title:  Right-Wing Media Won’t Let Slain DNC Staffer RIP
text: The story of a slain DNC staffer complicates as an ex-detective claims there is new evidence behind his murder. On Monday, a private investigator suggested that Seth Rich was communicating with WikiLeaks before he was murdered. And right-wing news outlets are taking his every word as true.Seth Rich served as a DNC staffer for two years until his untimely death at the age of 27. Washington, DC police maintain that his murder resulted from a botched burglary that July night last year in Northwest DC. But according to the leading Right-wing outlets, like Fox & Friends, the Drudge Report, and Breinbart, an ex DC Officer presents damning new evidence of Rich s ties to WikiLeaks. What kind of evidence? The invisible kind, of course.Rob Wheeler, the former detective and Fox News contributor, told Fox 5 DC, on Monday, that his private investigation into the murder has led him to believe there is a cover-up. The key to his theory is Rich s missing laptop. [The police and FBI] haven t been forthcoming,  Wheeler told the station. He claimed that a source within the department told him they were given orders to suspend the investigation. The DC Police, when asked for a response, called his claims false. His parallel investigation, which was offered to the Rich s family free of charge, led him to suggest there is some tangible evidence of wrongdoing. I believe that the answer to solving his death lies on that computer, which I believe is either at the police department or either at the FBI,  concluded Wheeler.He went on to entertain a possible cover-up going as far as the Mayor s office. But no independent source has yet to corroborate his claims. Wheeler s comments come months after various internet threads and right-leaning media outlets have mentioned Seth Rich as a functional actor in conspiracies involving the Podesta emails and WikiLeaks documents that had an impact on the 2016 presidential election. According to Yahoo News, suspicions grew when infamous hacker Grucifer 2.0 named Rich as the whistle blower and WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, offered a $20,000 award for finding the perpetrator of the heinous crime. But there is still no confirmed evidence that Seth Rich was the leak. Not one email, witness, or clue.In fact, Rich s family has denounced the claim that he was a whistleblower, and they have distanced themselves from the special investigator. Representative for the family, Brad Bauman, told Business Insider, that there is a special place in hell for media outlets that  try and manipulate the legacy of a murder victim in order to forward their own political agenda. He added that even if emails did show up, they would not be a high enough  bar of evidence  because the family believes those  pushing conspiracy theories will stop at nothing.  His final statement sternly distanced the family from the private investigator. The services of the private investigator who spoke to the press was offered to the Rich family and paid for by a third party, and contractually was barred from speaking to the press or anyone outside of law enforcement or the family unless explicitly authorized by the family. Featured image via Getty/Drew Angerer