GOP Lobbyist Now Opening 'War Room' Dedicated To Solving Seth Rich Murder

Kevin Doherty (L) and Jack Burkman (R) in front of a billboard soliciting information in the death of Seth Rich. (Photo by Rachel Kurzius)

A couple of reporters and cameras gathered in a Bloomingdale gas station parking lot trying to hear a microphone over the loud sounds of construction across the street.

The press conference was designed to introduce the "Seth Rich Center for Investigation." No, wait, it was for "The Profiling Project" (imagine The Innocence Project, only this one is solely dedicated to finding out who murdered a young political staffer over the summer). Actually, it's for The Profiling Project, which will be working within the Seth Rich Investigative War Room, which is opening on Friday morning in Arlington.

Jack Burkman, a Republican lobbyist who says he has staked his reputation on solving Seth Rich's murder, is behind the new "war room." He first got involved in the case in September, pledging increased reward money to "finally get to the truth of what happened here and will either debunk the conspiracy theories or validate them."

Now, he says he's footing the bill to provide space for a "private investigative effort" that will involve forensics and "victimology" to crack the case. What exactly the difference is between The Profiling Project and the investigative war room remains unclear.

Rich was fatally shot around 4:20 a.m. on July 10 in Bloomingdale. He was found on the scene with his watch, wallet, and credit cards, and he died at a nearby hospital. D.C. Police have not yet solved the case. His family thinks it was a botched robbery following a series of gun incidents in the neighborhood.

In lieu of answers, conspiracy theorists got cooking online, placing Rich at the center of a plot involving the hack of Democratic National Committee emails and blaming Hillary Clinton.

"Seth would be so offended" by those theories, his mother said. MPD says it has not discovered any links between Rich's job and his death.

Burkman started proffering his own conspiracy theory earlier this month, also hinged upon the leaked DNC emails. He spread the claim that Rich "discovered, shortly before he died, Russian involvement in the hacking [of the DNC], and the Russians did away with Seth." He provided no proof, though said on Thursday that he's "trying furiously hard to corroborate that."

While he claimed to have the Rich's backing, a member of the family told DCist that Burkman's new claims were "hurtful and it's very distracting as we're still very early in grieving and dealing with all of this."

While Mary and Joel Rich joined Burkman to announce a new public information campaign in November, the family this week launched their own crowdfunding campaign.

"The family certainly thanks Jack for the spotlight that he has brought to this case," Brad Bauman, a spokesperson for the Rich family, said when they launched the crowdfunding campaign. "But the truth is that the family needs to have the independence to ensure that this is being investigated in a responsible way and without any particular political or conspiratorial agenda."

When asked about the Rich family's reaction, Burkman says, "I love the family." As for their crowdfunding page? "I think it's a good idea," he says. Burkman says he's "apprised" the family of his most recent venture but they didn't issue their support.

According to a spokesman, the family is expected to issue a statement soon. Throughout the ordeal, they've emphasized that the Rich they want people to remember is someone who cared about other people. "His whole goal of being in D.C. is he just wanted to make a difference," a family member told DCist.

Why, exactly, is Burkman so stuck on this case? He explains that he thought about what it was like for Mary Rich to get the phone call saying her son was dead, and how his mother could have gotten a call like that.

But there were 135 such calls in D.C. in 2016, and 64 homicides besides Rich's have not been solved. Why is he focusing so intently on this one?

"Well, I'm in politics," Burkman says, referring to the fact that Rich worked for the Democratic National Committee. "It's a political fraternity and I want to protect my own kind."

Before he got involved in Rich's death, Burkman organized a protest against the Dallas Cowboys for signing an openly gay player, tried to ban gay people from the NFL and the Boy Scouts. He also made an appearance on the D.C. Madam list and apparently tried to pay some out-of-towners for sex at the Mayflower Hotel on Myspace.

Burkman didn't have his facts straight at the press conference. At one point, he said the D.C. murder rate was in the thousands when he moved here 30 years ago. There were 225 homicides in 1987. He said that he had given $130,000 towards upping the reward money for information leading to Rich's killer, when he has pledged $105,000, with the D.C. Police offering the same $25,000 they do in any homicide. (Burkman also hasn't actually filled out the official paperwork to increase the reward, though his team says that he tried.) He didn't know how much he's spent on billboards or how many there are in the District. He said hundreds of college students would be contributing in the effort, when the number appears closer to 30. He even directed reporters to the wrong address in his email about the press conference.

"I'm sorry about that," Burkman says, blaming it on his "factual senility."

Burkman introduced the two people who would be working on a volunteer basis to help run the war room—Kevin Doherty, a forensics graduate student at George Washington University, and Jennifer Rohrer, his former professor. They say, though, that they're strictly working on The Profiling Project, which just happens to be housed in the war room. Other members of The Student Association for Forensic Psychology at GW will be helping, too.

They're basically providing a "new set of eyes," says Doherty. "We'll recreate timelines, look at statistical analysis, look at link analysis, profiling, and victimology. We'll have as much [information] as we can obtain publicly. We're going to have far less information than even the media."

Doherty says he learned about Burkman's efforts when he read about his plans to stage a full reenactment of the murder, which Doherty says would not be helpful. "Sixty percent of cold cases are solved because someone comes forward," he says.

Is Burkman still planning to move forward with the reenactment? "Yes," he says. "As soon as it gets warmer."