True Crime/Paranormal/Conspiracy Theories Part VII (Wattys2025)

Murder of John P. Wheeler III

John Parsons Wheeler III (December 14, 1944 – c. December 30, 2010), known as Jack Wheeler, was an American veteran, businessman, and activist, who held multiple positions in the U.S. government for five decades. He was murdered by an unknown person in Wilmington, Delaware, in 2010.

In the 1960s, Wheeler served in a non-combat position in Vietnam during the Vietnam War and worked for the Pentagon as a staffer and systems analyst. In the 1970s, he was a senior planner for Amtrak, an official of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and chairman of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund. In the 1980s, he was the CEO of Mothers against Drunk Driving and an aide to the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations. In the 1990s, he was an activist for the deaf and environmental concerns, and in the 2000s; he was an aide to the George W. Bush administration and consultant to the Mitre Corporation.

Wheeler had homes in New Castle, Delaware, and New York City. On December 28th, 2010, a man matching his description threw smoke bombs into a house neighboring Wheeler's in New Castle. Wheeler was last seen alive in Wilmington on December 30; he was acting unusual, though this may have been an aspect of his bipolar disorder. On the 31st, his dead body was found while being dumped from a garbage truck into a nearby landfill. The truck had received its contents from a commercial trash bin in Newark, Delaware, earlier that day. Police labeled the death a homicide, but it is unknown if a political assassination was the cause.

Early life

Wheeler was descended from a family of military professionals which included Joseph Wheeler, who had served as a general both in the Confederate Army and later with the United States Army. Wheeler III was born in Laredo, Texas, where his mother, Janet Conly Wheeler, was staying with her mother while his father was in Europe. Five days after the delivery, the family received a telegram that his father was missing in action in the Battle of the Bulge. His father was later found to be alive. Wheeler had one younger brother, Robert Conly Wheeler, and one younger sister, Janet Wheeler Gilani.

Military career

Wheeler was a member of the United States Military Academy (West Point) class of 1966 which lost 30 of its members in the Vietnam War.

After graduation from West Point, he was a fire control platoon leader at a MIM-14 Nike-Hercules base at Franklin Lakes, New Jersey from 1966 to 1967. From 1967 to 1969, he was a graduate student at Harvard Business School spending the summer of 1968 as a systems analyst for the Office of Secretary of Defense in Washington, D.C. From 1969 to 1970, he served in a non-combat position at Long Binh in Vietnam. From 1970 to 1971, he served on the General Staff at The Pentagon.

Wheeler's West Point and later years are featured prominently in Rick Atkinson's book, The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966.

Law career

After leaving the military he was a senior planner for Amtrak in 1971 and 1972. From 1972 to 1975 he attended law school at Yale University becoming a clerk for George E. MacKinnon in 1975–76 and an associate for Shea & Gardner in 1976–1978. From 1978 to 1986, he was assistant general counsel, special counsel to the chairman, and the secretary of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Vietnam Veterans Memorial

From 1979 to 1989, Wheeler was chairman of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund which built the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, opening in 1982. Working with Jan Scruggs and Robert W. Doubek, he supported the controversial Maya Lin design, which was opposed by Ross Perot and Jim Webb, who both tried to oust him as chairman of the memorial. Wheeler worked to address their issues by adding The Three Soldiers sculpture by Frederick Hart to the memorial.