16. Extract from statement of Gladys McElroy

[24 July]

.

"...I have been a bus-driver with the Manassas Bus Company for the last 23 years. Since January of this year I have been driving the Manassas-DC-Manassas route.

Yesterday morning there were maybe 10 or 12 passengers on the 11 a.m. ride from DC to Manassas. Three of them I know by name. Mrs Flores, the schoolteacher; she was returning from a visit to her mother at the hospital where Nurse Henry was murdered. Miss Evans, the widow of the old police chief; she had stayed overnight in DC after seeing something fancy at the theatre. And Mr Jermyn, the postman; he has his own reasons for visiting DC. There were also a number of passengers whose names I don't know off the top of my head but who I would know to see. And of course there was the man who the police are interested in. He was wearing a crumpled linen suit, a bit like those suits that Matlock used to wear on TV and his hair looked like it had been dragged backwards through a bush. He handed me a $20 bill - the fare from DC to Manassas is $12 - and told me that I could keep the change. As it happens, I had to keep the change anyhow. The company operates an exact fares policy so customers either pay their $12 or else they pay more but in any event they don't get change. It was the way this man spoke that caught my attention most. He sounded like Little Lord Fauntleroy all grown up and certainly not the kind of person whom you'd expect to be catching the mid-morning bus from DC to Manassas. Even so, there was something about his accent that wasn't quite right. I emigrated from Jamaica to England before I came to the United States so I know what a genuine upper-class English accent sounds like and his wasn't the real deal. It was too much. More like a Hollywood impression of an Englishman's accent, rather than the real thing.

Anyhow, the man sat down a few rows back and in the mirror I could see him looking at me every now and then. Strange looks as if I had somehow offended him. I paid no attention to him. As a driver I'm well used to getting odd looks from odd customers. It goes with the turf.

When we got to Manassas the man came up to me and said he'd noticed a sign which said that we had CCTV on the bus and that if he'd known his privacy was going to be violated he wouldn't have travelled by bus. I told him that the signs had been put up by the bus company in the hope that it would stop young hoodlums writing graffiti on the bus but that the cameras had never been installed. When he heard this he slapped his thigh and said this was a "cracking" story. There was something about the way he spoke and looked which made me wonder whether he wasn't quite right in the head. But he seemed pleased not to have been caught on CCTV and headed off to do whatever he had to do in Manassas.

Later on when I finished my final run of the day and was doing a tidy-up of the bus I found a newspaper on the back seat and there, staring up at me from the front page, was the strange-looking man I had carried as a bus passenger earlier that day. The picture in the paper was a police drawing and didn't quite capture him right but I have no doubt that the man in the paper and the odd-ball passenger on my bus were the same person. I read the story in the paper, saw that the man was wanted for questioning and came to the police station straightaway...".

15. Manassas Man Murdered

[Virginian Farmers' Journal, 23 July]

.

"Manassas Man Murdered

Manassas local, Josh Wheen (43) was gunned down yesterday only feet away from the front door of his farmhouse.

Mr Wheen's body was discovered by his wife when she returned home from morning coffee with friends in Woodbridge. The emergency services were immediately called and while waiting for them to come Mrs Wheen attempted unsuccssfully to resuscitate her husband. When the ambulance crew arrived a short time later there was nothing they could do to revive Mr Wheen.

Police quickly sealed off the family home and grounds for forensic examination. It is understood that no sign of a break-in was discovered and it is possible that Mr Wheen either knew his killer or, at least, was expecting the killer to call.

A search of the outhouses on the Wheen farm revealed that Mr Wheen's distinctive red, silver and blue SUV had been stolen, presumably by the killer. Readers may recall that this SUV was won by Mr Wheen at this month's Independence Day Cattle and Ploughing Fair in Manassas.

A state-wide alert was put out for the SUV shortly after mid-day yesterday and radio stations were also asked to broadcast the vehicle details. A couple of sightings were reported and while the vehicle and driver were not apprehended it seems likely that it was driven towards the DC metropolitan area.

A police search of the Wheen family home indicated that a 44 Magnum Colt Anaconda which Mr Wheen had advertised for sale was missing. Although, at the time of writing, the autopsy on Mr Wheen has yet to be concluded it is understood that Mr Wheen was shot at close range by someone holding a small arms weapon. Police are proceeding on the basis that the stolen 44 Magnum Anaconda was the weapon used.

This last fact gives the police a potentially useful line of enquiry. Mr Wheen had moonlighted as a licensed gun-trader in the last few years, buying and selling small-arms to gun-lovers to supplement his income, often advertising in this paper. One possibility being explored by the police is that Mr Wheen's killer called to the house looking to buy a gun and, when shown the 44 Magnum Anaconda, turned the weapon on Mr Wheen.

Another possibility being explored by police is that Mr Wheen's killing may in some way have been connected with a protracted boundary dispute that has involved a number of Manassas residents over the past few years. However, it is understood that investigators consider a rogue gun-buyer to be the most likely culprit behind Mr Wheen's murder.

One high-placed source within the police department who did not wish to be named indicated that officers are also considering whether there is a possible connection between Mr Wheen's murder and the dramatic daylight bludgeoning of Nurse Bridie Henry in Washington DC's Rock Creek Park last week.

Nurse Henry's brutal murder has featured prominently in the national media over the last few days. Less prominently reporte has been the alleged sighting at a gun-range in West Virginia of a man whom police want to speak with regarding Nurse Henry's murder.

Significantly, a Manassas bus-driver has apparently indicated to police that yesterday morning a passenger resembling the man police are looking for in connection with the Nurse Henry murder travelled in the driver's bus from DC to Manassas yesterday morning. The driver did not have an opportunity to report this to police until after her day-shift ended. So police had no chance to apprehend the man. However, this alleged sighting raises the possibility that Nurse Henry's killer came from DC with a view to acquiring a gun from Mr Wheen, killed Mr Wheen rather than buy the gun and then sped back to DC in Mr Wheen's SUV.

This is a dramatic sequence of events, if true. However, it does seem to fit a certain pattern in that whoever killed Nurse Henry also made his getaway in the victim's car.

Police have asked that the public keep a close eye out in any event for Mr Wheen's SUV in case the driver of that vehicle should return to Virginia. However. on no account should the driver be approached as he is likely armed and dangerous.

It is understood that Mr Wheen's funeral arrangements will be announced after the mandatory state autopsy on his body has been completed."

14. Iranian Prince Appointed to US Supreme Court

Daily Examiner, 24 July

.

"Iranian Prince Appointed to US Supreme Court

In a surprise decision the President last night nominated Professor Saeed Yarvali of Georgetown University to fill the Supreme Court seat of retiring Justice Corelli.

Professor Yarvali is related to the late Shah of Iran and, until the student revolution of 1979 led to the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Yarvali had a distant claim on that nation's throne. In the course of the revolution, Yarvali's father - a member of the Shah of Iran's feared secret police - was executed by revolutionaries. Soon after, the young Yarvali fled with his mother and brother to Switzerland. For a time they managed to maintain themselves there in the comfortable lifestyle that they had enjoyed back home in Iran. However, when Switzerland froze the Geneva bank accounts of certain members of the Shah's regime the suddenly penniless Yarvalis were forced to emigrate to the United States.

During a visit to America in 1966, Mrs Yarvali had spent a week at the luxurious Everglades Country Club and resort in up-market Hampton, Illinois. Soon after her arrival as an immigrant in the United States Mrs Yarvali (a onetime member of the Iranian Olympic tennis team) returned to the Everglades, this time as an in-house tennis coach. In the years that followed the Yarvali boys attended Hampton's elementary and high schools. From here hard graft and the occasional scholarship took the young Saeed to Yale and then to Harvard where he graduated first in class from the Law School. (His younger brother followed more closely in his mother's footsteps, taking a bronze medal in swimming at the Barcelona Olympics and subsequently becoming lead swimming coach at the Everglades).

After university, Yarvali did not immediately continue with his law career, spending two years instead as a volunteer with the United Nations in Palestine. Since that time Professor Yarvali has been critical of Israel's conduct in the Palestinian territories and a prominent member of an ongoing campaign to boycott Israeli universities pending a full and final resolution of ongoing Mid-East tensions.

Given the strength of the pro-Israeli lobby within Congress, Professor Yarvali's stance towards Israel is likely to become a key area of focus during his confirmation hearings and could conceivably stymie the nomination process. Questioned about this, one administration official closely involved in the selection process indicated that Professor Yarvali's views on a particular foreign policy issue were not germane to his suitability for the office of Supreme Court justice and claimed that it would be difficult to find many Iranian-American attorneys of Professor Yarvali's calibre whose views on the Palestinian issue would entirely accord with those of the pro-Israeli lobby.

While this may be true it rather begs the question why the President would apparently go out of his way to antagonise a powerful constituency that was partly responsible for his success in the Presidential election. The answer may lie in the math. While the President scored well in east and west-coast states he did less well in central and mid-western states. In this context the President's nomination of Professor Yarvali can be seen as something of a political master-stroke. Before his appointment to Georgetown University, Yarvali spent the better part of his life living and working in Illinois and Michigan and several times in last night's nomination speech the President emphasised those mid-western connections. This courting of the mid-west has to be worth something when the President goes grubbing for votes in key mid-western states in the next Presidential election.

Of course internationally the President's nomination of Yarvali also sends a strong political message. Since 9/11 this nation has been perceived by many in the Muslim world to have embarked upon a new Crusade. The President's nomination of a prominent Muslim-American signals that such logic is unduly simplistic, that the United States can be an enemy to Muslim terrorists, yet remain a land of opportunity for Muslim people. Professor Yarvali's nomination also sends a message to the American people that there is a community within our midst who contribute much and have much to contribute to our nation's continuing prosperity. In the near constant drum-beat to war that has sounded since the Twin Towers collapsed that is a message which has often been drowned out. It remains to be seen whether it is a message that the Ameerican electorate has any appetite to hear.

During his own lifetime, Professor Yarvali has made an impressive contribution to American society. During the later Clinton administration and the first George W Bush administration, Yarvali served as head of the Civil Rights Unit within the Department of Justice. Much of his workload during this time was concerned with the continuing struggle for full equality by African-Americans and Yarvali has forged strong links with this community which will likely stand him in good stead in the confirmation proceedings before the United States Senate.

Yarvali's urbane personality and his obvious talent as helmsman of the Civil Rights Unit led to his being retained in position by President George W Bush. The reasons for his unexpected departure mid-way through Bush's first term in office have never fully been explained and may yet become a point of focus during the Senate confirmation hearings. Yarvali's profile on the website of Georgetown University Law School suggests that he left only because he was offered the position of Professor of Constitutional Law and Theory at Georgetown. However, a Justice Department official who worked with Yarvali suggested last night that Yarvali's departure was prompted by discomfort with the Bush administration's policies towards the Muslim world and, in particular, its invasion of Iraq. If true, this could be the Achilles Heel in Yarvali's generally impressive resume. The American people and their representatives on Capitol Hill are a tolerant lot but that tolerance is unlikely to extend to a Supreme Court justice who is opposed to a war in which American soldiers are dying. Unswerving patriotism of a particular sort is generally considered a prerequisite to holding high federal office.

At Georgetown, Yarvali is reputed to be a popular faculty member among both staff and students. His courses are heavily over-subscribed, though attendees are warned to come prepared: the professor apparently does not suffer fools lightly and does not suffer the under-prepared at all. In his time since joining the Georgetown law faculty, Professor Yarvali has authored a seminal textbook on civil rights law. However, it is a law review article on "Muslim Rights in Christian America", published last year, that will perhaps excite the most attention at Yarvali's confirmation hearings, particularly among those eager for their own purposes to portray Yarvali as an extremist who should not be allowed to join the nation's foremost jurists.

If Yarvali's nomination is confirmed by the US Senate and the President for one must believe that he will be - Presidents tend not to nominate sure losers - it will be a tremendous personal achievement for Yarvali and a significant political milestone for all Iranian-Americans. To go from turmoil in Tehran to a seat in America's foremost temple of justice in a single lifetime is a remarkable accomplishment. For the President to nominate the first Muslim Supreme Court justice at a time when America is embroiled in difficulties with much of the Muslim world presents a challenge to those who contend that America is fundamentally anti-Islam or anything other than a land of equal and golden opportunity for all of its people, regardless of background."

13. Autopsy Report on Nurse Brigid Henry

[24 July]

.

"...Ms Brigid Henry (the "Deceased") was admitted to Georgetown University Hospital on the afternoon of 18 July. She had suffered heavy injuries to the face. These had macerated the bone structure on the left side of her face to such an extent that the Deceased was not immediately recognised by the nurse who admitted her or the surgical team who operated on her, all of whom had worked with the Deceased.

The Deceased was found to have suffered severe brain damage as a result of the massive contusions to her skull. These contusions were initially attributed to a fall that the Deceased was alleged to have suffered at her house or in a public park. On closer examination it is difficult to see how any fall could have occasioned the injuries that the Deceased sustained. These injuries were confined to the face and any fall that occasioned such injuries could reasonably be expected to have caused additional bodily injury. However, there was no injury of any nature to the Deceased's body apart from some bruising of the right wrist and the left knee.

The nature of the injuries to the Deceased's face and the absence of any other injury apart from limited bruising of the right wrist and the left knee suggest that the Deceased was beaten around the face with a blunt weapon while lying on her back. The bruising on her right wrist and left leg suggest that her attacker held down her two hands with the hand that was not wielding the instrument which struck her - probably the left hand - and that he held down her two legs by kneeling heavily on the left leg (the right leg being trapped underneath).

I have been asked to comment expressly on whether the other injuries suffered are consistent with the accused being held down in a car whilst simultaneously being battered about the face with a hammer. It is my professional opinion that they are.

The autopsy examination reveals severe cranial, cerebral and arterial damage that occasioned massive internal bleeding and would have resulted in the Deceased being reduced to a severely vegetative state had she survived.

The report of the operating surgeon reveals that despite every effort being made to halt this bleeding and to resuscitate the Deceased she died at 2.15 p.m. It is my professional opinion that this was the near inevitable result of the injuries that the Deceased had suffered and that, if she recovered consciousness, she would have suffered continuous and irreversible brain damage that would have rendered it impossible for her to enjoy any semblance of "normal" life. That the Deceased survived as long as she did after her admission to hospital is perhaps best ascribed to her own fighting-spirit and also to the quality of the surgical team who operated on her.

.

Cause of Death: Cerebral haemorrhage.

Proximate cause of death: Assault with a blunt weapon, consistent with hammer injuries.

Any other injury noted: Limited. Bruising of the right wrist. Marked bruising of the left leg (immediately below the knee joint) consistent with some form of restraint.

Blood tests: Clear.

Any other comment: The Deceased was in the very early stages of pregnancy (2-3 weeks)."

12. Extract from Washington DC Radio's "News at 5"

[23 July]

.

"...Presenter - Okay, we're going over now to Toni Rogers for breakking news in the Nurse Henry investigation which Toni has been covering for us. Toni?

Reporter - Hi, Bob. I'm at a shooting-range outside Martinsburg, West Virginia with Irv Holstein, the owner of the range and Irv, you're responsible for a breakthrough in the Nurse Henry investigation, aren't you?

Mr Holstein - Well, we think so, yes.

Reporter - Why do you think that, Irv?

Mr Holstein - Well, we're a pretty small operation here. We have a loyal group of regulars who come shooting here once or twice a week but they're mostly from hereabouts so we know them all, know some of them all their lives. So the other day this fella' turns up looking to become a member and asking if he could look around the range. So I started showing him around but he just didn't seem right.

Reporter - What do you mean by he "didn't seem right"?

Mr Holstein - Well, folks that come to a shooting-range tend to fit into one of two categories. They either have a police or army connection or the like. Or they enjoy hunting. This fella' didn't fit into either category. In fact he didn't seem that interested in guns at all and being interested in guns is kind of a prerequisite to getting the most out of a firing-range. Plus he was kind of funny too.

Reporter - In what way "funny"?

Mr Holstein - Well, not funny ha-ha, that's for sure. He was dressed in fancy clothes. Looked like he was going to a garden party with the Queen of England. And he spoke like the Queen of England too. Very posh. As if he was born better than the rest of us. Anyhow, I asked him if he'd like to let off a few shots on the range and he said that he would. But when I gave him the shot-gun he didn't know how to aim and fire. He looked as if he hadn't ever lifted a gun in his life.

Reporter - And had he said that he knew how to fire a gun?

Mr Holstein - I don't recall that he'd ever quite said as much but he'd never not quite said as much either. In any event, I took the shot-gun from him and let off a shot. At which point he said that he was more a revolver man than a shot-gun man. But when I asked him what kind of revolver he liked to use he couldn't name a single type. Which told me that he'd never fired a revolver either. It made me quite uneasy.

Reporter - Why?

Mr Holstein - Well, he was a strange type. Looking for a gun. Pretending he was something he wasn't. Swanning about in his strange clothes and with that funny way of speaking. I wasn't sure what to make of him or what he was up to, except that I was sure he was up to no good.

Reporter - So what did you do?

Mr Holstein - I told him that he looked like he needed some shooting-lessons and that we didn't offer lessons, so he'd need to go elsewhere.

Reporter - How did he react to that?

Mr Holstein - He told me what a "good fellow" I was for showing him around and then - strangest thing - he asked me if I would sell him a gun. When I asked him why he wanted to buy a gun he said that he'd need it if he was to do shooting-lessons. This from a fella' who'd been lording it around as though he was born with a silver gun in his mouth.

Reporter - And did you sell him a gun?

Mr Holstein - I'm not licensed to sell firearms and even if I was I wouldn't have sold one to this fella'. Why he'd likely shoot me once I gave it to him. When I told him that we don't sell guns he said that if we didn't do lessons and we didn't sell guns then he might as well leave. I told him that he might as well and off he went.

Reporter - Did he have a car?

Mr Holstein - No. Given all his airs and graces I wouldn't have been surprised if he had a chauffeur with him but all he had was a pedal-bike. Said it was better for the environment.

Reporter - What did you say to that?

Mr Holstein - I said that maybe it was better for us all if he left. He gave me a vicious look when I said that but headed off without saying anything more. It gave me a land that look. Showed me the true nature of the man.

Reporter - When did you realise that you might have been speaking with the man police want to talk with about the Nurse Henry murder?

Mr Holstein - The next time I was in Martinsburg. The sheriff's a friend of mine and I called in to the station to see him. When I was there I saw the "Wanted" poster on the notice-board and I knew the "Wanted" man was the fella' I'd met.

Reporter - When did you see him?

Mr Holstein - Three days after that girl was murdered.

Reporter - And he was looking to buy a gun.

Mr Holstein - He was.

Reporter - There you have it, Bob. Police believe that this was a sighting of the man they have been looking to speak with about Nurse Henry's killing. They are obviously concerned that he was looking to buy a gun and are even more concerned that he may have managed to acquire one by now. They are warning that anyone who sees the man should treat him as armed and dangerous and make no attempt to confront him.

Presenter - Worrying news, Toni. Is there any sign that the police are any closer to catching this man?

Reporter - The official line is that the police are following a number of lines of enquiry, Bob. However, privately some officers admit that they are not an awful lot closer to arresting this individual than they were when this whole sorry saga began.

Presenter - But they're not looking for anyone else?

Reporter - No they're not, Bob, and that tells us something.

Presenter - It certainly does, Toni. Thanks for that and do let us know if anything new arises.

Reporter - Will do, Bob...".

11. Extract from statement of Louis Babcock

[23 July]

"...I am an ambulance driver at Georgetown University Hospital.

On 18 July I was returning to the hospital after bringing an elderly patient to her home on the Waterfront. As usual there was a tailback at Washington Circle. I joined the queue of traffic and waited for it to start moving. I was listening to the usual chatter on the ambulance radio when I noticed that there was a woman bleeding in the car beside me. I got out of the ambulance and cautiously approached the car. The man driving the car was clearly in distress. He rolled down the window and asked if I could help him get to the hospital. He had a foreign accent when he spoke, I think an English accent. He sounded educated and when I noticed a Georgetown University Hospital Parking permit on the windscreen of the car I assumed that he must be a doctor. It occurred to me that it was a little odd that I hadn't seen him around the hospital previously but I assumed that he must be new. He told me that the woman in the car had been working at home when she fell and injured herself. The woman herself tried to speak once or twice but she was drifting in and out of consciousness and I couldn't make any sense of what she said to me. I told the man to follow me, then jumped back into the ambulance, turned on the siren and made my way to the hospital. as quickly as I could.

There was one strange moment on the way. When we got to the turn-off from M Street onto Memorial Bridge the man braked his car and put out his left indicator as if he was going to turn towards Arlington. Then immediately the indicator turned off and he continued following after me.

When we got to the hospital I pulled up the ambulance in front of the rear entrance. A couple of aides ran out and, together with the man, we managed to lift the injured woman onto a trolley. One of the aides asked the man how the patient had suffered her injuries He replied that she had fallen in Rock Creek Park. This was not the same story that he had told me and this immediately made me suspicious of him. So I let the two aides and the man continue pushing the trolley through to the casualty unit and quickly ran off to fetch a security guard. There was something about the man's manner that I found unusual and it was troubling that he had told two different stories about how the woman came to be injured.

I told the security guard on duty that there was a man in the casualty unit whom I thought might have hurt the woman who had come in with him. The guard radioed this through to the DC police - he is required to do that - and then he came with me to the casualty unit. However, by the time we got there the man was gone. The nurse-in-charge told us that he had gone out to move his car so that it wasn't an obstruction. By the time the security guard and myself got out into the parking area, the man and his car were gone.

I have seen police sketches of the man believed to have killed the woman whom I helped to bring to the hospital. I have no doubt that this man and the man whom I helped to rush through the DC traffic are the same person. He is a young to middle-aged man of pale complexion. He has greying hair and a red beard, though I believe that his beard may be dyed. He is of medium height and build and speaks with a foreign accent, I think English...".

10. Extract from statement of Dwayne Olveira

[23 July]

"...I work as a printer at the DC Sunday Post. I usually work nights. On 17 July I worked through the night on a very long run. There was a special supplement being published on the economic crisis and these kind of supplements always take a lot of time. Anyhow, as a result I didn't leave work until about 10 a.m. on the morning of 18 July. This was getting close to the time that my wife finishes work. She has a part-time job as a guide at the Old Stone House and finishes work around 12.30 every day. So I decided I'd suprise her by meeting her after work and save the cost of a bus-ride home in the process - my wife takes the car to work each day so that she can collect our daughter from school on the way back. Anyhow, that gave me a couple of hours to spare. So I went into Rock Creek Park to grab forty winks. I lay down in the sunshine behind some high bushes near the 23rd Street end of the park. I set the alarm on my cell-phone for 12.15 - Old Stone House is quite close by - and then took a nap.

At 12.15 the alarm on my cell-phone started ringing. I turned it off and lay for a few minutes more in the sunshine. To be honest, I was still half-asleep, though not so asleep that I didn't hear a strange conversation going on over the hedge. I heard a man say something like "This is a hold-up". I don't think those were the exact words but I am certain that I heard a woman say "Is this some sort of joke?". The man then asked if the woman had a car. She said yes and he told her to take him to the car. Because I was still half-asleep I didn't appreciate the significance of what I was hearing. Once I realised what I had just heard I got up to see if I could spot the man and woman I'd heard talking. However, there was no-one behind the hedge any mote and no-one else around. I mentioned the conversation to my wife when I met her but thought no more of it. We spent the last few days out-of-town in Chincoteague. When we're there I go fishing with my friends and my wife spends all the time gossiping with hers. The end result was that neither of us saw much television. It was only when we got back and I saw the death of that young nurse smeared all over the papers and heard the details on the television that I realised that I must have overheard a conversation between the nurse and the man who killed her. I called the police immediately and was asked to make this statement...".

9. The Nomination of Saeed Yarvali

[Transcript of White House Press Conference, 23 July]

.

Press Secretary - Ladies and gentlemen, the President of the United States.

President - Good evening. Over the last month my staff and I have done a thorough job seeking a person suitable to succeed Justice Corelli to the Supreme Court bench. Choosing a member of our nation's highest court is a responsibility that I take very seriously. Presidents - and even distinguished members of the press corps - have a tendency to come and go. Members of the Supreme Court continue in office for many decades. So the person I nominate today will, if that nomination is confirmed, serve on the Supreme Court long after my administration has been consigned to history.

Our country is constructed on the rule of law. Law is the fabric from which the founding fathers and mothers and every generation of Ameicans since their time have fashioned the complex magnificence of the world's greatest democracy. Supreme Court justices, as the final arbiters of what our Constitution and our laws truly mean, have played a central, sometimes controversial, but always vital part in our nation's being. So I have approached the task of finding Justice Corelli's successor with all due consideration. I have sought to find a candidate who represents what is best about this nation and who seems best place to steward it from the rarefied heights of the Supreme Court in the months and years to come.

Contrary to speculation by journalists, including some prominent members of the press corps gathered here tonight, I have not evaluated candidates solely through the prism of who they vote for or what faith they practise or what corner of the world their forebears came from. At least, not entirely. [Laughter]. The office of President is a political office and so I cannot pretend that I have been blind to the fact that a particular candidate may hold especial appeal for one constituency or another. Nor do I deny that Justice Corelli's departure has given me a chance to change the present voting balance within the Supreme Court. Transforming it into what some would describe as a more liberal institution but what I believe will be a court better attuned to the norms and aspirations of today's America and not a Court espousing the hide-bound sensibilities of yester-year. However, in all my considerations I have sought to find a jurist of the highest character. Someone who has attained the highest distinction in the field of law, yet who has that understanding of humanity which is the universal hallmark of good judges.

I have found that combination of excellence and understanding in Saeed Yarvali. Dr Yarvali teaches constitutional law and theory at Georgetown University. He grew up in Illinois, the great state that I had the opportunity to represent in the United States Senate. Then, as a young man, he came east on a tour de force of the Ivy League, graduating first in class with an arts degree from Yale University and then summa cum laude from Harvard Law School. Giving him what President Kennedy once described as the best of all worlds: a Harvard education and a Yale degree [laughter] - a two out of three that I have yet to achieve. [Laughter].

After Harvard, Dr Yarvali returned to the mid-west. He worked as a civil rights attorney in Chicago while simultaneously studying for his doctoral degree at Northwestern University. Later he also worked as a civil rights attorney at the Department of Justice during the Clinton and George W Bush administrations. By this time he had also begun to scale the greasy pole of academic life, teaching for a short time at the University of Chicago Law School before finally being granted tenure as Julie Eisenberg Professor of Constitutional Law and Theory at Georgetown University Law School here in Washington.

Unknown to you all, late last year Dr Yarvali declined an offer from me to become US Attorney General, choosing instead to nurse his mother through the illness that finally killed her just two months ago. Mrs Yarvali was herself a person of no little distinction. She was a distant relative of the Iranian royal family. She was also married to a high-ranking member of the late Shah of Iran's secret police. When the Islamic Revolution erupted in 1979, Mrs Yarvali's husband was soon executed by the revolutionaries. Mrs Yarvali fled to Switzerland with her then ten-year old son, Saeed, and his younger brother. A year later they came to the United States where they lived for a short time in Manhattan before moving to the Great Plains, far from the terror and turmoil of revolutionary Iran. I am told by Dr Yarvali that it was his childhood introduction of the harsh realities of life without law that eventually led him to his choice of career.

Dr Yarvali is a distinguished Iranian-American whose professional achievements and personal experiences make him a man of rare distinction. Whether as a boy fleeing a land where the rule of law had collapsed, for a time at least, or as an attorney championing civil rights in a land where the rule of law holds strong, whether as an ambitious teacher of law who has scaled the heights of academic life or as a dutiful son who declined high public office so that he could nurse his dying mother, Dr Yarvali shows a rare combination of talents and attributes which in my opinion make him a distinguished candidate for nomination to a court which is no stranger to distinction. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Professor Saeed Yarvali, my nominee for the position of Supreme Court justice. [Applause].

Professor Yarvali - Thank-you Mr President for those kind words of introduction. I do not know if I am a man of distinction but I know that I am standing beside such a man this evening. [Applause]. Only in America is it possible for a man to dream a life and then to live the dream. However, you will forgive me for admitting that while the President was speaking I had to pinch myself once or twice to make sure that I was not still dreaming. I cannot yet believe that the little boy who fled Tehran not so many years ago is now standing before you as a prospective member of this great nation's greatest court. I was very young when I was forced to flee Iran with my mother and brother but the memory of the lawlessness of revolution that we left behind us is something that I have never quite escaped. It was that brief bitter taste of lawlessness, and the misery that ensues when the rule of law collapses, that inspired in me a lifelong passion for the law and the civilising order that it brings. Of course in the years since I came to America a lot has changed. The little boy who left Tehran has been given a degree of opportunity that only the land of opportunity could afford. A top-class education in Illinois state schools. A world-class education at our nation's finest universities. A chance to plough back the profits of that education through public service in two presidential administrations. And the privilege of tenure at Georgetown University where every day I get the opportunity to nurture the finest minds of a nation that has nurtured me in every way since I arrived on its shores as a stranger.

I am grateful to the President for giving me the opportunity through this nomination to do still more to discharge the enormous debt of gratitude that all of us, and I more than most, owe as citizens of a republic that gives us all so much. I know that nomination is no sure promise of confirmation by the Senate and I look forward to answering any questions that Senators may seek to put to me before my nomination is deicided upon by them. For now I must content myself with whe dream of joining the United States Supreme Court, a dream that many an attorney harbours and which only a few can realise. I thank the President for the great honour that he has brought on myself and my family and all Iranian-Americans with the nomination that he has announced here this evening. Thank-you, Mr President.

President - Thank-you, Professor Yarvali."

8. Extract from statement of Lucy Oldfield

[22 July]

"...I am the owner of "Headcases", a hairdressing salon in Penn Quarter. At about 2.20 on the afternoon of 18 August a man came into the salon. I know it was around 2.2o because I had just seated Mrs Wu, my 2.15 appointment.

The man asked me if he could have a glass of water. I told him to take a glass from the water-cooler. I kept an eye on him as he did so. He was sweating heavily and he looked nervous. There was a part of me that wondered for a moment if he wasn't going to rob the store. He had a little tuft of red hair beside his right ear as if he had once had a beard but shaved it off. He was wearing a light summer shirt that was drenched with sweat. He was also wearing a pair of dirty black trousers.

After the man finished drinking he asked where the nearest Metro station was. He spoke well, like he was well-educated but foreign, maybe English. He seemed a bit eccentric in his manner, like he was trying to be something he wasn't. His whole manner made me quite edgy. I told him that we were half-way between the Judiciary Square and Union Station stops and told him how to get to both. He gave me a funny look and then left without saying thanks. As he walked from the store I saw that there was a red stain on his left shoe. It looked like dried blood.

On the evening of 21 July I was watching television with my husband. The lead story was about the woman who got murdered in Rock Creek Park. There was a sketch of the man police are looking for. In the picture the man had a red beard but apart from that he looked pretty much like the man who called into the salon. I immediately called the police and told the lady on the phone the same facts that I have just mentioned. She took my details and asked me to call into the Chinatown police station to give this statement...".

7. Extract from "Sell 'n' Buy" Magazine

[22 July]

"44 Magnum Colt Anaconda for sale. 3 years old. Good condition. Ideal for self-defence or home safety. Fits in glove compartment, handbag or bedside locker. $295 o.n.o. Call Josh at..."

6. Rock Creek Victim Named

[Independent Star, 22 July]

"Rock Creek Victim Named

The young woman who was attacked in Rock Creek Park last week and who died later at Georgetown University Hospital was named by DC police yesterday as Brigid Henry.

Ms Henry was a nurse at Georgetown University Hospital where she worked on the casualty unit up to the day of her death. The brutal attack on her in broad daylight and in full view of witnesses, none of whom immediately realised what was happening, left Ms Henry's face so disfigured that she was not recognised by her work colleagues when brought to the University hospital afterwards.

Ms Henry hailed from Wilmington, Delaware, and had moved to DC last year, living in a Georgetown apartment close by the hospital where she worked. She is survived by her grandparents, parents and three siblings, all of whom are said to be devastated by Ms Henry's shocking murder.

Wilmington schooolteacher, Pug Tansey, a longtime friend of the Henry family described Nurse Henry last night as "an irreplaceable treasure with a bubbly personality and a gentle soul whom no-one could fail to love". He requested that the media give Nurse Henry's family some privacy in which to mourn.

Closer to home, DC police are mystified as to the motive for the attack on Nurse Henry and have been urging locals to avoid visiting isolated sections of DC's public parks until her assailant is captured. They have also asked for any witnesses who may have seen Ms Henry's attacker in the time prior to her murder at Rock Creek Park. He was a bearded man, dressed distinctively in a woollen jumper and hat and carrying a plastic bag containing the hammer that he used to bludgeon Ms Henry. The beard and clothes are known to have been a disguise and were quickly discarded after the attack. One feature the attacker will find less easy to discard is a pronounced foreign accent, possibly English.

Anyone who thinks they may know the attacker's identity is urged to contact DC police directly and not to confront the (clearly dangerous) man directly."

5. Extract from statement of Dessie Mahon

[20 July]

"...I am a first-year law student at Trinity College Dublin. I am spending the summer working in "Flaherty's", an Irish bar off Rawlins Park.

On 18 July, I started my shift at 1 p.m. Sometime later I saw a man entering the bar. He caught my eye because he was wearing a very heavy jumper on what was a very warm day. The man looked about him for a moment or two and then went into the restroom at the back of the bar. I said nothing to him and did not follow him. We were quite busy as it was the end of the week and some workers from a nearby construction site had come in to spend some of their week's wages on a few drinks.

Perhaps a half-hour later I noticed a man leaving the bar. At first I didn't recognise him. He gave me a slightly sheepish look as he passed where I was standing. Then I recognised him. It was the man who had come in and gone straight to the restroom. He looked different from when he had arrived. He wasn't wearing his jumper. Plus he didn't have a beard any more - and he did when he came in.

All of this made me suspicious of the man. I called out to him but he immediately ran from the bar. I ran out into the street after him. However in the few seconds that it took me to get around the bar-counter he was almost down at the Corcoran Gallery, a good half-block away.There was no way that I could catch the man and in any event I couldn't leave the bar un-tended. So I went back into the bar and into the restroom to see what he'd been up to.

Inside the restroom I found a fake beard stuffed into a trash-can. I looked around for the man's jumper but couldn't find it. However, when I was throwing out rubbish later that evening I found it in a laneway behind the bar. There is a window onto the laneway from the restroom and it is possible that he threw the jumper out the window.

As the day went on the television stations were full of news about a woman who'd been murdered in Rock Creek Park. We have a television running in the bar and I was half-watching the news between serving drinks. When I heard the description of the man police were looking for, I was sure that this was the man I had seen in the bar. I have since been shown a police sketch of the man wanted for murder. I am confident that this is the man I saw, except that he has gotten rid of the beard that features in the sketch.

My uncle was also working in the bar on the evening of the 18th. I told him about the man who came in earlier that day. When I saw the television news I told him that the man I had seen was the man police were looking for. After we shut up shop for the evening, my uncle brought me to the police station where I have given this statement...".

4. Extract from statement of Xavier Gonzales

[20 July]

"...I am an assistant gardener in Rock Creek Park. On the morning of 18 August I was working on the south lawn of the park, weeding some flower-beds. At around mid-day I had a 15-minute break. As it was very hot I bought a soda from one of the vendors in the park. I then sat down on a bench near Anderson House to drink the soda.

While I was drinking I saw a young woman enter the park through one of the entrances on 23rd Street. She was wearing a green summer dress and a pair of white sandals. She was carrying a folded-up blanket. The woman walked towards me and then headed off towards the creek. She attracted my attention because she was a very beautiful woman. I am certain that she was the woman who was later murdered.

After a while I returned to work, joining one of my fellow gardeners, Juan Esteban. The two of us had been working for a while together, maybe 15 minutes, when I noticed a man sitting on one of the benches nearby. He was wearing very heavy clothes: a thick woollen jumper and a heavy woollen hat. He looked like a New England fisherman. He even had a beard. It was red in colour but it looked like it was dyed. He seemed to be talking to himself. After a quarter-hour or so this man got up and walked away. He carried a bag with him. It was a plastic bag from Dulles Airport, This stuck in my mind because he did not look like he had the money to be travelling by plane. We get a lot of strange people hanging around the park from time to time so after the man was gone I thought nothing more of him.

At a few minutes after one o'clock I finished work for the day. My wife is off visiting her mother in New York so I was taking a half-day in order to collect my daughter from school. As I walked through the park I saw the man I had noticed earlier. He was leaving the park with the young woman I had seen when I took my break. I was surprised to see them both together. They did not seem a likely match. The man did not have his airport bag any longer and he seemed to be holding something against the woman's back. I think now that it may have been a gun but I am not sure of this as they were some distance away.

I left the park by the P Street gate. When I stepped onto the street I saw the man again. By now he was almost a block away from where I was standing. He was leaning into the back of a car and doing something. He looked like he was hammering at something. When he reached back I saw that there was blood all over his jumper. I shouted at him to stop and started running towards him. When the man saw me coming towards him he quickly closed the back of the car, then jumped into the driver's side and drove off. He was moving so fast that he knocked the hat from his head. I noticed that his hair was a different colour from his beard. His hair was grey and his beard, as I mentioned, was red.

I continued running towards the car, thinking that it might get stuck in traffic, but the man was lucky. He slipped into the traffic and pulled away before I got to him. Undeterred I ran back into the park, found Juan Esteban and told him what had happened. He got his truck and we drove around the park a couple of times to see if we could spot the mystery man but he was well gone.

At 1.33 p.m. I called the police and told them what had happened. I know this is the time I called because it is recorded in my cell-phone. The police told me to stay where I was and arrived about a half-hour later...".

3. Extract from Washington DC radio's "News at 5"

[18 July]

"...Presenter - Welcome back. News is still filtering in about that sensational murder in Rock Creek Park where Toni Rogers is standing by to tell us the latest. Toni?

Reporter - Thanks, Bob. As you say I'm here in Rock Creek Park which, as listeners will know, is barely a mile from The White House. Normally the park would be full of locals and tourists making the most of the late summer sunshine. But today it is just the DC police and some journalists who are allowed inside following the cold-blooded murder that took place here just a few hours ago.

- Tell us what happened, Toni.

- We still don't have all the details, Bob, but what we know is this. Sometime around lunchtime a young nurse from Georgetown University Hospital came here to do a spot of sunbathing. She parked her car in 23rd Street and then made her way to a quiet corner of the Park, threw a blanket on the ground and lay down. A while afterwards she was approached by a man who pulled a gun on her.

- Do we have a description of the man, Toni?

- People seem to have noticed more what he was wearing than what he looked like, Bob. Unusually, despite it being a hot day today, he was dressed in a thick woollen jumper, a heavy duffle coat and a woollen fisherman's hat.

- Sounds like he shouldn't be too hard to spot.

- You might think that, Bob. However, he seems to have disappeared from the face of the earth.

- And now he's wanted for murder, right?

- That's right, Bob. After he pulled a gun on the nurse, he apparently led her back to her own car. She got inside and he climbed in after her. There appears to have been a scuffle and then he clubbed her to death with a heavy weapon, it's thought a hammer.

- Did nobody see what was happening?

- There were a few eyewitnesses, Bob, but most of them weren't close enough to understand what was happening. One man did shout at the attacker to stop - .

- At which point the attacker panicked?

- He did. He jumped into the driver's seat and drove off, presumably having snatched the keys from his victim.

- Who was dead I presume?

- No, she was still only injured, though seriously injured, at this time.

- How do we know that?

- Well that's where this tragic story takes an unusual twist, Bob. The attacker sped off towards Washington Circle where he got caught in traffic.

- Traffic on Washington Circle isn't unusual.

- No but what happened next is, Bob. The vehicle that pulled up alongside the assailant was an ambulance. The driver of the ambulance saw that there was a wounded person inside, noticed a Georgetown University Hospital permit on the windscreen of the car and assumed the killer was a doctor bringing a patient to Casualty. So he turned on the ambulance siren and escorted the murderer and the victim through the traffic to the hospital.

- Didn't anyone at the hospital suspect the attacker?

- No. When he got to the hospital the staff were so busy looking after the wounded nurse that the murderer managed to get away.

- But not before the hospital staff got a good look at him?

- In all the commotion they seem not to have got a much better look than the people in Rock Creek Park, Bob. The hat and coat were noticed, there is some suggestion that the murderer may have had a beard. Oh and he spoke briefly to one of the nurses who thought he had an English accent.

- And his victim. How was she by this time?

- She was in surgery for over an hour, Bob, but the doctors weren't able to save her. She was declared dead at 2.15 this afternoon.

- Do we know her name?

- Not yet, Bob. The police won't release the victim's name until her family have been contacted and we understand that not all of her family members have been contacted at this time.

- When did the police become involved?

- Not too long after the killer brought his victim to the Hospital. The staff quickly realised that they were dealing with a crime victim and immediately called the DC police. The police interviewed the ambulance driver and separately they got reports that a woman had been attacked in Rock Creek Park. It didn't take them long to realise that all of these events were connected. They sealed off Rock Creek Park soon afterwards and a forensic team has been combing the place for evidence since then.

- But so far there's been no further sight of the killer?

- No sign of the killer, Bob, and not a lot to go on by way of description.

- Maybe you should give us again what description there is, Toni.

- Sure, Bob. Police are looking for a man of medium height and slim build with possibly a reddish beard. He may speak with a foreign accent, perhaps an English accent. He was wearing a heavy coat, jumper and hat when last seen but it is possible that these were simply by way of disguise and that they may have been discarded. He is clearly highly dangerous and any people who think they may know him are urged to contact the police as soon as possible and not to challenge him.

- Okay, thanks Toni for that report. Let's hope the police catch the killer soon.

- Let's hope so, Bob...".

2. Who Will Replace Justice Corelli?

[Daily Examiner, 11 June]

"Who Will Replace Justice Corelli?

The President may have remained silent last night as to who he might appoint to the Supreme Court in place of Justice Corelli. Others have not been quite so reticent.

Italian American leaders are already suggesting that Corelli should be replaced from within his own community. (Corelli's lineage is Italian, though his father originally hails from French-owned Corsica). Their claim is considered strong but there are other powerful constituencies within the President's party who will want the President to choose Corelli's successor from among them.

Women continue to be under-represented at all levels of the federal judiciary and the National Women's Sodality was already calling last night for another female justice to join the Supreme Court bench.

Native Americans may consider that they have the best claim of all: this was their land first, yet no Native American has ever served on the nation's highest court.

African-American leaders have long voiced dissatisfaction that there continues to be a solitary African-American on the Supreme Court and have called for another African-American to be appointed.

Gay Americans maintain that their struggle for equal rights would be immeasurably advanced by the appointment of the first openly gay member of the Supreme Court in that body's history.

Even America's WASP community might be considered to have a claim. Though long the dominant force on the Supreme Court bench, in recent years that dominance has markedly declined. Indeed the present Supreme Court is comprised of six Roman Catholics, two Jewish members and only one justice who might be described as a WASP. In exclusive golf and country clubs from New Hampshire to New Haven there is rumoured to be a palpable sense among the nation's pampered and privileged that with Corelli's resignation their time has come (again).

One thing is sure. While the identity of Corelli's likely successor is as yet unknown, he or she will certainly need big boots: the better to tread in the footsteps of giants."

1. Corelli Resigns

[Independent Star, 11 June]

"Corelli resigns
Yesterday's announcement that Supreme Court justice Joe Corelli is to resign came as a complete surprise. At 68, Corelli is one of the younger Supreme Court justices and could reasonably have been expected to remain in office for at least another half-decade before retiring. The official statement from Corelli's chambers gave unspecified "family matters" as the reason for his early departure from office. However Supreme Court insiders suggested last night that personal health concerns may have prompted Corelli's departure.
Whatever the cause of Corelli's intended resignation, the effect is dramatic. His departure will leave the Supreme Court bereft of a justice who has been a towering force since his appointment by President George Bush, Sr. almost 20 years ago. In a series of punchy judgments over the last two decades, Corelli has established himself as the most brilliant member of a luminous bench and as a champion of (occasionally extreme) conservatism in America's so-called "culture war". However, not all of Corelli's judgments have been conservative. He has consistently proven himself a stalwart supporter of free speech, though nothing less is perhaps to be expected of a Supreme Court justice who once described a colleague's opinion as "nonsensical" and another's as "irrational".
On a personal level Corelli's life involves a long litany of achievements. The son of a Corsican immigrant father who taught French in Hoboken, Corelli attended Princeton University before taking his law degree from Stanford where he graduated second in class. After a period of study at the University of Paris, he landed a job at a San Diego law firm, then served for a time in the Ford and Reagan administrations before taking a teaching position at Harvard University Law School. He was nominated to the federal Court of Appeals in 1986 and elevated to the Supreme Court four years after that.

Married for four decades and the father of five children, Corelli is one of a small clutch of Catholics who have served on the Supreme Court, though he leaves at a time when a record six of nine serving justices are, at least nominally, Catholic.

Corelli's departure presents the President with a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform the political balance within the Court by nominating a liberal appointee in place of a conservative incumbent. There is no indication yet who the President might choose to take Corelli's place. At a press conference yesterday evening the President praised Justice Corelli for his "long years of distinguished service to the nation" and refused to be drawn on the matter of who Corelli's successor might be."

0. Murder in Rock Creek Park - an explanation

Over the next 100 days, I, Sebastian Giles, will write a full-size novel in 100 parts. Each part will be comprised of a (fictional) newspaper article or an extract from a radio or television interview, a book or diary, a medical or police record or another such source. At the end of the 100 days this collage of blogs will make up a full-size novel. This novel is called "Murder in Rock Creek Park" and tells the intertwined stories of the failed Supreme Court nomination of an Iranian-American lawyer and the murder of a young nurse in Washington's Rock Creek Park.

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SG