FBI and US Congress investigate the death or disappearance of 11 nuclear and aerospace scientists

“We are very concerned because this is a matter of national security,” James Comer, chairman of the committee and representative from Kentucky, said Sunday in an appearance on the Fox News channel. “This suggests that there could be something sinister behind it… We hope that, through our visibility, we can draw attention to the issue and that anyone with information will contact Congress.”

The FBI, for its part, said it was “collaborating with the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, and our state and local law enforcement partners to find answers” ​​about the disappearances.

Although there are no obvious connections between the cases or evidence of criminal acts, A series of assumptions have been woven on social networks about an alleged conspiracy that has even reached the White House.

Four of the cases are linked to Los Angeles County. Authorities are investigating whether there is a connection between the circumstances of the death or disappearance of Carl Grillmair, an astrophysicist at Caltech’s Infrared Processing and Analysis Center (IPAC); and the three experts from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL): Michael David Hicks, Frank Maiwald and Mónica Jacinto Reza.

Grillmair died last February at age 67, while Hicks and Maiwald died in 2023 and 2024, respectively. For his part, Jacinto Reza disappeared in June of last year while hiking with a friend in the Los Angeles National Forest.

Added to these cases is that of retired Major General William Neil McCasland, 68, who was last seen at the end of February at his home in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and is missing.

McCasland directed some of the Pentagon’s most advanced aerospace research, and headed the Air Force Research Laboratory, according to data cited by FOX.

Scientist Jason Thomas, director of Novartis, disappeared last December in Massachusetts, his body was found three months later. Police found no evidence of a crime related to his death.

There are other cases, such as the death of Amy Eskridge in June 2022 in Alabama from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

The death of the scientist, who worked at the Institute for Exotic Science, has drawn public attention for her complaints of a “psychological war” aimed at stopping her work in the field of antigravity, as she said in a podcast.

The FBI is also investigating the death of Portuguese scientist Nuno Loureiro, shot dead at his residence in Massachusetts; Authorities attributed the homicide to a suspect also responsible for a mass shooting at Brown University.

Loureiro was the director of MIT’s Center for Plasma and Fusion Science, as well as a world-renowned expert in nuclear fusion and magnetic reconnection.

The list of cases is completed by the disappearances of experts Melissa Casias, Anthony Chávez, and Steven García.