AK AK - Anchorage, WhtMale 439UMAK, 25-40, naked, fell from flagpole, Aug'89

[reasypeasy]

His facial hair reminds me a lot of Brett Jellicoe, but he went missing from an entirely different continent. Still, the rest of his stats stack up.

http://www.police.qld.gov.au/News+and+Alerts/missingPersons/e_k/JELLICOE+-+Brett.htm

 

[carbuff]

His facial hair reminds me a lot of Brett Jellicoe, but he went missing from an entirely different continent. Still, the rest of his stats stack up.

http://www.police.qld.gov.au/News+and+Alerts/missingPersons/e_k/JELLICOE+-+Brett.htm

Faces. I wish we had a profile view of Jellicoe. I think the noses are wrong but it's hard to be sure.

I dunno, I suppose if you're leaving Australia, you might as well wind up in Alaska as anywhere. Especially if you signed onto a fishing boat or something.

 

[SeeMamaRun]

Has anyone checked out Ralph Newcombe?

http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/n/newcombe_ralph.html


He was suggested as the Fire Island Doe, but after reading his circumstances from Charley Project I'd be more willing to bet that he's this UID.

Ralph's circumstances sure sound like they could match up with this UID and I think they resemble each other! I wish we had a front shot of the UID

 

[OkieGranny]

No NamUs File
W/M Found 8/23/89

I've just spent a couple of days looking into Alaska's MPs/UIDs and I have to say Alaska has a pitiful record of submitting their cases to NamUs. Currently 57 MPs and 6 UIDs listed; the true numbers are much, much higher.

 

[DrDMike]

The Doe looks like me. Not a bad looking guy. However, the reconstruction is awful.

 

[MagnoliaMountain]

Bumping.

 

[nerosleuth]

http://www.doenetwork.org/cases/439umak.html


The victim was discovered on August 23, 1989 in Anchorage, Alaska.
Cause of Death: Suicide

Vital Statistics

Estimated age: DOB is between 1949 and 1964

Approximate Height and Weight: 6'2" - 6'4"; 180 - 185 lbs.

Distinguishing Characteristics: Blue or hazel eyes; curly brown hair with full beard and mustache. No tattoos and no scars.

Dentals: Available

Clothing: Not found

Other: Fingerprints available

Case History

The victim committed suicide on August 23, 1989 in Alaska.

A police officer was stopped by a citizen who told him about a man running down the road with no clothes on. As he responded and arrived in the area of the McDonald's Restaurant on Mt. View Drive, he saw the man running through the parking lot, then climb up the center flagpole at the restaurant. The man climbed up all the way to the top and looked as if he was surveying the area.

The officer called up to him, but did not get a response. The man then let go and fell to the ground. The police were never able to find his clothing or figure out where he came from. Fingerprints were sent out to all states, FBI and Canada with negative results.

He may have come from another country and jumped ship near Anchorage.
The autopsy showed no drugs were found in his system.

I've taken a vested interest in getting this guy identified..

If his ship made a stop at a shipping port near Anchorage, I believe the shipping port would have a record of all ships arriving and leaving the docks.

Another possibility is that he could have been a deck hand on a fishing vessel when he jumped ship.

If he came from another country, he could have came from Australia, New Zealand, or Europe.

Taking into considersation that the fingerprint search came back negative in the United States and Canada, you have to wonder if a fingerprint search was done with Interpol and national LE agencies from other nations.

 

[MagnoliaMountain]

24 years this month...Who was this young man?

 

[MagnoliaMountain]

Who was this man? It's been 25 years this month.

 

[jjohnston0827]

I wonder why he isn't listed on NamUs? I searched and couldn't find him, has anyone else seen a profile on NamUs for him?

 

[bflocket]

Pretty sure he's not on NamUS. Just see him on DN.

I absolutely HATE that DoeNet classifies this as a suicide.
I think it is quite clear that this man was in some kind of psychotic state due to hypothermia. Two common symptoms of hypothermia are confusion (or basically just not thinking right) and "paradoxical undressing," both of which this guy seemed to have.

He may have fallen or jumped from the pole to his death, but he wasn't "with it" enough to know what was going on. I mean, he was running around naked in the snow and climbing flagpoles. Wish they'd change COD to accident or something like that.

 

[ebonydarkness]

But I doubt it would have been that cold in August.

 

[necco]

But I doubt it would have been that cold in August.

I don't think it was. I guess 50 degrees is theoretically possible, but that was the low. http://www.climatespy.com/climate/summary/united-states/alaska/merrill-fld/august/1989

 

[bflocket]

I don't think it was. I guess 50 degrees is theoretically possible, but that was the low. http://www.climatespy.com/climate/summary/united-states/alaska/merrill-fld/august/1989

Sorry for not thinking more. I really don't know what Alaska is like and I'd just assumed it was cold at all times.


Still, he had something wrong with this head at the time. ...There's the running around naked, climbing flagpoles and such without evidence of drugs.

He could have been under the influence of some local mushroom/herb that wouldn't have shown up on the toxicology report.
He could have had some kind of reaction to something (food/drink).
He could have had some bad thing happen to him that caused a psychotic break.


Whether it was hypothermia, schizophrenia, PCP or what have you, I don't think the guy was "in his right mind" enough to have intentionally committed suicide (by climbing naked up a flagpole and jumping/falling).

 

[necco]

Sorry for not thinking more. I really don't know what Alaska is like and I'd just assumed it was cold at all times.


Still, he had something wrong with this head at the time. ...There's the running around naked, climbing flagpoles and such without evidence of drugs.

He could have been under the influence of some local mushroom/herb that wouldn't have shown up on the toxicology report.
He could have had some kind of reaction to something (food/drink).
He could have had some bad thing happen to him that caused a psychotic break.


Whether it was hypothermia, schizophrenia, PCP or what have you, I don't think the guy was "in his right mind" enough to have intentionally committed suicide (by climbing naked up a flagpole and jumping/falling).

No worries, it was an excellent guess. I likely would have thought the same thing if I hadn't watched way too much Alaska State Troopers and saw the summer episodes

 

[JusticeWillBeServed]

From July:

Unearthing the truth: After 26 years, man who leapt from flagpole may finally get a name

http://www.anchoragepress.com/news/unearthing-truth

And so on a cold and windy September day, the man was buried in a simple wooden coffin covered in gray felt at Anchorage Memorial Park Cemetery, a man with no name and no history laid to rest among some of Alaska’s most storied leaders and pioneers. Besides the press and various officials, four strangers showed up, including two mental health consumer advocates, people who couldn’t bear the thought of a man with no name going to his grave with no one to mourn him.

The call was from a California woman who is certain the man lying in that grave is her brother. So certain, she’s having his body exhumed for DNA testing this month in hopes of giving him back his name, and his dignity, and finally bringing him home.

If Terry Mihok is right, the man who died that day in Mountain View is Gordon Bethel Lopez, a Reed College student who vanished from Portland, Oregon in 1986. On purpose.

“The sister contacted me and said, ‘I want to pay for this; let’s do it,’” he said, adding that the exhumation is going to cost her about $1,200 including mortician fees.

Trull arranged for the collection of Terry’s DNA for the second time, and, working with the Alaska State Medical Examiner’s Office, reapplied for the exhumation permits. This time, the exhumation seems to be a go.

“(Terry) is willing to pay even if it’s not her brother,” she said. “She’s willing to take that risk.

“And the reality of it is, if it’s not her brother, which I’m really hoping it is for her sake, but if it’s not, maybe the man’s family has put their DNA into a database and we can identify who this guy is.”

Once exhumed, the man’s femur and some teeth will be shipped to the federally funded forensics program at the University of North Texas, where his DNA will be compared to Terry’s, according to Stephen Hoage, operations manager and investigator with the medical examiner’s office.

It could take six months to a year for results to come in.

OR - Gordon Bethel Lopez, 21, Portland, 3 Jan 1986

 

[alreetlike]

If it is Gordon, Snuf had this solved in 2010 right in the OP.

 

[taramarie]

DNA and dentals have ruled out Gordon.

After the exhumation, the brother’s dental records were compared to those taken during the 1989 autopsy. They didn’t match. James Trull, the APD detective in charge of the flagpole case, broke the news to Mihok.

“It's so unlikely that all those circumstances are mere coincidences,” she wrote via email at the time. “I can imagine along the chain of custody his records may have been compromised. Also, the dentist we got those from, our family hadn't even seen in years, as far as I know. I hadn't seen him since I was a child, about 10 years old.

“I would rather it not be him, but I really feel like it is. But time will tell.”

Because DNA has the final say, the Medical Examiner’s Office shipped teeth and a femur via Fed Ex to the Center for Human Identification at the University of North Texas in Fort Worth. As a suicide rather than a more pressing homicide case, the results would take six months to a year.
They’ve finally come back. Confirmed. It’s not him.

http://www.anchoragepress.com/cover-news/doe-arrival

 

[carbuff]

Wow. That's a surprise.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[taramarie]

A huge surprise. I was 99% sure they were a match.