June 23, 1993
Washington DC -- The badly decomposed body of Paul David Wilcher, age 46, was found today at his Washington DC apartment. Mr. Wilcher was an attorney and an investigative researcher who had been working with Gunther Russbacher, the October Surprise pilot, trying to prove that the Reagan 1980 campaign conspired to delay the release of the 52 American Embassy hostages. Such a delay would have meant a victory for Reagan.
Mr. Wilcher recently had told friends and colleagues in Washington that he knew far more about October Surprise and all the related scandals, such as the Inslaw scandal, the BCCI scandal and other government scandals and coverups, than did Danny Casolero, a reporter and writer who was "suicided" in Martinsburg, West Virginia in 1990. Even though Mr. Casolero's death was ruled a suicide, there are still unexplained questions which leave many people feeling that he was murdered to keep him from exposing a network of government corruption which he termed "The Octopus".
Mr. Wilcher's friend and colleague Marion Kindig said that he had expressed concern that he might be killed for "what he had in his head."
Sara McClendon, the senior White House correspondent and a personal friend of Mr. Wilcher's had been trying since Monday to get the police to open the door to his apartment and see if he was there. The local police had expressed a reluctance to get involved.
Finally today, Ms. McClendon was successful in getting the police to open up the apartment. Mr. Wilcher was found in the bathroom, sitting on the toilet. No ruling has yet been made on the cause of death. Hopefull, an autopsy will be performed, but that is not a certainly as this summary is being written.
Sara McClendon and Marion Kindig viewed the body to make an identification. Neither woman was able to positively identify Mr. Wilcher's body. They were only shown the face, which was badly decomposed, swollen and purple. Both women said that the face looked as though it had been badly beaten. Neither woman, even though they knew Mr. Wilcher very well, could positively identify the body as being that of Mr. Wilcher. If the body is not that of Mr. Wilcher, where is Paul Wilcher, who was last seen June tenth or eleventh by his neighbors.
Gunther Russbacher, The October Surprise Pilot, had recently arranged for a controversial video tape to be delivered to Mr. Wilcher. The video tape was the cockpit video of the flight back from the Paris meeting that concluded the October Surprise. The flight was in an SR 71 spyplane. Mr. Russbacher says the reason he is in prison is to discredit him and keep him quiet about his role in the 1980 October Surprise scandal. According to Mr. Russbacher, the cockpit video tape will conclusively prove that he did fly vice-presidential candidate George Bush back from a Paris meeting on October 20, 1980. This tape was supposed to have been delivered to Mr. Wilcher sometime between the 10th of June and the 19th of June 1993.
No one, except government authorities, has been allowed inside Mr. Wilcher's apartment. No one has any idea if any of his data and research is still there. No one knows if the tape was delivered, and if it was, if it is still in the apartment. Sara McClendon has asked that fingerprints be taken to prove conclusively that the body is that of Mr. Wilcher. She has also demanded that autopsy be performed.
