained a number of risque photos, but little else surfaced for the public in either the legal filings or as evidence at last summer’s obstruction trial.

Some had wondered about the existence of a contract between Price and Ward. It’s common in some S&M relationships that the specifics, bounds and limitations of what is to transpire, in the bedroom, playroom and beyond, is stipulated in writing. 

Recently we’d heard from a very reliable source, that such a contract was found on Price’s office computer.  And from that document, a number of interrogatory and deposition questions were drawn up and posed to the then defendants.

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E-Z Pay

There’s no telling what the amount of contributions have been to the Robert Wone Memorial Trust since we started solicitating for them over two years ago.  We hope plenty of readers have reached deep to cut hefty checks. While fundraiser-in-chief, Jerry Lewis, has been sidelined from his annual MDA telethon, our Labor of Love will continue. 

And the good news is that it just became a whole lot easier to contribute to charities and organizations that Robert held dear.

The website of the Community Foundation for the National Capital Region is now accepting contributions online.  CLICK HERE to donate, and go to the pull-down menu and look for the Robert Wone Charitable Trust.

Good deeds by good people will continue, but only with your help. Thanks.

Secrets Are Rarely Secret for Long

We knew this day would come.  Whatever the form, we four editors, the close contributors, the many commentors and the legions of the just-plain curious – we all knew that eventually there would be something that felt like an end.

Except, once again, this case has defied our expectations.  Once again, we have less of an end and more of a slow fade.

Not like this is new ground.  Years ago, in the lead up to the criminal trial, many hoped that the authorities, the larger DC gay community or even this raggedy band of trouble-makers could help crack open the silence of 1509 to get someone, perhaps even one of the defendants, to spill just enough.

We hung wanted posters (which the DCMPD never did), we consulted outside forensics analysts, and introduced ourselves to many who probably wished we would just go away.  We tried tricks old and new, orthodox and otherwise, to get Robert’s unsolved murder in front of as many eyes as possible.  And at least some of them didn’t turn away.

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Long, Strange Trip

We’re going to take the next few days to share a few thoughts about the last two and a half years. Word of the final settlement came six weeks after we first broke the news that a deal was in the works.

We’ll have an update on what Price, Ward and Zaborsky are up to in Florida as well as a report on what may be end up being the final chapter of last summer’s criminal case – a conference next week organized by an association of court public information officers that will feature a panel discussion on blogging trials.

Sharing the dais with us will be Superior Court Judge Lynn Leibovitz. Until then, perhaps the final document we post after the jump – the statements released yesterday from Covington and Mrs. Wone.

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Robert Wone’s widow settles civil suit in husband’s killing
By Keith L. Alexander, Washington Post

The wife of slain Washington attorney Robert Wone on Wednesday settled a $20 million wrongful death lawsuit against the three roommates who shared the Dupont Circle-area rowhouse where Wone was fatally stabbed five years ago.

The agreement was reached on the fifth anniversary of Wone’s death. On the evening of Aug. 2, 2006, Wone, 32, was fatally stabbed in his chest and abdomen while spending the night at the elegant home in the 1500 block of Swann Street NW after working late at his job as general counsel for Radio Free Asia.

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

No one has been arrested in Wone’s killing and the case remains open. Roommates Joseph Price, 40, Victor J. Zaborsky, 45, and Dylan Ward 40, said an unknown intruder came into their home and killed Wone as they slept. Authorities said there were no signs of an intruder.

Two years after Wone’s slaying, D.C. prosecutors charged the three men with conspiracy to cover up the killing, obstruction of justice and tampering with evidence. During a trial last year, D. C. Superior Court Judge Lynn Leibovitz acquitted the men on all charges.

Wone’s widow Kathy filed the civil suit before the criminal trial began. But in September, the attorneys for the three men told a judge overseeing the civil trial that their clients would invoke their fifth amendment right not to offer any testimony before or during a trial.

During subsequent depositions, the men repeatedly declined to answer questions about the August evening, leaving Wone’s widow and her attorneys frustrated and resolved to the fact they may never learn what truly happened to her husband.

In the end Kathy Wone and her attorney decided to settle the suit, thus recovering some funds from the men — who have since sold the Swann Street home and moved to South Florida. The men have been financially strapped by years of legal costs.

Both sides avoided a lengthy trial civil trial the potential for subsequent appeals.

“I am very much at peace with this decision,” said Kathy Wone, 40, sitting in a conference room next to her attorney at the Pennsylvania Avenue offices of Covington & Burling.

“I agonized over this and put a lot of thought into it,” she said. “And I thought about what would Robert want me to do and nothing gave me more happiness than knowing I was at peace, focusing on hope and optimism.”

The funds from the settlement will be split between the Wone estate and a law clinic at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Robert Wone’s alma mater, that will provide legal aid to inner-city residents.

“I am moving on. I want to spend the next 40 years of my life focusing on good,” said Kathy Wone.

Wone’s attorney, Benjamin J. Razi, said if the case had gone to trial, it would have been a “show.”

“They weren’t going to come forward and provide any information. This case was never going to put anybody in jail or bring Robert back to life,” Razi said.

With the settlement, Kathy Wone and her attorney said they have received “justice” and some enlightenment about what happened to her husband of three years. She remains convinced that the three men were involved in her husband’s slaying.

“They can rot from the inside out from all the secrets they chose to keep,” she said. “That’s their choice. I chose to move on.”