Gay Housemates Face New Charges in D.C. Murder Case

Here’s something we learned from our Law & Order marathons: Innocent people do not tamper with the evidence at a murder scene. Innocent people do not put the victim’s blood on a knife to make it look like the murder weapon. Innocent people do not clean the crime scene before calling the police.

Three gay men, Joseph Price, Victor Zaborsky, and Dylan Ward did all three in the murder of their roommate D.C. attorney Robert Wone (pictured). The police have charged them with conspiracy and evidence tampering in addition to an earlier obstruction of justice charge.

The Washington Blade explains the gruesome details:

“Most of the allegations in the latest indictment were discussed in a police affidavit that authorities released on Oct. 31, when Ward was arrested in Miami on an obstruction of justice charged prior to the first indictment.

The affidavit described how police investigators and the city’s medical examiner’s office determined that the kitchen knife that the three men told police an intruder used to stab Wone did not appear to be the true murder weapon. The affidavit noted that the depth and shape of the stab wounds on Wone’s body were not consistent to the kitchen knife found by the body.

The affidavit also said investigators found fibers on the knife from a towel retrieved near the body that indicated someone had deliberately wiped blood from Wone’s body on the knife to make it appear as the murder weapon.

Thursday’s indictment for the first time specifically accuses one or more of the defendants with evidence tampering in connection with the knife.

“The defendants, individually or in combination, retrieved a knife from a set located on the kitchen counter of the residence,” the indictment says. “The defendants, individually or in combination, used a white, cotton towel to place Robert Wone’s blood on the knife that had been retrieved from the kitchen,” it says.

The affidavit said investigators believe the actual murder weapon was a knife that was missing from another cutlery set police found in Ward’s bedroom.

The grand jury indictment handed down Thursday alludes to this in its charge of tampering with physical evidence.

It says the three men “altered, destroyed, mutilated and concealed objects and items, that is, blood and bloody items, a knife, and items used to clean the scene of the homicide, knowing or having reason to believe that an official proceeding was likely to be instituted, with the intent to impair the integrity and availability of that evidence for use in the official proceeding.”