by zardos » Thu Feb 11, 2010 6:10 pm
There were several rumours about Larry being thrown out of the Air Force for being a drug user, and I asked him outright if this was the case, but he absolutely denied it. Edward Cabansag remembers seeing Larry in the supply hut and was told by a fellow airman that Airman Warren was waiting for his release, which was a result of his involvement with drugs. Larry reminded me that he had an honourable discharge from the Air Force (I have a copy of this document) and was never associated with drugs. He believes these rumours were started to discredit him as a witness because the Air Force knew he was talking about the incident. Other personnel told me that sometime during 1980 a huge drugs bust was carried out on the Bentwaters installation. Those involved were members of the Security and Law Enforcement Squadrons and they were immediately sent back to the United States. In fact most of the new recruits at Bentwaters in December 1980 were said to have been replacements for those who were transferred. If Larry had been busted for drugs he would probably have received the same treatment and may even have been discharged. Besides, I have in my possession a copy of a document with the stamp of Wing Commander Gordon E. Williams' signature, which proves that Larry himself requested separation from the Air Force and not the other way around.
Not only did Larry's attempts to re-enlist fail, but when he applied for his passport to be renewed in 1994 he received a letter stating his request had been denied due to the passport being altered or mutilated. He was told he would have to appear before a passport agent or designated court employee with acceptable proof of his US citizenship. He also had to submit a written statement explaining the reason for the condition of the altered/mutilated passport. Larry called the State Department Consular Center in New Hampshire and was told the letter had been sent to him at the behest of the Department of Defense. The reason given for the refusal was that he had been discussing sensitive defence issues on foreign soil. Further attempts to obtain a passport were blocked and Larry discovered that all files relating to him had disappeared from the State Department's computers. He simply did not exist!
On 17 October 1994 Peter Robbins wrote to former Attorney General Ramsey Clark, explaining Larry's passport predicament and asking for his assistance in the matter. Apparently Ramsey, who had represented New York police officer Frank Serpico, offered his advice, but things did not go as well as expected and in the spring of 1995 Larry was again refused a passport. According to both Peter and Larry, Ramsey stepped in and suggested they mention his (Ramsey's) name, and one month later Larry received his new passport.
One can see why Larry Warren's story is by far the most con¬troversial. However, Dot Street and Brenda Butler had to admit that, in 1983, he had certain information about the case that was not public knowledge. But had he picked it up from others on the base, or was he actually a witness? Unfortunately alterations in times and dates have occurred throughout the years. He originally claimed there were two hundred witnesses at the site, then changed it to one hundred and more recently it became forty. However odd this may seem, we must never forget what a trauma it was, and Larry is not the only one who has made errors or has changed his story.
Nevertheless, his errors are more prominent because his story has changed more often, and this might be where the real problem lies. For instance, in 1983 he told Dot Street that following the incident he had found himself on his bed, fully clothed and covered in mud, with no idea of how he had got there. This story changed until it became obsolete when in 1997 he described walking back to the truck and returning to the base.
When The News of the World newspaper interviewed Larry for the 2 October 1983 issue he did not claim to have seen any aliens, but a month later (6 November) he gave the newspaper a different story. Still using the pseudonym Art Wallace, he had since undergone hypnotic regression and was able to offer a full description of the aliens. According to the newspaper article, during his session with two unnamed hypnotists, he discovered he had witnessed General Gordon Williams communicating with the entities. We must consider that until Williams was featured on the front page of The News of the World a month earlier, Larry had never mentioned his name, but now he had linked him with the incident. According to Skycrash, Fred Max was a behavioural psychologist who had conducted the hypnotic session that apparently helped Larry to recall the names of other witnesses and much more detail of the events. However, this session still sees Larry having blacked out and waking up in his barracks, which is strange considering he has since claimed this did not happen.
I found it equally strange that there was no reference to this session, or indeed Fred Max, in Left at East Gate, especially as Larry has since trashed the newspaper article. Surely this was important because it would apply to his involvement in the actual incident and would help to quell the accusations that he was not involved. I decided to contact Peter Robbins in New York, who explained that the reason the session with Fred Max was not featured in their book was due to a decision made by Larry. When I pushed Peter for more information, it turned out that for whatever reason Larry was not put under hypnosis but had gone through the motions.
I already knew there were problems with Larry's testimony. Several months earlier I had heard what sounded like a full confession that he had not been involved in the underground incident after all. It was discovered on an old audio cassette tape with a faded name scrawled on it, the name Art Wallace, his pseudonym. The tape revealed details of conversations between Larry and Dot Street.
Dot had paid me a visit and had brought along several audio tapes, and after listening to them most of the day I was just about to finish up when, towards the end of the tape, Larry's voice became very anxious. Unfortunately, the tape ran out so I only heard the first part of his statement, but it was enough to confuse matters even more. He confessed to Dot that the hypnotic session in 1983 had not been genuine because unbeknown to the hypnotist he had not been fully hypnotized. His excuse was that he had gone along with the pretence because someone had paid for the session and they had said words to the effect that, 'it better be good'.
In the conversations with Dot, Larry then went on to explain that he had asked Larry Fawcett and Barry Greenwood to find Adrian Bustinza in order to back up his story. 'I said, get a hold of Bustinza, he'll tell you what happened, I just told them their names and where they came from . . . Once they get a hold of Bustinza, I'll come out. Larry [Fawcett] called me and said, "We finally got a hold of Adrian Bustinza . . ."' However, it seems Bustinza had clammed up and would not discuss the underground facility, or that they were interrogated, and Larry felt let down. The following is taken from my notes of the recording and it is obvious that Larry was confused:
It's real, Larry's [Fawcett] lost interest with the case. You know this underground stuff; Larry to this day does not believe me. I told Barry [Greenwood] and Larry Fawcett that it didn't happen to me. I'm telling you it did not happen. When I first came out with that, well, I said it did ... It was March '81. What can we do about it? Bustinza and a few others, we went down to this place. This underground garbage, I've erased that stuff for ever. I didn't even see those space things. I told Larry, the thing is, March '811 got together with some people. We were all involved, rehashing the whole thing, Bustinza said we were taken down to this . . . Bustinza wouldn't give him [Fawcett] specific details of the underground. If I said I heard it second-hand no one would believe it. Bustinza said we were taken down to an underground base ... I did some checking, it seemed there was some fact to him. I'd hoped that Busty would tell him what we went through. Busty denied the underground. I had to play devil's advocate.
OK, I did this. I have an ace in the hole, if I get screwed around by this, it would make . . . [tape cut off]
Just before this bizarre conversation with Dot Street, Larry claimed he had received a telephone threat from an anonymous source. Dot had already spoken to Larry's mother, who seemed clearly concerned for the safety of her son. I listened to part of that recording and heard Mrs Warren tell Dot that Larry could no longer talk to anyone, that he had to stop all talking. Apparently, Larry had received a brief call from someone warning him 'It's OK for people talking about this, but you've gone too far. You've ruined families. If you keep this up we'll be in touch.' Larry believed the threat was as a result of Larry Fawcett's call to Major Malcolm Zickler's residence. The Major was not at home when Fawcett called but he managed to talk to Mrs Zickler at great length, which might have upset her husband. Whoever called Larry might not have approved of him giving out Air Force personnel details. Could the threatening call have prompted him to deny his involvement in the underground affair? I asked Larry to explain why he went off at a tangent, telling Dot Street that the underground story was a non-event. 'I had just gone public with my name, thinking other guys would start talking,' he said, 'but when Adrian denied being in the underground I decided I wasn't going to talk about it anymore. I just wanted to forget it so I denied I had been there.' A few days after the conversation with Dot, Larry was flown to Japan to appear on a television show.
But the biggest surprise was yet to come. More than fifteen years ago Larry had told Dot Street that he had an ace in the hole, but what was that ace? I was about to close this chapter on Larry Warren — and believe me it was the most difficult one to write - when he called with important news he wanted to share with me. It was news I desperately wanted to hear, but it did not come cheap; in fact, it cost me many a weary night rewriting the details time and time again as Larry recounted a different set of events with each conversation. At one point I even considered eliminating the story altogether, but then I knew it had to be told, but only in its entirety.
Early in 1999 I had called and left a message for Larry, who had been visiting Liverpool, where he was staying with Sue McAllister. There were some final details I wanted to check with him; however, I was not prepared for what I was about to hear. He told me that a few months earlier he had been sent some photographs of the actual UFO encountered by Jim Penniston and John Burroughs, which were taken during the initial incident on 25/26 December. I had heard rumours that someone had managed to take pictures and smuggle them out but had never been able to find any evidence to support this story. According to Larry, someone had read the reviews of Left at East Gate on the Internet and had sent the photographs to him care of his publishers.
Included in the package were negatives, a Bentwaters photograph folder, a map with directions to the landing site and a letter from the witness. Larry would not reveal the contact's full name but gave his Christian name as Mark. The witness was an accountant living with his wife and family in the United States and although he was very nervous about the whole affair and did not want to be named, he had sent Larry the photographs in the hope that it would back up the case.
The witness had been a bystander who was off duty when he and another airman saw lights over the forest from the nearby village of Eyke. He and his friend became curious and drove back to Bentwaters to collect a camera before making their way to the forest. On passing some buildings by the roadside (Foley Cottages), they saw lights moving through the trees and decided to park the vehicle with the aim of investigating them. But Mark's friend was frightened and refused to follow him into the forest. As Mark moved closer to the lights he could see two figures and a triangular UFO sitting in a clearing. At one point he was only five feet away from the UFO, standing behind a tree taking pictures. The UFO then lifted up and began moving through the forest, dipping in and out of the trees. Mark thought the others had been abducted and decided to run for it. On returning to the base he put another film into his camera and shot pictures of the ground. This film was then turned over to his superiors, and he was told that it had come out 'fogged'. Three months later, when he thought it was safe to have the UFO film developed, he risked taking it to the Bentwaters supermarket. A few days later he collected the film, which included pictures of himself and some friends taken prior to the incident. For the rest of his tour, almost two years, he kept them safely hidden on the base, sometimes moving them to other locations when he became nervous. As soon as Mark returned to the United States he placed the negatives and pictures into a safe deposit box and there they remained until they were sent to Larry in late 1998. An incredible story!
Over the course of several weeks, I listened to Larry as he told me about the pictures and how Mark had kept them safe all those years. In an attempt to get the facts correct I would go over the details, only to find that the story changed during these conversations, which of course gave me cause for concern. Then Larry sent me one of the photographs. It was a glossy black picture with a group of coloured lights in the shape of a triangle and a few other coloured balls of light scattered throughout. I eventually had the photograph blown up and lightened and was amazed to find what appeared to be a distorted forest with a triangle of lights hovering over a clearing.
Beneath the lights was an azure mist and at ground level there appeared to be a strange yellow mist rising up a few feet off the ground. It certainly looked interesting and, as promised, I sent a blown-up copy back to Larry. I am aware that the photograph could easily be a hoax. However, until it had been enlarged several times and lightened there was nothing to see except blackness and a few lights, so that in itself is interesting. I asked Larry if it were possible that someone might be trying to set him up, but he was adamant that the source was genuine: not only did he know the identity of the witness, but they had exchanged correspondence and talked on the telephone. Besides, the photographs had come not only with the negatives but also with the Bentwaters supermarket folder, and of course there was the map that Mark had sketched, indicating details of the route to the landing site. If these photographs were of the Rendlesham UFO, they were a good piece of evidence, but unless I could talk to the witness, or have something constructive to back them up, I had to remain wary. Larry promised to send me a photocopy of the Bentwaters folder and a negative. Hopefully, if the negative proved to have coding, it would at least date the film.
Imagine my surprise then when a week later I received a call from Larry confessing that he was the person who had taken the photographs. I was dumbfounded. My first question was, without doubt, 'Why did you sit on them for nineteen years?' This was followed by a barrage of questions. I could not believe that he would not use them in his book or even in the early days when he was trying so desperately to prove his case. Peter Robbins was devastated but still had confidence in Larry, blaming it on the incident and the fact that he had been messed with. Meanwhile, Larry confessed to Peter that he had told me the story and given me permission to use the photograph. Obviously Peter felt betrayed, having been his co-author and helped research his story for almost a decade. I felt for Peter, I had only worked with Larry on a chapter and knew how intense it was - there were surprises around every corner. The problem was the way Larry convincingly told the first story — all those details. I thought he deserved an award for an excellent performance.
Larry's new story was, of course, different. He and Mark had driven to Ipswich railway station and parked Mark's car in the car park. They were catching a train to London to meet two German girls, but first they visited a music shop that was situated near the station. I reminded Larry that it was Christmas Day and the shops were most likely closed during that period. He said Arabs owned the shop, but when I suggested that back in 1980 it might have still been the law to close on Christmas Day, he decided it was not open after all. He now explained that some men were delivering merchandise to the shop and he had stopped them to ask about prices. Mark, I was told, was an airman who had top-secret clearance, worked for the National Security Agency and was posted at RAF Martlesham Heath. On their way back to Bentwaters that night they picked up four other airmen, but how they all got into one old car I have no idea. As they approached the Bentwaters base they saw three strange lights in the sky formed into the shape of a triangle that seemed to be making a droning noise. Mark drove to the base, dropped off the other airmen, picked up a camera, and he and Larry headed for Rendlesham Forest. As they approached the cottages they heard Motorola radios and saw a white Law Enforcement vehicle parked on the roadside.
Having parked their car close by, they followed the noise of the radios into the forest where they found the UFO, which had three points to its base and looked like a Christmas tree. Apart from the reddish lights, everything was pitch black and as Larry took a photograph the UFO moved up off the ground and the radios became silent. Mark suddenly became very frightened and ran away, hiding on the ground in the forest. Larry saw some figures he could not recognize but thinks they were abducted because as soon as he began taking photographs the men disappeared. On leaving the forest, Larry spotted John Burroughs who was standing beside a truck. Of course, at that stage he did not know who Burroughs was. Mark then fired off a blank roll of film (both films were Cannon 35 mm) and Larry took the canisters back to his dorm for safekeeping.
Larry put the canisters on his windowsill but his roommate was uncomfortable with the situation and told him he should report it. He decided to take only the blank film to his superior, Senior Master Sergeant Lee Swain, who then referred Larry to Major Drury. However, Larry thinks Drury was unaware of what was going on. Later that day he heard that someone called Burroughs had seen a UFO and, realizing there might be a search, he wrapped the canister inside a sock, which he placed in a small canvas bag and took to Steve La Plume. Without explaining what it was, he asked La Plume to look after it in case someone searched his room. But La Plume declined, so he went back to his dorm and hid the canister inside his mattress.
Larry smuggled the pictures out of Bentwaters by placing them in the bottom of a Wedgwood German beer mug, which he had bought on a recent trip to Germany. He posted the parcel to his mother, who knew nothing about the photographs until he returned home a few months later. Once back in the United States he placed the photographs and negatives in his sister's safe deposit box. 'I was very frightened of having the pictures,' he told me. But then he said he had thought of taking them to the newspapers. Larry suggested I contact Steve La Plume, because although he may not be aware of what was inside the sock, he might remember him asking to look after it. But La Plume does not recall the incident and according to his earlier testimony he and Larry never talked until the middle of January 1981. Larry also told me that Adrian Bustinza knew about the photographs, but when I questioned him he denied any knowledge of them.
A year earlier I had discussed Larry's alleged trip to Germany with Peter Robbins. According to Left at East Gate, Larry had just arrived back from Germany the day before his encounter in Rendlesham Forest. Peter assured me that was what his co-author had told him, but I was not convinced. If Larry was in Germany, I thought he could not have been a witness because by his own admission and his records he was on D Flight, which meant he should have been on duty during 26/27-28/29. Therefore, if he had been involved in the second landing, he would have already been on duty the day before. However, since then I had discovered that some of the flights were mixed up due to the Christmas holidays. With this in mind, I realized Larry could have been on a different shift that week, but for no reason in particular I had failed to mention my new findings to Larry or Peter.
Just when I thought I had heard everything, Larry had another surprise in store for me. He was now confessing that he had never been in Germany during the Christmas holidays but had used the trip to cover up the fact that he had been involved in the initial incident. He claimed that if researchers thought he was out of the country then they would not connect him with it. I was obviously trying to figure out how anyone could connect him with the photographs or his alleged involvement when nobody had known anything about it anyway. This statement was remarkable, considering he had diligently done everything he could to prove the incident had occurred and especially that he himself was involved. Suddenly, I was expected to believe that he was trying to cover up his involvement in an earlier encounter. I could have gone on for weeks with my questioning but I felt there was no point. I was burnt out with this latest saga and had already spent far too much time on the Larry Warren story.
However, I did ask Larry if he would send me some evidence to back up his claims. I suggested he send me one of the negatives, a photocopy of the strip of negatives, showing the code numbers, a copy of the Bentwaters folder and a letter admitting he had taken the photographs and had copyright to them. These items were promised to me but Larry claimed he might not be able to locate the folder and instead of the ten photographs he originally had there were now only five. In a previous conversation, when we were discussing the mystery witness, he had told me that some of the photographs had been taken before the incident and featured Mark and his friends. Understandably, I was very sceptical about all of this, and until such time as Larry could prove he took the photographs I would remain so. Unfortunately, albeit innocently, Peter related my concern and disbelief to Larry, who then thought it was not worth pursuing the matter with me. I admit I discussed the situation with Peter because we were both totally confused. I believe we were both looking for some positive answers but Larry seemed to be even more confused than we were.
John Burroughs, who was a witness to two events, offered his opinion of Larry's story to science writer Antonio Huneeus in an interview in 1990:
Larry Warren has hurt this case quite a bit. The only thing I can say about Larry Warren's testimony, that aliens came out, his excuse was that CNN did a botched-up job and he never described those little men like they were and stuff like that. There was something out there that was intelligent, that (hurt the eyes especially) when there was the blue transparent-type lights that were coming out, and the different things that they were capable of doing. That is my stand on that. Now Larry Warren took it a step further and, as far as I am concerned, there was no contact between, he called him the base commander, Lieutenant Colonel Williams at the time, and I did not see him out there. I know for a fact that Colonel Halt was out there and there is a small possibility, if I remember, I did see for a brief moment possibly the new base commander, which would have been Colonel Conrad at the time. But there was nothing that I am aware [of] or through talking to other people that would describe what Larry Warren described to CNN, other than there were blue transparent lights that could be possibly - they did act intelligently, some of the stuff they did . . . There was something else that came off the main craft that was able to do different things and flew over the top of us and flew through a pick-up truck and did stuff like that.
Larry always told researchers he had an ace in the hole to play, and he has since told me that the photographs are that ace. But are they? Could it be that he was not involved in the Rendlesham Forest incident after all? Throughout my investigation I have found no witness to back up Larry's story. Whether he was involved in one of the encounters, either standing next to the object or further back in the forest, is open to debate. Did Larry take the photographs of the first encounter or was someone trying to set him up? If a witness really did send the photographs to Larry then it is a real pity, because the story has now become so distorted that unless the witness comes forward there is no way of knowing the truth.
Sue McAllister, who married Larry in Nevada in March 2000, told me in early 1999 that she believed he was genuine. 'He's one of the most courageous people I've ever met,' she told me. Sue recalls the first time she heard Larry talk at a UFO conference. 'The whole audience were mesmerized by him,' she said. 'He comes across as being genuine.' Sue is a member of a small Liverpool UFO group, and apparently Larry showed some of the photographs to them when he visited England. According to Sue, one of the members suggested they might be a set-up. Obviously, at that stage he had not told the group that he had taken the photographs.
Peter Robbins has seen one of them and when I asked him if he knew who was responsible for them it turned out that Larry had claimed witness Ed Cabansag had taken them. After almost twenty years of silence from Cabansag, Larry might have thought he would never have gone public. Was Larry doing this to protect the witness named Mark, did he really take the photographs himself or was he trying to paint himself back in the picture?
In 1999 Sue McAllister wrote me a letter pointing out that, among other things, Larry's medical records should be proof enough that he was involved. Larry has produced medical records for an eye problem that he suffered whilst at Bentwaters and another injury that surfaced a few years later. During 1983 he had complained of a burning sensation and bleeding through the skin on his neck and back. On one occasion in 1984 his former wife had rushed him to hospital thinking he had ruptured a blood vessel. According to Larry, the doctors detained him for four hours while they conducted several tests. Finally three doctors entered the room and the most senior of these asked Larry a number of questions. He wanted to know if Larry had ever been in Vietnam or worked around any nuclear devices. When Larry admitted he had worked at a nuclear base, he was told that it was their opinion that he had been exposed to an unshielded nuclear device. The doctor asked Larry if he could recall when this might have happened. Larry explained that he could but he doubted the doctor would believe it. Larry was then told that in normal conditions these effects should not show up for twenty years. Considering Larry did not have clearance to work in the weapons storage area, it is unlikely he was exposed to any of the nuclear devices deployed at Bentwaters. But then if he was standing facing the UFO, why would only his neck and back have been affected, and why was Adrian Bustinza, who was also standing facing the object, not affected?
Peter Robbins went to great pains to research the site where Larry claims the second landing had taken place. In 1990 samples of soil were analysed by Matthew Miniz of Springborn Laboratories Inc., Wareham, MA. Miniz concluded that it was a difficult task due to the time lapse and the conditions the samples had been stored under, but nevertheless his professional opinion was in favour of anomalies in the samples, although he expressed a need for further research. Although Larry is the only person to claim the UFO landed in the farmer's field, the analysis tends to show that something affected the soil on that particular site. However, local resident Gary Collins claims the UFO could not have landed in Capel Green, which he says was only a road, or the farmer's field, which was visible from his property. 'I would have been able to see it if that had been the case,' he told me. However, so would the occupants of the three properties that were directly facing the site, but they deny they witnessed anything unusual.
I met Larry Warren in 1997 when he visited my home with Peter Robbins during their promotional tour in England. I found him to be a charming well-mannered individual, albeit that I sensed there was hidden anxiety. Against all the odds, I had believed he was somehow involved in the incident along with numerous other witnesses. At no time did I favour his underground scenario with the alien being, but considered that he was possibly messed with. Always, I asked myself the same question. 'Why stay with it for so long and put up with all the criticism if it was not true?' Was Brenda Butler right, did Larry get the story from someone else? Certainly, he told Dot Street he had heard the underground story from Adrian Bustinza, and had apparently confirmed it with Larry Fawcett and Barry Greenwood. It was the only way to get the truth out, he had told Dot. If he explained that the story was second-hand it would not be believed, so he had to play the devil's advocate. This was the gist of what he told her in 1983. I know because Dot, my mother and I listened to those recordings when Dot visited me in March 1999. However, we all agreed it was probably because he had been threatened.
Adrian Bustinza would eventually admit to having been taken to an underground facility, but his story is different from Larry's. Was Larry tampered with, either by government agents who gave him several memories and trigger words, or by some alien force that we still know so little about? There is no doubt that he is very bitter and blames the USAF for what happened, but we must then question why he was so intent on re-enlisting so soon afterwards. It is not my intention to discredit Larry Warren; in fact I had hoped more than anything to prove his case was genuine. It is difficult to believe that Larry is intentionally lying, but could there also be some confusion there?
He has genuinely cooperated, leading me to sources he truly believed would back up his story even when they did not. And he has endured so many years of harassment from all sides and appears to have still managed, sometimes with great difficulty, to hang on to what he believes is right. I have discussed with both Larry and Peter the possibility that Larry could have unknowingly been used to spread confusion and disinformation. Let us also not forget that if he truly was involved in a close encounter of the third kind there are forces out there that would want to silence him. But Larry was not one to keep his mouth shut and, as we know, was already discussing the incident within hours of it happening — even threatening to go public. If Larry Warren could not be silenced he could be discredited. It is very possible that he is a victim of the Rendlesham Forest incident but, like Steve Roberts, Larry's story has become very confusing.
In March 2000 Larry Warren attended a UFO conference in Nevada where he impressed researchers with the story about the UFO photographs. Only this time he did not admit that he had taken them himself but claimed they came to him from a witness. It was a similar story to the one he had originally told me in early 1999. Larry's chopping and changing is so much in line with that of Steve Roberts that it actually bears thinking about. Here are two seemingly intelligent men who over the years have altered their testimony to such an extent that it has surely discredited the case, yet they appear to have played some role in the events. Roberts told his original story regarding the alien presence to Chris and Brenda, and Larry recounted an almost identical story to Steve La Plume a few weeks after the incident. Did something sinister really happen during those debriefings? Could it be that the witnesses were programmed with trigger words or sounds, which every now and again would result in them telling a different story in order to confuse the truth?
Larry says, 'Take me out of the story and you still have a case.' That is true, but I don't believe the Larry Warren story will ever go away. It will just change from time to time.