With No New Leads, Police Say Suicide Most Likely Explanation for Missing Wiley

Despite no new leads in the investigation, a Memphis Police Department spokesperson said yesterday that suicide is the most likely explanation for Harvard professor Don C. Wiley’s disappearance in Memphis earlier this month.

“Indications are that he parked the car on the bridge and took his own life, [but] we can’t conclude that,” said Lt. Richard True, a department spokesperson. “We’re basing this on previous experiences where people park their car and jump off the bridge and leave their keys in the ignition.”

Police have not found Wiley’s body, and have uncovered no new leads in the case that has baffled authorities since the Loeb professor of biophysics and biochemistry disappeared after a Nov. 15 meeting in Memphis.

Wiley’s empty rental car was found abandoned with a full tank of gas and the keys in the ignition on a bridge at 4 a.m. Nov. 16, with the professor last seen in a Memphis hotel four hours earlier.

In recent days, authorities have honed in on Wiley’s empty car and its location as signs of suicide, particularly because there is no evidence that supports contrary explanations for the disappearance, True said.

But Harvard Professor of Statistical Sciences Marvin Zelen, a friend and colleague of Wiley’s who also attended the Memphis meeting, said the police department’s hypothesis was “nonsense.”

“He wasn’t in any depression. I don’t believe that for a moment,” Zelen said.

Others who talked to Wiley hours before his disappearance said he discussed plans for the upcoming weekend.

William Evans, deputy director at St. Jude’s Hospital, which hosted the meeting, said Wiley planned to meet his wife and two younger children in Memphis on Nov. 16. Wiley wanted to take his children to Graceland and had asked the scientists for other sightseeing suggestions during the meeting’s banquet at the Peabody Hotel, Evans said.

“He was definitely making plans for the weekend. I think that’s important,” said Evans, who last saw Wiley at 11:30 p.m. on Nov. 15.

Several colleagues of Wiley’s in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology would not comment to The Crimson yesterday.

Associate Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology Brian D. Dynlacht said that the department’s administration circulated an e-mail instructing professors not to speak to the press and to refer all questions to the University’s press office.

The University and St. Jude’s Hospital announced Tuesday that they have each donated $5,000 as a reward for information leading to the arrest and charge of anyone connected to Wiley’s disappearance.

Because there is no evidence of foul play and Wiley remains classified as a missing person, Captain Jesse Richardson, Crime Stoppers coordinator for the Memphis Police Department, said his non-profit group which is administering the fund has not yet contributed any of its own money to the reward.

Andrea Shen, a Faculty of Arts and Sciences spokesperson, said that Harvard’s reward offers “no implication that we have any idea what happened to Professor Wiley.”

True said that while rewards often generate many calls to the police, in most cases few provide solid evidence.

“For most of these leads, there will turn out to be nothing to that sighting,” he said.

True said police have notified agencies “up and down the [Mississippi] River so they can notify us if the body is found.”

He added that it was unlikely Wiley unintentionally fell off the bridge.

“It’s extremely difficult to fall off accidentally,” True said. “We’ve had [kids horsing around] do that in the past, but you’d have to climb up over the railings.”

Though numerous national media outlets have reported a possible link between Wiley’s disappearance and a bio-terrorist threat, True said such a connection was unlikely, despite the professor’s work with viruses. Earlier this week, two of Wiley’s Harvard colleagues emphasized that his work is unlikely to be of interest to bioterrorists.

Final test results of all forensic evidence from Wiley’s rental car will not be available for several more weeks.

True would not comment on whether fingerprints and hairs besides Wiley’s were found in the car.

The abandoned car, True said, had yellow paint on its bumper and was missing a hubcap, which police think was not lost when Wiley rented the car.

True said squad cars, patrolling the bridge frequently since Sept. 11, did not see Wiley’s car parked at 3 a.m., so his car had been parked on the bridge for no more than an hour.

True confirmed reports that Wiley, who was last seen at the hotel around midnight, had consumed alcohol that night, but said there is no current evidence that he was inebriated prior to his disappearance.

Evans, who remained at the hotel with Wiley and about six to eight others after the banquet, had bought Wiley a glass of port wine at about 10 p.m. and said Wiley may have had another glass previously, but was not drunk.

“He certainly was in complete control,” Evans said. “He was carrying the conversation.”

Evans also said that Wiley may have been particularly cheerful on the night of his disappearance, but that such emotion was typical.

“He was definitely happy and outspoken, but I’m not sure how unusual that is,” he said.