According to CBS News, on December 8, 1972, United Airlines Flight 553 crash-landed near Midway International Airport with Dorothy Hunt on board. President Richard Nixon had just been reelected that November, having successfully fooled the public into thinking that he was innocent (via History). During the Watergate investigation, Nixon had asked the CIA to stop the FBI from uncovering the story, and Dorothy Hunt’s husband, E. Howard Hunt, was one of the CIA agents under indictment for possible involvement in the scandal (via The Washington Post).
But it was the FBI, not the CIA, who found Dorothy Hunt’s body in the wreckage, not long after the plane hit the ground. When they arrived at the scene, they discovered that her purse was full of a suspicious amount of cash — $10,000 in $100 bills — money her mourning husband later claimed was intended for her cousin. Nixon makes reference to the money in one of the White House tapes, during which he asks if the money is traceable.
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E. Howard Hunt’s contact in the White House was presidential aide Charles Colson, and it later transpired that the pair had discussed the hush money that was doled out to the burglars. According to a 1974 Time Magazine article, Colson reportedly told a private detective he believed Dorothy Hunt was murdered for her involvement, saying, “I don’t say this to my people. They’d think I’m nuts. I think they killed Dorothy Hunt.”
