Our son Patrick Casey served his country in combat as a Sergeant in Afghanistan in 2009-2010. For a year we worried about receiving a dreaded phone call from the Army. Patrick returned home safely when many soldiers he served with did not. Shockingly, we did get the phone call we had dreaded. It came from the D.C Police on September 23, 2011.
On that tragic day in the early morning hours, Patrick was attacked from behind while attempting to break up a fight between a friend and a group of three men from Virginia. The men had a history of drunken behavior and several brawls in the same downtown area of Washington D.C. Patrick died from his injuries four days later. No one was ever charged. Making matters worse, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for D.C. led by Ronald Machen precipitously and falsely blamed our son for his own death by concluding without supporting evidence that the perpetrator, Jason Ward, acted in defense of another.
The USAO-DC denied Patrick due process.
As we will document, the USAO-DC gave Ward preferential treatment by cutting a secret deal with him and obstructed the DC Police from performing a complete and fair investigation. Throughout the homicide investigation in 2011 and ever since, the federal prosecutors have denied us information, deceived us and outright lied to us and the public.
Before Patrick joined the Army he worked in Israel and traveled to the Palestinian area, Jordan and Egypt. He grew to love that part of the world.
The DC Police have concluded that Patrick was murdered and requested the case be prosecuted. The DC Police conclusion of Murder is irreconcilable with the USAO-DC conclusion of defense of another. Regrettably and unfairly the DC Police have remained publicly silent in the face of deliberate misconduct and obstruction by the USAO-DC.
Over a decade since the crime, we are still seeking justice for Patrick, a man who was falsely blamed in the tragic events of his own death while Ward, his friends and the corrupt federal prosecutors have not been held accountable.
*Current Update: View the Complaint we filed in September 2019 with the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General and the June 2024 response that incredibly took the Inspector General five years to produce.* The role of the Inspector General is to prevent and investigate fraud and abuse by government departments not to participate in it.
We present the truth about who Patrick was, what happened the night he was attacked, and the deliberate misconduct by federal prosecutors. We continue to fight for Patrick’s legacy so that who he really was — a dedicated son, a brother and combat soldier with his whole future before him — is remembered and he receives the justice and respect he earned.