For those new to the Robert Wone murder case and this site, rather than ask you to sift through nearly 600 posts (while we welcome the clicks, we know that’s a major chore), we’re offering a quick guide on how to get smart quickly.
A primer on the case, essential reading and a little about who we are: This FAQ we banged out in 2009 is still mostly valid. There were initially four of us: Craig Brownstein, David Greer, Michael Kremin and Doug Johnson. Michael passed away in 2018 and we lost Doug, Craig’s longtime partner and later his husband, in 2022. Without them, this project would never have survived and thrived in the way it did. This site remains a testament to the passion and skills they brought to this project.
As stated previously, the site went dormant and offline for a while and we did our best to restore all of the content. While mostly successful we lost some functionality and a few items (graphics, links, document and audio & video elements) due to an ancient WordPress theme we have. We’ll make an effort to revive many of those functions moving forward but two sites laden with content are still up: our Scribd documents page has nearly every court filing from the criminal and civil proceedings. There’s a boatload of filings on there in descending chronological order and with a documents naming convention that made sense in 2009 but not so much anymore…
Although we lost a lot of video in our media library, in particular the interrogation interviews of Price, Zaborsky and Ward immediately after the murder at the MPD Violent Crimes Branch, our Youtube page survived. It has some courthouse scenes we taped following court sessions (The WMRW Shaky-Cam©) and a few clever and cheeky videos that Doug produced. Restoring the interrogation videos remains a top priority and we may succeed in getting those back online. MARCH 21 UPDATE: They’re posted!
The criminal trial transcripts were just posted and the daily courtroom coverage, usually a mid-day highlight and an evening recap, began May 2010 and ran through June. As you scour the hundreds of posts we wrote, you’ll see all of the voluminous comments (sometimes >500 for an individual post) remain intact. We had a committed and passionate readership, many of whom brought serious legal backgrounds and credentials with them, one of them who became our pro bono attorney and helped us organize and file a motion to oppose a defense gag order on the media during the civil proceedings.
Considering the lurid nature of the crime and how many comments sections on any blog can be downright toxic, our readers kept the discussion above the fray. While sharp elbows were thrown, the level of discussion was remarkably focussed and mature with few if any trolls sticking around for long. Trial principals confidentially told us how impressed they were by the elevated and informed level of discourse that our commenters provided. There are too many old timers to thank but a few names stick out: Bea, Hoya Loya, CDinDC, AnnaZed, Clio, Themis, Susan, ChiLaw79, Meto, SheKnowsSomething, our thanks to the larger WMRW family that helped us keep this effort moving forward.
Is there a way to see the old comments?
They should be all in-line on the old posts.