Whenever there is a contrived story flashing on the news wires, your smart move is to look somewhere else for what’s really important.
The big “scoop” yesterday was that The President discussed the possibility with Russian and American officials that ISIS was trying to put a bomb inside a laptop. Kind of boring conversation, when you realize that the first such bombing by bytes was in 2013. So, what was the real news, planned for muffling by a WAPO/NYT story from the clouds? (TSA already scans all laptops separately, any visitor to an airport will tell you.)
Enter Rod Wheeler, retired Washington homicide detective hired by a third party to investigate the murder of Seth Rich, Voter Expansion Data Director at the DNC. He was shot and killed last July in Northwest D.C. and police said the killing in the District’s Bloomingdale neighborhood was a robbery, not a murder-for-hire. He was shot twice in the back, and his wallet and valuable watch were not stolen.
Wheeler had concerns from the beginning of the case, running a parallel investigation of his own:
“My investigation up to this point shows there was some degree of email exchange between Seth Rich and WikiLeaks,” Wheeler said. “I do believe that the answers to who murdered Seth Rich sits on his computer on a shelf at the DC police or FBI headquarters.”
Yesterday, a federal investigator alleged that a FBI forensic report of Rich’s computer — generated within 96 hours after Rich’s murder — showed he made contact with WikiLeaks through Gavin MacFadyen, a now-deceased American investigative reporter, documentary filmmaker, and director of WikiLeaks, who was living in London at the time, the federal source said.
The federal investigator, who requested anonymity, said 44,053 emails and 17,761 attachments between Democratic National Committee leaders, spanning from January 2015 through late May 2016, were transferred from Rich to MacFadyen before May 21.
Twelve days after Rich was killed, WikiLeaks published the internal DNC emails that showed top party officials colluded to stop Sen. Bernie Sanders from winning the party’s presidential nominee.
Wheeler said he believes there is a cover-up and police were told to back down from the investigation.
Neither the police department nor the FBI have been forthcoming. They haven’t been cooperating at all. I believe that the answer to solving his (Rich’s) death lies on that computer, which I believe is either at the police department or either at the FBI. I have been told both…
I have a source inside the police department that has looked at me straight in the eye and said, ‘Rod, we were told to stand down on this case and I can’t share any information with you.’ Now, that is highly unusual for a murder investigation, especially from a police department. Again, I don’t think it comes from the chief’s office, but I do believe there is a correlation between the mayor’s office and the DNC and that is the information that will come out.
Meanwhile, Rich’s family is understandably trying to refute the idea that he was involved with Wikileaks. Somehow there is a belief that not all facts in the world trump the “Russians are coming” email narrative.
Following publication of this post, a flood of media reports repudiated Wheeler.
Still, not everyone agreed that the Rich investigation was unfounded:
You can fool nearly all the people... 