When Chandra Levy disappeared 15 years ago, the national media’s quickly focused on then-Rep. Gary Condit, a married Democrat who represented Levy’s hometown of Modesto, California.

Condit denied ever having an affair with the former federal government intern before authorities would match him to DNA evidence collected from Levy’s underwear in her apartment. Authorities ruled him out as a suspect in Levy’s murder early in their investigation, but the scandal has followed him.

Condit lost his House seat in 2002 – just weeks after Levy’s skeletal remains were found near a trail in Washington, D.C.’s Rock Creek Park. He has remained mostly out of the public eye ever since, briefly returning to the news cycle in 2012 when he and his wife, Carolyn, supported their son, Chad, in his failed bid for Congress.

For more on the latest in the Chandra Levy case, pick up this week’s issue of PEOPLE on newsstands Friday.

While Chad Condit refused to speak to PEOPLE about his father this week and calls to several numbers listed for Condit were not returned, the former politician now splits time between Colorado, Arizona, and California.

According to the Washington Post, Condit has written a book but allegedly can’t find a publisher. Soon after leaving politics, he invested in Baskin-Robbins ice cream franchises. The Post reports those stores failed and prompted a breach-of-contract suit in which Condit was ordered to pay about $98,000.

A source close to the Condit family says Gary has long since left the ice cream business.

WATCH: Chandra Levy: Five Things to Know About the Murdered D.C. Intern

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Condit also briefly served as the president of the Phoenix Institute of Desert Agriculture, a non-profit devoted to bringing modern farming techniques to desert farming in the developing world. That venture has since folded, records show.

In 2005, court documents show Condit settled a defamation lawsuit against crime writer Dominick Dunne. Two years later, he lost a civil suit against an Arizona newspaper and had to pay the paper’s $42,000 legal fees.

Condit’s name is back in the news this week after prosecutors moved to dismiss murder charges against Ingmar Guandique, the El Salvadorian undocumented immigrant who had been facing a retrial after being convicted in 2010 of Levy’s murder.

In a statement to PEOPLE, Condit’s lawyer, L. Lin Wood, says his client was “extremely disappointed to learn that the prosecution has decided against a retrial of Ingmar Guandique, the individual previously found guilty of the murder of Chandra Levy.”

But Wood adds the decision “in no way alters the fact that Mr. Condit was long ago completely exonerated by authorities in connection with Ms. Levy’s death.”

Wood, his statement says, has “been informed by the U.S. Attorney’s office in charge of the Levy case that Mr. Condit is neither a subject nor a target of the investigation into the murder of Chandra Levy. The U.S. Attorney’s office has authorized the public release of this information.”

While Condit has not spoken to reporters in years, Wood tells PEOPLE he believes his client “will speak out publicly in the near future.”

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