A Children's Treasury Of Recent Suspicious Suicides

As America mourns the suspicious death of "D.C. Madam" Deborah Jeane Palfreyand gives up hope that anyone or anything can bring down Dick Cheney (or even David Vitter), let's look back in anger at other recent suspicious suicides involving Our Federal Government. Did you know one of Palfrey's escort-service contractor ladies also supposedly hanged herself? And what about all these FBI targets and mysterious CIA agents meeting weird, tragic ends? WTF, people, WTF?

* Madam Palfrey wasn't the first woman to be found hanging dead in this whole D.C. escort scandal. That sad honor went to ex-University of Maryland professor and Washington prostitute Brandy Britton allegedly killed herself in her Ellicott City home last year. Last May, Palfrey told ABC News that Britton was her employee. [ Crime Library ]

* Joggers in Austin found 55-year-old schoolteacher and FBI target Riad Hamad drowned in Lady Bird Lake on April 17, his hands and legs bound in duct tape, which also covered his eyes. The local ACLU director immediately sent out an email calling Hamad's mysterious death a homicide, but Austin cops immediately ruled it "consistent with Hamad having done it himself." [ Austin American-Statesman ]

* Supposed CIA agent Roland Carnaby was shot dead by police in Houston after a traffic stop Tuesday. He carried a CIA ID, had a car full of "legally owned" guns, but was shot when he grabbed his Blackberry. Now the Central Intelligence Agency denies he was ever an employee. [ Houston Chronicle ]