Unsolved cases
Homicides and other crimes with no one held responsible. Some are a century old. Some are from this year.
Murder of Seth Rich
The murder of Seth Rich occurred on July 10, 2016, at 4:20 a.m. in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Rich died about an hour and a half after being shot twice in the back. The perpetrators were never apprehended; police suspected he had been the victim of an attempted robbery.
Year unknown · District of ColumbiaUnsolved
Alma Preinkert
Alma Preinkert (October 22, 1895 – February 28, 1954) was the registrar at the University of Maryland before being murdered by an intruder at her Washington, D.C. home. A Maryland alumna and a beloved figure in the university community, her murder sent shockwaves through the area. Although a large investigation ensued, her attacker was never identified.
2018 · District of ColumbiaUnsolved2018 Wayne Place murder case
In April 2018, an abandoned address at Southeast Wayne Place in Washington, D.C. was found to contain the remains of three missing women, Jewel Marquita King, Verdell Jefferson, and Dorothy Jean Butts, who all disappeared in 2006. The case remains unsolved.
1981 · District of ColumbiaUnsolved
Raymond Nels Nelson
Raymond Nels Nelson (September 2, 1921 – June 1, 1981) was bureau chief of The Providence Journal and Evening Bulletin and later a member of the staff of Senator Claiborne Pell. He was found murdered in his Washington, D.C. apartment on June 1, 1981. The murder is still unsolved.
1986 · District of ColumbiaUnsolvedSuitland murders
The Suitland murders refers to a series of murders of young girls and women committed from October 1986 to January 1987 in the unincorporated area of Suitland, Maryland, considered a suburb of Washington, D.C. All victims were black, and each had been sexually assaulted and stabbed afterwards. During the investigation, police arrested a resident of D.C., Alton Alonso Best, for the murder of a girl that was never…
1971 · District of ColumbiaUnsolved
Freeway Phantom
The Freeway Phantom is the pseudonym of an unidentified serial killer who murdered six girls and a woman in Washington, D.C., between April 1971 and September 1972.
2006 · District of ColumbiaUnsolvedMurder of Robert Eric Wone
Robert Eric Wone (June 1, 1974 – August 3, 2006) was an American lawyer who was murdered in the Washington, D.C. home of a college friend, Joseph Price, in August 2006. Wone was living in suburban Oakton, Virginia, but had been working as general counsel at Radio Free Asia in downtown Washington. He had stayed the night at the home of friends located about one mile from his office.