Seth Rich, a staffer at the Democratic National Committee (DNC), was murdered on July 10, 2016 while making his way home from a night out in Washington, DC.
The 27-year-old was speaking to his girlfriend on the phone when shots were heard. The killer or killers have not been found. Police have long insisted Rich was the victim of a botched robbery.
Private investigators have claimed there is evidence that Rich was the source WikiLeaks used to obtain DNC emails, which were copied on July 5, 2016.
Related: Report: DNC files were copied, not hacked, 5 days before murder of Seth Rich, July 11, 2017
The leaked DNC emails detailed efforts by the committee to rig the 2016 Democrat primary in favor of Hillary Clinton.
Garrett Ziegler, founder of the Marco Polo research group, blames the Department of Justice, specifically the DC U.S. Attorney's office for allowing the Rich case to go "cold."
Speaking on video at the site of the murder, Ziegler said that testimony of the former Crowdstrike CEO revealed that "Crowdstrike had no data, no evidence of exfiltration — he said this under oath — of Russian hackers. There is zero evidence that the DNC was hacked by Russians."
"The truth about Seth Rich has never come to light because there has been no proper investigation," he added.
Ziegler said he holds out hope that the new U.S. Attorney in DC, Jeanine Pirro, will revive the case.
9 years ago today, Seth Rich was murdered—at this very spot.
The @USAO_DC has utterly failed so far. @JudgeJeanine/@USAttyPirro owes it to the American people to change that. Ft @Ty_Clevenger, @EdButowsky, @SinesDeborah, @AndyKroll, @CrowdStrike, @Shawn365Henry, et al.… https://t.co/TDaXKfQbzc pic.twitter.com/gVG9ut7rAZ — Marco Polo (@MarcoPolo501c3) July 11, 2025
