Somewhere in the Skies - The Brooklyn Bridge Alien Abduction

Episode Date: November 2, 2024

On episode 380, we revisit a past episode and interview that tackles a highly controversial case. With the recent release of a 3-part Netflix series titled, The Manhattan Alien Abduction, we look back at the Brooklyn Bridge alien abduction case of Linda Napolitano, investigated by the late abduction researcher, Budd Hopkins. In November of 1989, Napolitano was seen emerging from an apartment building window twelve stories above the ground accompanied by three small alien figures. She was then lifted into a craft which then moved off in the direction of the Brooklyn Bridge. Twists and turns in the case have made it a highly debated event for many decades. To further that debate, Ryan invited Peter Robbins to the show. Robbins is a UFO researcher, author, and former assistant to Budd Hopkins. Robbins runs us through his personal experiences with both Hopkins and Napolitano, and sheds light on this dark and disturbing case like never before. Read "Witnessed: The True Story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO Abductions: https://a.co/d/dMEkE10 Follow Peter Robbins on Twitter: https://x.com/PeterRobbinsUFO Patreon: www.patreon.com/somewhereskies ByMeACoffee: buymeacoffee.com/UFxzyzHOaQ PayPal: [e-mail] Website: www.somewhereintheskies.com Store: http://tee.pub/lic/ULZAy7IY12U YouTube Channel: CLICK HERE Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/somewhereskies/videos Order Ryan’s new book: https://a.co/d/4KNQnM4 Order Ryan’s older book: https://amzn.to/3PmydYC Twitter: @SomewhereSkies Read Ryan’s Articles by CLICKING HERE Opening Theme Song, "Ephemeral Reign" by Per Kiilstofte Produced by LIONSGATE Copyright © 2024. Ryan Sprague. All rights reserved. Support this show http://supporter.acast.com/somewhere-in-the-skies. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hey guys, Ryan here, host of Somewhere in the Skies. So, a documentary series recently premiered on Netflix. It's called The Manhattan Alien Abduction. It centers on one of the most controversial alien abduction cases out there, involving a woman named Linda Napolitano. This three-part series doesn't only cover the case, but it also focuses on the primary investigator of the case itself, the late Bud Hopkins.

Featured in the series is Linda herself, filmmaker Carol Rainey, and my personal mentor, friend, and colleague, Peter Robbins. Many years ago, I wrote what has become one of my most popular articles I've ever written, and that was on this very case. It was the cover article of the now-defunct Open Minds magazine, and it went on to be published in several other countries and in other languages. In the article, I was both open-minded and critical of the case at the time, of which I admittedly still am today. However, both Linda and Peter have taken great issue with how the case and even how they themselves were portrayed in this docu series, and this has unfortunately culminated into a lawsuit in the Supreme Court,

currently being filed by Linda in members of the Hopkins family and estate. All this being said, I clearly have a conflict of interest when it comes to this case and those involved. However, I thought this would be a valuable opportunity to share this classic episode and interview with all of you, where I give an overview of the case, and then we hear directly from Peter Robbins. When it comes to this case, my advice, as Peter is often given me, is to read the original book by Bud Hopkins, titled, witnessed the true story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO abductions. And I urge you, whether you read the book or watch the docu-series, to just come to your own conclusions.

Because if there's anything I've learned from over 20 years of UFO research in almost 400 episodes of the podcast, the truth always lay somewhere in between. But for now, here's a classic episode about the Brooklyn Bridge alien abutments. where that truth also lay somewhere in the skies. Enjoy. This was the first time I'd ever consciously seen those things.

I mean, when I opened up my eyes before I threw that pillow, this thing was standing at the foot of my pen. Do you know what that's like? Well, we put locks on our doors. To keep outside is from coming in. How did that thing get in my apartment? And I was standing there, just standing there staring at me. I was horrible.

This is somewhere in the skies, and Brian's bread. Despite the controversial nature of the UFO phenomenon as a whole, there's one sibling to its anatomatic family that remains the black sheep in the corner. Alien abduction. From the strikingly human story of Whitley Streeper in upstate New York to the mysterious case of Travis Walton in the backwoods of Arizona. Abductions have made headlines around the world. Most shrug abduction allegations off with a skeptical shoulder,

chalking it up to sleep paralysis, concocted hoaxes, hypnagogic hallucinations, and suppressed memories of childhood trauma. But one man dared to take the phenomenon to heart, with a compassion unlike most. That man was Bud Hopkins. Well, the first thing I like today is I have been dealing with the phenomenon for a long time, And I know that when people come back from an abduction experience, very often what they remember is not exactly what happened. It's as if their memories have been altered, played with, whatnot through some sort of hypnotic means.

We don't know what happens. And we know that they have been told certain things sometimes, which is obviously not true. And there's a certain degree of deception. Hopkins encountered many abduction stories that may be explainable as a result of the aforementioned reasons. but some would stick with him as genuine and deeply complex. And in the case of one woman in New York City, the abduction account would change both her life and that of Hopkins forever. Bud Hopkins was coming off the heels of two very successful books

concerning his hypnotic regression work with individuals spanning the globe, who claimed to have been abducted by beings from other worlds. Missing time, the publication that would ultimately revolution, the abduction phenomenon, had instantly become an international sensation. Soon after, he released his second book on the abduction topic, intruders, the incredible visitations at Copley Woods. But in his second book, Hopkins focused more in depth on an individual case concerning Kathy Davis, a multiple abductee who would recall her frightening encounters with small beings, who would literally float her out of her bedroom window, take her aboard their craft,

an experiment on her. It all began with this photograph. After the publication of his first book on UFO research called Missing, Bud received this picture from Kathy Davis of Indianapolis. Kathy claimed that the circle and strip of dead grass had appeared in her yard after she had seen a UFO in the area, and she wondered if the damage had been caused by a UFO taking off and landing. Oddly, she also mentioned that both she and her mother had similar scars,

and neither of them could remember the causes. Her curiosity opened a floodgate of revelations. Under hypnosis, Kathy recalled not just the terrifying events of the night she mentioned, which culminated with her abduction, but several other close encounters that had occurred throughout her life. At the age of seven, she had apparently become an unwilling participant in a long-term genetic experiment. Kathy remembered none of this consciously. Hypnosis revealed that a sample of flesh had been removed from her leg during that first abduction by an alien creature she described as having a large head with huge black eyes.

Now, if Kathy were the only person describing these encounters, one would be inclined as she did herself to doubt her sanity. But these drawings have been done by dozens of different people from various locations claiming similar experiences. Now, over the course of many hypnotic sessions, the purpose of these abductions became clear. Kathy had an over-removed from her body and was eventually shown a hybrid child.

apparently par human, part alien. She was told that she was the mother but could not keep the child. Obviously, this revelation, whether real or imagined, was devastating to Kathy. Kathy's story had a huge impact on others who claimed similar experiences, but none more than that of Linda Napolitano. Napolitano had previously been working with Hopkins on hypnotic regression sessions. She had written Hopkins a letter, stating that she had an implant put into her nasal cavity during one of her abductions.

The cavity was examined by a physician who insisted that she must have undergone some sort of surgery when she was younger. Napolitano never remembered ever having such surgery, an assertion confirmed by her mother shortly after. Hopkins, a New York City resident, lived only miles from Napolitano. So he decided he would work with her directly, having her attend his abduction support group meetings, and checking in with her every now and again. But it was Napolitano who would contact him next,

and the story she had to tell would ignite a flame that still remains burning today. It was in the late morning of November 30, 1989, that Napolitano called Hopkins in a daze and sounded like she was in complete shock. She went on to tell him that she had been abducted earlier that morning. A few days later, she went under regressive hypnosis with Hopkins, and details about the abduction slowly begin to trickle in.

She remembered literally floating out of her bed and being carried through a solid window of her 12th floor apartment in lower Manhattan. Colors of blue and white enveloped her eyes as she ascended into a craft that was hovering over her apartment building. Three small beings accompanied her up to the craft. The beings then began swiftly partaking in what seemed to be a protocol of examination. She was returned to her bed sometime later. I tried to wake my husband.

Eyes still closed. And there was no response from my husband. And that's when I did open my eyes and I looked straight ahead. And there was this thing, this creature, standing at the foot of my bed. And it was the first time I had ever seen that consciously. I was awake. I hadn't gone to sleep yet. I was saying my prayers.

And so by this time my legs were numb. And I sat up in bed dragging my heavy legs with me and turned up behind me and threw a pillow, big pillow that I made. You would think that I stuffed them or rock was heavy. And I hit him too, that creature. And my next conscious memory, fragmented memory, was seeing white. fabric flow up and over my eyes and then down again and then I felt something perhaps little fists or maybe an instrument pounding on my back and and that was all I remembered and then my next conscious memory was that of falling into my bed I could have fallen anywhere from two inches up or two feet

up or whatever, but I was conscious and I felt myself falling to bed. This episode is brought to you by Netflix. Most valuable promotions in Netflix are hosting a blockbuster triple headliner Saturday, May 16th. Rhonda Rousey returns to face fellow woman's MMA pioneer Gina Carrano in the main

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He was looking for something solid that could help put Napolitano at ease or bring some sort of closure to her. Then, a letter arrived in Hopkins mailbox that would break the case wide open and confirm that not only did Napolitano have a genuine and physical experience, but there had in fact been witnesses to the entire event. It wasn't until February of the following year that Hopkins received a shocking letter regarding Napolitano's abduction. In reading it, Hopkins was convinced

that he was getting closer to some sort of answer to the abduction phenomenon. But first, he had to figure out how to approach Napolitano about the letter. For so long, she had tried to convince herself that it was some sort of continuous night. or hallucination. But the story Napolitano told under regression matched so strikingly with this letter that Hopkins had no other choice but to share the letter with her. The letter was reportedly

written by two New York police officers under the assumed names of Richard and Dan, who were working undercover on the night of the event. They sat in their car under FDR Drive in Manhattan and watched as a large red object with green lights wrapped around its cylindrical exterior, hovered in the dark sky. They sat in the car terrified, and soon they saw the figure of a woman in a nightgown, crouched in the fetal position, floating in mid-air. Three small beings surrounded her in a triangular fashion as they ascended into the craft. The craft then headed towards the Brooklyn Bridge and disappeared out of sight. The officers couldn't process what they had just seen and sat there, dumbfounded, not quite sure how to proceed.

They were deeply concerned about the whereabouts of this woman and wanted nothing more than to know that she was not only safe, but alive. Hopkins confronted Naboletano about the letter and warned her that the officers were planning a visit to her apartment. They had, in fact, remembered the exact location of her apartment building and even the floor she was mysteriously taken from. They were only two blocks away, and they were sitting under the FDR drive in their car,

and they used binoculars. And that's how they identified me, because they realized they knew what building and window that I came out of. It was only a few days later that Napolitano phoned Hopkins, confirming that the men had visited her, and that it was a strange interaction indeed. The meeting was emotional on both ends. Meeting with each other confirmed that something impossible had been witnessed and experienced in real time,

and that Napolitano was physically taken by something possibly extraterrestrial. Richard seemed a bit more relieved, although Dan was clearly distraught and bluntly asked Napolitano, quote, how did you do it? How did you make it happen? End quote. Napolitano was completely taken back by his questioning, defending herself by explaining that the entire event occurred against her will. Dan just didn't seem to accept that she hadn't had a part in the events that took place that night. Napolitano requested that the men meet with Hopkins to further the investigation of her experience. The men immediately said they wished not to meet in person and said they would contact Hopkins via phone. After more conversation, the officers left her apartment.

Weeks later, Hopkins received a phone call from Richard, which threw a new curveball into the case. Richard admitted that he and Dan were in fact not members of the police department, but were hired security officers who were escorting a client to a helicopter pad in Lower Manhattan that night. This client was also a witness to the events. There was now a third person involved, who Hopkins hoped to speak with, although doing so would prove difficult

because the third person was a prominent figure in the political world. It would be some time before the name of this individual was leaked to the public. Hopkins eventually was able to meet with a man who confirmed this story, and after close deduction by many researchers and investigators, the name of the individual was divulged

as Javier Perez de Quaylor. Hi, Javier Perez de Quayar. Solian is to exercise in all loyalty, discretion, and conscience. The functions entrusted to me as Secretary General of the United Nations. The identity of this witness definitely heightened the stakes of the case immensely, but nothing would heighten them more than the actions Dan and Richard would soon take. Although Napolitano had been kidnapped by what seemed to be beings from another world, it was a kidnapping by humans that would traumatize her even worse.

On October 15, 1991, Napolitano was walking the streets near the South Street seaport in lower Manhattan. When she spotted Dan jogging in the area, they both came to a complete halt. And suddenly, Dan grabbed her and forced her into his car, all the time spouting incoherent assertions that Napolitano was what he referred to as a half-breed, and that she belonged to him. Clearly, Dan had been affected dramatically by the original event, and he was having a complete mental breakdown. Dan began driving, and Napolitano slowly calmed herself down and tried to talk with Dan in a civilized manner, hoping that he would let her go. But Dan had different plans.

They drove quietly to Long Island, where Dan would bring her to a beach house near the water. He presented her with a white nightgown and demanded she put it on. After a debate and concerned for her life, Napolitano reluctantly put it on over her clothes. Seeing Napolitano in the white nightgown was confirmation to Dan, that it was indeed Napolitano that he had seen floating out of the window that night. As Dan fiddled with a camera to take pictures of her, Napolitano was able to escape. A few photos were taken by Dan of her running away from the beach house.

Dan caught up to her and was able to capture her again. The strange behavior of Dan was interrupted when Richard finally arrived, putting things into perspective. He drove Napolitano home and apologized profusely for Dan's odd behavior. Why Napolitano didn't report the incident to the police was beyond comprehension. One can assert that perhaps she felt threatened, having discovered that these men were working with some sort of intelligence agency and that the police would do very little to help her. Or perhaps she still had hope that some sort of conclusion was inevitable,

thus proving that this was all seemingly connected and all for a reason. Whatever that reason, no one would ever discover. Sometime later, Dan sent Napolitano a letter, stating that he was in a mental institution and that he was indeed in love with Napolitano. As if things weren't hard enough for her, she now had a rogue agent of an intelligence agency professing his love, for what he claimed was an alien human hybrid. Napolitano couldn't catch a break,

until she discovered that Javier Perez de Quollar wasn't just a witness of her event, but may have been an abductee himself. Napolitano remembers that after her abduction that night, she was returned to her bed. Her husband lay asleep completely oblivious to the situation. Napolitano would later admit that her husband laid so still that he appeared to be dead. Shortly after the abduction, she went into her son's room, and the same was true for him.

He laid there with small breaths, slowly escaping his body. Napolitano put a mirror under his nose just to make sure he was in fact breathing. After confronting her son about the incident, he said that he remembered being comforted by a man while his mother was being examined during the abduction. Hopkins would show over 20 different photos of different men to the boy, and without hesitation, he identified the mysterious man as Javier Perez. Hopkins now believed that this event didn't just involve the abduction of Napolitano, but perhaps multi-abductees.

He confronted Javier Perez about this theory, and he would neither confirm nor deny the accusation that he was somehow involved or part of the abduction. That same year, Hopkins received another list, from a retired telephone operator, claiming to have been on the bridge on the morning of Napolitano's abduction. She requested anonymity by Hopkins and was given the pseudonym, Janet Kimball. Kimball claimed to have been driving on the Brooklyn Bridge when her car stalled and the lights went out. I'm standing at exactly the spot where this very strange event was

seen at 3 a.m., really, on November 30, 1989. A. Woman is driving. from Brooklyn to New York, right down here in the outer lane. Her car engine died. The lights went out. And she looked over to this building. One of the distance was a little pointed roof. And at that point, she saw a burst of light as a UFO hovering only a few feet above it, turned on all of its lights. And then from a window below, small ball-like figures rolled out. They unrolled in the bright light, And there was a woman in the middle with a long white nightgown, and two small figures below her and one above her. And the figures floated up into the UFO,

and then the UFO changed its lights, zoomed out across the river, and across the bridge it disappeared. And the woman's car lights and engines started back up again. But this is the way it started for her that night. Kimball went on to write that she would never return to New York City again. after this experience. She felt compelled to look up Hopkins in the phone book after one of her family members had mentioned his work in abduction research. With the letter she sent him, she included a drawing of what she had witnessed that night. The drawing matched the stories of Napolitano,

Richard, Dan, and Javier Perez down to the color of the craft, and the fetal position Napolitano seemed to be stuck in as she disappeared into the craft. After Kimball came forward, other witnesses began trickling in. Hopkins was both excited and completely overwhelmed at this point. With a number of claims, the accusations against Napolitano and the sheer weight of this event happening, he found it very challenging to decide how to move forward with the case. He decided that there was really only one option, and that was to bring the entire case to the forefront and let the public decide. This decision would become his third book. It was titled witnessed the true story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO abductions. It was released in 1997.

The book would bring the case to a wider audience and Cement Hopkins as the prominent researcher in a field that he had ultimately created. The Brooklyn Bridge abduction case is hard to swallow at first glance, obviously. It almost plays out like a science fiction novel. In fact, some investigators have gone so far as to claim that Napolitano borrowed this story from a book entitled Night Eyes, written by science fiction writer Garfield Reeves Stevens. The book bore striking resemblances to Napolitano's story. It was also published in April 1989, a few months before her supposed abduction. But even if she had fraudulently taken the story as her own, how would that explain the multiple witnesses? Again, one could make a bold

theory that it was all a giant hoax perpetuated by Napolitano, Richard, Dan, Javier, and even Hopkins, himself. While this seems like a grand conspiracy theory, crazier things have happened in the UFO field, and the skeptical inquiry into Napolitano's case has to be acknowledged for several reasons. The first would have to be the entire affair with Richard and Dan. The events with them seem ripped directly out of some sort of thriller or even soap opera. And the fact that they never agreed to meet with Hopkins in person is cause for concern. Today, the Linda Cortill case website claims that there have been 23 witnesses to the events that night. A staggering amount of people who can't fully be accounted for or identified.

And skeptics continue to claim many loopholes to the story. arguing that many details of the case could be too good to be true. The apartment block that Cortill lived on was a stone's throw from the active loading dock of the New York Post. Not a single worker on duty that shift reported anything unusual at the time. Now that could be due to their own schedule at the time in question. A more telling fact that counts against this abduction taking place could surround Quelar and his limousine. Security personnel insists that transporting a dignitary such as the Secretary General of the UN is an enormous logistical process. Security teams often prepare high-ranking officials travel well in advance.

A huge part of this is the timetables given. If the car that is transporting the Secretary General is even a few seconds behind schedule, then UN forces would have to move in and determine what, if any, action is required. Checkpoints are also set up and used to help determine whether or not lateness is an issue. So one really has to wonder, how were these men out there at 3 a.m. in the morning, and there was no contingency plan set in motion when all of this seemed to have occurred. So these observations definitely leave room for debate, as is the case with any UFO event, especially when it comes to the abduction phenomenon.

And while a large part of me remained skeptical of this case, I felt it only appropriate and fair to hear the other side. And to do that, I turned to someone who had a direct connection to the case, having assisted Bud Hopkins on countless cases. And this one in particular, we're now going to hear from UFO researcher, author, and my mentor, Peter Robbins. I wanted to hear his thoughts on the case and his personal experiences during this long. lengthy, extraordinary, and highly controversial investigation. Hey everyone, Ryan Sprague here, host of Somewhere in the Skies. If you've ever thought about supporting us, we have great two easy options for you right now. If you listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, you can click the subscribe button at the top of your

Apple feed. Or you can join our Patreon at patreon.com slash somewhere skies. Both of these options give you the same benefits, early access to the main show, bonus episodes and content, and priority to ask our guests your listener questions. So to help support Summer in the Skies, click that subscribe button on Apple or visit patreon.com slash somewhere skies. Thank you so much for your support and keep looking up. Peter, thank you so much for joining me today. Glad to be back on the show. So for the past 20 minutes or so, I've sort of gone through a brief overview of the Linda Cortillo case, a pseudonym, I might add. And I wanted to get your personal thoughts on this, Peter.

You know, having a close connection to both Bud Hopkins and Linda, I thought no one better to come on and give their personal thoughts about the controversy behind this very hotly debated case out of New York City. So I guess I'll sort of let you take it from here. What is your connection to this case? And what are your overall thoughts on all of this? As certainly some of your listeners know, for many years, I had a good friend named Bud Hopkins. And for many of the 35 years that we were friends, I worked as his assistant. I guess a little backstory is appropriate here. Bud and I met in 1976.

I had gotten involved, obsessed with the subject of UFOs the year before. And the following year read an article, a case investigation in the village voice of all things. A newspaper, legendary New York publication, no longer in print now, but a weekly that never dealt in UFOs. and saw the headline walking by a newsstand, bought it, read it, thought it was about the best investigative work I had read in the year that I had been seeking out information and trying to learn more about the phenomena. The New York art world is a fairly small place in that I remembered the name Bud Hopkins, Bud with 2Ds, because he had been part of a group show that I had seen as a young painter in New York. And I wondered if it was the same person who had written this brilliant analysis and investigation of a case that the following year, Mufon, awarded the distinction of being the best case of the year, that of George O'Barsky. Anyway, to cut to the chase, I cold called him out of the New York phone book, told him I was an artist interested in the subject, that my sister seemed to have had an experience. We had had a siding together.

He invited me over for coffee. we had coffee for the next 35 years. I worked as Bud's assistant throughout the six years that he investigated what first became known as the Linda case and grew quite close to Linda, who I still consider a good friend. I was there pretty much every step of the way as Bud went into detective mode. And I should say here, you know, we bandy about names. cases and investigations in this field. But unless you've really read case investigations by individuals, it's very easy to just, you know, hear bits and pieces,

form an opinion based on often not a lot of material, and, you know, then defend that opinion because it's your opinion. And, hey, I would have to say in the more than 40 years that I've been involved in this subject, that six-year-long investigation, which I assisted in and received a lovely credit for in the book, year after year, was by far the most complex, the most fascinating, in many ways the most chilling, and most as human, a story as imaginable, but with so many extraordinary aspects that the logical mind is. compelled to dismiss it as collectively too far out or too weird or too impossible. And I would say at whatever point we leave off on this discussion, listeners should remember

one thing, which is the book that came out of this, a book called Witnessed, the true story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO abductions, is a must read for any serious investigator or student of the subject. You have a chance to see one of the best people in the field ever conduct a years-long investigation with the skill, objectivity, knowledge, compassion, chutzpah, as you've ever experienced in a true story. I was there working with Bud in one of my capacities at the time was I responded to the mail he received. We're going back now to 1989. And this is two years after Bud had published Intruder's, a huge international bestseller.

Certainly by UFO standards, I don't know how many languages it came out in over the years. A seminal investigation. And that, of course, followed his first book, Missing Time, which came out in 81. People wrote to him from all over the world. and this is all pre-digital. And Bud was a very old school and insisted that literally every letter be responded to, even with a brief note on our stationery, that I signed, or in some cases he did. And he had worked out a simple code for me to follow of symbols to put on the outside of an envelope

when I had given him the day's mail after reviewing it. From, you know, a fan letter to X number of stars that this sounded very compelling and it should be followed up on. Should I do it? Should he do it? And I read this letter from this woman named Linda. Her pseudonym is Cortiel. It's another last name.

The Italian American, who lived in New York City your whole life, talking about concerns that she had. I was there when she first visited, demure, polite, very old-fashioned in many respects, still lived in the same neighborhood down by the Brooklyn Bridge that she had grown up in. And in so many cases, a very regular person of a certain archetype. Catholic went to church regularly, I expect still does. and the investigation commenced with interviews and ultimately the experience that led her to contact Bud that had happened to her in late November of 1989. When you asked me to come on the show and talk about this a couple of days ago,

I thought, sure, I'm familiar with the case and, well, more familiar than most people are, But I realized when I was asked about it a month or so ago in passing on another show that I had gotten a date wrong. And when you work from memory, things like that are bound to happen. So I wanted to just reread parts of witness and go through notes I had at the time monographs that Bud had written on it. And as things developed, the central event became something that obsessed us both, that on the night in question, Linda, who had a lifetime of experiences as classic abductee experiences, was taken from her bedroom on the 12th floors, I recall of her apartment, in her nightgown, cold weather out, floated through the plate glass window of their

bedroom, her and her husband, who, as always, remained sleeping as. is the way it is. Couples are separated at moments like this, and floated up into a large, glowing, circular shape hanging just above her building. What made this case, to use the dispassionate word, very different than any of her previous experiences,

was that it was not only witnessed, but multiply witnessed, even though it happened at about three, in the morning. This is Manhattan. As you know, as a adopted Manhattanite, a lot of people work through the night. And what followed after Bud decided to publish a monograph on it and word got out about this particular event, letters started coming in from decidedly different individuals, with different addresses, with different handwritings, with different postal cancellations, all of them describing literally the identical phenomenon. Many people's first reactions were,

oh my God, they're making a movie. How are they doing this? People seeing what they were seeing from different angles around Lower Manhattan. One memorable witness, A woman who was returning from a friend's retirement party observed, as a number of people did, this large glowing shape from the Brooklyn Bridge and observed the shapes going up into the disc. It moved away from the building, headed toward the East River, and dived into the East River. To emerge further out on Long Island, at some discernible time later, with three other individuals, on board as well, who witnessed Linda on the beach talking about something that comes up fairly often with abductees, a message basically about the destruction of the environment and the idea that we needed to clean up our act.

It's generally interpreted as a logical message from these other intelligences to take care of our planet. In this case, that seemed to be more opposed. Linda, who is a smoker and eats meat and is not particularly caught up in environmental causes, was, I don't even know the right language controlled to do this in front of these three individuals, two of them security, for the third individual, who we did not discuss their position, or their name alluded to certain things in the book, but in fact was a man named Perez de Quayar, who at the time was the Secretary General

of the United Nations. And along with security people was downtown at that time for reasons we can only guess at. And we were left to assume that this was to take a person who dealt regularly with world leaders, give them this experience and perhaps I'm extrapolating here the hope being that they might ultimately speak out about it. Perez de Quayar never did but the investigation um and this again is almost five years more than five years after Linda presented herself to Bud bud and de Quayar met

in the VIP lounge at O'Hare Airport in Chicago, arranged by a reporter who had an appointment to do an interview with D'Quayar, was aware of this story, a colleague of Buds, and essentially set up this opportunity for Hopkins to speak with the Secretary General and to present him with information that we sense that he would appreciate. I remember very well how excited Bud was and the description of the event because I was working in the office when he returned from, it was either JFK or Newark having come back from Chicago that afternoon. There are so many tangents on this. A pattern that we observed that came up very strong in this case was that one of the security people, was somebody who Linda had a pre-existing relationship with and not one in the normal sense. She and this individual, Richard, his real name, were brought together repeatedly as children and observed. And they both remembered the quirkier, finer points of being respectively like five and seven years old and being brought together repeatedly in childhood or. adolescence, I would assume to be observed and perhaps even to set up or put pieces in place that would later be played out.

The other security person for the secretary, Dan, was incredibly freaked out by all this. These were career for part of their career, state department service personnel, United Nations, and NYPD connection, and trying to put oneself in the place of a regular person in an extraordinary job, going through this experience under these circumstances, we feel led to Dan's having a profound breakdown and being removed from the situation. Richard and Bud began to correspond for quite some time before they would meet with him. Dan literally kidnapped Linda and interrogated her because he was so freaked out and wanted answers that she could not give him. At this point, let me ask you if you have any particular questions that are coming up.

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Isn't it nice to have someone like that on your side? Save up to 40% your first year at LifeLock.com slash Spotify. Terms apply. And a very detailed book as well. I mean, we did, I did go over the Richard and Dan incidents, you know, the kidnapping, you know, the breakdown, the correspondence with Bud. So I guess, you know, playing off of the Richard and Dan thing a little, Peter. Now, I guess I was unclear in my research of this case.

Had Bud actually met face-to-face with these two individuals? I know there were, you know, taped audio that they had sent to Bud at one point. There were letters exchange. Had he ever met Richard and Dan face-to-face would be my first question. Boy, I'm trying to remember now. I think he did meet with Richard ultimately. Okay. But, you know, I'm not positive.

I'd have to double-check that. Yeah, that would be my only question in terms of, of the discrepancy with the Richard and Dan affair, which again, like you said, is so it can go many different ways. It plays out almost like a thriller or soap opera, which is a lot of the, I guess, a lot of the, you know, the more skeptical of those with this case think that, you know, this story seems too good to be true, you know. All of these things happened all throughout the investigation. But again, like, Like you said, we weren't there when any of this happened.

So we cannot say for sure what happened, what did not. So in terms of that, I guess my next question for you would be, in terms of Javier, you said that Bud did meet with him. And in the research I did, I came up with Javier, neither confirming or denying any of this story. Now, do you have any more insight? on what exactly they talked about and what Javier had to say in terms of all this? Oh, yeah.

And again, this is one of the reasons why if I'm on a show and somebody asked me to talk about a case, either that I have an opinion on or was involved in, I will do it and we'll move on. This is one of those rare instances where I would say to anybody listening, who has questions or whose eyebrows are going up or rubbing their chin rhetorically, read this book. It's impossible for me to do it any justice, but I'm getting away from your question. And I think the best way to answer that is to take us to back to that time in Bud's words. No. First, De Quayar's wife was there and at times within earshot, Bud was there with a reporter, and this was prearranged. the material that he gave to the secretary was acknowledged essentially with a nod.

But let me jump right into the text here of Bud writing about this and beginning when he got home that afternoon. Okay. This is not something that he was reflecting on years later. Walking slightly behind my reporter friend, so it was not to be immediately seen by the third man. I entered the airline's VIP lounge, a quiet place with deep luxurious seating, and discreet bar. A dozen or so people waited for their connecting flights, and I immediately spotted the third man sitting with his wife reading. My nervousness abated somewhat when I saw no sign of a security detail. Walking over, the reporter introduced himself and then said, this is my friend Bud Hopkins, a colleague from New York.

I looked at the third man, whose passive,ogenic expression. impression registered no change. He asked no questions about me, who I was or why I was there, and turned to the reporter, who began talking to him about finding a more private place for the proposed interview. Nervously, I handed the third man my bulging package. Sir, this is some material I think you'll find interesting, I told him. With the warnings about not taking packages from strangers fresh in my memory, and with the awareness that the third man must have been thoroughly briefed by previous security details about the danger of hidden explosives and letter bombs. I watched to see what he did with my suspicious-looking parcel.

Without a break, he continued speaking with a reporter, while on obtrusively on zipping a small carry-on suitcase, he quickly tucked the package inside and closed the case. Not a word was directed at me, not a question about the package. Moving on here, the frustrated reporter continued to press the issue, asking if he ever remembered seeing anything strange late at night in the area. And again, the third man paused and thought for a moment, saying softly that maybe one of his bodyguards might have seen something a light years ago, but didn't remember anything now. I'm sorry, I can't help you, he said. You could try to contact some of my bodyguards. Let's see. I believe one of them had a Russian

name. What was that name? Throughout, his responses had been gentle, extremely unruffled, and very low key. What was missing was any sense of surprise or anger when he saw that his name had appeared in print in such a context. He did not say, how did my name get mixed up with this? Well, this is ridiculous. Or who wrote this piece anyway? The response is one would logically expect a well-known person, protective of his reputation to make. It continues on, but Hopkins' skills as a human observer and deductibilities for me are legend. And while, you know, it's so many memories come up, the letters that we received were very poignant, all of them hungry to find out what in the name of God they had seen.

None of them wanting attention, none of them wanting money, none of them wanting anything but information. Also, as trained artists, Bud was a very well-known painter in New York, I was an inspiring one. We received drawings in at least half of these letters, most of them by untrained artists. And there's something very poignant, I think you'll agree, about witness-related drawings from regular folks. They have not studied art, but they have such intensity, and high intention. And in this case, there was a certain lighting sequence and a specific quirk to the shape.

And son of a gun, if all of these different drawings, didn't capture it to some degree, again, seen from different angles, different positions, different locations. I still find this, again, to be the most memorable UFO case I've ever worked. And that includes Rendlesham in terms of the hyper-specifics of the event. And for me, the ethics, if you will, the honesty, the character of the central individual involved. Linda is not, you know, a Machiavellian sophisticate. She graduated from high school.

Got married, had two sons. not surprisingly the impact of these events extended into her family. If this brief conversation that we're having, although I'm doing most of the conversing, produces any result for your readers, I ask you again in a way that I normally would not. If you're interested in this subject, if you find this challenging or too challenging, or want to know more about it, or see the work of a course. crack investigator, a world-class investigator, sticking to an important story year after year. And I have to laugh sometimes because I think if Hopkins had gone into law enforcement instead

of the arts, Lord help the criminals of this world. Had he been a New York City police detective, he would have had a very long list of convictions and, I'm sure, commendations. Anyway, my point just being, you don't have to go out and spend money on a collectible book. You can find paperback copies online for a couple of bucks. The book is Witness, The True Story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO abduction by Bud Hopkins. Perfect. Peter, I can't thank you enough for giving that insider's perspective on all this. Like you said, it's easy for one to, you know, in passing, read an article about this case.

You know, my whole involvement with covering this case was in a brief article I'd written many, many years ago for Open Minds magazine. You know, as a young naive researcher, I can attest that I did my research, but without really going deep, without having read the entire book, I had no, you know, right to cast judgment on the case on either end of it. So to have someone like yourself who is directly involved with the prime investigator on the case, and even the person who was involved, is refreshing and invigorating. And again, I'm so happy we were able to get your side of this story. And like you said, for anyone who really wants to look into it on either end of the skeptical or believer end of it, read the book. So again, I have to thank you for cover. covering this with us today.

Glad too, my friend. My thanks to Peter Robbins for taking the time to reflect on this case. It certainly opened my eyes on the legitimacy of Linda's claims and the diligence Bud Hopkins showed in his thorough investigation of the incredible accounts. And this is where I land on this entire event. Like so many other cases that we've covered here on somewhere in the skies, and so many others that continue to come across my digital desk,

these are accounts, stories, irrefutable evidence or evidence in general is predominantly sparse. And in the case of Hopkins and his book based on this case, it was an extraordinary story that defied logical explanation. And while it was fascinating and well told, it was, as so often these cases are, open to extreme interpretation and scrutiny. We're asked to accept the account as is, based on the testimony of some of the participants.

As a result of this, I remain on the fence. For all I know, the Linda Napolitano case might have gone down the way that Hopkins said it did. I wasn't in the room when Peter Robbins read Linda's letters and passed them on to bud. I wasn't in the room when Hopkins put Linda under hypnotic regression to retrieve possible memories of the event. And I wasn't there on the Brooklyn Bridge to watch as a woman ascended into a craft and disappeared out of sight. No matter where you land on this case, I urge you, as Peter Robbins did, to read the book witnessed by Bud Hopkins, remain open-minded, but also remain on guard. Because as Carl Sagan once said, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

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