National Institute for Discovery Science: Fort Dix/McGuire AFB Investigation: Jag

Fort Dix/McGuire AFB Investigation

Interview Transcript: Jag Officer

JAG Officer implicated by primary McGuire eyewitness as having debriefed him concerning the entity incident. The debriefing by this JAG officer allegedly happened at Wright Patterson AFB.
Transcript of the interview of the named JAG officer by NIDS
December 5, 2000

JAG: Are you from California?

NIDS: No, Las Vegas, Nevada.

JAG: Oh, Las Vegas, Nevada. I was puzzled as to...who the devil was calling me from Las Vegas, Nevada? What can I do for you?

NIDS: Well, are you the ________ who was in the Air Force?

JAG: I sure am, I was. [inaudible]...years.

NIDS: Well, I found in the Morristown, or Morris Co. Bar Association there was an award that you had received at one time but it didn't give when, it was the Professional Lawyer of the Year Award.

JAG: Yes, that's right.

NIDS: When did you receive that?

JAG: I received that award in a meeting of the New Jersey State Bar Association, I believe it was in June of 1999. I have the little citation and the...there was a little silver tray that they awarded us, Lawyers from the different counties. There are 21 counties in New Jersey and I believe it was in June of '99.

NIDS: Well congratulations, that's a very prestigious award. I have a lot of friends and relatives who are in the legal profession so, I'm...I kind of look up to them. But that is how I found your information and it says here that you had received meritorious service medal in 1987 and you retired as a Colonel.

JAG: Right.

NIDS: Okay, my question is I'm researching an historical incident that occurred at air force base in New Jersey, McGuire Air Force Base?

JAG: Yup. Ya.

NIDS: Okay, and your name had come up indirectly in regards to this investigation and it's kind of an historical thing we're trying to, to find out if it really happened or not, and that's why I'm really calling about. And I wanted to know, basically, you, you were admitted to the Bar in '57?

JAG: That's correct. February 15.

NIDS: And when did you enter the Air Force?

JAG: Ah, well, ah, let's see, I was, I was in Notre Dame. I was an ROTC student so I received my commission in June of 1955, but because I wanted to finish law school, the Air Force gave me a deferment for one year to finish up in '55,'56, so in December 6, 1956, pursuant to orders that I had I showed up at Lackland Air Force Base and began my career.

NIDS: And, and what did you essentially do while you were in the Air Force, were you in the JAG or did you have some other assignments?

JAG: Well, I was in the Pilot Training Program for six months in anticipation that I would be serving no more than a three-year tour and then the...what was then the Flying Training Air Force was revamped to become the Air Training Command. And anyone then in the pipeline earning, ah potentially wings or being ultimately successful would be earning wings as an Air Force Pilot, they would have to then commit themselves to a five-year tour of duty.

NIDS: Oh, I see.

JAG: So I had a dilemma on my hands. I had committed myself to no more than three years when I initially entered the Air Force, so with a law degree and a family, and the like, I was able with some assistance from the people that were aware of who I was in the Air Training Command to transfer out of the Pilot Training Program into JAG. And that's what I did.

NIDS: OK.

JAG: I became a lawyer in the Air Force.

NIDS: Did you ever do any flying though?

JAG: Oh yes I did. I flew for six months.

NIDS: And you did, did you get your wings, or..?

JAG: Oh no, no, no, no. I [inaudible] ... two aircraft and then ah, ah found that I had this choice to make and so before I went on to advance training down in some of the Southern bases and only having completed contract, primary contract training flying in North Carolina at a place called Kinston, Kinston Air Base, that's where I made the transfer in the summer, spring/summer of 1957 I returned to Lackland and I was assigned to the 37th, whatever the heck it was, 37th 25th headquarters of the 37th 25th Air Base group and I served out the next 2 ½ years as a lawyer.

NIDS: That is very interesting. That is an interesting career. And so you retired in 1987 as a full Colonel.

JAG: Ah no, yes.

NIDS: And how many years total was that, was your service then?

JAG: I came home vowing that I would probably never put on another uniform after I had served for three years, and then one day the phone rang, there was a fellow over here in Burnersville, New Jersey now deceased, by the name of _________, and _______ was in the Reserve, he was a lawyer. He wanted desperately to form a unit, a Reserve Training Unit. He needed seven warm bodies, he had identified five among his colleagues who were Captains and Majors, I was a 1st. Lt. having just come off active duty. He got my name and address, God knows how, he called me on the phone, entreated me to go to a meeting in Newark, in uniform, which I had vowed never to put on again. Back I went to Newark and I met seven men who I immediately came to like, there were some older, some were about my age and they said '...look ________, we can get...you don't, you don't have to come to these meetings, just help us prove that we've assembled seven people who are lawyers in the JAG and the Reserve and we can be certified and we can be made eligible to pick up assignments at McGuire Air Force Base for two-week tours of active duty and serve in the Reserve in the active Reserve.' And so, much against my better judgment to help these guys out, I did exactly that and within a year's time the Pentagon wrote me a letter and said, '...look, if you're interested, since you are a lawyer, and you have earned a law degree, we can credit your active duty time and accelerate you to a promotion to Captain in the JAG reserve if you're interested and assign you to McGuire Air Force Base.'

NIDS: OK.

JAG: And that's what I did.

NIDS: When did you enter, when did all of this take place?

JAG: This took place in 1961 or thereabouts.

NIDS: And did you ever in your, so from that point on you were in the JAG?

JAG: From that point on I was in the JAG, I tooled up and down the Garden State, forgive me, the New Jersey turnpike, through seven years as a Captain, seven years as a Major - 14 years, five to six years as a Lt. Colonel and then my career took a turn that was wonderfully satisfying. Ah, I was given the opportunity to, now with some rank, I was a Lt. Colonel, I found that some of the legal conventions or meetings, actually there were, they were district meetings of Air Force JAG officers at places like, ah, oh Andrews Air Force Base down in Washington, D.C. we went up to Massachusetts and different places. And I finally met enough people who felt that it might be helpful to assign me to a place in Texas. So I ended up going to (Berstrom?) Air Force Base and I became a mobilization assignee to the Air, forgive me, the Tact..., what was then known as the Tactical Air Command and I ended up serving there, and I went back to Lackland as a Lt. Colonel, and then finally in the, in February of 1982 I got a very wonderful phone call from Washington, from some colleagues, people who were my preceptors, they said '...congratulations _______, you're now a Colonel.' So that was in February of 1982, and then from that point I was able to go to places around the world, that otherwise I couldn't have gone. On reserve assignments I went to Germany, I went to Alaska, ah you know these were two-week tours, or week tours but and then of course I continued with my daily, or I should say monthly, commitment down to McGuire but I was able to take these other trips and really feel a, a major part of the United States Air Force.

NIDS: And, and in the service of JAG do you have the opportunity to serve, you do prosecution, defense and were you also a judge?

JAG: Well, I was never a judge because I was never a regular active duty officer-

NIDS: Oh, you have to be one ha.

JAG: You may recall, you may remember the shoot-down of the 007, the Russians shot down Korean Airlines 007 -

NIDS: Right.

JAG: - with a Congressman named McDonald on board, I think it was, it occurred in the mid-80s. The Air Force was sued and defended in the U.S. Federal District Courts of Washington, D.C. When I was sent to Alaska, I would do things like this; they would, they would say to me, '...look, we've got a, a box full of investigative items here, ah we are investigating and taking depositions and interviewing people who were here on the base at Elmendorf ah, on the radar when, when the...', because this, even though it was a civilian airliner, it was a Korean airline, it used the radar hand-off systems at Elmendorf to go on down to the Sakkhalin Island area and all the way down to the South China Sea area off the coast of Japan. The Russians shot this damn thing down.

NIDS: Right.

JAG: The Air Force was in [inaudible]. So I would, I would do investigative work along those lines.

NIDS: And when you left the Air Force, did you, is that when you started your law firm or did you, did you already start that before you left the Air Force?

JAG: Well no. I, my father was in practice here, I joined him and then I maintained a law practice, which was not easy to do but nevertheless, in lieu of taking personal time and vacation time, my vacation became the Air Force. That's what I did.

NIDS: Well, when you were working were you automatically, did you have to do the bar admission procedures for New Jersey or was it already taken-

JAG: I was already admitted as a lawyer-

NIDS: When, when you got your ah, J.D. degree then?

JAG: I took the bar, I took the bar examination here in New Jersey just weeks before I, as I earlier told you I left [inaudible] 1957 for Texas to enter the flying program, and I only had one shot at the bar. The Air Force said, '...we're not going to give you two bites of the apple you take it first time and if you don't pass it, we've got you for three years.' NIDS: [laughter] Well you got it. Okay, that's understandable. Well the incident which we're interested in that, that doesn't really concern you but you're implied in, is really a weird incident, it's very strange. It occurred at McGuire, on January 18, 1978 and it was shooting incident, and it is a very unusual case in the sense that it started at Ft. Dix with an MP chasing, I think there was a, what they had considered was a UFO sighting over the base at the time, over the fort, and a being was sighted and an MP had actually chased him across Gate 5 near the Air National Guard facility by an abandoned runway, went on to McGuire's property on that inactive runway and shot the thing. And the whole thing was ah, involved several security police members from the 438th SPS Squadron. We have the name of a gentlemen by the name of James Morse, who we've never been able to track down but he has been interviewed about, some 15 almost 20 years ago over the course of a few years during the early to mid 80s, late 80s, by several people interested in this particular episode, and no one has seen him since. But the reason why your name came up is that Jim Morse had inferred that you...what had happened was he was one of the SPS members on patrol that night who encountered the incident and was the first to call in and report it. He submitted an Air Force DD Form 1569, which is the Air Force's Incident Report, detailed report and he provided a copy to these investigators, who are not colleagues of mine but I-

JAG: When did this happen?

NIDS: This happened January 18, 1978 in the early morning hours, somewhere about 2-3 a.m., 0315 hours ya-

JAG: Up and down Dix or at the, at the Air Force or at McGuire on one of runways?

NIDS: Well, I was wondering if you were at Wright-Patterson at the time?

JAG: I was never at Wright-Pat.

NIDS: You never were?

JAG: No.

NIDS: Okay. You've never had an assignment -

JAG: Never [inaudible]

NIDS: Well the question is, is Morse had alluded to the fact that 48 hours after this episode he was taken on a C-141 to Wright-Patterson and interrogated by a, military officers in civilian dress, in civilian outfits, in other words they were wearing dress suits, you know office business suits, and they had nameplates with their names and military rank on the plates. And one of the investigators, his name was ________, had been given Jim Morse's 1569, had the name of the military officer's and other investigators involved in the incident from both Ft. Dix and McGuire Air Force Base listed on it. They had the base commander, they had the OSI commander's name, they had the name of the SPS squadron, and so forth, and he said that one of the names of the investigators was you. It would have been, it would have been Lt. Col. or, I'm not sure if I got the rank right but I got your name as ______. and you were one of the gentlemen who either debriefed him or interrogated him over the incident. And I was wondering if you remembered it?

JAG: You know NIDS, I am going to absolutely candid with you. I am sitting here absolutely nonplussed, I'm just drawing a total complete blank on this. Ah, you know I, we were during the day, I would arrive at McGuire, now...if this happened in January, that tells me that it would not have been likely to have occurred during a two-week tour of duty that I would have been serving there, and as I said earlier although it's true in '78 I had not yet been promoted to Colonel and I would have been a Lt. Colonel in 1978. If it happened in January my typical routine would be to drive from Morris County, New Jersey by car, to, in uniform to McGuire, for a one-day tour of duty in the legal office, and invariably if this incident that your talking about would have involved an Article 32 investigation of some kind, the active duty JAG's would typically be assigned to those things. What they had us do would be do to, we would perform legal assistance matters, we might interact with, we might attend some staff conferences or staff meetings of one kind or another to become briefed on current evolution of certain Air Force policies. But there was a limit to what they could have us do during the course of one day. What we often would do would be to take a look at a file where there had been a conviction, and where there was an automatic need for an appeal and maybe do some legal review of that transcript to determine whether it would pass legal muster under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, or, but typically we would be doing office work, investigative work, but as far as going out on airplane to another base or interviewing people in the course of a homicide investigation, I absolutely don't recall ever doing that at all.

NIDS: Okay. Well let me, can I read this to you and tell you what it says? It was at 0315 hours, so-

JAG: 0315, okay that would be the morning?

NIDS: Ya. Quarter after three in the morning.

JAG: Right.

NIDS: Ya. 0315 hours in the morning on January 18, 1978, and the story is a UFO incident on inactive Runway #5, McGuire Air Force Base, New Jersey and it gives the zip as 09864. Um, there is, this is hard to read, the DD 1569, I'm reading a copy, it reports that a New Jersey state police officer of Wrightstown [inaudible] New Jersey was also involved.

JAG: That would be possible.

NIDS: Okay. [reading from report] On the above date and time it was apparent to this office that there were reports of UFO sightings over the base and an incident in progress on the Ft. Dix installation, also McGuire Air Force Base control tower, Airmen 1st Class blank, it was blacked out, reported same. Upon further investigation reported that an unidentified being had been shot by Dix's MP's and same entered McGuire Air Force Base at above location.

JAG: Hold on, hold on. Who, who was shot?

NIDS: I'm sorry?

JAG: Slow down there. Who was shot?

NIDS: A being. B-e-i-n-g. An unidentified being.

JAG: A being, was shot by whom?

NIDS: A Ft. Dix MP.

JAG: Okay.

NIDS: And same-

JAG: Who, who reported the shooting?

NIDS: Ahh, the New Jersey state police officer and-

JAG: Okay, that's alright-

NIDS: ...the S, the Security Police Squadron, Jim Morse reported it.

JAG: Okay.

NIDS: And there's another name that's been blanked out that we can't recover and it is his, he, Morse was an E3. Another E3 in that squadron also reported it, John Samuels was the MP that shot the being. He's an E4 listed Ft. Dix MP battallion.

JAG: Well I have to tell you, NIDS I have to tell you that I am drawing total, absolute...I just have no recollection of this, and if it happened indeed at three or so in the morning or the early morning hours of any given date in, in the month of January now-

NIDS: Okay.

JAG: -ah, I have never been on an Air Force base, in my life, other than the two-week tours that I have pulled in the Spring, in the, usually during the Easter recess, but I have never been there in January at 3 o'clock in the morning.

NIDS: [inaudible] evidence, one body of unknown origin, released to the care of OSI District Commander and Special Recover Chief from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Well, we interviewed the OSI Special...District Commander and he has no recollection of any such of thing. Distribution of this report went to the Base Commander, Ken Landon, do you remember him?

JAG: I do not.

NIDS: Okay. We interviewed him. Distribution went to Brig. Gen. Brown and he was not AFOSI, it was somebody else, but we interviewed the AFOSI Commander and that's who I just mentioned earlier, it was the ah, Detachment Commander, is actually what the term-

JAG: Who was, who was the acting ah...there were, there were the two Air Force JAG's that would have had knowledge of this. That would have had their hands on it, [inaudible]. First there would have been the Air Force Judge Advocate for the 21st Air Force, Headquarters 21st Air Force at that time. They would have, they obviously would have known about this. Secondly, there would have been the base legal office, the base-level legal office, Air Force JAG officer whoever was assigned to that position-

NIDS: Okay.

JAG: I served under a number of these people, typically they were in the rank either Lt. Col. and no more than that.

NIDS: Okay.

JAG: Once you got to be promoted to Colonel they would move people up and on to a numbered Air Force. And as I said earlier, when I got promoted to Colonel, I spent little, I, I went for my monthly tours of duty at McGuire, but my two-week tours of active duty were off the station. I have to tell you, I, I wish I could help you but my dear man, I don't remember this thing at all.

NIDS: Ya. We interviewed the ah, 21st Air Force Commander, do you remember him, Gen. Sadler?

JAG: I remember, yes, he was ah, Tom Sadler-

NIDS: Ya. He doesn't remember it either and, do you recall that he had a briefing, an Intelligence Briefing Officer by the name of, it was either Captain or Major George Filer.

JAG: George who? The, I don't know that name.

NIDS: You don't know that name? Okay. We did interview [Source 1]. [Source 1] was the __________.

JAG: Okay.

NIDS: And, we also interviewed the _______ and he does, also, his name was ______.

JAG: When you say "we", who is "we"?

NIDS: My colleagues. We have an investigator who is retired from the OSI. And he served at McGuire, some, not too long after this incident occurred. He has nothing to do with this but he is an employee now and he is a retired police officer from San Diego, but he was in the OSI in the Air Force for a number of years during the 1980s. And, he is our Field Investigator. We employ him to go out and track down people for various historical cases of interest and-

JAG: Are you saying that in effect this, your investigation is focused upon learning whether it is conceivable or possible that an extra-terrestrial being, if I have the, I don't want to make assumptions that I'm stating here, were, was seen to be or was thought to be a presence on this base and that either directly or indirectly or accidentally or whatever sum, this being was shot, and that in the investigation that ensued all these different people played a role in it? Is that what you're saying?

NIDS: Yeah. That's what we're looking at and finding out if it really happened or not or whether this whole thing was a hoax-

JAG: I will tell you this. In all the years that I was at McGuire, ah, either at a serious [inaudible] in a serious conversation, in a joking context, with all the lawyers I interacted with the, the different civilians that were on the base in the law offices and the legal offices and so on, this is the first time in my life in this conversation that I'm having with you and I accept what you're saying in good faith, I never heard of this at all in my entire, from any source.

NIDS: Oh, I know. I know it's very unusual but we, we're a-

JAG: [inaudible]

NIDS: Ha?

JAG: You obviously have a desire to pursue it [inaudible]. But that's the best I can for you-

NIDS: Well, that's all I'm asking is just whether you, how you were involved and whether you had heard of James Morse. He was an E3, I don't know why he would have given your name.

JAG: I haven't the...Well, you know he may have, I don't know, I can only speculate. You know in the course of, of talking to people about wills, talking to people about their personal family issues, whatever they may be, it is conceivable that a James Morse may have visited the legal office and introduced himself to me and I filled out a card of some kind to give him some kind of family legal advice of one kind, or he may have met me in some context, but I don't remember the name at all, I wouldn't know James Morse if I, it doesn't register with me.

NIDS: Okay. Did you ever talk to a gentlemen by the name of _______?

JAG: No. Never.

NIDS: Okay. He was the gentleman who gave me your name and he is the one who interviewed James, Jim Morse in Washington, D.C. sometime in the mid 80s. And he has been reluctant to give me any of the other names or social security numbers so I can track down some of these people but, [inaudible] did not happen.

JAG: Well, NIDS, I appreciated talking to you, if I can be of further help you know where I am. I'd be more than happy to -

NIDS: Well, thank you. I think you've more than helped actually.

JAG: Okay. Good luck with this.

NIDS: Well, thank you.

JAG: This is not, I've seen on television and I've seen you know through the cable news network systems and so on and then we've all read and heard about the Roswell, you know this thing is sort of in the public psyche, in one form or another. But, I can tell you this my friend, in 30 years of being in the Air Force, here and abroad, there never was anybody that I ever dealt with, officially or unofficially, who ever confided me or suggested to me that there were UFOs that the Air Force knew about that didn't acknowledge or hold up to, ah, never in my life did I ever hear-

NIDS: Oh no. I'm just, ya, I'm only interested in just this particular issue and whether you recognize any of these names -

JAG: I do not. I do not.

NIDS: and if you had been briefed or if you did any briefings or any interviewing of any of these individuals.

JAG: None at all.

NIDS: But you never ah, recognize, you did know _________?

JAG: I knew of him. Yes, of course I did because he was there, I mean I probably met the man in some staff meetings of one kind or another or official functions of 21st Air Force as I did other high-ranking officers. You know sometimes you run into these people at staff meetings. Somebody would introduce you to somebody and so on.

NIDS: But how about [inaudible] did you ever know of the ________?

JAG: Commander. I seldom had interactions with the OSI people at McGuire, again because I was there to back up and assist the office legal personnel on overflow on assignments that, because you know you're there for one day and you know you're a practicing civilian lawyer, you show up in uniform for one days activity they wouldn't send us out in a car to interact in an OSI investigation because we'd be gone the next day and it would break the, the chain of continuum in terms of that, so they'd have the, typically the Captain's and Major's on base doing that work and they would be regular active duty officers who would be doing that.

NIDS: And so you, so you're in a support role and of course you weren't there, I guess you were there at the time but you weren't ah -

JAG: Not at 3 o'clock in the morning in January of 1978.

NIDS: Nor that day, nor the next day, I gather.

JAG: No. Absolutely not.

NIDS: Okay, well I thank you very much and this is very helpful.

JAG: I appreciate talking to you.

NIDS: And I know, I'm sorry, it is a very strange topic to talk about -

JAG: No, it's interesting. Happy to talk to you, okay.

NIDS: Okay, thank you very much. Bye.


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Home	Fort Dix/McGuire AFB Investigation Interview Transcript: Jag Officer JAG Officer implicated by primary McGuire eyewitness as having debriefed him concerning the entity incident. The debriefing by this JAG officer allegedly happened at Wright Patterson AFB. Transcript of the interview of the named JAG officer by NIDS December 5, 2000 JAG: Are you from California? NIDS: No, Las Vegas, Nevada. JAG: Oh, Las Vegas, Nevada. I was puzzled as to...who the devil was calling me from Las Vegas, Nevada? What can I do for you? NIDS: Well, are you the ________ who was in the Air Force? JAG: I sure am, I was. [inaudible]...years. NIDS: Well, I found in the Morristown, or Morris Co. Bar Association there was an award that you had received at one time but it didn't give when, it was the Professional Lawyer of the Year Award. JAG: Yes, that's right. NIDS: When did you receive that? JAG: I received that award in a meeting of the New Jersey State Bar Association, I believe it was in June of 1999. I have the little citation and the...there was a little silver tray that they awarded us, Lawyers from the different counties. There are 21 counties in New Jersey and I believe it was in June of '99. NIDS: Well congratulations, that's a very prestigious award. I have a lot of friends and relatives who are in the legal profession so, I'm...I kind of look up to them. But that is how I found your information and it says here that you had received meritorious service medal in 1987 and you retired as a Colonel. JAG: Right. NIDS: Okay, my question is I'm researching an historical incident that occurred at air force base in New Jersey, McGuire Air Force Base? JAG: Yup. Ya. NIDS: Okay, and your name had come up indirectly in regards to this investigation and it's kind of an historical thing we're trying to, to find out if it really happened or not, and that's why I'm really calling about. And I wanted to know, basically, you, you were admitted to the Bar in '57? JAG: That's correct. February 15. NIDS: And when did you enter the Air Force? JAG: Ah, well, ah, let's see, I was, I was in Notre Dame. I was an ROTC student so I received my commission in June of 1955, but because I wanted to finish law school, the Air Force gave me a deferment for one year to finish up in '55,'56, so in December 6, 1956, pursuant to orders that I had I showed up at Lackland Air Force Base and began my career. NIDS: And, and what did you essentially do while you were in the Air Force, were you in the JAG or did you have some other assignments? JAG: Well, I was in the Pilot Training Program for six months in anticipation that I would be serving no more than a three-year tour and then the...what was then the Flying Training Air Force was revamped to become the Air Training Command. And anyone then in the pipeline earning, ah potentially wings or being ultimately successful would be earning wings as an Air Force Pilot, they would have to then commit themselves to a five-year tour of duty. NIDS: Oh, I see. JAG: So I had a dilemma on my hands. I had committed myself to no more than three years when I initially entered the Air Force, so with a law degree and a family, and the like, I was able with some assistance from the people that were aware of who I was in the Air Training Command to transfer out of the Pilot Training Program into JAG. And that's what I did. NIDS: OK. JAG: I became a lawyer in the Air Force. NIDS: Did you ever do any flying though? JAG: Oh yes I did. I flew for six months. NIDS: And you did, did you get your wings, or..? JAG: Oh no, no, no, no. I [inaudible] ... two aircraft and then ah, ah found that I had this choice to make and so before I went on to advance training down in some of the Southern bases and only having completed contract, primary contract training flying in North Carolina at a place called Kinston, Kinston Air Base, that's where I made the transfer in the summer, spring/summer of 1957 I returned to Lackland and I was assigned to the 37th, whatever the heck it was, 37th 25th headquarters of the 37th 25th Air Base group and I served out the next 2 ½ years as a lawyer. NIDS: That is very interesting. That is an interesting career. And so you retired in 1987 as a full Colonel. JAG: Ah no, yes. NIDS: And how many years total was that, was your service then? JAG: I came home vowing that I would probably never put on another uniform after I had served for three years, and then one day the phone rang, there was a fellow over here in Burnersville, New Jersey now deceased, by the name of _________, and _______ was in the Reserve, he was a lawyer. He wanted desperately to form a unit, a Reserve Training Unit. He needed seven warm bodies, he had identified five among his colleagues who were Captains and Majors, I was a 1st. Lt. having just come off active duty. He got my name and address, God knows how, he called me on the phone, entreated me to go to a meeting in Newark, in uniform, which I had vowed never to put on again. Back I went to Newark and I met seven men who I immediately came to like, there were some older, some were about my age and they said '...look ________, we can get...you don't, you don't have to come to these meetings, just help us prove that we've assembled seven people who are lawyers in the JAG and the Reserve and we can be certified and we can be made eligible to pick up assignments at McGuire Air Force Base for two-week tours of active duty and serve in the Reserve in the active Reserve.' And so, much against my better judgment to help these guys out, I did exactly that and within a year's time the Pentagon wrote me a letter and said, '...look, if you're interested, since you are a lawyer, and you have earned a law degree, we can credit your active duty time and accelerate you to a promotion to Captain in the JAG reserve if you're interested and assign you to McGuire Air Force Base.' NIDS: OK. JAG: And that's what I did. NIDS: When did you enter, when did all of this take place? JAG: This took place in 1961 or thereabouts. NIDS: And did you ever in your, so from that point on you were in the JAG? JAG: From that point on I was in the JAG, I tooled up and down the Garden State, forgive me, the New Jersey turnpike, through seven years as a Captain, seven years as a Major - 14 years, five to six years as a Lt. Colonel and then my career took a turn that was wonderfully satisfying. Ah, I was given the opportunity to, now with some rank, I was a Lt. Colonel, I found that some of the legal conventions or meetings, actually there were, they were district meetings of Air Force JAG officers at places like, ah, oh Andrews Air Force Base down in Washington, D.C. we went up to Massachusetts and different places. And I finally met enough people who felt that it might be helpful to assign me to a place in Texas. So I ended up going to (Berstrom?) Air Force Base and I became a mobilization assignee to the Air, forgive me, the Tact..., what was then known as the Tactical Air Command and I ended up serving there, and I went back to Lackland as a Lt. Colonel, and then finally in the, in February of 1982 I got a very wonderful phone call from Washington, from some colleagues, people who were my preceptors, they said '...congratulations _______, you're now a Colonel.' So that was in February of 1982, and then from that point I was able to go to places around the world, that otherwise I couldn't have gone. On reserve assignments I went to Germany, I went to Alaska, ah you know these were two-week tours, or week tours but and then of course I continued with my daily, or I should say monthly, commitment down to McGuire but I was able to take these other trips and really feel a, a major part of the United States Air Force. NIDS: And, and in the service of JAG do you have the opportunity to serve, you do prosecution, defense and were you also a judge? JAG: Well, I was never a judge because I was never a regular active duty officer- NIDS: Oh, you have to be one ha. JAG: You may recall, you may remember the shoot-down of the 007, the Russians shot down Korean Airlines 007 - NIDS: Right. JAG: - with a Congressman named McDonald on board, I think it was, it occurred in the mid-80s. The Air Force was sued and defended in the U.S. Federal District Courts of Washington, D.C. When I was sent to Alaska, I would do things like this; they would, they would say to me, '...look, we've got a, a box full of investigative items here, ah we are investigating and taking depositions and interviewing people who were here on the base at Elmendorf ah, on the radar when, when the...', because this, even though it was a civilian airliner, it was a Korean airline, it used the radar hand-off systems at Elmendorf to go on down to the Sakkhalin Island area and all the way down to the South China Sea area off the coast of Japan. The Russians shot this damn thing down. NIDS: Right. JAG: The Air Force was in [inaudible]. So I would, I would do investigative work along those lines. NIDS: And when you left the Air Force, did you, is that when you started your law firm or did you, did you already start that before you left the Air Force? JAG: Well no. I, my father was in practice here, I joined him and then I maintained a law practice, which was not easy to do but nevertheless, in lieu of taking personal time and vacation time, my vacation became the Air Force. That's what I did. NIDS: Well, when you were working were you automatically, did you have to do the bar admission procedures for New Jersey or was it already taken- JAG: I was already admitted as a lawyer- NIDS: When, when you got your ah, J.D. degree then? JAG: I took the bar, I took the bar examination here in New Jersey just weeks before I, as I earlier told you I left [inaudible] 1957 for Texas to enter the flying program, and I only had one shot at the bar. The Air Force said, '...we're not going to give you two bites of the apple you take it first time and if you don't pass it, we've got you for three years.' NIDS: [laughter] Well you got it. Okay, that's understandable. Well the incident which we're interested in that, that doesn't really concern you but you're implied in, is really a weird incident, it's very strange. It occurred at McGuire, on January 18, 1978 and it was shooting incident, and it is a very unusual case in the sense that it started at Ft. Dix with an MP chasing, I think there was a, what they had considered was a UFO sighting over the base at the time, over the fort, and a being was sighted and an MP had actually chased him across Gate 5 near the Air National Guard facility by an abandoned runway, went on to McGuire's property on that inactive runway and shot the thing. And the whole thing was ah, involved several security police members from the 438th SPS Squadron. We have the name of a gentlemen by the name of James Morse, who we've never been able to track down but he has been interviewed about, some 15 almost 20 years ago over the course of a few years during the early to mid 80s, late 80s, by several people interested in this particular episode, and no one has seen him since. But the reason why your name came up is that Jim Morse had inferred that you...what had happened was he was one of the SPS members on patrol that night who encountered the incident and was the first to call in and report it. He submitted an Air Force DD Form 1569, which is the Air Force's Incident Report, detailed report and he provided a copy to these investigators, who are not colleagues of mine but I- JAG: When did this happen? NIDS: This happened January 18, 1978 in the early morning hours, somewhere about 2-3 a.m., 0315 hours ya- JAG: Up and down Dix or at the, at the Air Force or at McGuire on one of runways? NIDS: Well, I was wondering if you were at Wright-Patterson at the time? JAG: I was never at Wright-Pat. NIDS: You never were? JAG: No. NIDS: Okay. You've never had an assignment - JAG: Never [inaudible] NIDS: Well the question is, is Morse had alluded to the fact that 48 hours after this episode he was taken on a C-141 to Wright-Patterson and interrogated by a, military officers in civilian dress, in civilian outfits, in other words they were wearing dress suits, you know office business suits, and they had nameplates with their names and military rank on the plates. And one of the investigators, his name was ________, had been given Jim Morse's 1569, had the name of the military officer's and other investigators involved in the incident from both Ft. Dix and McGuire Air Force Base listed on it. They had the base commander, they had the OSI commander's name, they had the name of the SPS squadron, and so forth, and he said that one of the names of the investigators was you. It would have been, it would have been Lt. Col. or, I'm not sure if I got the rank right but I got your name as ______. and you were one of the gentlemen who either debriefed him or interrogated him over the incident. And I was wondering if you remembered it? JAG: You know NIDS, I am going to absolutely candid with you. I am sitting here absolutely nonplussed, I'm just drawing a total complete blank on this. Ah, you know I, we were during the day, I would arrive at McGuire, now...if this happened in January, that tells me that it would not have been likely to have occurred during a two-week tour of duty that I would have been serving there, and as I said earlier although it's true in '78 I had not yet been promoted to Colonel and I would have been a Lt. Colonel in 1978. If it happened in January my typical routine would be to drive from Morris County, New Jersey by car, to, in uniform to McGuire, for a one-day tour of duty in the legal office, and invariably if this incident that your talking about would have involved an Article 32 investigation of some kind, the active duty JAG's would typically be assigned to those things. What they had us do would be do to, we would perform legal assistance matters, we might interact with, we might attend some staff conferences or staff meetings of one kind or another to become briefed on current evolution of certain Air Force policies. But there was a limit to what they could have us do during the course of one day. What we often would do would be to take a look at a file where there had been a conviction, and where there was an automatic need for an appeal and maybe do some legal review of that transcript to determine whether it would pass legal muster under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, or, but typically we would be doing office work, investigative work, but as far as going out on airplane to another base or interviewing people in the course of a homicide investigation, I absolutely don't recall ever doing that at all. NIDS: Okay. Well let me, can I read this to you and tell you what it says? It was at 0315 hours, so- JAG: 0315, okay that would be the morning? NIDS: Ya. Quarter after three in the morning. JAG: Right. NIDS: Ya. 0315 hours in the morning on January 18, 1978, and the story is a UFO incident on inactive Runway #5, McGuire Air Force Base, New Jersey and it gives the zip as 09864. Um, there is, this is hard to read, the DD 1569, I'm reading a copy, it reports that a New Jersey state police officer of Wrightstown [inaudible] New Jersey was also involved. JAG: That would be possible. NIDS: Okay. [reading from report] On the above date and time it was apparent to this office that there were reports of UFO sightings over the base and an incident in progress on the Ft. Dix installation, also McGuire Air Force Base control tower, Airmen 1st Class blank, it was blacked out, reported same. Upon further investigation reported that an unidentified being had been shot by Dix's MP's and same entered McGuire Air Force Base at above location. JAG: Hold on, hold on. Who, who was shot? NIDS: I'm sorry? JAG: Slow down there. Who was shot? NIDS: A being. B-e-i-n-g. An unidentified being. JAG: A being, was shot by whom? NIDS: A Ft. Dix MP. JAG: Okay. NIDS: And same- JAG: Who, who reported the shooting? NIDS: Ahh, the New Jersey state police officer and- JAG: Okay, that's alright- NIDS: ...the S, the Security Police Squadron, Jim Morse reported it. JAG: Okay. NIDS: And there's another name that's been blanked out that we can't recover and it is his, he, Morse was an E3. Another E3 in that squadron also reported it, John Samuels was the MP that shot the being. He's an E4 listed Ft. Dix MP battallion. JAG: Well I have to tell you, NIDS I have to tell you that I am drawing total, absolute...I just have no recollection of this, and if it happened indeed at three or so in the morning or the early morning hours of any given date in, in the month of January now- NIDS: Okay. JAG: -ah, I have never been on an Air Force base, in my life, other than the two-week tours that I have pulled in the Spring, in the, usually during the Easter recess, but I have never been there in January at 3 o'clock in the morning. NIDS: [inaudible] evidence, one body of unknown origin, released to the care of OSI District Commander and Special Recover Chief from Wright-Patterson Air Force Base. Well, we interviewed the OSI Special...District Commander and he has no recollection of any such of thing. Distribution of this report went to the Base Commander, Ken Landon, do you remember him? JAG: I do not. NIDS: Okay. We interviewed him. Distribution went to Brig. Gen. Brown and he was not AFOSI, it was somebody else, but we interviewed the AFOSI Commander and that's who I just mentioned earlier, it was the ah, Detachment Commander, is actually what the term- JAG: Who was, who was the acting ah...there were, there were the two Air Force JAG's that would have had knowledge of this. That would have had their hands on it, [inaudible]. First there would have been the Air Force Judge Advocate for the 21st Air Force, Headquarters 21st Air Force at that time. They would have, they obviously would have known about this. Secondly, there would have been the base legal office, the base-level legal office, Air Force JAG officer whoever was assigned to that position- NIDS: Okay. JAG: I served under a number of these people, typically they were in the rank either Lt. Col. and no more than that. NIDS: Okay. JAG: Once you got to be promoted to Colonel they would move people up and on to a numbered Air Force. And as I said earlier, when I got promoted to Colonel, I spent little, I, I went for my monthly tours of duty at McGuire, but my two-week tours of active duty were off the station. I have to tell you, I, I wish I could help you but my dear man, I don't remember this thing at all. NIDS: Ya. We interviewed the ah, 21st Air Force Commander, do you remember him, Gen. Sadler? JAG: I remember, yes, he was ah, Tom Sadler- NIDS: Ya. He doesn't remember it either and, do you recall that he had a briefing, an Intelligence Briefing Officer by the name of, it was either Captain or Major George Filer. JAG: George who? The, I don't know that name. NIDS: You don't know that name? Okay. We did interview [Source 1]. [Source 1] was the __________. JAG: Okay. NIDS: And, we also interviewed the _______ and he does, also, his name was ______. JAG: When you say "we", who is "we"? NIDS: My colleagues. We have an investigator who is retired from the OSI. And he served at McGuire, some, not too long after this incident occurred. He has nothing to do with this but he is an employee now and he is a retired police officer from San Diego, but he was in the OSI in the Air Force for a number of years during the 1980s. And, he is our Field Investigator. We employ him to go out and track down people for various historical cases of interest and- JAG: Are you saying that in effect this, your investigation is focused upon learning whether it is conceivable or possible that an extra-terrestrial being, if I have the, I don't want to make assumptions that I'm stating here, were, was seen to be or was thought to be a presence on this base and that either directly or indirectly or accidentally or whatever sum, this being was shot, and that in the investigation that ensued all these different people played a role in it? Is that what you're saying? NIDS: Yeah. That's what we're looking at and finding out if it really happened or not or whether this whole thing was a hoax- JAG: I will tell you this. In all the years that I was at McGuire, ah, either at a serious [inaudible] in a serious conversation, in a joking context, with all the lawyers I interacted with the, the different civilians that were on the base in the law offices and the legal offices and so on, this is the first time in my life in this conversation that I'm having with you and I accept what you're saying in good faith, I never heard of this at all in my entire, from any source. NIDS: Oh, I know. I know it's very unusual but we, we're a- JAG: [inaudible] NIDS: Ha? JAG: You obviously have a desire to pursue it [inaudible]. But that's the best I can for you- NIDS: Well, that's all I'm asking is just whether you, how you were involved and whether you had heard of James Morse. He was an E3, I don't know why he would have given your name. JAG: I haven't the...Well, you know he may have, I don't know, I can only speculate. You know in the course of, of talking to people about wills, talking to people about their personal family issues, whatever they may be, it is conceivable that a James Morse may have visited the legal office and introduced himself to me and I filled out a card of some kind to give him some kind of family legal advice of one kind, or he may have met me in some context, but I don't remember the name at all, I wouldn't know James Morse if I, it doesn't register with me. NIDS: Okay. Did you ever talk to a gentlemen by the name of _______? JAG: No. Never. NIDS: Okay. He was the gentleman who gave me your name and he is the one who interviewed James, Jim Morse in Washington, D.C. sometime in the mid 80s. And he has been reluctant to give me any of the other names or social security numbers so I can track down some of these people but, [inaudible] did not happen. JAG: Well, NIDS, I appreciated talking to you, if I can be of further help you know where I am. I'd be more than happy to - NIDS: Well, thank you. I think you've more than helped actually. JAG: Okay. Good luck with this. NIDS: Well, thank you. JAG: This is not, I've seen on television and I've seen you know through the cable news network systems and so on and then we've all read and heard about the Roswell, you know this thing is sort of in the public psyche, in one form or another. But, I can tell you this my friend, in 30 years of being in the Air Force, here and abroad, there never was anybody that I ever dealt with, officially or unofficially, who ever confided me or suggested to me that there were UFOs that the Air Force knew about that didn't acknowledge or hold up to, ah, never in my life did I ever hear- NIDS: Oh no. I'm just, ya, I'm only interested in just this particular issue and whether you recognize any of these names - JAG: I do not. I do not. NIDS: and if you had been briefed or if you did any briefings or any interviewing of any of these individuals. JAG: None at all. NIDS: But you never ah, recognize, you did know _________? JAG: I knew of him. Yes, of course I did because he was there, I mean I probably met the man in some staff meetings of one kind or another or official functions of 21st Air Force as I did other high-ranking officers. You know sometimes you run into these people at staff meetings. Somebody would introduce you to somebody and so on. NIDS: But how about [inaudible] did you ever know of the ________? JAG: Commander. I seldom had interactions with the OSI people at McGuire, again because I was there to back up and assist the office legal personnel on overflow on assignments that, because you know you're there for one day and you know you're a practicing civilian lawyer, you show up in uniform for one days activity they wouldn't send us out in a car to interact in an OSI investigation because we'd be gone the next day and it would break the, the chain of continuum in terms of that, so they'd have the, typically the Captain's and Major's on base doing that work and they would be regular active duty officers who would be doing that. NIDS: And so you, so you're in a support role and of course you weren't there, I guess you were there at the time but you weren't ah - JAG: Not at 3 o'clock in the morning in January of 1978. NIDS: Nor that day, nor the next day, I gather. JAG: No. Absolutely not. NIDS: Okay, well I thank you very much and this is very helpful. JAG: I appreciate talking to you. NIDS: And I know, I'm sorry, it is a very strange topic to talk about - JAG: No, it's interesting. Happy to talk to you, okay. NIDS: Okay, thank you very much. Bye.	What's New
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