Robert Askins, 1938 DC Cyanide Killer: A Four-Decade Arc
On December 28, 1938, in a small alley off 6th Street NW, a 31-year-old woman named Ruth McDonald accepted a drink from a young chemistry student and was dead within the hour.
Crime
The Bishop Family Murders: A Bethesda Home, a Foggy Bottom Memo, and a 48-Year Manhunt
On March 1, 1976, a Foreign Service officer killed his family in their Carderock Springs home and vanished into a 48-year manhunt that is still open.
The Kalorama Triple Murder of 1919: The Case That Helped Build Miranda
On Chinese New Year 1919, three Chinese diplomats were shot dead at the Mission house on Kalorama Road, and the case set in motion the Brandeis opinion that helped build Miranda.
Five Forgotten Murders in DC’s Murder Bay
Five forgotten people, robbed, slashed, shot, or stabbed in Washington’s Murder Bay slum between 1865 and 1868. We pulled their names out of the old Evening Star: named victims, named killers, and real intersections that no longer exist.
Mary Harris Shot the Man Who Jilted Her in the Treasury Building, Then Married Her Lawyer
She walked into the Treasury Building on a Monday afternoon in 1865, shot the clerk who had courted her since she was twelve, and walked free in five minutes.
The Two Times Someone Landed a Stolen Aircraft on the White House Lawn
Twice in twenty years, someone climbed into a stolen aircraft and put it down on the White House South Lawn. In 1974 it was a 20-year-old Army private in a stolen Huey. In 1994 it was a depressed truck driver in a stolen Cessna. Both times, the president was away. Both times, the Secret Service had to rewrite the rules.
Dallas Williams, the Bad Man of Swampoodle
On January 31, 1958, the Evening Star started calling Dallas O. Williams “the Bad Man of Swampoodle.” The nickname stuck through five trials, three vacated convictions, and a 1961 double murder that exposed the broken machinery of DC’s insanity defense.
The 1857 Election Day Riot, When Marines Fired on a DC Mob
In 1857 the commandant of the Marine Corps faced down a rioters’ cannon at a DC polling place, armed only with a cotton umbrella.
1966 Arlington Biker Shootout: Pagans vs. Avengers
In June 1966, the Pagans and Avengers shot it out in broad daylight at the Lee Harrison Shopping Center in Arlington. Eleven bikers went to prison.