Psychic Detective
Each month, ex-cop and psychic Nicky Alan teams up with her spirit guides to investigate an unsolved mystery. Here she delves into the brutal killing of US socialite Mary Pinchot Meyer
Stepping back, Mary Pinchot Meyer studied the abstract painting she was working on.
She decided she’d done enough for the day. It was time for some fresh air.
Pulling on a blue angora sweater, she headed out for her usual stroll along the nearby Chesapeake and Ohio canal in Georgetown, Washington DC.
It was Monday 12 October 1964. The towpath was beautiful at that time of year, with the leaves on the trees turning red and gold.
Only, this particular autumn day would end in horror. For Mary was brutally murdered — shot twice and left to die by the water’s edge. The mum-of-three was 43 years old.
The police were soon on the scene. A mechanic called Henry Wiggins, who was working nearby, said he heard a woman scream:
‘Someone help me, someone help me!’, followed by two gunshots.
Running towards the cries, Wiggins looked over a wall and saw a man standing below on the towpath, near a woman’s body.
Noting Wiggins’s description of the suspected killer, the police were quick to act. They arrested an African-American man who was about a quarter of a mile away from the murder scene.
Ray Crump was soaking wet and incoherent, unable to explain his presence in the area. It looked like an open-and-shut case. However, there were unanswered questions. For a start, where was the murder weapon? Crump didn’t have it on him. In fact, the gun would never be found. And what was his motive?
At Ray Crump’s trial the following year, he pleaded not guilty. He said he was wet because he had fallen into the canal while fishing. His defence lawyer was a trailblazing black woman called Dovey Johnson Roundtree. She highlighted that Crump was five inches shorter than the 5ft 8in man described by Wiggins. Also, there was no forensic evidence linking Crump to the murder. There was no blood on his clothes, even though Mary had bled profusely.
A second witness, Army Lt William Mitchell, claimed he had seen a man fitting Crump’s description on the towpath. However, Mitchell was unable to identify Crump as being that man.
Ray Crump was acquitted of all charges.
So, if Ray Crump was innocent, who had slaughtered Mary? And why?
Over the following decades, as details emerged about Mary’s life and the circles she moved in, the question was raised… Had she been murdered by a trained assassin?
Mary Pinchot was born into a wealthy New York family and sent to the finest schools.
In 1945, she married Marine Corps Lieutenant Cord Meyer, and they had three sons together. Cord joined the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in 1951, and the family moved to Washingto
