2 years ago
WASHINGTON, DC(WUSA)--"Sharon didn't need to die that day, there was just no reason for it and to die in that manner-with that brutality, just makes no sense."
Ten years after that cold day in January of 1997, DC Homicide Detective Brett Smith says he remembers in vivid detail the crime scene at Sharon Moscowitz's apartment on Biltmore Street, NW.
"They jumped her right at the door...when she came in, her bags fell out of her hands and hit the floor."
Twenty-five-year-old Sharon Moscowitz had stayed home from her job at the Japanese Embassy to nurse a cold. In the afternoon, she went to the health store to get a remedy and returned home.
Police say the burglars must have heard Moscowitz come in and were waiting for her.
Sharon Moscowitz was tied up and gagged. After ransacking the place, the burglars strangled her.
Detective Smith says the burglars even took the time to drink the juice and eat some of the food Moscowitz had bought, while her body lay on the floor: "They took a burglary and turned it into a horrible murder."
Police have surveillance photos of a man wearing a University of Pittsburgh sweatshirt using one of Moscowitz' credit cards at a grocery store shortly after the murder.
Detective Smith nicknamed the suspect "PITT," and a neighbor was able to place two men, one wearing a similar sweatshirt, in an alley behind Moscowitz's building at the time of the crime.
Police believed that, given the brutality of the crime, one of the burglars would turn the other one in, but that has not happened.
Still, Detective Smith keeps the pressure on: "There's people out there that know, that recognize the photo that we showed then and that we are showing now."
If you have any information that could help police find the killer call DC Police Detective Brett Smith at 202-727-9099 or call our Cold Case Tipline at 202-895-5750.
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