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Chapter 23. Horse Trail

 
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Joined: 13 Sep 2002
Posts: 9273
Location: Jacksonville, FL

PostPosted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 8:38 am    Post subject: Chapter 23. Horse Trail Reply with quote



available from Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com


Murder On A Horse Trail: The Disappearance of Chandra Levy
by Ralph Daugherty
iUniverse
ISBN: 0-595-31847-9


Murder on a Horse Trail: The Disappearance of Chandra Levy also available free to read online here on www.justiceforchandra.com




Glover Road


X1: site where the body was found
X2: point on Western Ridge Trail above site where body was found
X3: entry to Western Ridge Trail from picnic area 17
X4: point at which the Western Ridge Trail branches from the path running through picnic areas 17 and 18
X5: point where Western Ridge Trail enters woods from picnic area 25
X6: location of benches at picnic area 25 next to wire-supported sapling
X7: cliff area that Chief Ramsey seemed to refer to
X8: entry point of a small path running along the creek inside the park (shown as a purple line)
X9: stables
X10: Nature Center and Planetarium

jabarn
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Location: Jacksonville, FL

PostPosted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 12:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Horse Trail


How did Chandra end up on a horse trail deep in a forest? Picnic area #18 is next to Western Ridge horse trail, which runs for miles to Maryland before looping back and coming back down the east side of Rock Creek Park as Valley Trail.

Chandra was found just off a crossroads of sorts of horse trails and a road with a place to pull back into the woods and unload. You're supposed to unload horses, though, not bodies.

andrew, a poster who bikes and hikes in Rock Creek Park, wrote by e-mail:

The Western Ridge trail is essentially for horses. I
assume people run on it, and it is listed (part of
it) as part of some running trails in DC, but it's
really not in the realm of most runners. In fact, of
the "serious" runners I'd say 99 out of 100 wouldn't
even take it. It's not in a part of the park that
people run in nor is it of the condition you would
want to run on (it's more a path than a trail). It's
not a main trail for hikers or bikers. The majority
of them (that even get up that far) opt to take
Beach Drive (beautiful) or Glover Road (hilly, but
smooth). I've never seen anyone running on Broad
Branch. [1]

If they were, they're suicidal, which is for some reason what a few people want us to believe about Chandra. Walking or jogging, she was miles from home, far beyond Klingle Mansion, with no protection or even a cell phone. Sven even walked her home down the street in Dupont Circle!

She would have essentially gone completely against character, in terms of security, to walk halfway to Maryland on a horse trail while, in terms of time, still not having a ticket to go home or indications she knew what to tell her landlord the next day about her move out date.

Niles Lathem wrote of this mystery in the New York Post:

How Chandra got there remains one of the biggest
mysteries of the case.

One possibility is that someone accosted her while
she was jogging or walking.

But the area, near a nature center, is 4 miles away
from Levy's downtown Washington apartment, and there
are no jogging trails leading there.

Another possibility is that Chandra was killed
somewhere else and her body was dumped in the wooded
hillside.

The roads leading to the area are fairly well-
traveled, making it a risky proposition for a killer
to take a body out of the trunk of a car and carry
it into the woods without being spotted.

Police think it's also possible that this was the
death scene.

"It is possible that she walked in there [with the
killer] and was killed there," said one law-
enforcement source. [2]


Sari Horwitz and Allan Lengel write further on that in the Washington Post:

Investigators also say Levy was probably killed
there, rather than dumped after being slain,
according to sources. They think there is a good
chance she was killed in daylight, partly because of
her sunglasses and clothing. The T-shirt and Spandex
leggings she was wearing would have been suitable
during the day, when the temperature rose to 82
degrees, but not at night, when the temperature
hovered about 50 degrees.

It is unclear, however, why Levy would have been
walking on that trail, four miles from her Dupont
Circle apartment. Her friends and relatives say she
was not a jogger, was not familiar with the park and
had expressed safety concerns about being in Rock
Creek Park by herself.

The most obvious attraction near the trail, the
Nature Center, was closed May 1 last year, as it is
every Tuesday. The stables were open, but employees
there said records do not show that she rode the
horses, and no one remembers her coming there that
day. Levy's friends also say she didn't like horses,
even though her mother owned two. [3]


Could Chandra have jogged there? Western Ridge trail is part of an extended trail system through Rock Creek Park down into downtown Washington. andrew describes by e-mail:

Anyway, heading north on Rock Creek Parkway from
downtown DC, you pass Georgetown, Dupont Circle, the
Zoo, and then the Klingle Mansion (including a big
tunnel under the zoo's vet clinic). You eventually,
I mean eventually (because this road curves all
over) come to a split where Beach Drive goes deep
into the park and Branch road skirts along the edge.
About a hundred feet after this split is a another
split, between Branch Road and this MASSIVE uphill
switchback road. It really blows when you are
biking. You cross the creek and then peddle uphill
until you are a third of the way up and then turn
around 180 and peddle up some more and then turn 90
and peddle up some more until you get up this
monster. It's pretty rough (as far as DC hills go).

It is about 1/10 of a mile north (barely 1/10th) of
the Branch/Beach intersection. I think it is called
Glover Road. This road is blocked off at Branch by a
police cruiser. It works it's way up the hill until
it runs along the top (parallel to the Western
Ridge). This hill is pretty tall. When you are on
top of it, you look down on the tops of the trees at
the bottom (and these are old, huge Oaks, Elms,
etc).

Something that isn't being reported is the fact this
is NOT a jogger's area, certainly not for some girl
from California looking for an evening run. Joggers
use the park EXTENSIVELY but by and large, I'd say
80% of them NEVER go past the Zoo. They run between
the Lincoln Memorial and the Zoo. After the zoo, the
number of runners drops to a minimum and bikers and
roller bladers really take over.

Don't look at a "crow flies" measurement of this.
Rock Creek pathways can take probably three miles to
do what a "crow flies" in one or two.

I've biked that hill a number of times (both up and
down). I rode up there the other day and police have
closed the road at the Beach / Branch split (you can
drive on Beach) and on the North side it is closed
at Abelmarle & Branch.

A lot of the "DC Media" never, ever cross that split
in the road (Beach & Branch). In fact, many never go
past the zoo. Unfortunately a lot of the reporting
(including the "talking heads") are based on this
idea that Rock Creek is this tiny, highly populated
little park through downtown DC (that's all they
ever see). It isn't--It's huge. Just huge and thick.

The area where Levy was found, if what I can make
out of the maps, is not a jogging area by any
stretch of imagination. On the lower side, Branch
Avenue, it is a very narrow dark street with tight
corners and very little room on either side. I don't
even like to bike on it because commuters come
ripping around on it at all hours of the night. It
basically runs north-south with the creek on the
east side of the road.

I am 100% convinced she did not run up to where they
found her. There are so many quality bike and
jogging paths in DC NEARER her home and more
interesting that this place. Basically, for her to
get up to the Western Ridge would have required
about a four + mile run, a 1/2 mile uphill, and then
having her decide "hey, after all this, I'm going
off road and cross country." The main bike running
trails on Rock Creek run parallel to the road (you
can always see the cars) but the Western Ridge is
very cross country.

Rock Creek has a paved, six to ten foot wide bike
path that runs from the Lincoln Memorial up to
Beach/Branch drive, then "continues" on Beach drive
(they close it to traffic on the weekend) and then
picks up with other suburban bike trails. From the
Lincoln Memorial you can cross the bridge and
connect with the Mt. Vernon trail (16 miles) or take
the trail along I-66 past Dulles (20+ miles). You
can also connect to the Georgetown C&O Canal
(crushed gravel) which runs nearly 100 miles to PA
or the Capitol Crescent trail (paved) that runs
nearly 10 miles upto suburban DC.

The point is: There are hundreds of miles of
dedicated running / biking paths in the DC area (as
a biker, it's great). Even the super runners
(skinny, granola eating marathoners) just wouldn't
run up here, let alone at night, especially their
last night in DC.

She was brought here or lured here. In fact, if
someone said "meet me at the Klingle Mansion" and
then let's go for a drive in the park" I can see
that happening very easily. It's a short drive. It
probably offered one of the first picnic areas
available as you drove up Glover. We won't know
until they open up the scene. [4]
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Joined: 13 Sep 2002
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Location: Jacksonville, FL

PostPosted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 12:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Rita Cosby and Bill O'Reilly also discussed this:

O'REILLY: The evidence that I've locked in on
yesterday and today are the computer records that
show that she looked at this park and a mansion
within the park before she left the house.

COSBY: Immediately before.

O'REILLY: Immediately before, the police know that.
Now, you don' t believe she was jogging, do you?

COSBY: No, I don't, and police do not believe she
was jogging. That area was so thickly wooded, so
many rocks in that area, it's not a common place to
jog. So they're saying she must have been brought
there, or that could be a secondary site, even.

At the top of the, it's interesting, there's a grove
area, as they're describing, a place where even a
car could park. So it is possible that either she
was lured to that area or that part was just the
location where maybe they dropped the body off. [5]


Could Chandra have gone to Klingle Mansion to meet someone? Greta Van Susteren discussed with ex-D.C. homicide detective Ted Williams:

WILLIAMS: But I can tell you, after having been over
to Chandra's apartment, it is highly unlikely that
Chandra walked all the way from her apartment.

I believe the department -- the police department is
doing the right and proper thing trying to determine
if cab drivers brought her to this venue. [6]


And in fact, there are no taxi dispatch records of picking her up, and no taxi drivers remember it. Even though Condit drove Anne Marie Smith around in an older red Ford Fiesta or Escort, Chandra never mentioned to Linda Zamsky riding in his car. She said they took a taxi.

Chandra could have taken the metro train from Dupont Circle, past the Woodley Park Station at Calvert St. and the Adams Morgan area where Condit lived, to the Cleveland Park Station at Porter St. It's not an easy walk to Klingle Mansion from there to Williamsburg Lane which has no sidewalks and is uphill at the end.

www.justiceforchandra.com member James Forrester posted about the walk to Klingle Mansion from the metro station:

The Klingle Mansion (KM) is on Williamsburg Lane
directly off Porter St. The closest subway stop for
Chandra would have been Cleveland Park which is just
two stops on the "Red" Shady Grove line from Dupont
Circle. Porter is one block from the Metro station
but when you turn on Porter its probably 15 or 20
minutes to Williamsburg Lane (WL). Turning on WL you
pass some very expensive houses. I later checked on
who lived there and its a real who's who of media,
government and business leaders.

You walk past a paved parking area to reach the
circular driveway in front of the KM. There is also
an extension of the paved road that goes behind the
KM where there are about 8 parking spaces.

The front of the Klingle Mansion faces the woods
which lead down to Rock Creek toward the East! Not
the West. There are walking trails and some steep
parts. Below, the view includes Rock Creek in one of
its deeper and wider points, a jogging trail on the
opposite side, and several roads. [7]


I also visited there, but arrived at Klingle Mansion one Friday morning in the more conventional manner of park goers there. I drove up early and parked in a Williamsburg Lane parking lot leading up to Klingle Mansion. I wanted to walk from Klingle Mansion to grove 18 on Ridge/Glover Road, the "ridge", to see if I could get a sense of what following Western Ridge Trail would have been like had Chandra jogged there as some suggest. It's a mile and half from Klingle Mansion. Exercise experts who don't know the terrain say the four miles from her apartment to where she was found, establishing at a minimum an eight mile run, is normal for a person in Chandra's excellent shape.

This doesn't take into account that there was no obvious destination for Chandra as to where she would start her return. Western Ridge Trail runs to the end of Rock Creek Park miles away. A closed Nature Center is mentioned as a destination simply because there is nothing else. She was four miles from home on a trail to nowhere, no end in sight.

And an idyllic eight mile run on a paved jogging path? Hardly. I ventured downhill from Klingle Mansion, looking for a sign for Western Ridge Trail, actually, looking for a sign for anything. A small unmarked footpath brought me out to a paved trail along Rock Creek. I turned northward, venturing toward what I knew from previously looking at a map would be Pierce Mill.

At a turn in the path was one of those signposts with signs sticking out in different directions. I saw Western Ridge Trail. I thought it pointed straight ahead but maybe my eyes were still bleary in the early morning. Anyway, I should have zigged when I zagged.

The trail started out nicely enough. I envisioned Chandra walking on the trail, enjoying a nice early May afternoon. Then the trail petered out to a footpath, then barely discernible concentrated wear and tear, then nothing. I was facing a bank with loose rocks as stairsteps. Horse trail? You'd have to help a llama up these rocks.

Hoisting my laptop bag securely over my shoulder, I clambered up the rocks to a new ridge. Time and again the ridge would thin to nothing. When in doubt, which was most of the time, I climbed another level to a new ridge. I came across a giant tree laying on its side, too thick around to climb over, so lengthy I had to debate whether to go up or down the hill to get around it.

It was at this point that I knew not only horses but Chandra had not come through here. I knew not where I was or where I was going, but knew going forward into the unknown was preferable to returning through the known.

At times I could see buildings high above. Large dogs would come out of brush above me and bark menacingly. I was sure I had stumbled onto private property of something formerly known as the Soviet Union and would be dealt with accordingly. Instead, I stumbled out of trees onto a busy sidewalk, looking for all the world like a disoriented homeless person with his belongings in a bag over his shoulder out foraging for breakfast.

People looked at me with some pity, not entirely a novel experience, averting their eyes lest I be a panhandler. I looked around, seeing a park sign. I had walked through Hazen Park and found myself on Connecticut Ave. I got the attention of a young man and asked where Pierce Mill was, explaining I had come through Hazen Park. He was somewhat surprised, and I don't blame him, but directed me on up Connecticut to Tilden Street and down to Rock Creek again. I was back on track, still in search of Western Ridge Trail.

From Pierce Mill I kept going north, here undoubtedly an idyllic paved jogging path running along Rock Creek. Suddenly, it came to a halt at a major intersection, Broad Branch and Beach Drives. Western Ridge Trail? Maybe, somewhere over there.

It is telling that experienced riders didn't think Chandra made the trip I was taking. Sari Horwitz and Allan Lengel of the Washington Post report:

Dwight Madison, supervisory ranger for the National
Park Service, said police officers have interviewed
him, asking what route Levy would have taken if she
had walked or jogged from Klingle Mansion to where
her remains were found. A section of the Western
Ridge trail runs between Grove 17 and the mansion at
the end of Williamsburg Lane, he said.

A longtime rider at the stables said she and other
riders think Levy was killed elsewhere and dumped in
the woods. They believe that their horses would have
picked up the scent of a decomposing body or that
riders would have seen animals attracted to a
corpse. [8]
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Location: Jacksonville, FL

PostPosted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 12:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I crossed and found a sign for horses pointing on up a hill. It didn't exactly say Western Ridge Trail, but it was a horse trail. I started climbing, looking for picnic areas 17 and 18. After a long trek uphill, past a large equestrian field, I was sitting at picnic table 18 facing Ridge Road. Where Chandra was found was behind me and over the hill.

As you pass picnic area 18 the horse trail becomes a gravel trail and continues on uphill. The dirt Western Ridge Trail becomes hiking only, or No Horses, as it dips downward just before turning sharply uphill.

It is at that point that Chandra was found at least 200 feet straight downhill from the No Horses path. I found an orange stake and three orange flags marking about a 45 foot long by 15 foot wide rectangle on the side of the hill, about 300 feet in from Broad Branch Road.

The site is a large naturally hollowed out spot below a tree on a steep incline. A log lays to one side, and there the left orange flag is planted. The flags are very small, planted in the ground with small stiff wires. Yet I saw the flags from a path looking across the ravine. Any clothes not covered with leaves would have been seen just as easily.

I believe the skull was found further downhill, probably at the orange flag below the stake. I estimated the flag at being about 45 feet downhill from the stake. There was no gully or ditch that the skull would have washed down, just a rocky slope downhill. The slope is so steep that the foot deep hollow wouldn't do much to hold anything from being washed on downhill.

I was amazed to see the lack of underbrush on that entire slope. Acres of trees on steep, rocky, leaf covered slopes with no bushes to speak of. It's not as if where Chandra was found has been cleared or is in a clearing, the entire side of the hill is the same way.

There are large deep ravines on both sides, but it is not the most inaccessible spot. For example, the area between there and grove 18 is very rough. But it appears to have been chosen based on the ability to drop downhill from the path and get back up fairly quickly. The more inaccessible sides of the ravines on both sides would take much longer to traverse.

The location was in my opinion picked by someone very familiar with the park who knew they could drive up to the entrance to the path, even pull off the road into the trees, and go straight downhill between two large ravines and deposit her on the steep side of the hill a hundred feet high above the busy road. This section between the two ravines and guarded nearby at the base by a sheer 70 foot cliff would never be traversed by a casual passerby.

For this reason I think it is possible that she lay there on the other side of the ravine from the top of the cliff since she was murdered, if covered well the whole time. The path to the top of the cliff and then on up to Western Trail Ridge is too well trodden to have missed seeing her clothes strewn about on the side of that hill across the ravine for a year, but if covered well so few would have traversed the side of the hill between those two ravines that she would likely have gone undetected.

However, a dog would not miss that site whatsoever. For us to believe she lay there a year, we have to believe that the turtle hunter is the first dog walker to follow their dog across the ravine to see what it had found. That is hard to believe.

There are walking paths up the side of the hill from Broad Branch. Path is a generous term here. It is little more than worn down footprints around logs and rocks. The start of the path is at the corner of Grant Road and Broad Branch. The creek channel running along Broad Branch is very wide and deep, but the water is that of a small creek. The path runs along the hill above the creek like walking on a wall above a sidewalk. The path is just wide enough to walk on and ten feet above the creek. It is also in plain view of traffic on the road.

One walks along the top of the creek for at least 300 feet before coming to a sheer cliff where the path goes uphill sharply. Another path comes up from the other side. The path stops alongside the creek below where Chandra was found. That is how inaccessible Chandra's site was from below at the creek.

The cliff is sheer and at least 70 feet high. The ground below is soft, though. The footing is treacherous. At the top of the cliff the path heads on uphill at a slant across the side of the hill. It is not an easily seen path to follow.

Any thoughts of someone bringing Chandra up the path from the corner of Broad Branch and Grant are totally offbase. Not only is there no parking down there, a person wouldn't even be able to walk along the road to get there. Entering at the corner of these country roads and walking on the path along the creek is in plain view of cars on Broad Branch and narrow and treacherous.

There is an almost invisible branch of the path that goes up the hill beside the cliff but it is little more than footholds for climbing straight up the hill. It is inconceivable doing this at night or carrying someone up the hill this way at anytime, even two people.

Did someone come up this hill to wait for a passing woman to attack? You have to see how high this hill is, how isolated from the streets it is, how one would be run over should they venture down to Broad Branch Road and cling to the side of the mountain as cars whizz around the curves, to see how unlikely anyone would be to venture up Western Ridge Trail and hang out in the woods to attack someone.

Just because it's unlikely doesn't mean it didn't happen, but if it did, the person had a long way to get back to his regular haunts. He would stick out like a sore thumb if he ventured on foot up that mountain. It certainly would have been isolated for a sexual predator.

I saw two couples with dogs in an entire Friday on Western Ridge Trail at grove 18. There were many groups of riders riding along Ridge Road just outside the trees and stopping at the picnic area, but none ventured into the darkness of forest. It is intensely silent. A sex predator would have a long silent wait in the forest for a lone woman to come by on that shadowy trail.

Of course a stalker could follow a woman up the mountain. With Chandra wearing headphones he wouldn't have to be particularly stealthy either, just stay back out of sight and follow. That's quite a distance to wait to attack, but if Chandra turned inward and walked into the No Horses branch of Western Ridge Trail it would have been an attack soon after she had ventured further away from the road and people who could help. Closing the distance between them without alarming the woman would require a cheetah like rundown, though.

Another suggestion of an attacker is that of a homeless person, a vagrant, perhaps a hobo if you will living in a tent. The same reasoning applies. It is so remote from food and water that a person would have to trek up and down the mountain on horse trails for supplies. In addition, they would be very noticeable and dealt with by the Park police if not reported first by the many horse riders.

As a result, I didn't see the usual bottles and rags that one sees in remote areas of metro parks. There were two beer cans laying next to the trail between where you drop straight down the hill to where Chandra was found and where the path that slants downhill to the top of the cliff starts. Quite frankly the trail is not an inviting spot to sit and party. I tried to sit on logs to type but everything was so slanted on the steep slope that I kept sliding off. And that was sober.

I would expect people to walk back there from picnic area 18 as you see people do in any state or national park. You have to expect the occasional beer can from picnicers being tossed. But the lack of parking and police chasing people out of there after dark would keep it from being a party spot.

It is exactly that isolation that makes it possible to drive up, pull into the trees at picnic area 18, and carry a body down the trail and then downhill and dump it and get back out of there in a hurry undetected. Greta discussed this with Ted Williams, the ex-D.C. homicide detective:

GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, HOST: Ted, your thoughts. You're
a homicide detective in D.C., you come upon a scene
and you see that. What do you do with that when you
discover that?

WILLIAMS: ...Listen, Greta, let's be very realistic.
When you're talking about rapists who murder, people
who rob, who kill, those individuals will rob, kill,
and get out of there. They will rape, kill, and move
out in a hurry. They don't take time to try to get
rid of a body. Somebody methodically attempted to
get rid of the body of Chandra Levy, as far as I'm
concerned.

VAN SUSTEREN: Ted, how far or how close can you
actually drive an automobile to the place where the
body could then be pushed over this sort of hilly
area?

WILLIAMS: It's a distance. It is quite a distance
away, I would say at least 200-300 yards or even
more from where you could drive an automobile. Now,
if you came in from one side, where you would have
to actually cross the creek and go up the incline,
as I did this afternoon, you would be closer to the
area where this crime took place, or where they
found the skeletal remains. But it's very difficult.

So, my theory on this is, it is difficult to believe
one person took that body through the woods, came to
this cliff-like area, and then dropped it. I just
don't see it happening that way. [9]


The difficulty has to do with the lack of sunlight because of the trees and the rocky, sandy soil which makes footing so treacherous. For example, with brush one can hang on to something as they gingerly traverse downhill. There's nothing to hang on to.

But it's not impossible to walk up and down the hill. I did it carrying a heavy laptop case over my shoulder. A person could carry or drag Chandra down that hill. It's not necessary for her to have walked it. In fact, in my opinion it would be far more difficult to force her down that hill than it would be to carry her.

When you take a look at what she was supposed to have done to get here to be attacked, how isolated this spot is when the Nature Center is closed, and how many people, horses, and dogs would have had to be totally oblivious to the corpse over the side of the hill, not only is it difficult to believe that Chandra jogged here, it is difficult to believe she was here at all throughout the summer Rock Creek Park was searched.

Somebody could back a vehicle off the road right to the path. The road to the Nature Center is open day and night, and there's next to no traffic on it. If you back off the road at grove 18 it even has marker posts to show where to stop backing up.

The thought of moving her body around is morbid, but consider the murdered Sacramento lawyer who was moved by his wife and buried in a vineyard after being kept in a refrigerator for a few months, and during the same year Chandra was murdered. It's morbid, but not inconceivable.

The perfect spot for driving up at night, hauling the bodybag across a field to a path, and then down the side of a hill to make it look like she had been sexually assaulted and robbed, then hidden in a ravine.

A little too perfect. While the ideal remote location for access by car, it was an impossible location for her to have gone to by herself that afternoon, four miles into wilderness, off jogging paths, off the horse trail, off into wilderness.

Chandra's body was not seen for a year even as condoms, beer cans, trash, tree markings, a lipstick, and, if she were there, even her bones littered the area. However, her body was not seen.

The logistics of someone encountering Chandra on that trail, subduing her, silencing her, controlling her, moving her down the hill, sexually assaulting her, and strangling her, are certainly doable as it does happen all too often, but it would be pretty tough to do with one person if there much resistance at all.

Over and over we come to the conclusion of her trusting someone even to be there, and then being betrayed as she was subdued and killed. Yet it is difficult to believe that a killer would risk parking a vehicle in broad daylight at the picnic area to betray Chandra in the woods. The risk is unimaginable.

She was at the end of a trail, and meant to look like she met her end there, hiking without a cell phone, without money or a credit card, without id, hiking to the ends of the earth until she died.

She was supposed to be distraught, obsessed, unable to take no for an answer, suicidal. That was the way she was left in the park. Suicidal, with her wish granted.

Officially, the police say that the elements have destroyed the crime scene and say both that she could have been there all along and that she could have been brought there later.

There is no forensic basis whatsoever for her death occurring at that site. Had there been such evidence, thinking would be oriented to an assault by a stranger or a betrayer at that site.

I would not expect such evidence, and there isn't any according to the police. On top of all other improbabilities of how she would come to die there, one must also add that the proof of her decomposition has been destroyed. The list of improbabilities is improbably long.
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PostPosted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 12:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote



Glover Road running up to the Nature Center at picnic area 18. To the left is the entrance off the road to the horse trail for horses and hikers. Horses would continue uphill on the wide rocky trail and hikers would enter the narrow dirt No Horses branch of Western Ridge trail. Parking for picnic area 17 across the road is on the right. - James Forrester





This is the place to backup to the trail off Glover Road at picnic area 18, or another one similar to it. Backing up into this would keep a car off the road while dumping a body over the hill. - James Forrester






Entrance to No Horses trail above where Chandra was found. - James Forrester






Walking along the trail. Imagine being a young woman alone without a cellphone, wallet, pepper spray, or dog for protection. This is supposed to be what Chandra did. - James Forrester






Left by Daniel Boone, a UFO, or whoever left some beer cans nearby. - James Forrester






This shows the dropoff down the hill from the trail. - James Forrester






Going downhill from the trail above. - James Forrester






Going on down through the trees. - James Forrester






Looking down at one of the orange flags marking the site. - James Forrester
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rd



Joined: 13 Sep 2002
Posts: 9273
Location: Jacksonville, FL

PostPosted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 12:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Next chapter - Guandique
http://www.justiceforchandra.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2537

Murder on a Horse Trail - Table of Contents
http://www.justiceforchandra.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2562


Horse Trail
1. “Thread Archives” at www.justiceforchandra.com/forums , 5 Sep. 2002.

2. Lathem, Niles. “Grim Park Site Is Reopened But Chandra Investigators Aren’t
Out Of The Woods Yet.” New York Post 1 June 2002.

3. Horwitz, Sari and Allan Lengel. “Levy May Have Been Strangled, Official
Says” Washington Post 14 July 2002.

4. “Thread Archives” at www.justiceforchandra.com/forums , 5 Sep. 2002.

5. Wecht, Cyril. Interview with Bill O’Reilly. The O’Reilly Factor. Fox News. 23
May 2002. Transcript.

6. Williams, Ted and Michael Baden. Interview with Greta Van Susteren. On the
Record. Fox News 4 June 2002. Transcript.

7. “Thread Archives” at www.justiceforchandra.com/forums , 5 Sep. 2002.

8. Horwitz, Sari and Allan Lengel. “Levy May Have Been Strangled, Official
Says” Washington Post 14 July 2002.

9. Williams, Ted. “Was Chandra Levy Sexually Assaulted Before She Died?”
Interview with Greta Van Susteren. On the Record. Fox News. 31 May 2002.
Transcript.

“A local murder mystery.” Sacramento Bee 25 June 2002.


A post from the Horse Trail

I am sitting at the picnic table at #18. Where Chandra was found is behind me and over the hill. The reporting has just been pathetic when you take a look at what she was supposed to have done to get here to be attacked, how isolated this spot is when the nature center is closed, and how many people, horses, and dogs would have had to be totally oblivious to the corpse over the side of the hill.

Let's just put it this way. I found out I'm not the only one who thinks she was brought back here and dumped after the searches ended.

More details when I have a chance. I'm going back down over the hill again to Broad Branch. I want to see what a turtle hunter and his dog would see from down there.

Here's a map that has everything marked.




X1 marks the spot where Chandra was found, and where I found the orange stake. The green path is Western Ridge Trail, which is essentially a horse trail and hiking path up this steep hill off in the woods running alongside the park road to the Nature Center.

As you pass picnic area 18, there's a dotted line where the horse trail continues on uphill and Western Ridge Trail becomes hiking only, or No Horses. The trail dips downward just before turning sharply uphill. It is at that point, at X2, that Chandra was found straight down the side of the slope 238 feet. It is another 283 feet on downhill from where she was found to Broad Branch Road.

X7 is about at the top of the sheer rock cliff set back from the creek along Broad Branch Road. There is a large ravine running up the hill in between X7 and X1, and an even larger ravine on the other side in between X1 and picnic table 18. X1 is not the most inaccessible spot, for example, the area between X1 and 18 is very rough. But X1 appears to have been chosen based on the ability to drop downhill from the path and get back up fairly quickly. The more inaccessible sides of the ravines would take much longer to traverse.

The purple lines are walking paths up the side of the hill from Broad Branch. Path is a generous term here. It is little more than worn down footprints around logs and rocks. The start of the path is at X8 at the corner of Grant and Broad Branch. The creek channel running along Broad Branch is very wide and deep, but the water is that of a small creek. The path runs along the hill above the creek like walking on a wall above a sidewalk. The path is just wide enough to walk on and ten feet above the creek. It is also in plain view of traffic on the road.

One walks along the top of the creek for at least 300 feet before coming to the sheer cliff where the path goes uphill sharply. You can see another purple line coming up from the other side. This is coming up the side of the hill on the other side of the cliff. Notice how the path stops alongside the creek below X1. That is how inaccessible Chandra's site was from below at the creek.


the No Horses trail above




going down the hill




seeing the flags from below by the ravine




the log to the left where one flag is




a close look at the hollow where she was found







I think what we have to emphasize is what the police have overlooked; that this location is based on ease of access by car to remote woods. There are more remote spots, but they aren't next to a backup drive for unloading horses as there is next to picnic area 18. Not only is this spot easy to drive up to, it is ideal for pulling off the road into the trees and unloading something unseen after dusk when the park is closed.

It is remarkable that the police didn't emphasize that aspect of where Chandra was found. It is as if they completely ruled out Chandra being dumped in the park. Statistics show that almost all bodies found in the park are dumped there. And this is next to the most convenient spot for driving up and dumping a body you could ever imagine.

rd
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