FBI asks public for help breaking encrypted notes tied to 1999 murder

FBI asks public for help breaking encrypted notes tied to 1999 murder

news.yahoo.com

In what seems like a throwback to the still-unsolved Zodiac killings that terrorized the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1970s, the FBI has sent out a public appeal for amateur sleuths to help solve a key cryptographic clue in a 1999 murder case.

On June 30, 1999, police officers in St. Louis, Missouri found the body of 41-year-old Ricky McCormick, who'd been murdered and dumped in a field. The only clues investigators recovered from the scene were two encrypted notes stuffed into the victim's pockets.

(visit the link for the full news article)

Click the link for images of the notes.
Why didn't they just come to ATS and ask us, especially if we are infiltrated with them?!? lol
Anyway , I thought this was a neat news story, and I really thought some of the best ATS minds could maybe lend a hand.
If it is in the wrong forum, I apologize, but it seemed to fit the criteria.

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by toolstarr


I am by NO means a mathematician...but it looks to me to have some sort of algebra format. Perhaps a code that relies on one part to decipher another part.....or perhaps the second note is the key to the first one. It seems stupid to include TWO notes, when you could just include one...unless the second note is the solution.... It's obviously SOME sort of code.

Wow. The brain really wants to make sense of this, but I can see why no one has decoded it.

I remember being young and making up my own language. If you had asked me what I was talking about, I couldn't have told you. I had no idea myself.

My sense is that this is the rambling of a very sick man...and indecipherable.

Drugs come to mind...

reply to post by toolstarr


This should be fun for us all to attempt to crack. Thank you for posting.

TOO COOL!
Something to do besides sudoku! I love cryptograms.

I know this is a really silly idea, but anagrams without spaces perhaps ?

Like poster said above it does feel as though your brain can half resolve it, but at the same time you can't.

Really looking forward to finding out what it says when it has been cracked, one things for sure, its unlikey to be a shopping list

What if the killer just simply wrote down randomness and there isn't a code to decipher?

reply to post by solargeddon


UNLESS the person that wrote it is on ATS. LOL. I have no faith in the FBI. They couldn't crack open a nut.

This looks very interesting, excited to see what comes of this thread. Any mathematicians out there willing to help??

reply to post by toolstarr


well..here they are..easier to see on ATS...

Maybe the cypher is like the movie Knowing, and the nubmers and letters lead to world disasters. See anything in there about the japan disaster??? =)

reply to post by Hoopinator


I thought the same thing when I saw it. Math. But thats the extent of my genius on the topic.

But Im with you, the reason they are having trouble is because the message has been turned in to a formula with the numbers being substituted for words and probably the symbols too.

reply to post by Illusionsaregrander


They should look at the victim's friends and acquaintances and see if anyone around them is either in the math or physics field, or if they're somewhat autistic. (not trying to be rude). It seems to me that there is something that the average person doesn't see...causing the confusion. We should get Eli from Stargate to take a look at it. Or Oprah. She's got an answer for everything.

"CBE" seems to be very reoccurring on the the second image, I wonder what it could mean??

I feel maybe its not English to decipher,try Spanish maybe?
Rantings of a madman?

This smells fishy.

It is a double win for the Feds. They get to solve a crime, and at the same time get input from the "Anonymous" types for compiling information about the group.

They would never stoop so low as to ask us mere plebes unless there were an ulterior motive.

Count me in..I love this kind of stuff.

First off I see there are very few letter "o" in either notes. Am going to start there and hopeful not go mad before posting a possible solution.

Have fun contributors.

Rhain

I knew a man who would write random numbers all day. He would smoke and just write and write with his worn out pencil. He had stacks of books all with the numbers he wrote. He was a cool dude, taught me oragami lol