Identified! FL - Big Cypress Natl Preserve, Male Hiker, Denim & “Mostly Harmless” July 2018 - Vance Rodriguez #3

[branmuffin]

I'm working my way back through earlier threads to reacquaint myself with this case. It does boggle my mind that he remains unidentified.

I noticed early on someone found a person who commented on a blog about hiking who went by the avatar name Mostly Harmless. Did that find elicit any clues? The individual shows that he was located in Norway and had posted on the site since 2009. I would think it's not unusual for someone who was a fan of the Hitchhiker books to associate themselves with the name. Also, as @Gardener1850 stated earlier, our Doe gave his trail nickname as Denim and that Mostly Harmless was assigned to him by others so I don't know if the lead from the hiking blog was a dead end.

I know that Norwegians like many Scandinavians speak perfect and fluent English making it difficult to identify them as foreigners.

I checked out the book after someone mentioned 'Mostly Harmless' economics and the man who co-wrote the book looks like this! Does he have a brother?


There is definitely plenty of rabbit holes to go down with this one.

 

[Ursamajr]

I'm focused on Sp1, Sp2, Sp3... Antibodies? Proteins? Could this possibly be related to the health bars he wanted to develop?
This stuff is waaay above my brain capacity.

Journal of Lipid Research

 

[navywife]

I'm focused on Sp1, Sp2, Sp3... Antibodies? Proteins? Could this possibly be related to the health bars he wanted to develop?
This stuff is waaay above my brain capacity.

Journal of Lipid Research

I agree with you - looks intriguing. I also was wondering about an electricians calculation of some sort. ??? Will be right back to add info.


ETA: Wallace Tree
Something with binary code? But possibly electrical circuits as well. I’m not the most educated in either option.

 

[navywife]

I

Journal of Lipid Research

spent nearly an hour just now reading up on this link and more. I just had to say again - IMO - this is a good trail. Great info.

 

[watergirl62]

Network topology?

Attached figure is from this.
Facebook data centers receive billions of user requests each day, and that number is increasing as the company adds members and introduces new features. All good for Facebook in general, but a challenge for Facebook's networking crew. For instance, a data center topology that was sufficient five months ago is now inadequate.

 

[Ursamajr]

I

spent nearly an hour just now reading up on this link and more. I just had to say again - IMO - this is a good trail. Great info.

I wonder if his background was in biology/science. If he didn't have a phone on him he must have had some papers or previous knowledge about the subject. Other than the journal, I haven't seen any mention about a book in his possessions.

 

[mp_1989]

I wonder if his background was in biology/science. If he didn't have a phone on him he must have had some papers or previous knowledge about the subject. Other than the journal, I haven't seen any mention about a book in his possessions.

Previous knowledge, for sure. Not necessarily papers or books though - if this was his area of research and life's work, he may have all relevant pathways memorised. But at the same time, if he was a researcher I'd find it strange purely for the fact that there is a lot of wet lab work involved which he wouldn't have been able to do. Such a weird case. He really would need a laptop or something to get deep enough in to the data etc

 

[branmuffin]

Is there anyone who has Photoshop or some other kind of app that could give us some indication of what Mostly Harmless would look like without a beard. I think this image is probably the best one to use since it shows him with the least amount of face hair.

 

[carbuff]

His alias was BILEMY with an e, not BILAMY with an a (It was written in all caps, so the letters were clear). And the trail name "Mostly Harmless" was given to him by other hikers. He didn't choose it for himself. It's safe to say that is a rabbit hole you can abandon following. MOO.

Many software engineers are terrible spellers. Mr. Carbuff, for example. I spent most of my career writing software manuals and fixing developer spelling and grammar errors.

So I wouldn't rule out the theory based just on that.

I worked with a jillion languages from COBOL to Bliss-32 and Pascal to C## and Java (though mercifully escaped before Python) and it doesn't look like any language I remember seeing. It looks like some kind of notes about program flow (though it doesn't use any conventional flow notation I'm familiar with) and it maybe possibly might be about a game, but it could be almost anything. But using personal abbreviations and symbols for brainstorming wasn't unusual with the various developers I worked with.

 

[branmuffin]

I know there are several information sites we are not allowed to link to on WS but I have to say that during my quest to identify this man I've found numerous sites whose common focus is the same as ours: to give him back his name.

I've watched Youtube videos as well. I've picked up information based on the comments that haven't been discussed here, AFAIK. One, some commenters have talked about an illness he may have based on the knee braces he wore. The individuals who discovered his body in his tent mentioned how he looked like he was leaping toward them or frozen. That is a very strange position for a deceased individual to be in even taking in to account rigor which would have been long gone based on the time of death and ambient temperatures.

There are illnesses that encompass some of the physical issues that Mostly Harmless presented: weak knees, distended stomach, accelerated weight loss and based on anecdotal information, a frozen musculature. I'm wondering if MH had some form of adult onset Muscular Dystrophy.

Someone mentioned whether or not he was involved in some kind of gaming or computer games since he mentioned he was creating a hiking app.

 

[Blueberry2720]

Is there anyone who has Photoshop or some other kind of app that could give us some indication of what Mostly Harmless would look like without a beard. I think this image is probably the best one to use since it shows him with the least amount of face hair.

Several of us did this exact exercise with some apps probably a year or so ago. I will look for the thread and pics. He looked a lot younger without the beard, as I recall. We played around with this thinking someone might be able to recognize him from his younger years - a highschool classmate, a neighbor, even as far back as a babysitter.

 

[Blueberry2720]

It was Thread #2.
Try this link. It should dump you at my post with a no beard pic. A little further down, someone else tried their hand with another app. Interesting results!
You can download several free apps from Apple or Android stores and play with them. Some are even regression apps.

FL - FL - Big Cypress National Preserve, Male hiker, "Denim" and "Mostly Harmless", 23 July 2018 #2

 

[branmuffin]

Reading back on previous threads it was mentioned that MH printed his name on hostel records. My friend's son, who is 33, always prints since he never learned cursive in school. This is in Ontario. His signature is printed! I guess as far back as '94, Ontario removed cursive from their curriculum.

Only thing is that a lot of engineers and architects seem only to print as well. I know my handwriting looks great, but in reality, it's hard to decipher, so probably there are careers where printing is promoted for clarity.

 

[branmuffin]

Could the name Ben Bilemy be an anagram?

 

[branmuffin]

Thanks to all who provided links to images using Photoshop to remove his beard. He really is very young looking. It's hard to peg his age since the shot of him at the Overlook shows his hair is very gray at the back of his head. I've known people to go quite gray in their late 20s and early 30s so again, it's hard to judge.

I'd also like to know where that scar is on his abdomen. If he'd had an appendix or gall bladder removed it might help ID him. Here's the link to the website

Abdominal Surgical Incisions | Gridiron | Pfannenstiel | Geeky Medics

Edited to add: some of the surgical scars are no longer used or not as popular as others, so again, knowing the type of scar could help identify his age.

 

[Gardener1850]

Thanks to all who provided links to images using Photoshop to remove his beard. He really is very young looking. It's hard to peg his age since the shot of him at the Overlook shows his hair is very gray at the back of his head. I've known people to go quite gray in their late 20s and early 30s so again, it's hard to judge.

I'd also like to know where that scar is on his abdomen. If he'd had an appendix or gall bladder removed it might help ID him. Here's the link to the website

Abdominal Surgical Incisions | Gridiron | Pfannenstiel | Geeky Medics

Edited to add: some of the surgical scars are no longer used or not as popular as others, so again, knowing the type of scar could help identify his age.

Here's what NAMUS says on the scar:

"Possible indistinct fine linear scar across abdomen. Very faint."

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

Not very descriptive, but that doesn't sound like a gallbladder or appendix scar to me.
MOO.

 

[branmuffin]

Here's what NAMUS says on the scar:

"Possible indistinct fine linear scar across abdomen. Very faint."

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

Not very descriptive, but that doesn't sound like a gallbladder or appendix scar to me.
MOO.

Wow, I was just reading that description on Thread #2! The fact they say 'across' suggests its horizontal rather than vertical. It also says 'possible' which is kind of confusing. Couldn't a pathologist identify scar tissue?

 

[Laughing]

Here's what NAMUS says on the scar:

"Possible indistinct fine linear scar across abdomen. Very faint."

The National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs)

Not very descriptive, but that doesn't sound like a gallbladder or appendix scar to me.
MOO.

Well, how about pyloric stenosis? Repaired as a young infant, more common in boys AFAIK:

default - Stanford Children's Health

Agree that the person performing the autopsy should know, IMHO Florida is not telling.

 

[branmuffin]

Again, going through all the previous threads, I agree that there does appear to be a trend of LE not being enthusiastic in providing information on MH or even worse, accepting information from the general public. Perhaps they've been inundated with frivolous comparisons that have no correlation to the facts of the case, like submitting convicted felons who would have fingerprints on file.

However, without the trove of information from the hiking community LE would be stuck with a decedent without ANY backstory and we'd still be looking at the artist's rendition of the deceased. It does seem like they are waiting for that Eureka! moment where some individual provides them with data that can allow them to transfer the case to the solved category. Which makes me agree with others on here that there is a specific key to open a lock. So what could it be?

Could it be his notebook? Did he have a rare blood type? Did he suffer from HIV/AIDS and LE are checking the public health registry for such an individual? Was there something on his person that would provide a clue? Where is his back pack? No one mentions it.

The 'possible' scar across the abdomen? Could it be a hernia scar, or from removing a ruptured or damaged spleen? Without knowing where it is, it's a dead end. Is HM missing any vital organs or a rib, which can occur if a UID was a kidney donor. Does excellent teeth mean he had no evidence of dental work or that the dental work was exceptional? Are those strange rule outs because the missing comps have DNA and they aren't flaunting privacy laws by making comparisons?

 

[branmuffin]

About Travis Butler. Why is the picture so old? A lot of the images of missing persons appear to be from a driver's license. Can't LE provide a more recent picture of him?