Murder In The House

The U.S. Capitol can feel like a World's Fair on pretty afternoons in late July. People dress well for the White House tour, keep their voices down because that is the President's House, but this is Our House. That was the whole idea. We come by the hundreds, thousands, in tank tops and flip-flops, to see where Webster debated and wars were declared and National Mushroom Month was inscribed onto the nation's calendar. Boy Scouts pose for pictures, senior citizens wear buttons and troll for a Congressman to pester, Pentecostal pilgrims deliver copies of the Ten Commandments and pray outside on the lawn, heavyweight champs and movie stars with a cause and CEOs come to call and oh, yes--the lawmakers themselves can walk the halls unmolested because no one really recognizes them unless they have a ribbon of reporters around them. The People have the run of the place; no guides required.

The lawmakers may be the only suits in the city who haven't been cutting out early for the weekend. It's the busy season: they work late and start again early because the Do-Nothing Congress needs something to run on in November. And so last week saw everything from a vote to send condolences to Florida for its wildfires to trade votes, abortion fights and a health-care bill passed just moments before the bell rang shortly after 3:10 p.m., telling lawmakers that school was out, the week's work was over and they could go home. John Boehner, the fourth-ranking House Republican, was sitting in his hideaway, the small office he often uses for meetings on the Capitol's first floor. There is a wheelchair access ramp outside, and when he heard a strange noise in the hall, "I thought it was just somebody pushing a cart up the ramp outside the door."

Officer Jacob Chestnut, 58, an 18-year veteran of the Capitol Police who was looking forward to retiring in a few months, was smiling, greeting visitors at the security checkpoint at the Document Room entrance on the House side. It was about 3:40 when Russell Weston Jr., 41, came through the doors, dressed in khakis and a hat, and tried to go around the metal detectors. Hold on a minute, Chestnut said, moving to stop him as he tried to barge through. Weston pulled out a revolver and shot him in the head, then ran down the hall toward the Crypt, the busy crossroads directly beneath the vast Capitol Rotunda. Tourists began screaming, "He's got a gun!" and dropped to the floor, grabbing children, rolling behind columns, trying to get smaller. Weston came to a door marked PRIVATE: DO NOT ENTER. It was the back door to House majority whip Tom DeLay's suite, the door staff members use to slip in and out of the warren of offices.

Around 30 House-leadership staff members were inside, cleaning up the week's business after the final big health-care vote, toasting their success with champagne. DeLay himself was back in his private office. His plainclothes guard, Special Agent John Gibson, 42, was sitting near the rear entrance when the normal merry chaos of the afternoon was punctured by sharp explosions in the hall. Gibson knew it was gunfire and had his hand on his hip as he moved toward the door. A leadership staff member yelled "Everybody get down, get down!" and pushed people under the desks and into side offices.