Photo by [-Travis-]Good morning, Washington. It’s something of a themed Tuesday here at the Morning Roundup, as it turns out a couple of crooked criminals are getting their just desserts. Like everyone else, we spent yesterday afternoon pondering Bernie Madoff, mulling over 150 years in prison, and wondering whether anything about this guy’s story will cause anything to change. Over at the Examiner, Leah Fabel checked in with some of his local victims, most of whom, understandably, just wanted to be left alone.
Walters to Be Sentenced: But the real local embezzlement story is of course the Harriette Walters case, and the Office of Tax and Revenue mastermind herself is scheduled to be sentenced this morning in U.S. District court. We expect to see Walters get somewhere between 15 to 18 years in prison for her role at the top of an elaborate scheme that bilked D.C. taxpayers out of roughly $50 million. Check back in later for more on the Walters sentence. And for a refresher, the Post compiled a helpful list of all the other co-conspirators and their pleas and sentences in the case.
Whoa, Some Encouraging Crime News! Could D.C. see a record low homicide tally for the year? That’s what the Post’s Martin Weil writes is possible, based on year-to-date stats so far. “If the homicide rate continued through December, the total for 2009 would be 134. That would be 52 fewer slayings than last year and 47 fewer than in 2007. It would be 35 fewer than in 2006.” Considering summer just began, that’s a pretty big “if,” but still, it’s a heck of a lot nicer to read stories like this one than about how the rate is going way up.
Briefly Noted: Moving 1000-series cars to the middle will probably “take a few weeks” for Metro to complete … Many gather to mourn couple killed in Red Line crash … Fairfax faces new $315 million shortfall with no easy cuts in sight … Man pushed into side of Metro train during fight at Gallery Place this morning.
This Day in DCist: In 2008, now defunct local bookstore chain Olsson’s filed for bankruptcy, and in 2006 we were still recovering from Deluge ’06.
