FILE 444 / 25 November 2023 / 70 MIN / express

A Tale Of Two Sisters

McLean, VirginiaListen

The town

N ↑Public placeTown centre (approximate places)
Static locations; no street basemap. Places and details. OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap.

'this is mclean virginia ... at the tip top of the upper virginia panhandle'; the 911 dispatcher answers as Fairfax County police and fire, 'which is where this town is' about 0:03:11

History, in brief

Town note

Named for John Roll McLean, former publisher and owner of the Washington Post.

about 0:04:51

1902

In 1902 McLean, Stephen Benton Elkins and a French aristocrat, Jean-Pierre Genard, brought the railroad charter through the town, connecting it to Washington DC.

about 0:05:03
All 2 history facts

Town note

Named for John Roll McLean, former publisher and owner of the Washington Post.

about 0:04:51

1902

In 1902 McLean, Stephen Benton Elkins and a French aristocrat, Jean-Pierre Genard, brought the railroad charter through the town, connecting it to Washington DC.

about 0:05:03

The figures, as told

Crime / national average

Crime overall
▼ less than half the national average

about 0:07:28

Money

Median home value$1,186,400
Median household income$242,610
All figures and comparisons, as told in 2023

Population

"49,310"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:04:05

Median household income

"$242,610"

Comparison: "national average $69,000". No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:04:17

Median home price

"$1,186,400"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:04:32

Crime rate

"less than half the national average"

Comparison: "national average". Direction: below.

As told in 2023 about 0:07:28

Hargan family home

"$1.5 million"

Comparison: "value in 2017". No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:27:30

Pam Hargan's estate

"about eight million dollars"

No direction stated.

As told in 2023 about 0:15:56

The reviews

3.0 / 5 · average of 4

5 stars

“An exchange student says the school was the first they attended in the US, and that students and teachers were welcoming, so they adapted and made friends easily.”
about 0:05:57

4 stars

“Pros and cons: great public schools, close to DC and Tyson's, mostly clean and very green, a good library and community centre, close to parks, safe for families but deteriorating; against that, cookie-cutter houses, no walkable or bikeable downtown, no Whole Foods in town and Balducci's overpriced with out-of-date meat.”
about 0:06:44

2 stars

“Very congested with tons of traffic, it takes forever to go anywhere, and there are few sidewalks, which makes walking dangerous; public transport is encouraged and widely available through city buses and the metro.”
about 0:08:04

1 star

“People in the area are snobs with million-dollar homes, the schools are too hard, the area is insanely expensive, the writer could not get into any Virginia schools because their GPA at Langley was not good enough, and the kids are spoiled, some getting $500 a month in allowance.”
about 0:08:22

In Virginia

Closest episodes

  1. Serial Killing Schizophrenic CannibalBethesda, Maryland · 20 February 20258 km / 5 miShow on map
  2. Mother Daughter MurdersLargo, Maryland · 14 August 202532 km / 20 miShow on map
  3. The Sugar Daddy Death CaperWoodbridge, Virginia · 7 July 202234 km / 21 miShow on map
  4. Stunning Brutality, Shocking StupidityDumfries, Virginia · 15 June 202343 km / 27 miShow on map
  5. The Mannequin MurdersElkridge, Maryland · 15 March 201848 km / 30 miShow on map

The story

In 2017 Pam Hargan, born in 1954, was a vice president of Lockheed Martin who had built an estate worth about eight million dollars. Helen, born in 1993, was the youngest. She had been at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, double-majoring in mathematics and management science, and worked there as a waitress, where she met Carlos Gutierrez, a man in his thirties who also worked at the restaurant. They planned to marry and to move into a house Pam was having built for Helen in Loudoun County, Virginia.

On the morning of 14 July 2017 Pam told Helen she was cancelling the contract on that house, because she believed Helen meant to move Gutierrez in with her. Gutierrez telephoned Fairfax County police, was told to file a report with his own jurisdiction first, and called back fifteen minutes later to say his girlfriend had told him her sister had killed her mother. Police went to the house at about 3 p.m. and found Pam shot dead in the laundry room, lying in a pool of blood with shell casings around her, and Helen shot dead in an upstairs bathroom with a .22 Ruger rifle placed between her feet.

The first reading was murder-suicide, and by 8 p.m. police were telling the media so. The scene told a different story. Pam's mobile phone lay on top of the blood and a blanket, as though placed there. Detectives also found bank statements and a spreadsheet of Pam's passwords folded inside a photo album. When they returned with a search warrant the documents were gone. The autopsy showed Helen had been shot from above, the bullet travelling straight down through her head into her neck, a wound the medical examiner said could not be self-inflicted.

On 17 July Capital One gave detectives a recording. On 19 July she came in for what she thought was an update, stayed more than four hours, and was played the recording. She said the voice was hers, that she had not mentioned it because of how it would look, and at one point said, 'just blame me'. She took a polygraph three times and failed all three, then was allowed to leave. A gunshot residue test later showed residue on both hands.

Carlos Gutierrez testified for the prosecution. Forensic witnesses said Helen's arms were about five inches too short to reach the trigger, while the defence argued she could have used her toe and the experts conceded that was theoretically possible. Ashley, the middle sister, said repeatedly that she did not remember earlier statements about Helen's threats of self-harm.

The case

Murders of Pam and Helen Hargan

Victims

Pam Hargan. Pamela Hargan, vice president of Lockheed Martin and mother of Ashley, and Helen; shot dead in her laundry room
Helen Hargan. the youngest daughter, a Southern Methodist University student who had just moved home; shot dead in an upstairs bathroom

Accused and outcomes

As told in the episode, on 25 November 2023.

Accused

Outcome

Other people

Steve Hargan. Pam's ex-husband and the father of the three daughters
Ashley Hargan. the middle daughter, 32 at the time of the murders; testified at the trials
Carlos Gutierrez. Helen's boyfriend, a restaurant worker in Dallas; raised the alarm and testified for the prosecution
Rebecca Wolf. friend, who met her rehoming dogs rescued from war zones and believed her innocent
Julia Elliott. Fairfax County detective who led the investigation
Tammy. the family's neighbour in Potomac, Maryland
Erin. Helen's friend at Southern Methodist University

The timeline

  1. 1954 Pam Hargan is bornabout 0:12:25
  2. 1984 , the oldest daughter, is bornabout 0:31:01
  3. 1993 Helen Hargan, the youngest daughter, is bornabout 0:14:10
  4. the mid 1990s Pam and Steve Hargan divorce; Pam moves the girls around before they settle in Potomac, Marylandabout 0:14:17
  5. 2014 Helen meets Erin at Southern Methodist University in Dallas (Southern Methodist University)about 0:17:46
  6. 2014 Pam's estate is worth about eight million dollarsabout 0:16:03
  7. 2015 meets Rebecca Wolf while volunteering to find homes for dogs rescued from war zonesabout 0:21:23
  8. 2017 Helen moves back from Dallas to northern Virginia to move into the house Pam has built for her (Helen's house)about 0:19:48
  9. July 13, 2017 brings the .22 Ruger rifle upstairs, saying she saw two men casing the neighbourhood (Hargan house)about 0:32:38
  10. July 13, 2017 Someone claiming to be Pam Hargan tries to wire $420,000 out of her Capital One account to a West Virginia title companyabout 1:01:04
  11. July 14, 2017 Pam tells Helen she is cancelling the contract on the house she was building for her, because she believed Helen would move Carlos inabout 0:34:05
  12. July 14, 2017 At about 11:30 a.m. Helen calls Carlos Gutierrez in Dallas, sobbing, and says has shot their mother (Hargan house)about 0:51:05

Places and phrases

N ↑Public placeTown centre (approximate places)
Static locations; no street basemap. Places and details. OpenFreeMap © OpenMapTiles Data from OpenStreetMap.

Places in the story

Public places are marked on the map.

Heard in this episode