RIP Geoff Farrar

"Rock-climber accused of killing friend with claw-hammer under Bethesda cliffs
January 13, 2014 by D.C. Crime Stories
Carderock Park near Bethesda has some of the most popular cliffs to climb on the eastern seaboard. (Photo: Wikipedia)

Carderock Park near Bethesda has some of the most popular cliffs to climb on the eastern seaboard. (Photo: Wikipedia)

A Virginia rock-climber has been accused of using a claw hammer to kill a fellow climber during a fight at Carderock Park near Bethesda.

David DiPaolo, 31, also known as David Jennings, was charged with manslaughter after U.S. Park Police detectives caught up to him in upstate New York on Thursday.

DiPaolo could not be immediately reached for comment. He remains in New York and awaits extradition to Maryland, according to a U.S. Attorney’s Office spokesperson.

The victim has been identified Monday as 69-year-old Geoffrey D. Farrar of Arlington.

According to charging documents, on the afternoon of Dec. 28, DiPaolo and three rock-climbing friends went to climb the cliffs at Carderock Park, one of the most popular urban climbing areas in the eastern United States. It sits within the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historic Park.

While DiPaolo, of Bristow, Va., and Farrar stayed down below, two of the climbers walked to the top of a cliff to anchor their ropes at the highpoint. The two then threw their lines down and peered over the cliff, but did not see anyone below, and walked back down to check on their friends.

The rock-climbers told police that they saw DiPaolo run down the trail and called his name, but he did not answer and kept running. When the two climbers round the bend, they found Farrar laying on the trail with his head against a wooden beam, bleeding profusely around his skull. Farrar was taken by helicopter to Suburban Hospital where he died later that day.

Witnesses told police that DiPaolo had fled in a minivan. Police traced a call from a pay phone at a gas station in upstate New York to his father’s home nearby. On Thursday, a New York State Trooper pulled DiPaolo over near Great Falls, N.Y., and he was taken into the police station where he waited to be questioned by U.S. Park Police detectives.

DiPaolo admitted that he and the victim had an argument at the park, and the next thing he knew Farrar was choking him, charging documents said. He and Farrar fell to the ground, and as DiPaolo began to lose consciousness, he found a claw hammer on the ground, he told police.

DiPaolo struck Farrar with the claw hammer until the victim let go of DiPaolo, charging documents state.

Police said DiPaolo then provided a written statement insisting that Farrar had his hands around his neck during entire struggle, ”I’m sorry this happened. I didn’t want it to happen. I didn’t know it was going to happen.”"