In this day and age, why in the world with the US government destroy documents and emails? storage is cheap. And history is valuable. But the US government feels they should. And they do. But is it always by the book? Well, what I
discovered years ago is no, it absolutely is not. And now, a new controversy has just been revealed with the discovery that even more emails were destroyed of a key player in a hot topic, Dr. James Lacatski, he's the guy that not only lead a program called us up that he says, explore the paranormal, that Skinwalker Ranch, but he also said the US government has gone inside an actual UFO. So why did his emails disappear? And wasn't all by the book? What proof, if any, could we have received from
his classified communications? If they weren't all destroyed? Stay tuned, you're about to journey inside the black vault. That's right, everybody. As always, thank you so much for tuning in and taking this journey inside the black vault with me. I'm your host, John Greenewald, Jr, founder and creator of The Black Vault. And we are exploring today, what could or could not be a malicious cover up and destruction of records. Now there's a couple of ways to look
at this. So what we're going to do is explore exactly what went down, at least to the best of my knowledge, and explore the questions that are still unanswered. Sadly, I can't give you whether or not this was a malicious cover up or not, it
may actually be by the book. But I want to go ahead and explore that a little bit also, because if it is, it's still problematic, and it's something that I feel needs to be addressed, needs to be explored more and needs to be fixed because we are losing valuable, valuable history, not just on the UAP topic, which we're going to be talking about today. Again, in the context of the emails that were deleted.
However, this expands well beyond just the UAP topic, in fact, pick any topic that involves the US government, and that history is likely destroyed, or at least a piece of it is likely destroyed after a certain amount of time. But we'll get into all of that. So thank you all for joining me. If this is your first time, I hope you do enjoy the channel, please give a thumbs up that really does help this channel, get get
more visibility more people see the videos. And of course, if you're not subscribed, please hit that subscribe button and turn the notifications on. That way you see when these videos drop when I do live streams. It happens sometimes at random. So definitely make sure you're subscribed and turn the notifications on. So that said, let's just go ahead and get into
it and explore exactly what happened here. Because I did post this out I feel that it was newsworthy, so don't like to sit on things that James Lacatski and his emails were destroyed. That was a new revelation. We had not known that before he was a DIA employee. And for those who don't know, let's explore a little bit about who James Lacatski is for anybody who does explore the UAP topic, you'll know that he has written now two books as of the recording of this video. The first out was
skinwalkers at the Pentagon. Now he wrote that with Dr. Colum Keller, her and George Knapp, the journalist from Las Vegas that everybody knows of the Bob Lazar fame and obviously, someone who has been deeply involved with covering these issues. Well, those three gentlemen came out with skin markers at the Pentagon and explored what was the AW SAP
program within the Defense Intelligence Agency. Now, depending upon who you listen to all SAP was allegedly, the paranormal program that spawned a tip that was led by Luis Elizondo in the Pentagon, specifically, OSD and that's at least one version. There are other versions, even away from the US government. Whether or not a tip was a nickname for us,
and that's a whole video in itself and kind of a mess. But skinwalkers at the Pentagon, according to that book, set the record straight, so to speak, because what we were told in the New York Times article, according to this book, was wrong and inaccurate. And so what they did was they explored what OSAP was where the $22 million went and James Lacatski was the guy who headed that program. Within the DIA. The contractor was Bigelow Aerospace, his subsidiary called
bass, and the rest was history. So that was the first book they came out with another one inside the US government. Covert UFO press program, initial revelations also authored by the same three gentlemen. So again, Lacatski was the guy who was at the helm. And it's it's not disputed either. There's a lot of government controversy here about Luis Elizondo and a tip.
The other. We'll call it a counterpart to this story that all SAP went through the years that it was about 2008 to 2000, technically 12, but really 2008 to 2010 was when they created the majority of their reports. And then Luis Elizondo was doing things inside the Pentagon, under what he called a tip. Now, his role is disputed by the Pentagon, they say he had no assigned responsibilities on the program. And essentially, he didn't do anything that he claimed. However, lookout ski is
a different story. It's never been disputed by the US government. In fact, if you know where to look, the original documentation back from 2008 That was looking for bitters for the off SAP within dia still has like cat skis name, so anybody can verify that he was going to be the contracting officer, contracting officers representative, or CLR. And he was the government project leader of all SAP, so none of that is in dispute. And it's easily proven. There is evidence
that supports that. Now, as the years went on, and documents came came out. I don't know why. But the DIA ended up redacting the cat skis name, but the documents were still downloadable from the US government when they were looking for bids. Go figure, who knows? Sometimes there's no rhyme or reason why they do things. But there you go. So anyway, that's exactly who look at Ski was now per this bid
solicitation. They call it a bid solicitation, they were looking for government contractors to come aboard, get a certain amount of money. And create essentially reports that were forward looking 40 years into the future. Now this is on paper, so don't kill the messenger here. But that's that's what the solicitation was on paper forward looking 40 years into the future. How could technology advanced when it came
to materials lift? propulsion, there were about 12 different areas of study primarily in aerospace research that they were going to be looking into per this contract. Now, what came out over the years was not necessarily that instead, it was supposedly this Paranormal Research Program, headed within the DIA with the contractor bass through Bigelow Aerospace. And they studied different aspects of the paranormal at Skinwalker
Ranch in Utah. Now this was owned by Robert Bigelow. And again, allegedly, the DIA was interested in what was going on there. They were studying UFOs they were studying paranormal creatures, all of which were outlined in the Catskills books. So it was on paper one thing, but allegedly something much, much more mysterious. And more paranormal, by the way, this graphic was not prompted by AI other than what is your interpretation of the offset program? That's what it came up
with? I'm fascinated by AI and how it interprets things. So anyway, that's why the image is a little wonky. But that's, that's the root of it, I always get a kick out of, again, how AI thinks about things. So that was the prompt, give me an image representation of the offset program. So now the question mark is, you know, was was it really this paranormal program? And I've always anybody who watches this channel, I've always had a problem with that for a couple of different
reasons. It's out of the CIA's purview. It just is. I mean, look, there may be some government agencies that would be interested in Skinwalker Ranch if there was provable paranormal research going on. I couldn't believe that that's not a problem. But it wouldn't be the DIA. It's just not in their purview to operate with boots on the ground on US soil. That's just not their job. So for me, I kind of lean towards this was if it was funded by government money, then the actual
government and the DIA didn't really know or authorize it. But rather, maybe this was something that was just off the rails that Lacatski was doing through the defense warning office where he was a part of, they got the $22 million over the course of a couple of years. And on paper, there was those aerospace research studies. And they did create 38 reports, all of which, but I believe one, because it's still classified has been
released. The rest are now in the public domain. And again, that controversy is palpable when It comes to OS app and whether or not it was related to paranormal. Now, why am I going into that diatribe here when we're talking about emails?
Well, because in my opinion, emails are going to be the absolute best way to either prove or disprove whether or not OS have truly was exploring this, because let's face it, there may not be government reports that were quote, unquote, deliverables as connected to us app when it came to some of these paranormal aspects. But, you know, they're talking about it. Dr. Colm Kelleher, who was part of bass was obviously talking about it. It's not 100% telephone
conversations for yours. No, I'm you're going to have emails, and you're going to have emails that touch on the topics that may be disputed by the US government. But within the email box of James Lacatski, maybe we can get a little bit of an idea of what really went on, what was the Kaski researching, what was he looking at? What was he trying to figure out, so on and so
forth. So I love that for anybody who delves into the FOIA and wants to explore with it, don't forget, it's not all about reports and, and snoozy memos and stuff like that for your email boxes, you will be amazed at the stuff that you will find when it comes to this type of material. So don't forget that in your for your travels. Definitely go after email. So that's why what I did here. Now, let me kind of detour from the Kaski here because obviously the DIA stance now is the Catskills
email box was destroyed. Now when I announced that on social media, a lot of speculation began from different corners of this conversation. And that's primarily because it tied into a story that I did back in May of 2021. And I worked on this story for months. And what the what the gist of this was, was that Luis Elizondo again that disputed director of a tip disputed by the US government that is I was going after his emails for the exact same reason because look, the government can
have their stance and can be completely lying. Luis Elizondo can have his stance and he could be completely lying. But if there was this program, called a tip, and there was this research and UFOs look, the chances that he was sending an email classified or not, that had keywords like UFO or a tip or UAP, or tic tac or Nimitz or go down the list. The odds of that would be pretty high. So the government can play this. He said, he said game with Luis Elizondo, that's fine. I don't
care. Because you go after the real records, you know, again, the away from the reports those emails, and over the course of months, in fact, it was actually years while I was filing these, these FOIA is, but some of them were coming back negative, that just didn't make sense. Negative meaning they were saying we got nothing responsive to your request, no records whatsoever. So I started prodding the Pentagon on this, specifically the DoD that that was in control of Luis Elizondo his emails even
after he resigned, because they archive those things. And after pushing and pushing and pushing, had finally discovered that Luis Elizondo 's emails were destroyed. Now, is that legal? Yes. However, you have to adhere to what are called records retention schedules, in order to make it legal. So when somebody resigns, you don't just poof, automatically delete their
entire existence. But rather, there are these schedules that outline from top to bottom left to right, depending upon your position, how high up you were, what did you do, what office were you at? What agency did you work for? It stipulates how long those agencies have to archive your emails and your files and your reports. Now, in some cases, it's a very short timeframe. In other cases, it's seven years. In other cases, it's in perpetuity, it's in its forever. So they they archive
them and they never get destroyed. So it depends on where you fall on the spectrum when it comes to where you are in the government infrastructure. And that's defined by these records retention schedules. So I dug and dug and dug and pushed and prodded and poked and asked anybody I could for statements and essentially the bottom line was Luis Elizondo, I could prove his emails were supposed to be maintained for seven years. Now, according to Mr. Elizondo, he
felt it was in perpetuity, I could not prove that. So he and I had many discussions about that. And, and I told him, I said, Look, I can't on paper. I can't prove that because you don't fit into the category from where I'm sitting. I can't prove it. But I can prove seven years and I can prove that the DoD just destroyed your emails well ahead of schedule. Now, I don't want to call that illegal, but it's definitely not by the book.
It is definitely frowned upon. And so what I had determined was based on his resignation date, October 4 2024, was when his emails were supposed to be maintained until so that means you file a FOIA in early 2024. Those emails should still be there ready for you to search. Yet in his case, they were deleted years ago. And so that was wrong. Now, that obviously created a lot of controversy and a lot of, shall we say,
conversation about what were they doing? Were they covering up Luis Elizondo and his history within the a tip, and the proof that people like me needed to support his claim? What were they doing? And of course, we don't know the true answer to that. But I can say and fill in one more blank, that in the future, I don't know how far I'm not hiding it from you. I just
don't have the proof yet. However, I am under How can I word this I have under very good authority, that that Luis Elizondo is not alone with these email destructions, that it was not just Luis Elizondo that was destroyed. But rather, this was a much bigger problem within the DOD. Now, I have not come across that information too well, after 2021 When I wrote
this story, so I plan on writing it more. However, I have open cases that need to complete for me to get the reports get all the proof, and all of that, but let's just say that this is a bigger story. And it's one that's incredibly important to me. And it goes to the root and heart of why I do what I do with the black vault. And quite simply that is the preservation
of history. Whether or not it's Luis Elizondo is ATypI. Males, whether or not it's James, James, the Catskills OS happy males, or whether or not it's completely unrelated to any of this. That's why I do what I do that this material is incredibly valuable and should be saved. And the fact that my story had really resonated within the Pentagon, but not in a good way. Things kind of started to fall. And people started realizing, hey, there's an issue here. There's there's information
being lost. And that's where I'm going to be able to pick up the story hopefully sooner than later. But we know the government's paces, you know, nothing short of a slug and sloth so I don't know when that's going to come but just know that that blank I want to fill in. And it's one that is a bigger issue here because of of things like this, not only with Luis Elizondo, but with James Lacatski. And the fact that these answers can be given this is evidence in what may be look
in the grander scale a small one to the UFO community. It's a big one. But to the grander scale here, look, not everybody's going to care about the Catskills email and proving all SAP was paranormal related. But look at the bigger picture and what this is and how things are being destroyed. And how things are being harmed how people's credibility is being potentially harmed here. Look at the proof the evidence that's being
destroyed. That is an issue. Now with Lacatski, I had filed multiple requests going back to you know 2018 2019 When the cat skis name really was started being bantered about that he was connected to all of this. We knew it from the original bid
solicitation that had already been out in early 2018. But again, not not necessarily his connection to the paranormal side of this more so at that time, it was Luis Elizondo, but as time went on, and people started talking and doing interviews, obviously that led to these FOIA requests being filed, one of which I had looked for anything that said Elizondo
within the Catskills box. The reason for that is pretty obvious it would have showed the connection between Luis Elizondo and potentially all SAP Luis Elizondo has now since come out and said that he talked to the CAT scan, they had conversation and again depending upon what version of these stories you listen to Luis Elizondo said he played no role in OS app yet in his IG complaint said that he did for a couple of days, again, depending upon which version of his that you want to believe,
regardless, sounded like there'd be evidence there yet. A search that ended in 2021 for the keyword Elizondo came up absolutely negative. They said that there was no records. Right here no documents responsive to my request, which I always felt was weird. I don't think I ever even posted this, because especially in 2021, everybody just thought I was out to get Elizondo and Lacatski. So I wasn't hiding this, but it was
like look, this doesn't make any sense whatsoever. So I archived it for myself and I moved on. Another one was straightforward. It was key word UFO on James Lacatski's email box. Now, that one's pretty obvious. And yes, I do these requests with all sorts of lists of UAP, UFO, different variations of view of UAP, so on and so forth. So I'm not going to, you know, bore you to death with every single word that I've used. But even this one also
came back with no documents responsive to your request. That was in March of 2022. So that was really kind of bizarre to me. Now, my mantra with the FOIA and I always preach this is always appeal. And that is true. I fully support that. And sometimes I don't follow my own advice. Some of these I didn't appeal. And it was just quite simply because there was no grant. I couldn't figure out what the grounds at this time that I could stand on to say, hey, here's my legal argument.
Here is how I can appeal this. Well, when it came to this request. That ended in September of 2023. I was looking for all James Lacatski communications with Luis Elizondo. I included multiple private emails now I've chosen to redact those to protect Mr. Elizondo has privacy. I've always done that. So when you see red redactions on documents, those are mine. They're very few and far between. But that's what I do.
And in fact, I also asked the US government to please be six redact my FOIA requests on Luis Elizondo, and other individuals as well when I use private emails as as a keyword or a target of a search to please do that to protect privacy, whether or not they do that. I hope they do. But again, I'm not interested in blowing anybody's privacy. So when you see those red redactions, they're mine. So I was looking for the cascade
communications with Elizondo and J. Stratton. He was the one that was part of the UAP Task Force. We don't hear a lot from him. We've heard a few interviews. I think just just one main one, I should say, with George Knapp. But Jay Stratton is somebody that has intrigued me the first time his name came out, was an article that I wrote a few years ago. His name was not connected to any of this. At that time, what I had discovered was Stratton had wrote, the original statements that I got from the
US Navy that went viral. I mean, it was covered worldwide, about UAP, and the three videos, the FLIR, the gimbal, and the go fast, and how the US Navy considered them unidentified. Now, they had leaked, obviously, but they had never been acknowledged before by the US Navy or the military. And on top of that never said to be unidentified. So that was a huge deal. So I had filed for years to figure out, Hey, how did that statement get written? And by doing that had discovered this
gentleman by the name of John J. Stratton. And I didn't know at the time exactly what his title was. But I knew that he was highly connected because he's the one that wrote those statements for the Public Affairs Office. And then the Public Affairs Office took them, reworded them a little bit shrunk them down just to make them more condensed. And that's what I got, while I had discovered the original emails
that Stratton wrote. So just to give you that little background on how Stratton came to be, I thought, okay, look, maybe there was some communication with Lacatski as well. So let's put it all in the same request. And yet that came up with no documents responsive to your request. Now, this I had grounds
to appeal. Why, because Elizondo had already put in writing and a document that he had submitted to the inspector general that he had talked to Lacatski, there was other material that I could draw firm from to build an appeal off of saying, hey, this doesn't make sense because of this. And so I essentially what what they call appeal, the adequacy of the search. And so when you appeal, you have to do so under certain grounds of proving what you're appealing. You also have to name what
you're appealing. You can't just say, I have a gut feeling things are are there, you have to appeal the adequacy of the search. Explain why so many FOIA people out there, I stress appeal. So I filed the appeal on this. And this was the letter that I got back just days ago. Dear Mr. Greenwald, this response, your freedom of information act appeal dated November 2520 23, I'm going to jump down, I reviewed your request for appeal and remanded your request to the review team
for an additional search. I'm gonna stop quoting right there. That means that I essentially won the appeal, that that they that they didn't see adequate evidence that the search was was done correctly. So from what I understand, appellate authorities don't just automatically remand it back. They only do so if they feel that the search wasn't adequate enough, which was what I was appealing, so they remanded it
back for an additional search. Going back to the letter. Upon remand and review, dia personnel verified the search procedures
and conducted a second search. No responsive records were located as a result of this Search, the records you requested were properly destroyed prior to your request, pursuant to records disposition schedules approved by the National Archives, and Records Administration, based on the above information and the governing law, I find that dia personnel performed an adequate search for records responsive to your request, please be advised that no further action will be
taken regarding this appeal. Now, I'm going back one, one. So April 2 2022. I'm going to write that down. So I don't forget, because we're going to talk about we're going to talk about why that data is important. So they said that the records were destroyed prior to me submitting that. So April 22, or excuse me, April 2 2020, to some date prior to that. So that's, that's the only way I'm trying to kind of dissect this and figure out when were these records destroyed,
because as you'll see, in a few minutes, that date is key. So they told me here in writing, boom, everything is gone. So I, you know, I do this a lot. I don't always talk about it. But when I write articles, and when I announce things that I think are newsworthy, I'm always double and triple checking. And
here is that double and triple check. Can you please confirm that, by this response, all of James Kathy's emails were destroyed, and the DIA responded, the DIA FOIA office can confirm that a search was conducted for emails using the cited name, James Lacatski, and no records were located. Now, that wasn't good enough for me because even though they said they were destroyed, it's so vague here. So I asked again,
I'll spare you my letter. But essentially just ask them what I'm trying to confirm is the entire email box, just the ones that I'm looking for, you know, what, what exactly are you saying? And their response? Greetings. Your question was understood, and the response is the same. There are no email records for James Lacatski as a result of records retention schedule, so everything is gone now. Anybody who knows me, I continued to push. And I said, Look, you guys got to you got to
do better than that. What disposition schedule Are you are you pulling from? And they said according to NARAS, General Records Schedule 6.1 disposition authority, da G Rs 2022 0060002 emails are deleted when seven years old. So that's what they said. Now, I did ask about James the cat skis, exact resignation date, because there's a couple of differing dates. They're kind of floating around. The DoD gave me Luis Elizondo when asked. So I was hoping dia would do the same for look like ASCII, and
they're making me sign a third party release form. And the Kaski doesn't return my messages that I stopped a year or two ago. But he's very, very tight with who he talks to, which is, essentially is Jeremy Korbel. And George Knapp. I'm not familiar with him talking to anybody else, when it comes to answering questions. So take that as you will. So that said, I don't know his exact resignation date. Now that schedule I just rattled off to you this is it general record
schedule 6.1. Here's the cover page. And here's the specific section that they were talking about, which is email and or other types of electronic messages of all other official staff and contractors not included in item 10. Now, keep in mind, these schedules are very, very detailed. I'm sparing you all those boring, nitty gritty details. But essentially, they go into what type of position, how long, what type of record, how long do you retain it for, so on and so forth. And
so it spells all that out. Where Lacatski fit was this and that that was stipulated here for seven years, then that's no longer needed. This item applies the majority of emails and other messaging account slash users within an agency adopting a capstone approach, which it seems like dia does not media neutral applies to records managed in an electronic format only. So again, it it actually separates electronic documents from paper records and so on and so forth. So they're that
they're that detailed, but this is where he fit. So seven years was when lookouts keys emails should have been maintained. Now this was item 10. Because some of you may may wonder, well, what was item 10? Why didn't he fit into their item 10 are actually permanent records is so things are kept in perpetuity forever, till the end of the world. As soon as they resign. It's kept and archived and there's no destruction. But he didn't fit into any of their that made the absolute closest,
but it was not. fitting for Lacatski was number six directors of significant program offices and or their equivalents, as far as I'm aware of the Cascade was not the director of a program office. He was within the offense warning office. And he did lead obviously OS app. And I'm sure he worked on a plethora of other programs as well. But he was not
a director number 10. Again, Close, but no cigar additional roles and positions that predominantly create permanent records related to mission critical functions, or policy decisions and are of a historical significance. Well, I mean, I guess ASA wasn't of his historical significance for them to say, Hey, we should maintain all of those records. On top of that, they didn't maintain any of his emails. So whatever he was doing, they felt it was not something that they needed to
keep in perpetuity. So that being said, seven years, so what exactly do we not have answered here? And it comes down to these two questions, what exact date the James or Kathy retire? Now, he has said in interviews around 2015 2016. And another one, I believe it was set in May of 2016, or just 2016. So for my purpose here, because I can't prove it yet. We're gonna say circa may 2016, which means that the destruction would have been authorized circa May of 2023. That would be seven years from
that. Now remember, I told you to put a pin in that one FOIA request that was filed April 2 2022. From my calculation here, it should have been May of 2023. That they were destroyed yet dia said they were destroyed prior to my request of April 2 2022. Now, if what is being said about lookout skis resignation date of May 2016 is true, or just essentially, any date in 2016. Then the destruction was not authorized until pick a month in
2023. That means all of the FOIA requests that I filed, including this April 2 2022 requests, and the other ones that I went over, which were filed in 2018 2019. So even years prior to that, should have not met a destructed email box, nothing should have been deleted that yet the DIA is saying oh, sorry, you know, you filed after, so it does not make sense. Now, in one off the cuff remark that Lacatski had made, he was talking about his
resignation, and he said, approximately 2015 2016. Now, I'd love to hear if anybody has aligned to him wasn't really 2015 Or was, again, this kind of off the cuff remark said just kind of like a 2015 2016 timeframe. Maybe he was planning it and 2015 didn't execute until May, you know, whatever that may be, then you're starting to cut it close. Maybe. But regardless, we still don't know. So, in my opinion, I believe his emails were destroyed early. But that is
just a guess at this point. It all depends on when the Kathy's actual resignation confirmed resignation date, or retiring date. When that actually was that'll determine if this was kosher or not. If I were to guess, I think it was early. I really do. So hopefully we can get that question answered. Number two, the second question that we still don't know what exact date was his email box destroyed that we don't know at all. According to them, the only closest the DIA came to
answering that was prior to April 2 2022. That doesn't help me at all. So I have asked now a couple of times with follow ups by the time I recorded this, but I'm kind of being met with deaf ears at this point. What was the exact destruction date? Because even though that they won't tell me when Lacatski retired, I said we can forget that just tell me when the emails were destroyed. And then we can kind of backdate from there and we can figure it
out. But until that happens, we're kind of in the dark. But bottom line though, I would guess that it was actually a little bit early. So was this routine procedure or an intentional cover up? And I think a lot of people kind of jumped to intentional cover up. And that could very well be true. But the reason why I pulled into Luis Elizondo story that I wrote in 2021, is what I've discovered since then, and that is a massive problem with record retention schedules not
being followed. And although that is getting into a very dry story, I mean, I fully admit that that not everybody really cares about the nitty gritty details when it comes to that. The bottom line is what matters and that is the fact that these records are be being destroyed way ahead of schedule. And that's a problem, that these records are being met with absolute disregard for their historical significance, but on top of that absolute disregard for what they need to be doing,
and that is preserving these records. And this is an issue. See, I started using the Freedom of Information Act thinking that the government just saved everything, and that you can just request and if it was there, then if it didn't fit into the nine exemptions, then boom, you got it right. Or it was heavily redacted or whatever. That was being young and naive and stupid on my part, because then you realize, no, the government actually destroys a lot. And that's part of the
game. And part of the game is the Freedom of Information Act, I do not believe is broken. There's a lot of people who trash it. Look, I got more than 3.23 point 3 million examples on why the FOIA is not broken, you can get some amazing things. But it definitely needs help. And in one of the reasons it needs help, and one of the ways it needs help, it is the amount of time that it takes to process requests. I've posted some in the last couple of months, a couple of them that almost had a
decade. That's a huge, huge problem. Some that take years, to to come our way, that is a huge, huge deal. It's not just because US citizens shouldn't have to wait that long, because we shouldn't, we're, we're doing stories, we're doing research, whatever. We're just curious, it doesn't matter. The Freedom of Information Act is at our disposal for a reason. But when
we get years of a wait, that is incredibly problematic. And I think that this is an issue that needs to be dealt with, because now when you when you add into the frustration of these delays, you add in the records, retention schedules, the records, retention schedules will destroy documents in a quicker amount of time than it takes some agencies to process a request. And what that means is, is it doesn't even matter if
your request goes in prior to document destruction. If they don't process it, they may not know to go to James look at skis, email box that's archived in whatever way that they archive and say, Hey, we have pending FOIA here, we have to go ahead and save that material for longer. No, none of that takes place. So if they prolong the processing of these requests, whether it be maliciously, intentionally, or just, it's the nature of the beast, because they're understaffed, doesn't
really matter. The end result is that it takes longer to process, that means all these records are destroyed. Now, we've talked about seven years here a couple of times, but there are records that are destroyed, literally within 30 to 45 days, all UFO fans out there will really kind of cringe on this one. But when it comes to the FAA records, and a lot of tower logs and, and the control tower recordings, while pilots are encountering UFOs and
UAP. That's undeniable, I have a pile of FOIA requests that prove that. But the only way I was able to prove that was that people gave me a tip. And they said there was an encounter over Dallas on this date. That happened two weeks ago. So go after records on it. And sure enough, recordings would come up, tower logs would note it, these incidents were being archived. But if it's after the 30 or 45 day period, the FAA destroys the air traffic control recordings, and they destroy
records because they don't keep them forever. Now, that's a problem. Now I'm only talking about one specific UFO related reason. And that's really interesting to me, may not be to the whole world. But what else is being lost on those shorter retention schedules? Some are only three years. Well, three years isn't a long wait when you talk about FOIA. So yet again, you're talking about a lot of material that's just being lost. A lot of these programs and stuff take years to come out
into the open. But if those those records, the emails that went in, to creating these programs, because a lot of times those emails and the banter back and forth, that's more interesting than what happened during the program itself. And the final reports and the quarterly summary reports and so on. The behind the scenes is a lot more interesting. But by the time that stuff is public, it's all gone. It's all destroyed. That's not true across the board. But it's true in enough
cases, that we need action. We need to do something about it because we are losing valuable, important history. And it doesn't matter what the topic is. Because all topics apply records retention schedules, it doesn't matter if it's a UFO or UAAP report or recording or something about aircraft or something about whatever, it doesn't stipulate that the records as a whole are either kept or destroyed. And that's it. And that needs to change. I hope we get more about the
Lacatski emails. I continue to dig not only through getting more information from dia, but also doing the exact same thing I did with Elizondo. And that was finding out key players that he was likely communicating with through other agencies, or maybe even dia, that even though the Catskills email boxes gone, the receiving end may have a retention schedule that says,
hey, this person is kept in perpetuity forever. And so even though the Catskills email box is gone, you do a request on that person for all communications they had with James Lacatski. And hopefully, fingers crossed, you can get the material. So it's a back engineering, if you will, the communications from James the cat ski out. I've done it with Luis Elizondo, and I've gotten results, not a tip related. But it was able to show a little bit of a glimpse of what Luis
Elizondo his job was within the Pentagon. Hopefully, we'll have the same with Rakowski. Only time will tell months, years, decades. Who knows. But you know, I've already filed quite a bit and I will report it to you whenever it comes in. So that's the update. Thank you so much for hanging out with me for a little bit here, talking about document destruction. And whether or not it's kosher or not by the book or not. Man, it really does irked me when that happened. So get involved. I
know some of this is dry. But get involved, make a stink out of it, start profiling these incidents where records are destroyed. Because look, look at what history we've lost. And it's important, and I think more people should know. So thank you for doing that. Again, thumbs up on the channel. If you're watching here on YouTube. If you're listening on the audio podcast version, I aim for five stars. Please take a minute of your time. Please add a review if you could, it is really
really helpful. And of course, make sure you're subscribed whether it be the audio format or the video if you are watching have no idea that some of these go down to a podcast audio form. If you'd like to listen to them while you're at work or or jogging or whatever it is that you're doing. It goes to every podcast platform that I know of anyway under the black vault radio. So just search for the black vault radio and you will
get the audio feed of these types of presentations. And again, enjoy if you're listening to the audio make sure you check out the YouTube channel as well go to the black vault.com/live and that will shoot you to the YouTube channel where you can see me sometimes live sometimes recorded but you'll be notified when the videos drop. Thank you again for listening and or watching. This is John Greenewald Jr signing off. And we'll see you next time.