Found Deceased JAPAN - Trevor Balint, 34, from Hubbard, Ohio, missing from Yokota Air Base, 1 Feb 2021

[Lusitana]

This is a really strange case. Did he really commit suicide or was it a freak accident?

 

[cmlegend99]

They look a bit grim! I'm wondering if life can feel a bit claustrophobic?

They are actually pretty spacious. We live in a town home on base now and the apartment seemed a little bigger.

 

[cmlegend99]

This is only true on the West side of base (Tower 3000-3005). In tower 4305 (East side) the storage units are individual rooms (not shared) and are surrounded by concrete, not chain link fence, so if one was unlocked you could go inside, lock the door and be undisturbed by anyone. Furthermore, you can lock the door from the inside, so if the SPs were doing a walkaround checking for unlocked doors they could pass right by without suspecting anyone was in there. Is this perfect? No, but I have a hard time faulting the cops during this unusual situation. No doubt the cops have updated their SOPs because of this case.

Personally I thought Trevor bailed on his wife and hooked-up with some Hoochie Mama off base - that's why he wiped his phone. Suicide in a storage room never crossed my mind.

Tragic.

Honestly, I thought that may have been a possibility too. But the more I thought about him with no ID, money or phone I thought of the worst scenario.

Japan can be pretty depressing for some. Japan is not 100% perfect like a lot of people think it is. Some people have culture shock when they move over. Most Japanese are polite and very respectful but I've had my fair share of ones who just really didnt want Americans around. A spouse finding a "good" job is nearly impossible. Usually they are minimum wage jobs on the base at fast food places, the BX, commissary or maybe at one of the american banks. We are not allowed legit employment at any off base facility. I have taught english at local schools a couple times for cash (Yen) payment. It is usually a one time thing. I can see how depression may set in. Just my honest thoughts.

 

[StrayCat]

A spouse finding a "good" job is nearly impossible. Usually they are minimum wage jobs on the base at fast food places, the BX, commissary or maybe at one of the american banks.

You're not wrong. Trevor had some exceptional skills - PhD and a computer wiz, so he could have pretty much done anything on base. DODDS is a great gig - he did the substitute teacher thing, but quit that back in November. I have the feeling he had set his trajectory at that point: quit work, sell car, check out.

 

[sahciepachie]

This is a really strange case. Did he really commit suicide or was it a freak accident?

Only doubting it’s a freak accident cause of the suspicious behavior before hand. Base commander assured everyone that his death didn’t pose any threat to the security of the base—kind of implying that he had hurt himself and not someone else.

 

[Lusitana]

Only doubting it’s a freak accident cause of the suspicious behavior before hand. Base commander assured everyone that his death didn’t pose any threat to the security of the base—kind of implying that he had hurt himself and not someone else.

Freak accident meaning he accidentally locked himself up.

 

[StrayCat]

Freak accident meaning he accidentally locked himself up.

This seems as unlikely to me as locking yourself in the bathroom and being unable to escape or call for help.

I'll bite, though. If he was completely trashed and decided to sleep it off in a stranger's storage room, even if he didn't turn on the light, when he woke up he could find the door by the light coming in around the door edges. The door locking mechanism is on the doorknob itself, so if you can find the door you can find the lock. The light switch is right next to the door.

Even if a PhD grad were somehow unable to find an illuminated door in a small room, there are literally eight different families that live on the floor just outside the door. Any one of them would easily be able to hear someone pounding on the door or yelling if they were in the hallway.

I don't buy it.

What I do buy, however, is a guy who is having problems with his marriage (sleeping in separate rooms) quitting his job, selling his car, wiping his phone, going and offing himself in a closet somewhere. That's what I buy.

I'm open to being wrong though, if someone provides a better explanation of the events.

 

[MimosaMornings]

Selling his car? I must have missed that.

 

[StrayCat]

Selling his car? I must have missed that.

This was widely discussed in the Find Trevor Balint FB search pages about him, which are now deleted/hidden/whatever FB does with them. I'm too new here, so I don't really know if this info is allowed, since it wasn't posts by the victim or his family. During the initial days of him going missing people saw his car driving around, and then the driver reported that she bought the car from him about two weeks before he disappeared.

I thought I saw it mentioned in these pages, too, but I'm scanning back and not seeing anything. I'll keep searching..

edit: Here it is referenced on this site on page 4 of this thread by @whitelilac :
"If you look at the Yokota Air Base FB page, there is a comment by LS, with a screenshot re: TB's advertisement.
May not have anything to do with his disappearance, unless he needed funds for something"

I don't know how to quote and link things yet.. sorry..

 

[ludakristen]

This was widely discussed in the Find Trevor Balint FB search pages about him, which are now deleted/hidden/whatever FB does with them. I'm too new here, so I don't really know if this info is allowed, since it wasn't posts by the victim or his family. During the initial days of him going missing people saw his car driving around, and then the driver reported that she bought the car from him about two weeks before he disappeared.

I thought I saw it mentioned in these pages, too, but I'm scanning back and not seeing anything. I'll keep searching..

edit: Here it is referenced on this site on page 4 of this thread by @whitelilac :
"If you look at the Yokota Air Base FB page, there is a comment by LS, with a screenshot re: TB's advertisement.
May not have anything to do with his disappearance, unless he needed funds for something"

I don't know how to quote and link things yet.. sorry..

This + quitting his job recently to me is evidence that he was planning for a time to commit suicide.

 

[MaxRx]

A person who is very intoxicated will sometimes do things that only make partial sense and a partner who is angry might not be as observant as she thought she was in hindsight. He might have come stumbling in after 1am and already have left his shoes and phone in addition to his jacket but she only noticed him missing the jacket when he went into the other bedroom.

I agree that actually resetting a phone would be an especially unusual thing to do but it's possible that bit of info is not 100% accurate. The phone may have just gotten damp and not wanted to boot up correctly which got confused by the time it was reported. On the other hand, plenty of phones can be reset without passcodes. I don't keep any of my devices locked. Someone could just pick one up and reset it if they were so inclined.

On the issue of the phone being reset ( and I had meant to post this much earlier )...

If the deceased’s phone was an iPhone, there is a setting where the phone will reset if the number of failed password attempts exceeds a certain number. The default , I think, is ten but can be set by the user to a lower threshold.

So, if this were the case, the phone may have been reset unintentionally two ways:

a. Given that the phone was found with his jacket, shoes, wallet , and a number of empty chu - hai cans ( abv b/t 9%-12% alcohol) on the porch of a vacant garden house / townhouse on base ... if one were appropriately drunk & disorientated, they could have done by screwing up the password on their phone. ( although you’d think the fingerprint ID function would work ).

b. After one of his possessions, wallet I think, on the porch had been found by another resident who then tried to reach BB, she found his phone. From the time TB left his personal effects on that porch to the time BB recovered them, anyone might have had a go at trying to open the phone. Even kids. And if a 10-attempt rule was in place, such an iPhone ends up ‘reset’ by the time his wife recovers it.

 

[T_Stanley24]

They found him hanging in the storage room. It was unoccupied space. They have chains in there that he used. Tower apartment ceilings are flat aka no way to hang yourself. Storage closets have the space. He has no shoes on, he was selling all of his *advertiser censored* including his car and other personal belongs. He quit his job before hand. It was a suicide, that’s it. No murder, no storage containers. Just unfortunate. Also people wondering how they didn’t find him, it’s people storage. SF wasn’t thinking prob to check that and if they even did, prob didn’t check hundreds of people individual storage closets. It was a smell complaint made by the 9th floor, which he didn’t live on. Occupants and still smell it now, with people having to relocate out of pocket. Also no, we don’t “adopt customs” lol. Most people try to learn some basic Japanese but they congregate at the Chili’s on base on a Friday as most people don’t like leaving base and being in a foreign country.

It’s sad for the family, they left Japan already. It’s not a mystery, just a sad case and highlights importance of mental health and paying attention to the signs. May his family move forward and we wish them the best.

 

[Skigh]

They found him hanging in the storage room. It was unoccupied space. They have chains in there that he used. Tower apartment ceilings are flat aka no way to hang yourself. Storage closets have the space. He has no shoes on, he was selling all of his **** including his car and other personal belongs. He quit his job before hand. It was a suicide, that’s it. No murder, no storage containers. Just unfortunate. Also people wondering how they didn’t find him, it’s people storage. SF wasn’t thinking prob to check that and if they even did, prob didn’t check hundreds of people individual storage closets. It was a smell complaint made by the 9th floor, which he didn’t live on. Occupants and still smell it now, with people having to relocate out of pocket. Also no, we don’t “adopt customs” lol. Most people try to learn some basic Japanese but they congregate at the Chili’s on base on a Friday as most people don’t like leaving base and being in a foreign country.

It’s sad for the family, they left Japan already. It’s not a mystery, just a sad case and highlights importance of mental health and paying attention to the signs. May his family move forward and we wish them the best.

Thank you very much for the update so we all have closure about what happened. A very sad ending . May he rest in peace.Poor man,he must have been in despair for a while,silently suffering.

My thoughts go out to his family and friends.

 

[PommyMommy]

JUN 6, 2022

Hubbard man’s death at Japan base ruled suicide

The death of a Hubbard man whose body was found in February 2021 at an apartment complex at the Yokota Air Base in Japan has been ruled a suicide. The ruling into the mode and method of death of Trevor Balint, 34, of Hubbard, was completed shortly after his body was found by both Japanese […]

www.vindy.com

[...]

According to the summary of the case provided by the U.S. government after this newspaper filed a Freedom of Information Act request for documents related to the investigation, a search of a storage closet in the apartment complex revealed Balint’s body was hanging from a water pipe with black and green rope around his neck. An empty bottle of rum, newspaper clippings and a chair were found in the storage unit, the report states.

[...]

Reviews of Balint’s receipts revealed that on Jan. 31, he had purchased a one-liter bottle of rum and one 375 ml bottle of gin in the morning. He also purchased four other 500 ml-sized alcoholic beverages from a 711 store.

Past health records showed Balint had attempted suicide in the past — in 2010 by drowning, by sleeping pills in 2016, by attempting to jump from a bridge in 2016, and when he attempted to jump from a sixth-floor window in 2018.

In 2017, Balint wrote an email that spoke about suicide and how he didn’t fit in with the world.

[...]

 

[MissUnderstood]

The above article has his missing date as Feb 1st, and approx TOD as Feb 8, noting it could be out by two days. So where was he all those days between missing and TOD?