Christine Mirzayan
Real Name: Christine M. Mirzayan
Nicknames: None known
Location: Washington, D.C.
Date: August 1, 1998
Case[]
Details: On August 1, 1998, twenty-eight-year-old D.C. biology intern Christine Mirzayan went to a barbecue at a fellow intern's home. She vanished while walking home. She was later found raped and murdered in a D.C. park.
Suspects: Christine's murder is believed to be linked to the deaths of D.C. interns Chandra Levy and Joyce Chiang. All three women lived in the same area, were about the same height and had brown hair, and were interns at some point in their lives.
Extra Notes: This case first aired as part of an segment on the June 10, 2002 episode, which primarily focused on the possible connection between Chandra Levy and Joyce Chiang's murders. It was profiled on America's Most Wanted.
Results: Solved. Authorities no longer believe that Christine's murder is related to those of Chandra and Joyce. Separate suspects have been identified in these cases.
DNA testing later linked Christine's to the "Potomac River Rapist" who raped several young women in the Washington, D.C. area during the 1990s. On November 14, 2019, sixty-year-old Giles Daniel Warrick was arrested and charged with Christine's murder and the rapes. Police used forensic genealogy techniques, similar to that used to catch the Original Night Stalker, which led them to him.
Eleven days before the murder trial was scheduled to begin, Warrick was found dead of a suspected suicide inside his D.C. Jail cell on November 19, 2022.
Links:
- Christine Mirzayan on Wikipedia
- About Christine Mirzayan
- Mirzayan Remembered as Brilliant, Passionate, Generous - August 5, 1998
- Gruesome, Unsolved Murders Haunt Levy Investigation - June 20, 2001
- Levy case may be linked to two D.C. murders - July 14, 2001
- Police See Nothing to Link Missing Intern and Dead Women - July 18, 2001
- Science intern beaten to death in Georgetown - May 8, 2011
- D.C. police renew efforts to find man who killed Christine Mirzayan in 1998 - July 21, 2011
- Christine's case on the FBI website - December 15, 2011
- New bid to solve '90s rapes, killing - December 15, 2011
- New tips in search for Potomac River Rapist - May 3, 2012
- Sex assault case linked through DNA to serial rapist - June 15, 2012
- 26 Years Later, Victim of Potomac River Rapist Hopes Her Story Helps Others - June 23, 2017
- Suspected Potomac River Rapist, Who Terrorized DC Area in the '90s, Arrested - Novemeber 14, 2019
- 'Potomac River Rapist' suspect found dead in DC jail cell - Novmeber 19, 2022
- Christine Mirzayan on Find a Grave