Woman's Body Found Tied Up In Montgomery
Alarm Grows Over Recent Burglaries

By Dan Morse
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 5, 2008

The body of a 63-year-old woman was discovered bound in her Bethesda home yesterday, and police were investigating whether her death is linked to recent attacks in which elderly victims in affluent areas have been tied up and their homes burglarized.

Police were examining possible connections to five home invasions in the past year, one in Northwest Washington and the others in Montgomery County, from Potomac to Chevy Chase. None of the victims in those cases was critically hurt, although all were bound and one was not discovered until a relative came to check on her two days later.

The death of Mary Frances Havenstein, whose body was found yesterday morning by a niece, left neighbors stunned. County police reminded residents to lock their doors and windows and to report suspicious vehicles and incidents.

"Police want all older women living alone and senior couples to know that these crimes have occurred and to be particularly mindful of their safety," police said in a statement.

At least one family member hadn't been able to reach Havenstein by phone Wednesday, and the niece went to her house, in the 8900 block of Seven Locks Road, yesterday to take her to a doctor's appointment, police said.

"She was just a wonderful person," said Karen Shea, a sister-in-law. "She helped everyone she could. . . . Everything she did, she did with an open heart. That something like this could happen to her is an absolute calamity."

Police officials declined to give details of Havenstein's death but said that they consider it suspicious and that they think someone entered her house. Two neighbors said in interviews that police told them that they were conducting a homicide investigation.

The cause and manner of her death will be determined by the state medical examiner's officer, as will the approximate time, officials said.

Lt. Paul Starks said police have not determined whether the incident was related to the previous incidents. "We absolutely do not know," Starks said. "It's too early."

A police spokeswoman, Lucille Baur, said there were "some similarities and some dissimilarities" between the latest incident and the previous ones.

Havenstein's death left many in her neighborhood, just north of River Road outside the Capital Beltway, deeply concerned about their safety.

"I've lived here for 29 years," said Gaylen Camera, 58, who lives two doors away from Havenstein's home and said she knows of no other neighbors being robbed. "I've never had my car vandalized. This is a huge shock in this neighborhood."

Another neighbor, Greg Barr, said someone recently broke into his unlocked Toyota Camry in the middle of the night and stole a $400 Global Positioning System device. The thief disabled a motion sensor in Barr's driveway that would have triggered a bright floodlight, he said.

Barr said he moved to the Bethesda area about 12 years ago from Southeast Washington, where he compiled neighborhood crime statistics, plotted them on a map and distributed them to neighbors in a newsletter. Although he had not given much thought to doing the same in Bethesda, "I'm thinking it is not such a bad idea anymore," he said.

In April, county police issued a warning about what were then four home invasion robberies that they and D.C. police were investigating. As the attacks continued, police grew concerned that a future victim might be seriously injured.

Victims in the previous assaults described the assailant as a Hispanic man, based in part on his accent, police have said. The victims described him as being of medium build and in his 20s.

In the first of the attacks, last September, a man broke a basement window at the home of a 92-year-old woman in the 7600 block of Maryknoll Avenue in Bethesda and disabled a circuit breaker. When the woman went downstairs to check, he tied her up and ransacked the house, police said.

In November, a man pried off bars and crawled through a basement window at a home in Chevy Chase. The 77-year-old resident said that after her lights went out, she walked down to her basement to check the fuses, and an assailant shoved her to the ground. The woman, who spoke on condition of anonymity to protect her privacy, said the assailant tied her hands and legs with clothesline.

She said she complained of the pain. "That hurts my knee," she recalled saying. "I have arthritis."

The man loosened the binding on her legs, she said, and she was relieved that he didn't seem intent on hurting her. After the man went upstairs, she said, she was able to wiggle out of the clothesline. She said she acted as if she were still bound until he crawled back out through the window. Then she ran to a neighbor for help, police said.

In January, a man tied up an 84-year-old man and an 85-year-old woman in a house on 49th Street NW in the District, in the Foxhall area.

The next month, a 78-year-old woman was confronted outside her home on Picasso Lane in Potomac and forced into her house by an assailant who took her car and other valuables, police said. She was discovered, still tied up, when her daughter went to check on her two days later. Police said she was taken to a hospital for injuries that were not life-threatening.

In May, a man in military-style fatigues forced open the back door of a home on Brookside Drive in the Bethesda-Chevy Chase area, police said. He crept into an elderly couple's bedroom, showed them a pistol and tied them up, fleeing about an hour later after taking valuables.

Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.