The Lede column of the NY Times notes the skepticism surrounding the two hangings in the DC Madam case:

That claim is being called a part of a cover-up by many of those disinclined to believe that Ms. Palfrey’s death was suicide, because she had often said the opposite — that she was not the kind to kill herself, unlike one of her former employees, Brandy Britton, a onetime university instructor who took her own life in February 2007 while awaiting trial on prostitution charges.

Ms. Britton was found hanged as well, and that’s another sore point with skeptics, who say that when women commit suicide, it is rarely by hanging themselves, and for two women involved with the case to have done so beggars belief.

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/02/skepticism-and-sadness-after-death-of-dc-madam/?scp=5&sq=Palfrey&st=cse