Illegal immigrant charged in slaying of Chandra Levy

Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON — Federal authorities say a Salvadoran illegal immigrant already in prison for assaults on women was charged Tuesday in the 2001 slaying of federal intern Chandra Levy, whose disappearance and death here ended the career of a prominent California congressman.

A Washington Superior Court judge signed the warrant charging 27-year-old Ingmar Guandique with first-degree murder in the killing of Levy on May 1, 2001, in Rock Creek Park, U.S. Attorney Jeffrey Taylor said at a news conference.

“Today marks a significant step forward in our effort to achieve justice for the Levy family,” said Taylor, whose federal prosecutors handle most murder cases in the district.

Guandique is charged with first-degree murder because he is alleged to have killed her in the commission of a sexual assault, according to authorities and the charging document.

Taylor and other authorities said Guandique killed Levy as she walked or jogged in a remote part of Rock Creek Part in the northwest part of the city. An intensive police search failed to find her body; a dog walker found her bones a year later. Her parents have pressed authorities to solve the case ever since.

Guandique faces between 30 and 60 years in prison if convicted.

Prosecutors believe Levy, a 24-year-old former intern for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons, was a random victim, just like two other women whom Guandique was later convicted of assaulting in the park around the same time.

Guandique, who has maintained his innocence, is serving a 10-year sentence in a federal prison in Adelanto, Calif., for those attacks at knifepoint.

Gary Condit, a California Democrat, lost his re-election bid in a March 2002 primary and has denied accusations by the Levy family and others that he failed to cooperate fully with police investigating Levy’s disappearance in an effort to hide their relationship.

A married father of two, Condit said in a 2001 televised interview that he and Levy had a very close relationship, but he denied having anything to do with her disappearance.