The first UFO casualty - podcast episode cover

The first UFO casualty

Jul 12, 202440 minSeason 4Ep. 57
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Episode description

In this spine-tingling episode of “Journey to the Fringe,” we delve into one of the most disturbing and mysterious cases of alien abduction ever recorded. Join us as we uncover the harrowing story of Sergeant Jonathan Lovette, who vanished from a top-secret military base in New Mexico under inexplicable circumstances. Witnesses claim to have seen Lovette being abducted by a UFO, only for his mutilated body to be discovered days later, sparking a wave of fear and speculation.

We’ll explore the chilling details of the case, the eyewitness accounts, and the classified documents that hint at a cover-up. Was Lovette’s abduction a random act of extraterrestrial violence, or part of a larger, more sinister agenda? Tune in as we piece together the evidence and attempt to unravel the truth behind this horrifying encounter.

Transcript

From the unexplained to the mundane, come join us on a journey to the fringe. Hello and welcome to Journey to the Fringe, here today reminding you that fringe topics aren't always fun and games. Sometimes people get hurt, other times they lose a penis. Or even dare I say die? We are your podcast host, Taylor and Chelsea, here today covering a more graphic topic that viewer discretion is advised for. It is the topic of alien human mutilation, Chelsea.

But I need to specifically say it's not the entire topic of alien human mutilation. It is but one account of it. And this account has come up on the podcast before. It came in the form of one John Lear's manifesto. And I got super interested in this because I was like, yes, we got it added to the list and it immediately got picked up because I said, my God, I need to know more about this and more about this I got for I have, I think what accounts to the whole story.

Now I do have to warn you this will be a shorter episode likely just because with dead people, there's less eyewitness account of what happened. But people can I witness anything, especially if there's multiple dead people. But if you're in a graveyard, there's all these dead people. I'm just going to say dead people can I witness so long as you talk to them before they die, but not in this case because they died very or they died beforehand. Then anyhow, that's a whole other thing in the story.

We are covering the story of Jonathan P. Love It, which happens in 1956. And my God, Chelsea, you're in for a treat because there's so much of the story. There are twists and there are turns and there are names that we have heard before that come up and I already feel like that's a red flag in your mind, but we're just going to go about. I am so excited. Can I just ask one piece of information before we start? Yes. Mr. Levin. Is he going to be okay? Is he alive or dead? I have no idea.

I would say no. Okay, fair enough. That's a good answer. I think a reasonable answer is no. But you're going to understand once we get to it why I have to say it in that weird way. Okay, we're going to start with an account of this story. We're going to go right into it here. And this is a live person accounting this. These are live people. I have some late questions already. It's based on your starting of this episode. Yeah, I know. But this is where it goes. I'd like to witness this.

And yeah, actually that one's going to get answered fairly quickly. So we're on a military base and a search crew of two pilots was sent out to the fields south of the central White Sands testing region on one chilly morning on March of 1956 to look for any debris that might have fallen from a missile test conducted the previous evening. Major William Cunningham and Sergeant Jonathan Lovett were the men in question.

Those men were affiliated with the adjacent Holloman Air Force Base's Air Force missile command at around 300. The two men arrived at the place and they got out of their Jeep and lived drowsily into the search area with flashlights. They had completed the same work numerous times before with varying degrees of success and boredom.

Following a few minutes of pacing next to one another, the two men eventually parted ways with Cunningham continuing to move forward while Lovett vanished over the top of a nearby sand dune. Cunningham had no idea where the sergeant was going because he still needed to tell him and his superior assumed it was probably a bathroom break. But after waiting for a few minutes, Lovett still hadn't shown up so Cunningham halted what he was doing and began to go back to where the two men had split off.

The high pitched scream of his subordinate suddenly pierced the darkness and he heard something that would send shivers down his spine. A scream of pure agony echoed throughout the black desert fields surrounding him. Cunningham ran over to the crest of the sand dune fully aware that Lovett must be in distress and presuming it was consequence of a snake bite or some other kind of animal attack only to be faced with a unique, albeit horrifying, scene.

Cunningham has maintained that he had witnessed Jonathan Lovett being transported to an alien aircraft. Cunningham could see a curious metallic disk hovering about 15-20 feet above the ground, about 30 feet from where he stood. The craft reflected in the weak beam of the flashlight held tightly in his right hand. The major had never seen anything like it, completely silent resembling neither a vehicle nor a piece of military equipment.

Cunningham directed his torch beam towards something, slithering and flexing like a snake at the base of the device and he could see that it was a strong steel cable of some sort. The officer was shocked to discover that the cable was wrapped around one of Lovett's legs when he pointed his torch at the end of the cable after being startled back into reality by another horrifying screen.

The Air Force Sergeant made a valiant effort to release himself from the heavy metal flex wrapped around his leg by kicking and slashing with his hands, but it appeared that his efforts were in vain and as Cunningham watched an increasing terror, the cable retracted quickly, pulling the trapped airman through the rocky terrain and then upwards towards the disk space. Paralyzed by fear, Cunningham watched helplessly as Lovett was relentlessly drawn up into the base of the puffing craft.

Before he vanished from view, the sergeant's pharantic eyes briefly locked with his own while pleading for assistance. The disk rose silently into the overcast skies with a faint click and Cunningham stumbled and tripped his way back to the waiting jeep as he tried to comprehend what he had just seen. He yelled into the radio that Lovett had been stolen and an airplane was leaving the scene.

Within minutes, every unit and resource of the Air Force was swarming in that direction but all they discovered was the major slumped over on the ground and wobbling in shock. In the days that followed, airmen searched every square inch of the area around the suspected kidnapping site but in vain. On the evening of the event, the crew on duty at the site control tower verified that unknown radar contact had shown up on their equipment.

Still, it was moving too swiftly for any potential counteractions to be taken and a search group operating about 10 miles down range from where Lovett had vanished had been questioning Cunningham for three days when Jonathan Lovett's body was found or what remained of it. Nobody participating in the later investigation had ever seen the horrifying mutilation done to Lovett's remains.

There was tongue, eyes, and a sizable section of jaw were now missing and a clean incision had been created from the point of his jaw around to the back of his larynx. With what appeared to be exceptional surgical expertise, the penis had been removed and the anus seemed to have been plucked out. The coroner's report also mentioned the absence of any signs of organ failure or vascular collapse elsewhere in the body, which was troublesome given that the body had no blood at all.

The report the officer tasked with investigating the case contained further peculiarities. Several paratory birds were also discovered dead at the scene where the remains were found, having perished while attempting to feast on the carcass. Go ahead. Oh no question. Okay. Just statement. I just couldn't help but getting hung up on the fact that his anus seemed to have been plucked out. I don't know how you pluck an anus. That is what appeared like that.

If they said plucked a penis, I would understand what they meant. Yeah. You can pluck a penis. You can't pluck an anus. You gotta think that if you're seeing it, it would clearly be like, oh, that's been plucked. That's the only way to describe it. Yeah. That's the only way you could describe it if it's been plucked, it's been plucked. That was the only thing that's been plucked on his body. The verbs that they're using, verbs is the word that I'm looking for, right? Adjectives. Adjectives.

I think verb, if you're talking about plucked, is correct. But overall, adjectives I think is correct. Yeah. That are being used to describe this are plentiful. Yes. Almost as if they're the parts that are being added to the story. Okay. Interesting thing to say. Yes. Okay. I can't imagine that's foreshadowing at all. No, not at all. Oh no. It was also in surprisingly decent shape despite being discovered in the open in one of the country's warmest and harshest climates.

Now that love is body had been found, Cunningham was taken into custody in the case of killing him. Military prosecutors claim that the major had killed his subordinate, made up the tale of the kidnapping and mutilated the body to make the lies seem more credible when the matter was brought before a tribunal. It did cross my mind. Wouldn't it be fun if something else happened and you're just like, oh, I saw like this craft came down and like, I'm just going to go.

I'm going to say that it was a human mutilation. There is a UFO. I'm just going to do it. And I'm just going to murder this guy? Yeah. Like it crossed my mind. Like at what point. I don't like him anyways. Yeah. At what point are you just like, I'm just going to fucking see if they believe it. Maybe. I don't want to admit what I did. Okay. Fair enough. Yeah. Human mutilation. Yeah. Aliens. I've heard about these cattle things. So like humans, that's not that far away.

No one's ever heard of this. This is, I'm a guard and I'm just going to try it and see where it lands me. Not a bad plan. Yeah. Just a thought. Just a thought. I'm just thinking here. Just a thought. Okay. I'm not going to be alone with you in like deep forest anytime soon or anywhere where this could present itself on a hike per se in the dark. Yes. I mean, okay. But that's fair enough statement.

It should come as no surprise that the court quickly rejected this argument and after being freed without being charged, Cunningham was permitted to quit the Air Force with an honorable discharge. Honorable. Jonathan Lovett's death has never been fully addressed. The US government has a solid and longstanding policy of not publicly commenting on reports of encounters between military and UFOs and as we have learned from earlier tales.

We should note where this story comes to light is in the grudge reports, which Chelsea, I don't expect you to remember fully. We covered this, I think in our second episode ever project grudge, which leads into project blue book. Now project grudge had, I should say 14 reports, one through 14. I do remember this. Most of them are public record. Allegedly, report 13 doesn't exist. And this is the report from which this story comes from. This is 13. This is from report 13 of project grudge.

We got it here exclusively. Sure. Absolutely. So what basically happens is this man by the name of William English alleges that he read project grudges report 13, which this story comes from and he tells the story. And this is where all of the later accounts come from is William English's account of this story, which he read in project grudges report 13. It should be noted, despite the fact that there are project grudge one through 14 and one through 12 fully exist and 14 fully exist.

It's not that report 13 is top secret. There's no account of it. Usually if something is top secret, they'll say like, if you do a FOIA request that this there's information that we cannot disclose. That doesn't happen. The government's position is report 13 doesn't exist. I don't know how I feel about that. I found an interesting follow up to this, which Chelsea, you're going to get some really good information from this.

How does it, how does it exist with project grudge if the government says it doesn't exist? Project grudge does exist. Project grudge reports do exist. They fully admit it. There were 13 reports numbered one to 12 and then 14. And there's just nothing about report 13. But how come they have it? The government says it. Same English alleges that he read report 13 as well as someone else, which we'll get to later in this story. Everybody's in agreement. Project grudge exists.

No question about that. Yeah, I know. I know. Project grudge reports exist. However, there's no evidence that there's a report 13 despite there being weirdly enough a report 14. Okay. Does that make sense? Are we on the same page? No, it completely makes sense, but I don't understand. It's still weird. I agree. Why it's happening this way. Like why? Like where are we getting the story from if it doesn't exist? Yeah. And we're going to get to that.

Yeah. Well, it's not here saying what's his face isn't it? Is it? Hey, don't go speculating yet. This is a true story from a William English, which is a name that has not come up yet. Oh, no. Okay. So my confusion and where the fuck did the story come from is going to go somewhere.

So anyhow, I found this great breakdown on a skeptical forum online of this entire story, which I think just reading it in full fully encapsulates the entire idea behind it and brings it back so much to what we've been talking about. So there is no mention or record of a report 13 ever being produced. If it were to exist, it is unclear whether it would have been a continuation of the regular monthly summary reports or another special report as with report 14.

The existence of reports one through 12 and then 14 was well known. In fact, a book was published about report 14 in 1956 entitled Flying Saucers and Analysis of the Air Force Project Blue Book Special Report number 14 by Leon Davidson. So to look at this origin of the story, it comes from William English who stated in 1977 he was given a document to analyze labeled grudge slash blue book report number 13.

He recorded his memories of the report onto two cassette tapes and these were transcribed into letters which were circulated among the UFO community in the 1980s. It is really weird. No matter what at the end of the day, I agree it is weird. There's not a 13. However, Chelsea, I'm just going to say this now it's going to come up later. 13 is not a weird number to skip in Western culture. I was just going to say that places don't have 13 floors. That's generally it. That's generally it.

But when I'm counting generally I don't just skip numbers and then just move on with life, especially when it's like a project for the government that I'm working on. Usually I want to include all the numbers. Professionally speaking, I agree. But at the same time, I don't think this is a realm ruled by logic either. I mean mostly, but no. Okay, let's keep seeing where this goes. Not liking where it's going, like usual. Text file typed in by UFO net one.

Original document is eight neatly handwritten pages of which photocopies have been circulated in the UFO research community. Note, what follows is purportedly the recollection of an intelligence analyst who was given an assignment to prepare an analysis of the Grudge 13 report. The timeframe in which this occurred was July 1977 with the original Grudge report having been published in 1953. The Grudge 13 report was made up of 624 typed pages on white paper with gray cover.

This memorandum as it has become known was first circulated in early 1981. It seems the letters were then typed up and uploaded to the internet. The uploader from the first website being William Cooper, also known as Bill Cooper, also known as very good friend of John Lear, who became Proto Alex Jones and dies in a gunfight with the friends. I remember him from behind the bastard. It's not a journey to the friend. Well, actually he did come up in the journey to the friend type. Yeah, he did.

But anyhow, the most important part in this story is William English, whose description of the report is this. Publication was withdrawn from pouch. It measured approximately eight inches by 11 inches with gray cover. Basically bound paperback style similar to technical manuals. Across the center front, it read Grudge slash Blue Book Report number 13. It was dated 1953 to 1963. In the lower right hand corner was AFSN 2246-3. An upper left hand corner was the word annotated.

Across the front upper right hand corner to lower left hand corner was red tape indicating code red security measures. Across the front was stamped in red ink, top secret need to know only crypto clearance 14 required. Inside front cover upper left hand corner were handwritten notations in ink, which were blacked out by black felt pen. Now that's a subscription of this document when he first got it. It should be noted this is clearly different from the other 12 reports.

So he says it was titled Grudge slash Blue Book Report number 13. I'd call my attention. The other reports all say it's Project Blue Book Report number and then the report number formerly Project Grudge. That's how they're all titled. Except this one. That's actually one thing that stood out to me. It wouldn't have been like Grudge slash Project Blue Book because it was one or the other at the time. Well, it was one or the other and then it transferred into the other.

There was never a time where it was both, which is a great point. I mean, it doesn't make sense for it to be both at one time. No, exactly. That right there is a big flag. The original person who brings up the story mistitles it or at least this one is significantly differently titled from the ones coming before and after it. Next up, very strange thing. English said this document is 624 pages, which is significantly different than the other 13 reports, which are roughly 20 pages.

Maybe that's why they excluded it. Two don't. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, both the juices. We put it in 13. Yeah. Because surely nobody's going to notice we skipped a number. Yeah, exactly. So he also, he gives a full table of concepts of this. I'm just going to go through what he says is in this entire document. Part one on the design of generators to accomplish strain free molecular translation. Part two, the generation of space time continuums closed open and folded.

Part three on the generation of temporary pseudo acceleration locus. Part one chapter one. One criteria for a simple generator and control system referring to equation 17 appendix a part two chapter one continuation of Einstein's theory of relativity to final conclusion.

Part three chapter one possible application of Einstein's theory of relativity at conclusion part one chapter two reports of UFO encounters classifications close encounters of the first kind subtitle sightings and witnesses part two chapter two close encounters of the second kind subtitle UFO sightings witness within close proximity.

Part three chapter two close encounters of the third kind subtitle to UFO encounters and extraterrestrial life forms witnessed and personal encounters subtitles slash colonies relocations thereof case histories chapter three part one military encounters with UFOs chapter three part two military reports concerning sightings on radar and electronic surveillance of UFOs subsection two analysis report J.L. and Heineck lieutenant colonel friend.

So there's a lot going on in this and anybody who's listened to our episodes and has some sort of weird memory thing which is good we need you on our side and please tell us when we're doing these things that we need to be linking but it should be noted that this support came out in 1963.

The idea of close encounters of the first second and third kind don't exist at this time J.L. and Heineck does create it but he never actually formally talks about it in any way until 1972 in his book the UFO experience the scientific inquiry which is much later that's a pretty big gap but but before this guy is talking about it in 1977 importantly which is pretty well around the time that he came out with it.

So whilst Heineck was a scientific consultant for Project Blue Book in the 50s the scale wasn't created until two decades later by Heineck and the U.S. Air Force certainly wasn't categorizing according to the system which didn't exist yet and particularly in only this one report too it would be weird for this to just show up in one report and then not appear again for 19 years. There's quite a few things that are showing up who lean in this report not other reports.

And in fact in his follow-up book the Heineck UFO report which followed the Blue Book reports he didn't use these terms anywhere so he actually wrote books prior to 1972 about these reports without using these terms at all. But in any event English does recount what he remembers of this Jonathan Love It story in his own words and this is his version of the story.

The report gave a clear indication of reports of human mediation most notably was a case witnessed by Air Force personnel in which an Air Force Sergeant E6 by the name of Jonathan P. Love It was observed being taken captive aboard what appeared to be a UFO at White Sands Missile Test Range in New Mexico. This abduction took place in March of 1956 at about 0300 local and was witnessed by Major William Cunningham of the United States Air Force Missile Test Command near Hallamon Air Force Base.

Major Cunningham and Sergeant Love It were out in a field downrange from launch sites looking for debris from a missile test when Sergeant Love It went over the ridge of a small dune and was out of sight for a time.

Major Cunningham heard Sergeant Love It scream and what was described as a terror of agony and the Major thinking the Sergeant had been bitten by a snake or something ran over the crest of the dune and saw Sergeant Love It being dragged into what appeared to him as silvery disc-like object which hovered in the air approximately 15-20 feet. Major Cunningham described what appeared to be a long snake-like object which was wrapped around the Sergeant's leg and was dragging him to the craft.

Major Cunningham admittedly froze as the Sergeant was dragged inside the disc and observed the disc going up into the sky very quickly. Major Cunningham got to the Jeep radio and reported the incident to missile control whereupon Mollilé Control confirmed a radar sighting. Search parties went out into the field looking for Sergeant Love It. Major Cunningham's report was taken and he was admitted to the White Sands Base Disciplinary for observation.

The search for Sergeant Love It was continued for three days at the end of which his nude body was found approximately 10 miles downrange. The body had been mutilated, the tongue had been removed from lower portions of the jaw, an incision had been made just under the tip of his chin and extended all the way down to his esophagus and larynx, he had been emasculated and his eyes had been removed.

Also his anus had been removed and there was comments in the report on the apparent surgical skill in the removal of these items including the genitalia. The reports commented that the anus and genitalia had been removed as though a plug which in the case of the anus extended all the way to the colon. Pulled out like a plug or plucked in my mind are the same thing. Too much. There was no sign of blood within the system.

The initial autopsy report confirmed that the system had been completely drained of blood and that there was no vascular collapse due to death by bleeding. Some comment added that this was an unusual event because anybody who dies or has complete loss of blood there is vascular collapse. Also noted when the body was found there were a number of dead predatory type birds within the area who apparently had died after trying to partake of the sergeant's body.

There were a number of extremely grisly black and white photos from all indications the body had been exposed to the elements for at least a day or two. The new Mexico sun in the desert is extremely hot and debilitating under the normal circumstances. So that's his original story. That's so funny. One that we have such differing opinions of plug and plug. Number two, a plug and plug danis. Well pulled out like a plug removed as though a plug in my mind is plucking. Okay when you put it that way.

Because that's the term had been removed as though a plug. So I don't like that as much as I like hearing that it was plucked out. Yeah. Makes it a little bit more disturbed. I already said it right off the bat. That gives me the shudder. The only real difference between that first story which is the more recent, it's from one of the more recent conspiracy sites. There's no difference except plug. Except for the adjectives and verbs. Yeah. Oh you're right.

Other than that it was exactly the same. I was like that. They added some flowery words. And that's why I wanted to read that first one off the bat and then come back to this and this is the original story. Anyhow English added a few extra details in an interview he gave with a man named John Lear. Namely that quote Major Cunningham was initially accused of murdering Jonathan Lovett. But charges were later dropped. Why? Because they thought the alien.

Because this guy had no way of draining his blood. Okay. I can see it. One more sentence. But anyhow that's where the John Lear part of it comes in. Okay. The White Sands missile range. No. I'm just saying okay. Okay. The White Sands missile range is a real place and does border hall in an air force base. However there appear to be no records that people named Major William Cunningham or Air Force Sergeant E6 Jonathan P. Lovett ever existed.

Great. The only Major General William Cunningham from this time period was stationed in the Pacific during the 50s. Was Army not Air Force and was promoted to Major in the 60s. Ultimately it should be concluded that the incident never happened. The only source for it is that of William English. But considering his recounting of the report, has it not matched legitimate reports and used terms that did not exist at the time, it's likely to be a fake. Is William English?

William English worked for the British Air Force I believe. It's gonna come up a little later. It should be noted however Bill Cooper saw the same report 13. Weird how he sees these reports that are all fake. Is it in hypnosis? However in Cooper's report he only states that he saw a document entitled Project Grudge. He makes no mention if it had been labeled for report 13 or mentioning Project Blue Book and no mention of it containing the story about Lovett.

Eventually the writer here found himself in possession of two documents, one called Project Grudge and another called Operation Majority. Project Grudge contained the history of alien involvement since about 1936 and it began talking about Germany's involvement with the crashed discs that they had recovered in 1936. And we're attempting to duplicate technology. When Project Grudge, William Cooper, saw photographs of the dead aliens and of the craft. I saw photographs of live aliens.

I saw photographs of off-top seas of our internal organs is what he says. I saw photographs of aliens designated EB which is a term that just keeps coming up. Who was held in captivity from 1949 to 1952 when he died. I saw the history of what had been able to put together at that time from incidents from the 1800s that involved aliens and their crafts.

As detailed, Bill Cooper was then one of the people who typed up online John Lear and William English's account of Grudge 13 and their interviews. He stated, this report was typed onto disc verbatim from the original document which was sent by John Lear via Federal Express and arrived on October 8th, 1988 by Bill Cooper. I Bill Cooper, do swear that no changes were made and do swear that this is an exact verbatim copy of the original. No idea who he's swearing to. It doesn't seem clear.

And just so that everybody's aware, this is not legal advice, but if you just state that, that has no legal ramifications. Is it like those people on Facebook sharing like I don't agree to let Facebook share? I do not consent, yes. Because you've already agreed to the exact same impact. It seems that after Bill Cooper saw Bill English's report, the two got in touch and at that point Bill Cooper claimed that what he had seen was in fact the same report 13 that Bill English had seen.

Once again, time has proven to be an ally in that evidence has come to light over the past several years that substantiated everything that was initially said about reviewing report 13. In addition, one other person, Bill Cooper, formerly of the United States Naval Intelligence section, CINCPAC, has come forward and admitted viewing an earlier version of the Grudge Blue Book Report 13.

This Bill Cooper's original claims were just to have seen something called Project Grudge, it was only after he read Bill English's report that he switched to claiming they saw the same Blue Book Report 13. I think it's reasonable to dismiss Bill Cooper's claims as absolutely false, particularly when everything we know about Bill Cooper is he just lies about what he was briefed on in red while he was in military, which again leads back to Bill English as being the sole source of the story.

English himself is known something of a grifter in the UFO community as well. In his book Fact, Fiction, and Flying Saucers, the truth behind the misinformation, distortion, and derision by debunkers, government agencies, and government con men noted UFO researcher Stanton Friedman recalls English's involvement in the 1981 Cash Lundrum UFO incident.

The Cash Lundrum incident is one of the few incidents to have left forensic evidence in the form of burns and psych-physiological effects suffered by witnesses, which led to a $20 million lawsuit against the US government. It was one of the more credible sightings of the decade.

But unfortunately, according to Friedman, English, who was an initial investigator of the incident as a member of the aerial phenomena research organization APRO, quote, sold his story to a tabloid and was expelled from ACRO for violating confidentiality, end quote. The Cash Lundrum story first appeared in public on the cover of the Weekly World News, a less than credible weekly tabloid.

In the late 80s, English's story of his experiences with the alleged captain in the Army Special Forces during Vietnam and later as an alleged intelligence analyst at RAF, Chick Sands, began to gain attention with the UFO researchers. Cooper's support of English's claims bolstered his credibility. Cooper and English both gained prominence around the same time. Around the same time, John Lear began making inroads to the UFO community and promoting the story of Bob Bazar.

One of the more atlandish and questionable conspiracy theories in the late 1980s was a document uploaded to the UFO bulletin boards called Krill Papers, which came up in our John Lear episodes. He just made them up. They were just a fun fanfic.

Cooper drew to his forum, claimed that he had seen copies of the Krill Papers during his time in the Navy, and in 1990, Don Ecker, director of research for UFO magazines wrote an expose about Cooper calling him a fraud and questioning his business practices and research methods. In 1991, English made what was essentially an early internet call out post claiming that the Krill Papers were a fraud perpetrated by Lear to expose the gullibility of the UFO community.

Cooper lash out at English claiming that he was the real fraud and that his claim of service in special forces were exaggerated. Given that English was born in 52, making him 18 when he claimed to be a special force captain in Vietnam in the 70s, there may be some merit to Cooper's claims of stolen valor.

Cooper also accused everyone who disagreed with him, including John Lear, George Knapp, Staten Freeman, and other notable members of the UFO community of being government agents and or Freemasons. English largely disappears at this point from the UFO community. He did have a short-lived campaign for a New Mexico Senate and in 2018, started a GoFundMe to raise $10,000 to write a book about his Vietnam experience.

The secret history of Cooper English debacle is largely forgotten as the story is one of unpleasant community infighting and of course complete fabrication. Much of the debate took place on bulletin board systems, early predecessors of modern internet and many of those threads that formed on the online UFO communities in the 80s had been lost to history.

Though there are a number of sites that have archived these discussions, the fact that much of the UFO community history has been lost is troubling because now outlets like the History Channel are uncritically repeating accounts of some of these dubious figures from the fields. And guess what? History Channel is one of those ones that has an in-depth story about Jonathan Lovett. Although that's not the one I chose to read, they do actually have a fairly balanced story on it.

And they do that does include like four sides that nobody can okay. Yeah, there's nothing to validate that this is promising. I am surprised that this guy has not come up for us before and until this point as he seems kind of tied in with everybody. But this is it for him. Yes, but it's really just for this one story. This is it for him. Yes, he just kind of says this, which makes me think that he probably did really murder this person. But he wasn't involved in the UFO community at all.

I do just want to come to his defense a little bit here. He was born in 52. So at the time of the murder, he was one. I don't think he was the one who did it. But wait, who was supposed to do the murder? Cuttingham. Then what the fuck's he doing? He was the guy who read the grudge report. Why? Just cuz. Okay, I got my wires crossed there for a second. So if he didn't do the murder, he just came in for a second and then left. He's the only one who recounts the story.

This is where all of the original stories come from. And it should be noted that neither Cunningham nor Love It seemed to actually have existed. This is weird. Why? Like why? I have no idea, but it just seems to kind of go in line with things that we learned about John Lear and Bill Cooper. Right, it comes back up. From the last few episodes. This is messed up. Yeah. It's just kind of right in line with all that. But then I forgot that John Lear was in there.

Yeah. Okay. Then especially everything going around with the animal mediation at the time. Like it fits in perfectly with that. It's just an elaboration on that story. Do we know this guy actually existed? English definitely did exist. I was wondering because it got tied back to Lear. He ran for Senate. Oh, oh. And he had ego fund me. And he also wrote a book. So he appears to at least have some evidence that he existed. What a weird thing. Okay. He did serve in the military. That is true.

However, there is questions about. Like what his actual role is. I don't know what to make of this. What do you make of it? I make of everything that I've learned about John Lear and Bill Cooper and that they get a lot of stories to change the view of aliens come forward during their time. This being one of them.

Because before they really came along, it was just this question of like these mysterious people and it was more so fearful things and somebody dying to aliens and being cored and plucked from their anus. It's worrisome. You're a weird choice there. That would be my choice to. I don't like plug. Chelsea, what do you think of the story? I'm still trying to process it to be honest with you. Okay. As you can tell, I'm trying to work through my thoughts on it.

But in the end comes back to John Lear and Bill Cooper. It's obviously made up, but I'm just trying to like the why doesn't is not there for me. It just kind of seems pointless. That's a fair point. I don't know as soon as Bill Cooper gets a hold of it and he just like, yeah, of course, if he says he read it is probably a lot. From everything I'm learning about this guy, I mean, good story. Nonetheless, I'm just trying to process the why because it's the why and everything.

That is the weird thing, but he also tried to sell UFO stories to the press prior to this. So I think he could have just been trying to make it. I was trying like it didn't make sense to me why he just shows up and then he seems to have a very minimal mark and then leaves. I know it's weird and I don't think we're going to get any more things from him, honestly. It doesn't seem like he does a very short flash in the pan. Okay. But yeah, that's I mean, I enjoyed it.

That was a great story connected back to the usual players that we find popping up now that I surprisingly did not know about before doing this podcast. And they really do play so much of what the average person knows about UFOs. I wouldn't say the average person. What the average UFO enthusiast knows. I don't know if you were like, what do you know about UFOs? I bet you it would tie back to aliens being found at Roswell. Maybe at least something the average person would know. See I don't.

Hmm. That's a good question. We can put this on as a poll. You know, it's not a spotify. That's going to be a bias poll though. It is going to be a bias poll. But also I said my viewpoint is UFO enthusiasts and I actually have no idea what fan base is. Who's listening? Yeah. How do you pull that even? Didn't we realize at some point it was all nothing but engineers or something like that? It came up in a previous episode like a while back. I would say that's probably one of the most renowned.

If you were to ask any Jobwell in the street, what do you know about UFOs? Roswell, Area 51. Yes, but that's not aliens. I think Bill Moore, John Lear and Bill Cooper specifically here who comes out of it, they really have the negative viewpoint of aliens and not necessarily UFOs on the community. Yeah. Like everything that's like people being killed by aliens comes from this group, which is just so mind boggling. That is weird. But that makes me wonder what Linda Moltenhouse up to.

Yeah. I feel like we're really alluding to her episode coming up in the next three to five years. I'm really, really scared to do her. Yeah. These guys just keep coming up to these guys that I never knew about before doing this podcast. Yeah. Way before this episode. We are again. And I should say this is not the only alleged case of human mutilation. There are other cases we will likely cover in the future.

I will not speculate at this time as to the validity of those cases, mostly because when I do speculate, I always get disappointed when I actually get to the story. So I'm just going to leave it at that. There definitely are other cases. I am aware of them. I will be researching them and they will come up in future episodes. Can you speculate on the state that their anus is, whether they were plucked? You know what? I know they're removed, but I am unwilling. Oh, you don't know the ad.

I am unwilling to use any verb at this point other than removed. Okay. Fair enough. Or missing. Sorry. Missing is a better one because that doesn't even connote a verb. Yeah. It doesn't even let us know what you would think. It's just missing. They are missing though. Yeah. So the state of how it became missing, we'll find, no, just leave it at that. Yeah. And I would like to leave this on something anus related, but that also seems a little off for an end up in episode.

So I have been Taylor here with Chelsea. We are Journey to the Fringe. Thank you all for listening and we'll see you next week. That was good enough. Bye. Thank you for listening to Journey to the Fringe. If you have liked what you have listened to, please like, share, subscribe, or follow depending on what venue you are listening to us through. Also please, if possible, leave a five star review as that really helps us in the algorithms.

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