Revolutionizing Cold Cases
February 4, 2022
LIVE EVENT
On February 2, crimeHQ hosted a special event with Alex Baber and J-Lynn Baber of the Cold Case Consultants of America, led by Kelly McLear.
McLear began by asking the couple to share their backstories. Alex said that it started for him when he was a child, growing up surrounded by his mother's true crime magazines. As he got older and was diagnosed with a neurodiversity, a form of autism, his IQ was tested and was in the 160s when he was a teenager. This focus and intelligence came with a downside though. "I typically do not sleep much, my brain is always processing information, like a computer," Alex said. He befriended members of law enforcement who urged him to "join the fight" because of his specific abilities. He declined repeatedly, choosing to focus on his family, but finally got involved in March of 2007. What drew him in was David Fincher's "Zodiac" movie, although Alex had not known anything about the case before then.
That evening, a Friday, he decided to take a crack at solving one of the infamous cyphers associated with the case. Alex claims that he solved it that evening—after 4,527 attempts. His solution gave him a name. Next, he went online to a forum devoted to the Zodiac Killer, and posted the name he came up with. On Sunday, he received a phone call asking, "Do you want to play a game?" After Alex replied no, the speaker said, "I want to compliment you on cracking my cypher." A little shocked and freaked out at this point, especially because he didn't know how the caller got his number, Alex said that he didn't want any trouble and volunteered to remove the post from the forum that mentioned the man's name. The caller then went to to prove that he knew Alex's full name, place of work, address, and fiancée's full name. At that point, Alex said again he'd take the post down and hung up on the caller.
He reported the call to local law enforcement who didn't take it seriously, found it humorous, and poked fun at him for believing that the Zodiac Killer had called him. Within two months, Alex had sold his house, switched jobs, and relocated, moving off-grid. He lived in paranoia, keeping close watch on his son and fiancée, doing everything he could to keep them safe. But after a while, with no new threats, the fear faded away. When some law enforcement and FBI buddies came to him and once more urged him to use his skills toward fighting crime, he rethought it.
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