The "Roswell Slides" Movie

The poster basically says all that there needs to be said. Courtesy of the talented Jeff Ritzmann.

Paul Kimball

Don Schmitt Apologizes

Don Schmitt has apologized for the Roswell slides fiasco.

Is he sincere? Who knows? If he is then he will withdraw from the public part of ufology - no more books, no movies, no more lectures. Responsibility entails consequences.

Based on his past record, I doubt we'll see that from him. Britney probably sums up the whole lot of them. But maybe Schmitt will surprise me this time and do the honourable thing all the way through.

If so, good for him and happy trails on the rest of his journey. If not... well, that's why we all have blogs.

Paul Kimball

How to Make the Roswell Slides Fiasco Right

Apologies from the promoters of the Roswell Slides fiasco in Mexico City, even if they are forthcoming, are not enough. It's easy to say you're sorry while you still hold the cash. The way to make it right, or at least as right as it can be, is as simple as it was for the Roswell Slides Research Group to solve the "mystery" - the promoters must immediately offer a full refund on each and every ticket sold to the May 5th event. Those who were only participants in the event or the build-up to it, like Anthony Bragalia and Richard Dolan, can begin to restore some of their reputation by publicly calling on the prime organizers of the event to take this step.

Anything less is just as worthless and hollow as the event itself.

Paul Kimball

The Roswell Slides... Game, Set, and Match

Deblurred image of original slide - not photoshopped other than an increase in contrast.

Curt Collins breaks it down here with clear proof that the figure in the Roswell slides is a mummy. A more recent, updated analysis is available here.

Tom Carey, Don Schmitt, Anthony Bragalia, Richard Dolan, Adam Dew, Jaime Maussan... all completely discredited.

This is the end of the story, and should be the end of their careers.

Paul Kimball

The Roswell Slides, Part D'uh

Told you so.

Paul Kimball

The Roswell Slides

Told you so.

Paul Kimball

Stan Friedman says "No" to involvement in Roswell slides May 5th circus

Chris Rutkowski posted in our sub rosa Facebook group looking into the "Roswell slides" that he had heard from the dean of pro-ET Roswell researchers Stan Friedman that Stan had been asked to appear at the May 5th event in Mexico City being staged by the slides promoters, and that Stan had declined. I contacted Stan yesterday and asked him to confirm this, and he did. "I can't find a connection between the slides and aliens at Roswell," he replied.

I followed up with Stan and asked him three specific questions on the record:

1. Who invited him to attend;

2. Was he going to be paid; and

3. Did he see the slides, or were they expecting him to participate without first having seen them.

His reply:

I was interviewed separately by Dew and Maussan at the 24th Annual International UFO Congress in Scottsdale Arizona Feb.18-22.and Maussan who has interviewed me before, broached the possibility of my attending the May 5 event with all expenses paid.No other remuneration was offered. I was on my way to San Diego to give a lecture at the Association of Electronics Industries on Feb. 25. On return here I received an email from Don Schmitt urging me to attend and then a note from Jaime.I saw some poor screen images, but did not handle or examine the slides. Several people I respect strongly urged me not to attend. After I told them (S and M) I had decided not to go, I received a brief note expressing regrets from Tom Carey. My original thinking was that I was certainly going to be asked about the slides afterward so that getting first hand information would allow me tO express an "enlightened" evaluation.

Anyway, good for Stan. He and I may disagree about Roswell in general, but when it comes to the "slides" we are in accord. 

Paul Kimball

All Of This Has Happened Before...

This Pittsburgh newspaper article about Roswell comes from 1997. You might recognize the names - they haven't really changed in decades (with the exception of poor Karl Pflock, who passed away several years ago from ALS).

The article can be viewed here as well.

As the saying went in the remake of Battlestar Galactica: All of this has happened before.

Paul Kimball

The Roswell "Dream Team" and the "Slides"

From my friend Jose Antonio Caravaca, who is part of the group of skeptical researchers looking into the Roswell slides. It sums things up nicely. From left to right, Bragalia, Randle, Carey and Schmitt.

Paul Kimball

Latest Trailer for the Dream Team!

Breaking news - I was just sent a super-duper advance look at the next trailer for the Dream Team's My 5th "Roswell Slides" release in Mexico City. What make this interesting is that all of the members are in it.

Enjoy!

Paul Kimball 

"Hacking" the Roswell Slides

My good friend Nick Redfern has a new column written at Mysterious Universe wherein he discusses the alleged hacking episode of the broader Roswell slides story. Nick maintains that it's "impossible" that a Dream Teamers would be involved in the hacking, largely because, he says, they wouldn't hack their own e-mail and then call law enforcement. And yet, I know people who have done exactly that, from first-hand experience.

When I was stationed with the RCMP in northern Cape Breton years ago, we were called to investigate a crime - property destruction - where the owner wanted us to believe that his neighbour had done it. Indeed, many of the indications pointed to the neighbour, with whom the complainant had a long-running feud. The only problem was that unbeknownst to the complainant, the neighbour had an air-tight alibi for the night in question... at which point we started to smell something fishy. Eventually, the complainant admitted he had done it himself to try and get his arch-enemy in trouble.

Stupid? Perhaps. But it happens, particularly when one has a motive and potential reward that they judge outweighs any risk. It's a question of a cost-benefit analysis.

Which brings us back to the "hacking" case with the slides. Nick rightly dismisses the idea of government involvement. Unless you're the truest of true believers, then I'm sure you do as well. His prime suspect is some other UFO researcher. But that strikes me as unlikely. There's no motive, other than the possibility of finding the slides and then... what? Posting them? As soon as that happened, he would identify himself as the hacker, or if someone else did it for him it would be traced back pretty quickly. That would be truly stupid given that the payoff would be so penny ante.

No, the people with motive and opportunity would have been the Dream Teamers, because something like having your e-mail hacked is gold if you're trying to build a con based on a conspiracy narrative, which is what the slides story is really all about at its core. The payoff is potentially huge (that 10,000 seat arena in Mexico City just being the lucrative start). Given that, then someone on the Dream Team - and let's recall that Donald Schmitt has a proven record of underhanded activities, and now they have linked up with one of the most disreputable hucksters out there, Jaime Maussan - could easily have judged it worth any risk.

A report to the FBI might have been an unintended consequence, or maybe it was all part of the plan, to add a little extra juice. Because here's the real truth - unless the hacking involved terrorism or corporate espionage, the FBI was highly unlikely to do anything other than a quick pro forma "investigation" and then move on to more important things... particularly when they realized it was UFO nuts (in their eyes) making the complaint. And that seems to be exactly what happened, at least to me. When I conduct a cost-benefit analysis, the risks are just as low for Dream Teamers as any ufologist (and probably lower), while the rewards are the highest.

My friend Nick? An unwitting part of it all, who is giving the "hackers" even more of what I have no doubt they were after all the time. - publicity. They are no doubt sitting back and saying, "mission accomplished" as they plan their trip to Mexico City.

Paul Kimball

Death of a Dream... by self-inflicted wounds

Kevin Randle offers his take on the recent "Dream Team" imbroglio in a blog post that proves to me at least that he is as slippery as an eel and has the ethical compass of a kumquat. This is the opinion I have formed based on my own interactions with him, and his public statements and actions in contrast to his private ones. Others may well come to a different conclusion (it's a free country, after all), but in my opinion I was mistaken to ever trust him, or to believe that he was genuinely interested in the truth about Roswell. Mea culpa.

And I will remind people reading this who go to read Randle's non-mea culpa, where he bemoans my bringing up Don Schmitt's proven record of lying about a wide range of things in the past, that in the already published e-mail to me Randle wrote:

My dilemma, then, is how to tell Tom that I'm now out. I hung in there with the unilateral decision to invite in Schmitt, even given his history of lying (which, BTW, continues in some arenas, and Schmitt's grab for the spotlight to the exclusion of all others).

And yet here we have Randle in his "Death of a Dream" post chastising me for focusing on poor Don Schmitt when in fact he was doing the same thing in his e-mails to me. Sadly, he is more worried about hurting the feelings of a man he says is still lying to him than he is about calling a spade a spade and advancing the truth. As Lance Moody wrote in a comment at the UFO Iconoclasts blog:

The latest revelations show that Kevin made the following decision about Don Schmitt: 

1. I know you were a liar. 

2. I still think you are a liar because you are lying still. 

3. You'll do fine for our Roswell Dream Team as we search for the truth.

Precisely so.

Of course, the real issue goes far beyond just Schmitt. It involves the credibility of the entire "Dream Team" investigation, and in particular the now notorious slides that are allegedly from 1947 and show alien bodies (if you believe Anothony Bragalia). Randle claims to have been out of the loop on it all, despite appearances to the contrary based on the e-mails he sent me. Indeed, at the start of his non-mea culpa, Randle writes:

I freely admit that it appears from those emails that I was involved but the reality is that I wasn’t even completely in the loop. 

Well, judge for yourself just how much Randle knew, and whether or not he was "out of the loop" (and recall that in his previously published e-mail he stated that he had made his own inquiries, which to any reasonable person must mean he conducted an "investigation"). This is the text of the second e-mail he sent me, on September 6:

I got to looking at the documentation that had been given to me, and I asked how they had determined that the slides had been exposed in 1947. Was it chemical analysis? Was it some sort of measurement? How did they know?

I got back an email that explained some things that would happen to authenticate the slides which confused me so I asked additional questions. The testing HAS NOT been done. The document sent to me was a "proposed way to issue the statement." The date was based on the codes on the film, which I had said to anyone who would listen meant nothing because anyone familiar with the Alien Autopsy would know the codes. So, they hadn't determined with the slides had been exposed other than the film had been manufactured in 1947 or 1927 or 1967.  

Now the kicker. The man who owns the slides today has approached Kodak to make the tests, but we all know how that went with the Alien Autopsy. The experts can supposedly tell when the slides were exposed (though I wouldn't put much faith in that) and based on the chemical analysis should be able to pin down the date of manufacture rather than have a forty year window and should be able to tell something about when the slides were processed, again based on the chemical analysis. I mention this not as an alibi but so you know (as I know) that it might be possible to determine some of these things. 

The problems... well, as you note, as do I, there is NO chain of custody. I'm told that they believe they know who took the pictures originally, but he's dead, as is his wife and just about everyone who ever knew him... and that is a guess as to him having taken them. He could have been given them by something else. There is no way to know this. 

Oh, yes, I almost forgot... there is no indication where the pictures were taken. It was a morgue of some kind but when and where doesn't seem to be in the cards. There are a couple of signs in the pictures, but they are angled and impossible to read... another clue you say? Of course. (Clue to a hoax, if I have to clarify). 

I suspect the reason this has been bouncing around for more than two years is because it is a hoax of some kind. If the slides were authentic, I suspect we'd have a better chain of custody and I suspect the guy who had them would have approached someone with the ability to authenticate them and find him some big dough for them because, if authentic, how much would they be worth? Authentic slides of alien creatures... can you say "Millions."

So, yes, I'm thoroughly disgusted. I believe, at this point, the investigation is dead because it is not going anywhere and is badly tainted by the nun's diary story (thanks to Don Schmitt who has told me for two years that he knew where the diaries were but we haven't advanced on that front and I learned the original source who claimed to be a Special Forces officer was neither Special Forces not an officer). While the Ramey memo might provide some interesting results, I really hold no hope for that either.  

I believe, at this point, it is time to strike the flag and move onto other things... sad to say.

This was what I knew when I read Randle's statement to the Examiner that he had never seen the slides (true) and had not participated in their investigation (untrue). Now he tries to go even further and claim that he was "out of the loop." I didn't sandbag Randle - I only released the information when I realized he was not going to be truthful about either his knowledge of the slides nor his role in their investigation, and he was not going to honour his commitment to me that he would withdraw from the "Dream Team" as I had implored him to do in order to salvage his reputation.

No matter how much Randle tries to shift the issues in a classic public relations spin, the self-proclaimed "Dream Team" has imploded not because of malfeasance or betrayal by me or Rich Reynolds or Nick Redfern or anyone else who merely told the truth, but because of self-inflicted wounds motivated by a combination of greed, ego, and believerism. People will have to judge for themselves what to make of Kevin Randle based on this entire episode, but for me the answer is clear. We already knew that you couldn't trust Donald Schmitt; sadly, in my opinion the same now applies to Kevin Randle as well.

Paul Kimball

Res Judicata

All that I can say is: "Res judicata". 

If I knew what the Latin phrase is for "The Mind Boggles" then I would use that as well.

Paul Kimball

The Intellectual Dishonesty of Saucerologists Continues To This Day

Apropos of my post earlier today about the Twining letter and the way Saucerologists selectively quote from it in order to make it seem as if the letter is proof positive of the presence of alien spacecraft here on Earth and the government's knowledge of that "fact", here is a recent lecture given by ace dream team member Donald Schmitt where, like a cult leader, he repeats the same selective (and false) quoting as if it were poisoned Kool Aid.

The part you want to watch runs from 28:16 to about 30:30.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

Paul Kimball

The Roswell Dream Team, Donald Schmitt, and the Broken Ethical Compass of Ufology

The ethical dilemma that has been revealed about the Roswell "Dream Team" in recent days should come as no surprise given the participation of Donald Schmitt, a person who should have remained a pariah in UFO research given the proven lies he told in the 1990s, lies that related to far more than just his background, despite what many many people would have you believe today (such as the Paracast hosts who had him on their show last week and gave him a complete pass on his past, although to be fair they just happen to be the most recent example of a long list of people who have given Schmitt a pass).

It's amazing how quickly people involved in UFO "research" forget and forgive transgressions that would sink a career in any self-respecting field of research. Schmitt has been back on the lecture and radio circuit for years, and has published several books with his current research partner Tom Carey... and when the "Dream Team" was formed he re-united with his original partner, Kevin Randle. 

I'm not going to revisit the long and sordid Schmitt story in its entirety here - that's what Google searches are for. But here's Kevin Randle's summary of Schmitt in an open letter published in 1995 that summarizes it succinctly:

He (Schmitt) will lie about anything. He will lie to anyone… He has revealed himself as a pathological liar… I will have nothing more to do with him.

The fact that any of the Dream Teamers, and particularly Kevin, were willing to partner with Schmitt years later should tell you all you need to know the direction in which their ethical compass is pointing.

Donald Schmitt

In an e-mail published in May, 2002, Kevin laid all of the problems associated with Schmitt and his ilk (which has since grown to include figures like Phil Imbrogno) when he wrote to Bill Hamilton and chastised him for attending a lecture given by Schmitt:

"I find myself a little puzzled here. I have waited for some sort of response to this suggestion that Don Schmitt has lied about his background, education, occupation, parts of his Roswell investigation and the like, yet no one seems willing to challenge Bruce [Hutchinson] on these points. It seems to me that we are in agreement about this. Bill, I don't mean to single you out, but when you attended the lecture, were you aware of the baggage that Schmitt brought to it? If not, then what is your reaction now, to the information he presented? Do you find it to be credible? I am interested in why anyone would listen to a thing he has to say, given what we know about him."

He continued:

Don Schmitt, while we were still working together, told a number of people not to talk to me because he suspected that I was a government agent planted on him. Here was my friend telling people I was a spy and not to be trusted. Since I'm not a government agent nor was I planted on him, would this then be character assassination?

And yet here we are in 2013, with Kevin and the others working with Schmitt, who is at the center of the "slides" story. The "Dream Team" was doomed to abject failure as soon as Schmitt was included on the team, just as Radio and TV shows and publishers diminished their credibility the minute they decided to do business with Schmitt. The "UFO research field" remains a joke a decade after Kevin wrote that e-mail in 2002 precisely because many within it have failed to heed Kevin's good advice - including, sadly, Kevin himself. 

If only Kevin had remembered the advice he correctly dished out to others in 2002.

How can we expect the scientific and journalistic communities to listen to us when some of those on the lecture circuit not only aren't telling the truth, they have admitted they weren't telling the truth, and turn up time and again selling their new and improved stories... Until we clean our own house, no one is going to listen to us. We're going to remain the lunatic conspiracy fringe whose positive evidence gets buried under the rubble of those who lie to us... and we're all so dumb that we'll just sign up for more we lies... So, that's where we are. We do not intelligently debate, we embrace those who lie to us, and we will not tolerate dissent... So, people, just why are we listening to Don Schmitt? I'd like to know the reason for it.

"Just why are we listening to Don Schmitt?" This is the real question that Don Ecker should ask when he interviews Kevin on Dark Matters Radio on Tuesday, October 1st. I hope he starts by reading Kevin's own words from a decade ago back to him, after which the only things that Kevin can say which would make any difference, and help him reclaim his credibility, are "mea culpa" and "I'm sorry".

Paul Kimball

The Roswell "Dream Team" Nightmare

On August 28th, I received an unsolicited e-mail from my friend Kevin Randle, in response to a note I had sent him thanking him for appearing on my podcast and offering my condolences on the death of Jesse Marcel, Jr. I am publishing it here in full, with no additions or alterations of any kind. I do so with great regret, because I value confidence highly and I had agreed after receiving it to keep this communication between Kevin and I private, even though I had not asked to receive the information and was therefore under no obligation to do so. But now, when to keep that confidence requires me to stand by and say nothing about subsequent statements that I know to be untrue, then the ethical balance as I see it has shifted, and I have a duty to set the record straight, even on a matter as inconsequential to me in the grand scheme of things as the Roswell Incident.

There has been, for several months now, speculation at the UFO Iconoclasts blog about rumoured "new evidence" that could break the Roswell case wide open. Some of the statements have come from Rich Reynolds, the man who runs the blog - others have come from various commenters at the blog, including Anthony Bragalia, one of the members of the self-proclaimed "Dream Team" that came together ostensibly to examine the Roswell case with a fresh outlook. That "team" also includes Kevin, his former research partner Donald Schmitt, Schmitt's current partner Tom Carey, longtime Roswell-as-ET proponent David Rudiak, and Canadian UFO researcher Chris Rutkowski, whom I had recommended to Kevin for the spot as "team skeptic" when I turned down his invitation to join. For the full history of all this, I recommend readers go to the UFO Iconoclasts blog and look through the archives. 

Things reached a head this week when Mr. Reynolds published an article titled "The Rumored 'New Roswell Evidence' by Anonymous", the central claim of which centered on the question of whether or not the "new evidence" which is the focus of the investigation by members of the "Dream Team" was photographic slides purportedly from 1947 showing alien bodies (there were other peripheral claims made, but those are beside the point). Previously, Mr. Reynolds had published claims that the slides existed but were subject to a non-disclosure agreement, among other things.

Mr. Bragalia responded at the UFO Iconoclasts blog as follows: 

Folks... bogus information from Richard Reynolds... and from anonymous. He is threading a tale to create whole cloth... but there are too many holes in Mr. Reynolds tale.

I knew this to be false, at least with respect to the central point of the existence of the slides and the Dream Team's interest in them, because of what I had been told by Kevin in the e-mail of August 28th. I asked Mr. Bragalia a simple question - was the central claim by Anonymous about the slides true? As I wrote in a comment at the UFO Iconoclasts blog:

How about Mr. Bragalia answer one simple question then that goes to the heart of the matter - are there slides, or not, that the "Dream Team" have access to and which purport to be from the Roswell "crash" in 1947? 

If the answer is "yes" then the story as reported by Rich is, in it's most fundamental aspect, correct. If not, then Mr. Bragalia should say so, clearly and unambiguously, and in a public venue. 

This is one of those "come to Jesus" moments where people have to make a choice. Admittedly, it's penny ante stuff in the grand scheme of things, so it's more like a "come to Jebus" moment, but still... within the context of the world in which Mr. Bragalia and the Dream Teamers live, it's the moment of truth. Is the basic story true... or not? Is Anonymous a liar (and Rich one too by implication), or is his / her account accurate in its core claim? 

Mr. Bragalia's response? "Paul Kimball you must be kidding. I owe you nothing. Come to Jesus? How about go to hell?" 

And that is where it would have ended for me, if not for comments that Kevin made to columnist Jack Brewer yesterday. 

"I have seen no photographs, slides, or pictures of alien creatures associated with the Roswell crash," Randle explained. "I have participated in no investigations of such slides."

That was the straw that shifted the balance for me, because the truth, as readers will see from the text of the e-mail below, is markedly different. There are slides. There is a non-disclosure agreement (which has clearly been breached, because the information made its way to me via a "Dream Team" member), and Kevin has investigated the claims of the slides.

In follow-up e-mails after August 28th I pleaded with Kevin to release this information himself, or at the very least disassociate himself from the "Dream Team" for reasons that should be clear from reading his e-mail (especially as they relate to Schmitt). He told me he was going to do so, and then several weeks later sent a note apologizing for "dilly-dallying". Last night he sent me a note saying that he could not do so now that Mr. Reynolds had published what is clearly substantially correct information, and because I had commented on it at the UFO Iconoclasts blog. "Now is no longer the proper moment to bail. If Reynolds had waited a week or two, I would have been long gone." I am afraid that given how the past month has unfolded, I simply do not believe that, but the point is moot.

My response? The proper time to bail was the end of August at the latest, given what the e-mail published below exposes - skulduggery, mistrust, half truths and complete untruths, profiteering, true believerism... all the things that undermine real research, a point Kevin made to me twelve years ago when I first met him.

Whether people believe it or not, it pains me greatly to publish this, because Kevin is one of the very few UFO researchers for whom I still had any respect. At his core, I still believe him to be a decent and honourable man. But it is clear to me now that he cannot be objective when it comes to Roswell, and that has led him to participate in the evasions, half-truths and untruths, and behind-the-scenes skulduggery that is the bread and butter of the Ufology circus, and Roswell in particular, but which has no place in a true, honest, open and objective search for the truth. 

I didn't ask to be dragged into all of this, and I won't be a party to it further for any reason. It offends me on many levels. 

The truth abhors a vacuum. It is time for someone to fill in the void with the real story, and let the chips fall where they may. 

Paul Kimball

From Kevin Randle to Paul Kimball, August 28th, 11:11 pm.

Good Evening, Paul –

Okay, here’s the deal, again just between you and me, and because Carey’s book has really screwed the pooch on this one. He had told me that it was about Wright Field and Wright Patterson Air Force Base. It was about what was there and I had no idea that he was going to delve as deeply in the Roswell pool as he did. 

Two years ago we had a meeting (and a few others since then) about doing the ultimate Roswell book. I told him, and Schmitt after Tom invited him aboard, that for this to work, we’d need to come up with something new and exciting. I said that we could review the data as presented, weed out the crap, and present the case as dispassionately as possible, but we needed something beyond the witness testimony and the few documents held. This had to be heavily and properly footnoted with all sources revealed for the “peer” review to follow. (I put peer in quotes simply because I figured that some of the peer review wouldn’t actually fit the definition, but that everyone had to be able to evaluate the sources.) 

They agreed with that but said nothing to me at the time. Now, here’s where it gets good. They knew, at that time, of a source who approached them and who claimed he had photographic evidence. Two color slides of the alien bodies, taken by a reputable geologist. The Kodak coding on the slides was proper for 1947 and there were plans underway to have the photographs properly analyzed. 

To get that information, both had to sign a “nondisclosure” agreement and both foolishly did. The investigation took off from there. I don’t know if you’ve seen The Newsroom on HBO but they talked of a Red Team to evaluate the data that the White Team was getting. Although I was excluded, and I think of my role as the Red Team, I don’t believe that was actually their thinking. They’d signed the damned agreement and they were stuck with it. 

What they didn’t count on was that the source would be down in Midland, Texas, talking to the geologist buddies of the man who took the photographs, and the story got out from there. I’m not sure what the purpose of the Midland trip was, but all it did was put the information out for others to find, including Nick Redfern. I’ve talked to Nick about this. 

Here’s where the train slips off the rails. I have learned that the man with the photographs is not the man who took them. The man with them got them from his sister who was cleaning out an attic in Sedona, Arizona but the sister was helping her boyfriend in the cleaning who worked for an estate service. (Convoluted enough for you?) The slides were found in a box in a separate envelop taped to an inner box lid, away from other slides. The box apparently belonged to the second wife of the photographer… the other slides in the box contained pictures from that “era” including one of Eisenhower (which is obviously five years too late). 

Neither Schmitt nor Carey told me the photographer’s name or the name of the man who allegedly took the pictures (though given the chain of custody, I’m not sure who might have taken the pictures but I had a name of the man who died decades ago and I know the name of the man who allegedly took them), but I have been able to learn all that, and found a telephone number of the man who lives in Chicago. 

I’m sure that I don’t have to tell you the problem with these slides… oh, and the man who has them now and who has approached a number of media outlets attempting to sell them, is a graphic artist. And the date code on the slides is correct for 1947. Well, Kodak recycled the codes so the date could have been 1927, 1947 or 1967. No real help there. 

I have been reluctant to say anything about this because, in the very off chance that the photographs are authentic, if I revel what I know, the owner will blame Schmitt and Carey for telling me, even though I learned everything through other sources. I haven’t wanted to screw up their chances of getting the pictures, but I really don’t believe the photos to be real. 

This is the alien autopsy without the motion, without the photographer, or without a chain of custody. Say what you will about Santilli, but at least he claimed to have talked to the photographer. Carey and Schmitt aren’t even sure who that might have been. Someone other than the geologist might have taken them and given them to the man who taped them in the box. 

While this little conspiracy of silence has annoyed me, I understood the necessity for it. If the photos were real, premature release could jeopardize the investigation and if they were fakes, then Roswell had just taken an unnecessary hit. If the investigation revealed them to be fake we could make that announcement without having to retract anything about their authenticity. 

So, you say, what changed? Carey and Schmitt’s book… which, when I saw the nature of it, revealed more about the Roswell case. They simply couldn’t talk about what went on at Wright Field; they had to get deeply into Roswell as well. It looks as if we’re putting out the information piecemeal, put I had nothing to do with that. 

My dilemma, then, is how to tell Tom that I’m now out. I hung in there with the unilateral decision to invite in Schmitt, even given his history of lying (which, BTW, continues in some arenas, and Schmitt’s grab for the spotlight to the exclusion of all others). But this latest book seems to sink our effort before we even get to the end point. 

No, I do not believe the story which is the main reason for not mentioning it. Why get everyone all excited about something that is going to blow up… and I suspect Rich Reynolds, knows it and is hoping to catch me in this web. 

I think that brings you up to date, other than to say that, again, between you and me, I have enough income from pensions that I could never sell another word and live quite comfortably. I write what pleases me now rather than what might be more commercially successful. 

I don’t know if this fully explains the situation, but if you have questions, feel free to ask. I tell all this privately, but will maintain publicly the attitude I have shown up to now. I see no reason to reveal this even though there are some who believe they have a right to everything we had found. 

Of course any comments you care to make would be greatly appreciated. I just can’t wrap my head around the chain of custody.

Kevin

Note: An addendum, at 11:20 pm Thursday, September 25th.

Kevin has commented at the UFO Iconoclasts blog as follows:

Now that the betrayal is out in full, let me say that there was nothing in my statement that wasn't the truth. Whatever Paul might believe, or think he's proved, I have never seen the slides, and I have not participated in the investigation of them.  

Because it was not my investigation, I believed it was up to those others to publish what they had when they were satisfied that it was authentic. I simply had no role in it. I am astonished that Paul would violate my trust by publishing an email that was clearly meant to be held between Paul and me... and then I'm accused of duplicity.

My reply:

Kevin wrote: "I have not participated in the investigation of them. 

From Kevin's e-mail to me: 

"I have learned that the man with the photographs is not the man who took them. The man with them got them from his sister who was cleaning out an attic in Sedona, Arizona but the sister was helping her boyfriend in the cleaning who worked for an estate service. (Convoluted enough for you?) The slides were found in a box in a separate envelop taped to an inner box lid, away from other slides. The box apparently belonged to the second wife of the photographer… the other slides in the box contained pictures from that “era” including one of Eisenhower (which is obviously five years too late).  

Neither Schmitt nor Carey told me the photographer’s name or the name of the man who allegedly took the pictures (though given the chain of custody, I’m not sure who might have taken the pictures but I had a name of the man who died decades ago and I know the name of the man who allegedly took them), but I have been able to learn all that, and found a telephone number of the man who lives in Chicago." 

Kevin may want to try and split ethical and moral hairs, but the claim that he has "not participated in the investigation of them" is clearly false, because he conducted his own investigation, and reached conclusions from it.

And yet Kevin thinks I'm the bad guy here. Given what can be seen in that e-mail (and others that I will not publish but which followed this one), it sadly comes as no surprise to me that Kevin is trying the one tactic left to him, the last refuge of the PR scoundrel - blame the messenger, and try to shift the story.

To which I will add a final note. Kevin's comments to Brewer shaded the truth to a degree where the grey and the black are indistinguishable, and the white is long gone. I was appalled. I was also terribly disappointed that despite obviously knowing what the right course was, he refused to take it (despite saying he would), and continued his association with a known liar who once accused him of being a government agent, and whom he acknowledged is still lying (Kevin's words, not mine). But that alone wouldn't have led me to publish - his comments to Brewer did, because they were public and they were not fully truthful.

I regret it's come to this, but I never asked him to send me that information, and I'm not the bad guy here. I realized when I published it that this would almost certainly cause an irreparable breach between Kevin and myself, not because he would never forgive me (anyone who forgave Schmitt clearly has a high degree of forbearance), but because I'll never be able to trust or respect him again. I honestly wish it were otherwise. As I said, I'm terribly disappointed in him.

And there it rests, for each to judge on their own.

Walter Haut and alien bodies at Roswell

Much ado is being made within ufology these days about statements made by the late Walter Haut, the young lieutenant at Roswell in 1947 responsible for releasing the "we recovered a flying saucer" press release, to the effect that he saw alien bodies. He made these claims in an interview with Wendy Connors and Dennis Balthasar in 2000, and again, in much more detail apparently, in an affidavit he signed for Donald Schmitt and Tom Carey in 2002.

My take?

It's much ado about nothing.

Let's all recall that Haut vouched for Frank Kaufmann, who was shown to be a fraud, and Glenn Dennis, who similarly has been exposed. This stuff about alien bodies, long after there was any reason for him to keep it secret, reads as bogus to me. Indeed, I interviewed Haut and Dennis in 2001 - they sat right next to each other, and Dennis told his story about dead bodies etc., and Haut said not a word about it. Don't tell me it was his "oath" either - he had already talked plenty about Roswell, and broken his oath if he had given such a thing.

It is my considered opinion, which will no doubt make me unpopular in certain quarters again, that there are three possible explanations for this "revelation":

1. Haut may have been manipulated, either intentionally or unintentionally, by unscrupulous or careless and untrained researchers for their own ends.

2. Haut may have told a purposeful tall tale in order to give new life to the Roswell story, which his family still has a financial stake in. A note here - when I interviewed Haut and Dennis in 2001, they both asked for money, even though I was doing a film about their old friend, Stan Friedman. It was only when Stan intervened personally that they dropped their request. They are the only witnesses to any UFO case that I have ever talked to who ever asked to be paid for an interview, and in my case I was talking to them more about Stan and his career than the Roswell incident itself. Charles Halt, Bruce Bailey, and Robert Salas, all veterans, made no such request for the recent Best Evidence film, for example.

3. Haut was simply an old man who had heard so many stories like Dennis' that he came to believe them himself.

The latter is the most charitable explanation I can come up with.

The fact that he insisted that none of this be released until after his death should be a red flag as well - it neatly inculcated Haut from having to answer the tough questions about what he said. As a piece of evidence, this kind of statement is practically worthless regardless of who made it, or the circumstances under which it was made, because the person who made it cannot be cross-examined / questioned by independent researchers.

A final note - if the affidavit was given in 2002, and Haut died in 2005, why is it only now making the rounds within ufology? If true, it is indeed an earth-shattering revelation, and yet it was neatly tucked away for well over a year, until (a) Schmitt and Carey had a book to sell (apparently they had to obtain permission from the Haut family to publish it, but why did it take so long), and (b) Roswell had a 60th anniversary to celebrate.

Consider those further red flags. Big ones. Because if aliens on earth really is the biggest story of the millenium, as Stan Friedman is wont to say, then these people deliberately withheld critical information from the public, for motives that could only be attributed to profit. So much for free and easy "disclosure".

None of this will stop those with financial and emotional interests in Roswell from flogging this story, probably for years to come, and claiming it as proof of crashed alien spacecraft near Roswell in 1947. Don't be deceived, folks. It is nothing of the sort.

Paul Kimball