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00:00On this episode of Expedition Files, in 1971, rock legend Jim Morrison dies in Paris. Or does he?
00:11Now, a wild theory ripped from the tabloids claims Morrison faked his death, is still alive today, and has now
00:19been found.
00:21Then, in Japan, what is said to be a fossilized mermaid is discovered in an ancient temple's vault.
00:28But what is this mystery specimen? New scientific testing finally uncovers the truth.
00:37And, at a place called Devil's Den, a U.S. airman is certain he had an alien encounter.
00:45Now, he's revealing the evidence that he says proves he was abducted by a UFO.
00:57In the corridors of time, are mysteries that defy explanation.
01:05Now, I'm traveling through history itself.
01:11On a search for the truth.
01:16New evidence.
01:19Shocking answers.
01:22I'm Josh Gates.
01:25And these...
01:27are my Expedition Files.
01:34Brace yourself for some shocking news.
01:37It turns out that sometimes, the tabloid media takes a story and sensationalizes it, blowing it out of all proportion.
01:45Not me, of course. I'm one of the good guys. I would never lie to you.
01:48No siree.
01:49And to prove it, I'm going to read the fine print of three sensational stories to see whether the media
01:56made a myth out of a molehill or if the truth really is stranger than any fiction.
02:01We begin on July 7th, 1971, in the famed Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, the final resting place of some
02:10of history's most famous celebrities.
02:12And one of them is being laid to rest today, but you wouldn't know it.
02:17There's no crowds, no fanfare, not even a priest.
02:21Just a plain wooden coffin.
02:23Who's inside?
02:24Jim Morrison, the 27-year-old front man of legendary 60s rock group The Doors, who passed away four days
02:32ago.
02:33The official cause of death? Heart failure.
02:36But the secrecy, the speed, and the silence surrounding this funeral don't just raise eyebrows.
02:42They ignite an extraordinary conspiracy theory that plays out in the media for decades to come.
02:49The idea that Jim Morrison's body isn't in this coffin at all, because he isn't actually dead.
02:55It may sound crazy, but 50 years on, a documentary filmmaker claims to have evidence that Rock's ultimate outlaw faked
03:04his final performance and is still alive and well.
03:17Born in 1943 in Melbourne, Florida, Jim Morrison is a Navy brat with a restless mind and a nonconformist soul.
03:26As a boy, he witnesses a violent car crash on a family road trip, a moment he later claims marks
03:33him forever.
03:34And while other kids toss footballs or dance to doo-wop, Jim is lost in darker worlds, reading French poet
03:42Charles Baudelaire and German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
03:46Their belief that suffering and pain are essential for creative growth grips the young Morrison.
03:54By the mid-1960s, he heads to Los Angeles to study film at UCLA, chasing images as intense as his
04:02inner world.
04:03Then, one afternoon in 1965 on Venice Beach, Jim bumps into former UCLA classmate Ray Manzarek.
04:12Jim shares some lyrics he's been scribbling, strange, poetic fragments about fire, desire and the end.
04:20Manzarek is stunned.
04:21Let's start a band, he says.
04:25The Doors is officially born.
04:27Morrison on vocals, Manzarek on keyboards, with guitarist Robbie Krieger and drummer John Densmore rounding out the lineup.
04:40Anchored by Jim's haunting lyrics, the band's sound is dark, poetic and defiant, perfect for a 60s generation that's disillusioned
04:50by war, assassinations and broken promises.
04:54With hits like Break On Through, Light My Fire and Riders on the Storm, Morrison becomes the face of the
05:01counterculture, equal parts sex symbol, shaman and showman.
05:06And despite Jim's heavy drinking, drug use and erratic behavior, the Doors become nothing short of a global phenomenon.
05:14The first American group to achieve eight consecutive gold LPs.
05:20In 1969, though, the now self-proclaimed Lizard King gets arrested for indecent exposure while on stage in Miami, sparking
05:30national backlash, canceled shows and a headline-grabbing trial.
05:35He receives a six-month jail sentence and a $500 fine, but remains free pending appeal.
05:42The combination of the scandal and Jim's escalating substance abuse strains his relationship with the band.
05:50In 1971, Morrison decides to break free from the Doors.
05:57That March, Jim and his longtime girlfriend, Pamela Corson, flee to Paris.
06:03It's supposed to be a reset, a chance for him to dry out, write poetry and enjoy a quiet break
06:09from his rock star persona.
06:12But then, in the early hours of July 3rd, four months into their French getaway, Pamela allegedly awakes to find
06:19Jim unresponsive in the bathtub.
06:26She eventually calls nearby friends who bring in the French authorities.
06:30But it's too late. Jim Morrison is dead.
06:35A doctor on the scene believes Morrison died of heart failure.
06:39No foul play is suspected. No autopsy is conducted.
06:43But here's where the story starts to twist.
06:46Considering Morrison's wild, rebellious lifestyle, some fans find it hard to accept that their hero died of natural causes at
06:55the age of 27 while simply taking a bath.
06:59Something doesn't make sense.
07:05Then, there's the secrecy and speed of what follows.
07:09Pamela had waited hours before alerting anyone.
07:12Along with no autopsy, there's no public viewing, a sealed casket, and just a handful of people at the funeral.
07:19Not even his bandmates or family are there.
07:23To many, it seems suspicious.
07:27The perfect conditions for conspiracy rumors to take root.
07:33Over the years, several theories surface.
07:36One of the most persistent, that Morrison overdosed hours earlier in a Paris nightclub.
07:42According to a former manager at the club, Morrison showed up that night in rough shape.
07:49Two drug dealers arrived and escorted him into the bathroom with a load of heroin.
07:56He claims Jim never came out.
08:00A little while later, the nightclub manager says Jim was found slumped in a bathroom stall, unresponsive.
08:08Allegedly, the club's owners were worried about a drug scandal, and allowed the pair of dealers to carry Morrison out
08:15the back door and to his apartment.
08:18There, they helped Pamela Corson get him into a cold bath in an effort to revive him, to no avail.
08:28The next morning, Pamela tells authorities that she found Jim dead in the bathtub.
08:33I'm so sorry.
08:36There's no mention of the club, no mention of drugs, just heart failure.
08:41The nightclub theory has plenty of skeptics, and for good reason.
08:46There are many conflicting versions of events, and at the time, not a single person at a Paris nightclub stepped
08:52forward to testify having seen one of the most famous rock stars in the world, which leads some to a
08:58darker conclusion.
08:59Maybe Morrison never left the apartment at all, but heroin was still ultimately what killed him.
09:06Multiple sources say Pamela often used the drug, while Jim stuck mostly to alcohol and occasionally cocaine.
09:15But that night may have been different.
09:18The theory goes that Pamela had heroin on hand.
09:25Jim, either curious or mistaking it for cocaine, tried some.
09:32Think Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction.
09:35Except in this case, it's fatal.
09:44Some suggest that Pamela wakes to find that he's overdosed.
09:53Panicking, it's argued that she clears the drugs from the apartment before calling for help, maybe to avoid being blamed.
10:00Or maybe because she fears no one would have believed it was an accident.
10:08With no autopsy or toxicology report, there's no way to know for sure if heroin caused Jim's death.
10:15But we do know this.
10:16Pamela Corson died of a heroin overdose herself just three years later.
10:21There's one more theory, though, the most extraordinary of all, that argues Jim never died in Paris because he never
10:28died, period.
10:30Supposedly, Jim faked his death and is still alive in 2025.
10:35Could it possibly be true?
10:42For decades, suspicion has shadowed Jim Morrison's death.
10:46Heart failure never quite fit the strange details of that night.
10:50And one shocking theory claims he may not have died at all.
10:54But how could that be?
10:56By 1971, Jim is burned out.
10:59He's facing a jail sentence for the indecent exposure incident in Miami.
11:04He's hounded by the press, bloated, depressed, and fed up with fame.
11:09Friends say he dreamed of disappearing, shedding the rock star persona and living quietly as a poet.
11:16Some even recall him joking about faking his death and sitting back to watch the legend grow.
11:23Over the decades, people have claimed to spot him alive, living under the radar in places like rural Oregon, Australia,
11:30even the Congo.
11:31Most of these are chalked up to wishful thinking, fans unwilling to let go of their hero.
11:37But now, documentary filmmaker Jeff Finn says the impossible might actually be true, that Jim Morrison is still alive and
11:45he's been found.
11:46There are numerous alternative theories abounding regarding Jim post-death, post-July 1971.
11:57Certainly, those helped inspire me to, you know, dive deeper down the rabbit hole.
12:04Chief among them was a fascinating story from one of the Doors' roadies who became a dear friend of mine,
12:11the late Gareth Blythe.
12:13Gareth Blythe told me that he had friends in the Bay Area, San Francisco, who were convinced they saw Jim
12:21in 1972, a year after his supposed demise.
12:27Now, this is fascinating because this sort of corroborates other sightings that were listed in the media through the years
12:36of Jim in the Bay Area.
12:38So, a picture emerges of Jim on the move.
12:43I had this, you know, innate sense that someday I'm going to find Jim Morrison alive.
12:50I kept all my notes and those added up to all the research I'd already done.
12:55And then there came a point in 2012 where I was ready to make a documentary film about Jim.
13:02In his film, Finn documents his years-long investigation into Morrison's fate.
13:07The search leads not to some distant foreign hideaway, but to upstate New York.
13:12And to a man Finn wants to call Frank X, not revealing his full name because, well, Frank X is
13:19allegedly Jim Morrison, alive and well.
13:23I first encountered the man I nicknamed Frank X in December 2016.
13:29I've joked that it's not so much that I found Frank, it's that he let me find him.
13:36He began following my official Facebook page, and I remember just being struck and, you know, zooming in with my
13:46eyes and then later pulling the photo up and enlarging it to see what I believed was the spitting image
13:53of an elderly Jim Morrison.
13:55And he was standing next to John Densmore, the Doors drummer.
14:02It's one of the most haunting moments I've ever experienced, like seeing a real ghost.
14:08Eventually, Finn convinces Frank X to sit for an interview.
14:12And during their conversation, Finn becomes certain that Frank and Jim Morrison are one and the same.
14:19I will never forget when we finally met in person in May of 2017.
14:25One of the many things that just blew my mind during the interview was Frank's expressed interest in French poet
14:35Charles Baudelaire, who was essentially synonymous with Jim's interest going back to his formative years, certainly his teen years.
14:45And who would you say is your favorite poet?
14:48I like Baudelaire. I don't read a lot of new poetry.
14:53He said that pleasure cannot be possible without the presence of evil.
14:58And forgive me, whose quote was this?
15:01Baudelaire.
15:02This was just astounding to me.
15:06Detractors will immediately say, this guy has brown eyes, you know, and indeed he does.
15:11But at one point in the interview, I kindly asked him to remove his baseball cap.
15:18If you would be so kind as to let us see you without your hat so we can see your
15:22face better, because the bill on your cap covers your eyes, like.
15:25I looked into his eyes and I instantly felt there was a murkiness there.
15:32And I thought, my God, he's wearing brown contact lenses.
15:35In terms of physical matches, it went on and on.
15:39Vein matches on the arms, moles, scars, one nostril being slightly wider or flared than the other.
15:50It's incredible.
15:52After the interview was completed, my editors and I extracted a vocal clip from my on-camera interview with Frank
16:02X, and we created a comparison, an audio comparison.
16:07I then played that comparison for a number of Jim's former friends, lovers, acquaintances, etc.
16:14Well, I like Artificial Paradise.
16:20I like interviews because.
16:22And each time I played it for them, they just assumed it was Jim.
16:26They went, oh, there he is, or there's his voice.
16:28You know, and I would tell them, no, no, that first voice is Frank.
16:32It's incredible.
16:35As for Frank X's take on all this, well, he hasn't copped to the fact that he's Jim Morrison.
16:41But Jeff thinks that Frank is just toying with him.
16:44It felt to me, you know, like a game of cat and mouse.
16:48I think he loves it.
16:49He, in fact, has basically said as much.
16:51He loves the game.
16:52He loves the attention, the respect.
16:55If, in fact, he ever does fully give it up, it's got to be under his terms.
17:01And I respect that.
17:02I understand that.
17:02And I appreciate that.
17:03I knew definitively, you know, for what it's worth, every molecule of my being.
17:11You know, I was like, this is him.
17:13It all adds up.
17:14The so-called Frank X denies that he is Jim Morrison, though he has always been a huge fan of
17:20his music.
17:22Frank claims he's lived most of his life in upstate New York, where he worked as a maintenance man.
17:28Let's get real, though.
17:30None of Jim Morrison's former bandmates or friends believe he made it past the age of 27.
17:35And for my money, Frank X is a little more Duck Dynasty than Lizard King.
17:40But, hey, wouldn't it be great to learn that one of rock's greatest icons defied the odds to forego fame
17:46and fortune in favor of the quiet life?
17:49Now that Finn's documentary has gotten attention, Frank X was recently invited to throw out the first pitch at a
17:55Syracuse minor league baseball game.
17:57If Frank really is Jim, he seems to be living his best life.
18:01Break on through to the other side indeed.
18:08It's 1842, and crowds flock to P.T. Barnum's American Museum in New York, eager to catch a glimpse of
18:16an astonishing oddity.
18:17The mummified body of a supposedly real mermaid.
18:22But Ariel, she is not.
18:24This preserved creature is half fish, half monkey.
18:28And Barnum's mysterious marvel isn't alone.
18:31Across the Pacific in Japan, similar mermaid monkeys have also been preserved and displayed.
18:37Now, if you're like me, you're probably thinking this whole thing sounds a little, well, fishy.
18:42So what's the real story?
18:44The answer involves dredging up a legend that dates back thousands of years and a scientific study that will finally
18:52reveal the truth behind one seriously scaly tale.
19:05Long before gracing your coffee as a Starbucks logo, the legend of merfolk goes back millennia.
19:12First surfacing in Mesopotamia with the half-man, half-fish god Ea.
19:19Centuries later, stories emerge of sea nymphs, sirens, and beautiful women of the water, mysterious, seductive, and just dangerous enough
19:29to keep sailors on edge.
19:31But in Japan, another version of this creature exists, the ningyo, meaning human fish.
19:38It has scales, a fish-like body, and a monkey-like face with tiny teeth.
19:45The first written account of ningyo's appears in an 8th-century book called The Nihon Shoki, a compilation of Japan's
19:54myths.
19:55It describes how in the year 619, a fish with humanoid facial features is allegedly spotted in the Gamo River.
20:03Later that year, it documents how a fisherman in the town of Setsu claims to have netted a gruesome creature
20:10with both human and fish traits.
20:13But there's more to a ningyo than its eerie fish-meets-monkey form.
20:19In Japanese folklore, these creatures carry powerful and dangerous supernatural baggage.
20:26Catch one, and legend says you could unleash raging storms that swallow ships whole.
20:34Not every ningyo encounter ends in disaster.
20:37Some stories claim that the ningyo's tears can crystallize into shimmering pearls.
20:44And the boldest legend of all?
20:47That a single bite of its flesh could grant you immortality.
20:51There are generations of powerful stories about the Japanese mermaid, but is there anything that could back them up?
20:58Remarkably, the answer is yes, and it's about to be revealed.
21:07The Japanese legend of the ningyo, half-fish, half-human with monkey-like features, has long captivated the public.
21:15But is there any hard evidence for these reported creatures?
21:21Starting around the 17th century, alleged ningyo mummies are often bought by the wealthy as exotic curiosities.
21:30Ningyos are also enshrined in temples and featured in traveling sideshows.
21:35But there is one so-called Japanese mermaid mummy specimen that is seemingly more convincing than any other.
21:44It is said to be discovered in the 18th century, off the coast of Japan's Tosa province.
21:52Early one morning, two fishermen allegedly land their most astounding catch ever, the seaweed-covered corpse of a half-fish,
22:01half-human creature.
22:02They soon learn they've dredged up a ningyo, and hear of the potential curses it can bring.
22:09The story goes that the Tosa fishermen sell it to the wealthy Kojima family to avert any potential curses.
22:17For generations, the family regards the mermaid mummy as a cherished heirloom.
22:23Later, it will find its way to the Enjouin Temple, a Zen Buddhist order near Okayama, Japan,
22:29where it then sits in storage for the next 200 years.
22:38A monk carries in a dusty wooden box to show his high priest.
22:43They've heard whisperings about its contents, but the gruesome, withered form that greets them still comes as a shock.
22:50A mummified ningyo.
22:52They know the legends, but where did this one come from?
22:56Inside the box, there's also a handwritten note.
23:00The note seemingly dates back over two centuries, and recounts this mermaid's storied history,
23:07from the fishermen who found it, to the Kojimas, to its relocation at the temple.
23:12The head of the temple puts the mermaid mummy on display.
23:17Almost overnight, it becomes a sensation.
23:19For the next 50 years, tens of thousands of pilgrims and tourists alike flock to the temple,
23:27all eager to lay eyes on a supposedly bona fide ningyo.
23:33In fact, during the COVID-19 pandemic, people even prayed to the mummy, desperate for it to help ease the
23:40crisis.
23:40For 50 years, the Tosa mermaid is treasured as a miraculous relic, the preserved remains of a magical sea creature.
23:50Yet skeptics argue the corpse is not what it seems.
23:54So what exactly is it?
23:55In 2022, scientists at Karashki University are the first in history to gain permission to investigate the relic.
24:03Using cutting-edge technology, they set out to solve the mermaid mystery for good.
24:08Professor of religion, Dr. Max Moorman, followed their unprecedented work closely.
24:14The scientists were given permission by the head priest of NJUJI to bring the ningyo into their veterinary hospital suite.
24:23They used CT scans and X-ray and found that there were no internal organs, but rather that the interior
24:32of the ningyo was made up of inorganic matter, textiles, cotton, and paper built up to form the interior of
24:43the body.
24:44And then the outside skin was coated with a substance of ground charcoal and sand and coated with a shellac
24:54-like substance.
24:55It was not an actual creature, just a structure built to resemble an actual creature.
25:02If this was all just a fabrication, how did it manage to be so convincing for so long?
25:08Well, it turns out that while the interior of the mermaid was fake, the exterior was all too real.
25:15DNA analysis revealed that the two halves were largely a monkey and a fish.
25:20So the upper part of the torso was mainly primate, the head, the torso, the arms.
25:29The jaw, however, was a carnivorous fish.
25:33The lower part was a fish, probably a croaker.
25:37These biological elements included just enough realism to convince the viewers that it just might be an animal.
25:46As for being discovered in the 1700s, well, turns out that's not true either.
25:51They were able to use radiocarbon dating on the paper and the cotton that was used to make the ningyo.
25:59According to the data, it was produced between 1870 and 1890, which is over 100 years after it was allegedly
26:09dredged out of the water.
26:10In other words, those two 18th century fishermen who supposedly found the ningyo, they were a myth too.
26:18And the so-called note of provenance, a forgery.
26:21There was in the late 1800s, early 1900s in Japan, a booming culture of public sideshow entertainment, carnivals and the
26:31like called misemono.
26:32And they exhibited all sorts of curiosities, like the ningyo.
26:40So it's very likely that this particular ningyo would have been produced for this sort of context.
26:47So, sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but the Japanese mermaid is definitely a fake.
26:53But what about P.T. Barnum's Fiji mermaid that we met back at the beginning of our story?
26:57Surely that's real.
26:59Well, it turns out both specimens had a lot in common.
27:02In a way, they were kind of the same species.
27:04Because the Fiji mermaid was not only completely fake, but most likely also handcrafted in Japan.
27:10Though there is one important distinction.
27:13While P.T. Barnum's mermaid was just for spectacle, its Japanese counterpart was a nearly sacred object of worship.
27:21The Tosa ningyo and other dried ningyo in Japan had protective value to those who viewed it.
27:31It had its own legend. It had its own cultural history.
27:34Despite the findings about the Enjuin Temple's mermaid mummy, the chief priest decided to put it back on display, where
27:42it remains a popular attraction to this day.
27:45He sees it not as a deception, but as a symbol of people's ongoing fascination with the mystical and unknown.
27:52And sometimes that can hold much more power than the truth.
27:57Anyone for sushi?
28:03June, 1977.
28:05Two men, Terry Lovelace and his co-worker Toby, are on a camping trip at Devil's Den State Park in
28:12Arkansas.
28:13It's a beautiful setting, with stars twinkling in the gathering night sky.
28:18But in a moment, this peaceful evening will reportedly turn to terror,
28:22kick-starting a decades-long mystery with out-of-this-world evidence.
28:27Because these two men are, allegedly, about to be abducted by a UFO.
28:41According to Terry Lovelace, before the lights appeared over Devil's Den, his life was altogether normal.
28:47Four years into his Air Force service at the Whiteman Air Force Base, he's newly married and studying to become
28:53a lawyer.
28:58He's also an EMT.
29:00He spends his nights working the graveyard shift as a medic.
29:03His partner on the shift is Toby, a close friend, fellow medic, and amateur astronomer.
29:10And on a long weekend in June of 1977, they take off on a four-day road trip, getting away
29:17from the city to go camping.
29:19The men drive six hours from the Air Force Base to a remote part of Arkansas, a place called Devil's
29:26Den.
29:28They settle in for a night under the stars, and then that massive triangular craft shows up.
29:35It hovers over their campsite, a beam of light shooting down over the two terrified men.
29:43Terry will later report that a strange wave of exhaustion washes over them, keeping them from running away.
29:56Terry says the next thing he remembers is waking up, his body scorched and aching, his clothes disheveled.
30:04Is it still out there?
30:08To his horror, when he looks outside the tent, he sees the craft hovering even lower.
30:14And more shocking, several small, gray beings on the ground.
30:20This is the story as reported by Terry.
30:23He claims that the terror he experiences this night will haunt him for the next 40 years.
30:29Many are skeptical about his account.
30:32That is, until a shocking medical discovery changes everything.
30:36Hold on to your hyperdrives.
30:38This sensational story is just getting started.
30:47According to Terry Lovelace, he and his friend Toby have an alien encounter in 1977.
30:53After spotting an unexplainable craft hovering above them, they black out, only to wake up and find mysterious gray beings
31:02surrounding their camp.
31:03The two men sit frozen, watching in silence as the gray figures dissolve into a beam of light.
31:12Moments later, the ship itself slips soundlessly back into the sky.
31:17Terry and Toby huddle fearfully in their tent.
31:22And when dawn finally breaks, they bolt for their car, leaving all of their camping gear behind and never daring
31:29to look back.
31:31Before they make it to town, Toby recalls something astonishing.
31:35Memories of both of them being taken on board the alien craft and experimented on.
31:42The men are shaken and feel lucky to be alive, but are due back on base, reporting for duty later
31:49that day.
31:51But Terry says their supervisor takes one look at them and sends them straight to the base hospital for medical
31:56attention.
31:57The men are allegedly examined, and both supposedly share near-identical symptoms.
32:04Burns, dehydration, blurred vision, and red welts across their bodies.
32:11According to Terry's account, his time in the hospital is painful and disorienting.
32:16His eyes are extremely sensitive to light, while doctors photograph him, draw blood, and run tests.
32:23Then, he says a senior officer persuades him to meet with agents from the Air Force's Office of Special Investigations.
32:31Terry says these real-life men in black have him consent to chemical hypnosis to help him recall what happened.
32:38However, Terry feels their primary concern is not his mental well-being.
32:43Instead, it's initiating a cover-up.
32:47How many pictures did you take?
32:49Sir, not one.
32:51He says that before they leave, the government official gives him a final order.
32:55Forget what happened.
32:58As Terry tells it, after he returns to work, he learns that Toby is reassigned to a base in Japan.
33:05In fact, he never sees him again.
33:08Over time, Terry, too, moves on, putting the events of that horrifying night in the rearview mirror.
33:15In fact, he goes on to an impressive career.
33:18He earns his law degree and later serves as Assistant Attorney General for the state of Vermont.
33:25Over 30 years pass.
33:27Then, one morning in 2012, Terry wakes with a strange, sharp pain in his leg.
33:32At the VA hospital, Terry says that doctors take an x-ray, and what appears on the scan is shocking.
33:38A mysterious, metallic object that looks like a microchip embedded deep in his leg.
33:44Never having had any surgeries or injuries before, Terry fears the worst.
33:50Could this be an alien implant?
34:0135 years after Terry Lovelace's alleged abduction,
34:05he says an x-ray reveals an unknown square object lodged deep in his thigh,
34:10and he has no explanation for how it got there.
34:13Baffled, Terry fears it's some kind of alien tracking device.
34:19A mysterious object in your body is pretty alarming,
34:22and for Terry, it was the catalyst to dig deeper into the memories he said he'd repressed over the years.
34:29He undergoes regression hypnosis,
34:31a highly controversial technique that claims to pull lost memories back to the surface.
34:37Terry says the treatment unlocks vivid memories he believes were buried by the trauma of abduction.
34:44Under hypnosis, one of his first recollections is being inside a massive craft.
34:50Looking around, he sees diminutive gray beings with large heads and almond-shaped eyes.
34:57Terry recalls being restrained on a surgical table.
35:00They begin probing and cutting, pain searing through his body.
35:08For Terry, the memories are a horrible validation.
35:11He is now completely certain he was abducted by aliens.
35:16He's also determined to convince the world of his encounter.
35:20In 2018, he publishes a book, goes on tour, and is embraced by the UFO community.
35:27Terry may be convinced, but me?
35:29I got a few questions.
35:31Chief among them, what happened to Toby,
35:33the only other eyewitness to this extraordinary encounter?
35:37Well, Terry claims he tried to track his old friend down,
35:40but says an FBI agent told him Toby died in 2007.
35:44No word on the identity of this agent,
35:47and Terry has refused to divulge Toby's full name out of respect for his family.
35:52Enter my old friend, UFO researcher Ben Hanson,
35:55who's spent years digging into Terry's account,
35:58starting with the memories he claimed to recover during regression hypnosis.
36:04Hypnotic regression is very controversial.
36:06It's used sometimes in law enforcement
36:08because it can help a witness remember things such as a license plate number.
36:12But often in the world of alleged alien abductions and things of that sort,
36:18it also has the ability to introduce what we call false memories.
36:24Having interviewed several alleged abductees
36:28and some of the most prolific cases,
36:30I feel that Terry's case is very similar
36:33in the description of the craft,
36:37the interaction with the beings and their descriptions.
36:40When it comes to very extraordinary stories,
36:43I tell people, don't believe everything you hear,
36:46but don't disbelieve it just because you haven't heard it before.
36:51Open-minded but also skeptical,
36:54Hanson then evaluated Terry's x-ray
36:56that potentially showed a square-shaped implant.
37:00I've seen the x-rays myself,
37:02and if this truly was from the examination that occurred,
37:06I am not a medical professional,
37:08but it doesn't take a medical professional to say
37:11that object does not belong in a human body.
37:15You can see what looks like about a thumbnail-sized square
37:20embedded in his right thigh,
37:23and running down from that,
37:25it looks like two very thin filaments or wires that come off of this.
37:30There's no part of the anatomy I'm aware of
37:32that should include a square object
37:35with what looks like antennae or wires coming off of it.
37:40This implant would seem to be the key to everything.
37:43If it truly exists, it could be tested in a lab,
37:47its makeup analyzed, its origin determined,
37:50settling Terry's claims once and for all.
37:53Unfortunately, there's just one small problem.
37:57In 2017, Terry claims he wakes with severe bruising on his thigh
38:01where the object was first found.
38:03He submits to a second x-ray,
38:06which reveals the object is now gone.
38:09Almost.
38:10All that remains are what looks like the two filaments or wires.
38:16So, are they there?
38:18In 2021, Ben Hanson opened an investigation,
38:21arranging an experiment with Terry,
38:23one Ben hoped would reveal if any foreign objects
38:27were indeed in Terry's leg.
38:30In 2021, I met him at his home.
38:34They need more people like you to tell their stories,
38:37so I appreciate it.
38:38Of course, when I saw the x-rays,
38:41I was just shocked because, for me,
38:44it was validation that these things put their hands on me.
38:47So I do have a few things here that we could try and test with,
38:51but is that okay if we do that?
38:53Oh, absolutely.
38:55We tried multiple different things.
38:57I used an electromagnetic field meter.
39:00I expected to find nothing.
39:02It did come up with some readings,
39:04which were kind of unusual.
39:10It's kind of odd.
39:12It's just really unusually high.
39:15I took out a neodymium magnet such as this.
39:19It's a very, very strong magnet,
39:21and passed it over where he said the object had originally been located.
39:28I expected to find nothing.
39:30But this little magnet, as powerful as it was,
39:34had a pole to it,
39:35and it rotated slightly in my hand.
39:38So as I would pass it over,
39:40it would kind of wobble,
39:42and you could feel that there was an attraction of something metallic
39:46within Terry's knee.
39:47The finding was intriguing,
39:50but Ben remains skeptical.
39:51A single piece of circumstantial evidence
39:54is not enough to close this case.
39:56The biggest weak link in Terry Lovelace's story,
39:59it's that all of the information
40:01and the evidence that's been presented
40:03comes directly from him.
40:05What we don't have,
40:06and what I wish we had,
40:07is more corroborating evidence.
40:09But what I would really like to have
40:11is a witness,
40:13but Toby's gone.
40:14And so all we have
40:15is the story from Terry himself.
40:21In the case of Terry,
40:23I found Terry Lovelace to be a credible witness.
40:26He was an attorney, very intelligent,
40:28who rose to the level of assistant attorney general
40:31in the state of Vermont.
40:32He had a lot to lose,
40:34not a lot to gain by coming out and talking about this.
40:37So it's unlikely that someone of his caliber, if you will,
40:42would come forward with such a fantastical story
40:45if it were not true.
40:47But at this time,
40:48we just don't have enough to say
40:49that it really happened exactly as he remembered.
40:52And so all we have is the story from Terry himself.
40:56Terry Lovelace's story
40:57has won over many UFO enthusiasts.
41:00But the skeptics note
41:01that we can't independently verify any of his claims.
41:05The square object seen on X-ray, conveniently gone.
41:09The wires, never removed.
41:11No hospital records, no military reports,
41:14and the one other witness, a phantom.
41:17The truth may be out there,
41:18but for now, this is one sci-fi saga in need of a sequel.
41:22Title it, The Evidence Strikes Back.
41:25I'm Josh Gates,
41:26and I'll see you on the next expedition.
41:28I'll see you on the next expedition.
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