Focus on One Suspect Leaves 2nd Unnoticed

Garrett had spent four years hunting down and obtaining a confession from Mir Aimal Kasi, a Pakistani who in 1993 killed two CIA employees outside the agency's Langley headquarters. Garrett also obtained a confession from Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. And he helped solve the 1997 slayings of three Starbucks employees in Georgetown. The former Marine from Indiana with a PhD in criminology was so successful at closing murder cases that colleagues called him "Dr. Death."

On July 26, Garrett -- along with D.C. Detectives Ralph Durant and Lawrence Kennedy -- interviewed Condit in Lowell's downtown Washington office. The congressman provided dates and details about his relationship with Chandra, some of them new. The investigators said they were building a profile of Chandra and needed more information about her habits.

Condit said she was a vegetarian, she was always upbeat, she took vitamins, she didn't take drugs or drink. She was mature for her age and very savvy. He described her as frugal, noting that her wardrobe looked like it came from a Macy's-type department store, not Nordstrom. He said he had been surprised that she ended the lease on her apartment because he expected her to return soon after her May 11 graduation from the University of Southern California.

Garrett came away with a gut feeling: Condit was not their guy.

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The Modesto Bee had stood by Condit's side in nearly every fight of his 30-year political career, but on Aug. 12, the largest newspaper in his district called for his resignation. The Bee's editorial board concluded that the congressman "knowingly hindered" the police investigation into Chandra's disappearance. "For 15 weeks, Condit has put his own interests ahead of the effort to find Levy," the editorial said. "His self-absorption has been a lapse not only of judgment, but of human decency."

Condit launched a last-ditch public relations campaign, hiring Marina Ein, a well-connected Washington media guru. The congressman and his wife consented to a People magazine cover story.

Condit also agreed to speak publicly about Chandra for the first time on ABC's "PrimeTime Thursday," in an interview with Connie Chung. In TV news circles, this was considered the biggest "get" since Barbara Walters got Monica Lewinsky to talk about President Bill Clinton. On the eve of his appearance, Condit wrote a letter to his constituents.

"Some suggest that not talking with the media could mean I had something to do with Chandra's disappearance. I did not," he wrote. ". . . I will be interviewed on television and hopefully I will be able to answer questions that help people understand. It is not something I look forward to. But things have gone on long enough."

The interview, broadcast Aug. 23, didn't go the way Condit planned. Chung rattled him with one of her first questions: Did you kill Chandra Levy? He said no, then was reserved for the rest of the session.

"She could have pulled my fingernails out. She could have started putting long knives down my throat -- I would not have given her any information," Condit recently recalled in an interview with The Post.

During the ABC interview, he declined to answer questions about whether he had an affair with Chandra. He said that he was not a perfect man and that he made mistakes. "But out of respect for my family, out of a specific request by the Levy family, it is best that I not get into the details of the relationship," he said repeatedly.