The FBI and D.C. police say they have arrested the Potomac River Rapist who killed a D.C. intern and raped nine women over the course of seven years in the 1990s. 

The suspect, Giles Daniel Warrick, was arrested Tuesday in South Carolina.

Warrick, now 60, is suspected of killing 29-year-old Christine Mirzayan in August 1998. She was sexually assaulted and murdered as she walked to her home in Georgetown. Her body was found near Whitehurst Freeway.

Warrick also is believed to have raped seven women in Montgomery County, Maryland, and two women in D.C. between 1991 and 1998. DNA linked those cases to the homicide.

“This is an answer to so many prayers,” a victim told News4. “My hope is that this man will finally be brought to justice and that closure can be given to all the people like myself who have been dealing with the uncertainty of this case for so many years.”

D.C. Police Chief Peter Newsham called the arrest “bittersweet.” 

“I can’t begin to imagine what the families have suffered over these 29 years,” he said. 

Police say they used forensic genealogy techniques to close the case. A DNA test taken by a family member of Warrick led investigators to him. Officials compared DNA collected from the crime scenes to DNA in publicly available databases, Montgomery County Police Chief Marcus Jones said. 

One officer was crucial to conducting genealogical research that helped connect the dots: Montgomery County Officer Steven Smugeresky. Also known as Smugs, the cold case unit has repeatedly turned to him to dig through databases, WTOP reported. 

Similar genetic genealogy techniques helped detectives find the suspected Golden State Killer last year.

Warrick looks strikingly similar to a 1998 sketch and a 2011 age-progressed sketch of the suspect.  

This is a 1998 sketch of the man wanted in the Potomac River Rapist case (left), alongside an age-progression sketch from 2011.
Photo credit: FBI

The cold case devastated victims and vexed investigators for decades, though the attacker’s DNA was found at many of the crime scenes.

He preyed upon women age 18 to 58. Two of the victims were at home with their young children at the time of the attacks. Another was at work as a housekeeper. Another was headed back from a business trip.

At the time of the attacks, Warrick worked in landscaping and as a contractor in the D.C. area, sources said. He recently moved to South Carolina, Jones said. 

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Investigators are examining unsolved rape cases in the D.C. area to determine whether Warrick may be responsible. 

A victim who was 18 when she was raped said the attack in 1991 changed her life forever. The attacker broke into a house in Germantown, Maryland, where she was babysitting. 

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Two years ago, she said she looked forward to the day he would be locked up. 

“I would look him in the eyes, because he has no control over me anymore,” she said. 

Former neighbors of Warrick in Frederick County, where he lived until last summer, told News4 they were shocked to learn he is the suspect, saying they never would have thought he could be capable of such crimes. 

Warrick is in jail in South Carolina waiting for extradition to D.C.

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