Looking For Mike (Mysterious Death Documentary) | Real Stories

in 2002 my friend Mike died under mysterious circumstances so this it's Michael's death certificate we've got a dead body we don't know who it is I've been with this school specifically since 1977 and all the time that I've been here I do not recognize that surname at all the mystery of his death has haunted me for years for me as an investigator in 37 years I've never seen a case quite like this how the hell did he know he was gonna have a heart attack in period city nervous why do you change your name what are the reasons you change your name I had no idea what took me 12 years to finally get some answers you put all these pieces together and you know what your work is done [Music] there it is Beachwood Cemetery hey I'm Dylan Dylan over Section nineteen is no I know you follow me I'll escort you okay how long have you not been here I've never been here oh six two two yeah okay god bless you gentlemen have a good day okay all right thanks so much my friend Mike died in 2002 I had been searching for his grave ever since the plot was unmarked in its location a secret these were just a few of the mysteries surrounding his death a death that sent me on a 12-year journey for answers my journey began in June of 2000 when I took a part-time job working for a tech startup while I was there I met the sales guy Michael Debussy a Mike wasn't your typical salesman he was quiet soft-spoken like a big teddy bear he had a good sense of humor but would never laugh out loud you chuckle quietly to himself he even wrote chuckles into his emails Mike and I quickly discovered we grew up in the same area I was from Baden Mike said he was from God Ridge I had family from God Ridge so I knew it well Mike and I became friends bonding over our small town roots we had a lot in common we would go for beers and joke about work and our small town hijinks I really got to know the guy in 2002 the company got bought out and Mike and I got laid off [Music] Mike wanted to teach English overseas he needed a new passport and asked me to be his personal reference I didn't think twice about it of course I would I knew him so well he told me to expect a call from the passport office any day that was the last time I ever heard from Mike a couple of weeks later I got a message on my answering machine on April 10th 2002 I spoke with the Toronto Police Detective he had found my contact information on Mike's passport application the detective told me that Mike's body had been found dead in his apartment and that he had died under mysterious circumstances the detective told me that Mike had died from what appeared to be a heart attack strange for 33 year old when the police went through his wallet to determine his identity they found the usual ID but they also found a card from a funeral company with a number to call in the case of his death they called and discovered that Mehcad prepaid his funeral one week before he died they tracked the rest of his ID his health card driver's license social insurance number each piece of identification was proven to be fake my friend had been living under a false identity his name wasn't Michael Debussy a-and his real identity was a mystery I hung up the phone shocked I thought about every single conversation I had with Mike every hangout every email I thought about every single detail I ever knew about Mike I realized I had been completely 100% fooled I felt betrayed I honestly thought of him as a friend I believed everything he told me about who he was and where he was from how could I have been so naive who was my friend and what had he done it's been 12 years since Mike was found dead his true identity remains a mystery the police were unable to solve the case and it went cold but I haven't been able to let it go it was very strange I don't know he was he was my age now and I can't imagine prepaying my funeral I've held on to everything I had of Mike every picture every correspondence I've gone over all details a thousand times searching for new angles that could lead me to Mike's real identity I got my hands on the death certificate it had details about the exact day Mike's body was found with those details I could request the police report on Mike's death maybe it had information I can use to track down his true identity so dear mr. rivaling please note that the Act requires the written authorization of the next of kin or the representatives as there were no such supporting documents enclosed with your request access is denied to the information at this time so basically I can access this information because I'm not next of kin and I don't have a written authorization from Michael the bustier I've kept in contact with the only other people who knew Mike my co-workers at the company where we met I've checked in with him occasionally going over all details trying to find new recollections anything that could point to a new lead was always the first guy you saw when you walked in the office he was always there he's punctual he's always very presentable and like just walk in hey Mike did he strike anyone as I always describe a pible in any way of doing anything extraordinary he was like no I don't mean this in any way insulting no you're he didn't jump out in any way so at the time someone told me that Rebecca was supposed to identify the body yeah some woman told me that Rebecca was one of the offices a year later I said Rebecca an email I was just like what was that like what was that whole experience was like and she said no I didn't identify anybody people's memories were fading details were starting to fall through the cracks I'm stuck in the same spot I've always been with a handful of details that go nowhere I needed help from someone with experience so I reached out to a private investigator Dave Perry is a retired Toronto police detective as a lead investigator with the Homicide Unit he led some of the city's highest profile cases before retiring and starting up his own private investigation firm he agreed to meet with me and go over the case any investigation starts right in the center and the center was actually your company where you worked yeah the company's no longer there you know so you become the center of the investigation you seem to have the best relationship with Michael back at the time I feel like I had a pretty compared with everyone else at work I had a pretty good relationship with Michael with Mike so this is something that's been bothering you one of the hardest things to describe about the story to people is the emotional side of it right it made very apparent how much relationships with other people depend on trust mm-hmm like you and your trusting someone that what they tell you is is the truth and how vulnerable that makes you and in everyday circumstance for me is an investigator in 37 years I've never seen a case quite like this so there are lots of possibilities of course we're not going to close our minds to any one point with coroner's reports there are police reports I have former colleagues that I could reach out to and see what we can find out about the police files we need to see what the police have already done and and how far they took this thing Dave helped me sort through my file and determine which details were important he got in contact with the police and got his hands on some documents and information from their file together with my evidence some patterns started forming one piece of evidence stuck out it was a high school diploma from God Ridge collegiate I emailed a copy of the Diploma to the high school they sent it back it was clearly a forgery but it got me thinking I remembered Mike talking about God Ridge he seems to know details that outsiders wouldn't maybe actually was from God Ridge he just changed his name it was a lead worthy of investigation I needed to go to God Ridge to find Mike so what we're doing today is we're actually going to make a trip to God Ridge district Collegiate Institute and then we're gonna go through the yearbooks going to God Ridge was a trip into my past I remembered the town vividly from when I was a kid Mike and I shared memories about this place and even those stories appeared to be lies I couldn't shake the feeling he was from here I could see him haunting these hallways sitting in these classrooms graduating here even if it was under a different name the high school librarian agreed to show me the yearbooks and help me find some answers and do we have a definitive surname debussy a is really what okay I've been with this school specifically since 1977 and do not recognize that surname at all so do you think it's possible that it was a totally different name it is entirely possible yeah okay that makes it for a little more interesting so part of what we have to do is see if there's anyone that matches okay his description well and I'll let you go through and have a look at the individual students and see if there's somebody in there that will ring about sure this one is 1988 okay and this would have been the only other group that would fall into the graduating class of that time period no not even close well thank you I appreciate the help and we'll keep searching so what is your plan when all is said and done with the information it's really to just be able to give yourself closure yeah we're trying to find out who this guy was because he was a friend of mine and we got along really well and we sort of bonded over being small-town Ontario kids whether that was true or not that's what you want to find out yeah well I do wish you the best of luck doing good luck with you I hope at some point you do get the closure you need oh thank you Thanks leaving Goderich was hard there were no traces of Mike at the high school I don't know why I thought it would be that easy maybe I just didn't want to believe that Mike had lied to me about growing up here I believed all his stories they seemed so real even if Mike wasn't from here he will always be here for me a specter haunting this place I needed to dig deeper into the evidence I came across a document that sent chills up my spine a second death certificate for Michael Debussy a one that said he died back in 1973 the police had given my private investigator a series of documents indicating that Mike was from British Columbia there was a birth certificate from Victoria BC I used the date on the birth certificate to look for more information and found something disturbing a death certificate for Michael Debussy a dating back to 1973 I came across a series of newspaper articles that reveal details about the death of a four year old boy from a tragic car accident Port Hardy do you know where that is yeah it's on Vancouver Island okay boy was killed Tuesday afternoon when he fell from a truck driven by his father my gut tells me that your friend probably knew something about this boy and for that to happen he probably at some point lived out there or knew somebody that lived out there he knew something about this story he didn't just walk through the gravesite and get this I don't think but it'd be interesting if we talked to the parents if they're surviving and they could tell us about friends of their son I needed to go to British Columbia to find if there was a connection between my friend and the identity he stole if I could trace the path he took to find the identity I could find out who he was Pearson Pearson yeah Terminal one and the further I got in the investigation that the stranger it felt at least with God Rajai at memory and familiarity but this was different Mike had never talked about British Columbia my friend was turning into a stranger with the murky history I was unsure of worse the story of the child's accident weighed on me it was heartbreaking but it also was a convenient identity to steal it was being used so how did my friend find it so right now I'm heading out to the burial Park where the original Michel Debussy I was buried I needed to explore theory that my friend stole the identity off a gravestone if I could trace my friend back to that first moment I could find out when information he started with I could then track that path to find new leads on him section F it says it's an F extension lot number a grave number 13 five six so it should be somewhere over there eleven there would be a 12 here [Music] 13 should be here f extension plot eight grape 13 should be right here I guess this means that if it was a stolen identity it wasn't someone picking a name off of a gravestone cuz there isn't one I had it wrong there was no gravestone this wasn't the path he took to find the identity it must have been some other way so I'm gonna go meet with the father of the real Michael Debussy a the original Michael Debussy a and go show him some pictures of mink see if it's someone he recognizes someone who may have grown up in the same small town someone who may have known enough about Michael Debussy a to be able to steal his identity I was nervous I was about to talk to someone about a terrible tragedy that had happened over 40 years ago did my friend ever think of this other family when he stole this identity the father declined an on-camera interview but agreed to meet with me I told him my story and showed him the pictures of my friend he didn't recognize any of them I don't think there's any connection I think the way he said it was he just happens to be it just happened to be a random person who chose his son's name so my search for my friend was taking its toll on me in the pursuit of answers to my questions I had opened up an old and painful room for a family who didn't deserve it and neither of us had anything to show for it with this dead-end my two biggest bleeds had turned up nothing my friend was disappearing right in front of my eyes again I was running out of leads and the case was starting to go cold again but I wasn't ready to give up one of my documents had details about Mike's teeth after Mike died the coroner must have scanned them so had they done an autopsy there must have been more information about the body all those details that solve cases on TV fingerprints DNA maybe there were some answers to the questions that had always bothered me did he commit suicide somehow inducing a heart attack Dave had a contact retired deputy chief coroner dr. Jim Cairns through his sources Jim could examine the autopsy report and relay the details to me so we were trying to find out information about the autopsy I guess yes and I was able to to check on the art on the autopsy and the autopsy confirmed that he did die of a heart attack and it was a real heart attack he just didn't have narrowing of his coronary artery he had a complete blockage so he had a genuine definite heart attack no one died about it okay so I mean because the question has always been he died of a heart attack he was pretty young so was it an induced heart attack they did toxicology screen on him and the toxicology showed that all he had was a social level of alcohol there was no issue about any other involvement so it was definitely classified as cause of death heart attack and there was natural causes his death seemed but it seemed this seems like a bit of an odd death he just dies of a heart attack in his apartment well it's unusual for people to die under 4045 of a heart attack but it's not unheard of it's just that how the hell did he know he was gonna have a heart attack in period cetera so it wasn't like in the weeks leading up to it he may have been having a pain yeah well it's not speculation than one of the speculation says he knew is going to have that he was going to die so he aprea is just funeral but I think that's I mean this is good a theory as any other because unfortunately we don't have a nice finish do we know how long it was between when he passed away and when his body was found we don't all we know is that it was long enough that he was decomposed and at the time I thought talk to yes he was significantly decomposed so they were not able to take fingerprints they weren't able to lift fingerprints weren't able to lift fingerprints right how would we be able to prove his identity apart from visually identifying people dental records are probably the second most useful way of identifying people but they're not gonna be in a police database know where the dental records would only be to compare missing person files with the infant based on the cost from the autopsy of course that's not going to work if there never was a missing person file in the first place yeah the only other way you'd be able to identify him would be to do DNA but you have to be able to compare the DNA with some of our elders we don't have any relatives okay those are sort of a proof and not a database like am I correct yes Dylan the interesting piece I find here is we can throw all the theories we want on the table we can't prove any until we actually know who he is until we get to that point we're basically at a stall I finally had some answers my friend died of natural causes not by his own hand and not by foul play the coroner had kept detailed evidence not fingerprints but DNA and dental scans unfortunately these can only be used to confirm an identity not lead us to one we had to find the identity first we had taken the case as far as we could we had reached our last dead end with no new leads I was back to where I started blindly stabbing in the dark for something anything that might lead me back to my friend if I needed to find the identity first maybe there was one in a missing-persons database that matched my friend the records were incomplete and the details were spotty but it's all I had left there's seven hundred and seventy nine people how we gonna do this so I guess I'll just go just search people one by one too old the task was hopeless but I needed to try I thought about Mike and why it was so important to me to find answers even though he had lied to me about his name and where he was from we still had a connection a relationship he was my friend and deserved better than an anonymous death age 21 that's him that's him that's him that one that's him I knew it that's got to be him I'm shaking yeah just looking at him that's him James Walton left his residence on the 2nd of August 1992 and headed to Syracuse New York USA James had attended college in Syracuse yeah acquaintances still living in the Syracuse area James was due to return home on the 6th of August 1992 but has not been seen since hey Dave it's still in calling I called my private investigator and told him what I found he called me to his office to go over my findings what do you got have you got a picture yeah I'll show you in your gut what do you think we're wearing in this oh my god yeah yes I never said 90% yeah yeah oh wow I think your instincts are correct I'm looking at these two pictures that's that's him right there you look at the look at the nose is identical yeah the jawline is identical I mean obviously he's put on weight here since that photograph but yeah I don't know my my professional guess is that you just found this guy be very interesting to track down his family yeah but I can't call up a family based on this even though I'm sure like I just feel like unless it's 100% I can't I can call yeah we'll do it together yeah I would have a hard time calling a family not knowing 100% but do we find out who he is first or I think it's very reasonable and very ethical of W to make the contact with a family quite frankly think it'd be better than a cold knock by a uniformed police officer right okay they're gonna speak to somebody who knew him mm-hmm somebody that actually cared about him and that was a friend so then what's what would be the game plan then well I think we need to do some background checking you know it's my opinion that within 24 hours we're gonna be talking to somebody I couldn't believe it after years of searching I was so close to an answer in less than a day I would be talking to a family find out who my friend really was but I was also anxious I realized I was going to have to break the news to this family that their loved one has been dead since 2002 did they still think he was missing alright hey Dave good morning how are you we'll see we'll find out have there been any updates there has I got a fair bit of information for you I've got several addresses and I think I want to go through these with you today and make a couple of phone calls to see if we get lucky and we still have a registered telephone number I think one of the more recent ones was in Goderich Ontario so Godrich may be a connection we are well here's what I find interesting about that even somebody living under a false identity they usually take enough of their personal life that they figure can't be verified and they insert that into their false life so let's make a couple calls let's see what we come up with so here we go this is the Godrich phone number so let's see what happens hello could I speak to Mary Walton please hi Mary my name is David Perry and and I'm an investigator and and I've been looking into a missing person file yeah and I'm wondering if you're related to James Walton here his mother I'm a retired Toronto police officer and I've been working with a gentleman who's sitting with me right now and I'd like to introduce you by by phone his name is Dylan hello hi Mary and Mary I think we've we may have found some information about your son that we'd like to come and speak to you about do you mind if I ask you a couple questions Mary hi how old are you 82 you're the same age as my father my father's in pretty good health how's your health excellent health do you live alone Mary okay do you have a friend or somebody that could come over and sit with you well we carry on our conversation okay I understand that you have a daughter okay I'm gonna call her right now and if she's home then all conference you would in the call also that all three of us can talk together okay all right if you don't mind you just stand by your phone and I'll call you right back okay yes please okay thank you all right so I don't want to tell this woman you know in isolation I mean I get it that you're always waiting between do you tell them now on the phone or what do we say so I but I I'm gonna make the call to the daughter and if she answers all difference in her mom hello my name is David Perry and I'm calling because I think I have some information about your brother who went missing in 1992 I'm calling calling about James and James Scott Walton I understand was your brother correct yes and I've been working with a gentleman who's sitting with me right now and I'd like to introduce you by by phone his name is Dylan hello and I think we've come up with some information on your brother that we'd like to share with you okay yeah is it okay if I conference your mother in on this call okay all right just hold on your mom is on the call so I'll just give you the story as it goes and and again I haven't confirmed this information but I am very sorry to have to tell you that I believe that that James is now deceased and again that was back in 2000 2000 to 2002 he'd actually been found dead in his apartment of a heart attack and he was using the name of Michael Debussy a and of course until really late yesterday and today we we weren't even sure who this gentleman Michael Debussy a was but Dylan never stopped looking and came across a missing-persons picture that struck him immediately as his friend that he had lost in 2002 so what we need to do now is to work with you is the family to verify the information we have so we're willing to meet with you at your convenience any time whatever is gonna work for you okay I'm sure it has okay we'll say goodbye for now okay all right you're welcome Wow it's not every day you have to do that is it I never they just never thought would happen [Music] after all these twists and turns my friend was from Godrich actually from God Ridge and I was going back this time to meet his family and finally get some answers we arranged a time to meet with the family I would show them my pictures my files all of my evidence and they would tell me the truth about my friend about who he was before he became like I was on my way back when Dave came out with that sheet of paper that said Goderich I could not believe it I thought I thought the first time we had gone to God Ridge we were just crossing our T's and dotting our eyes and just making sure that Mike was never from there and then when you saw his mother was from God Ridge I was Florida couldn't believe it [Music] I don't know where to start um maybe we should share some pictures first and let's have an understanding of your impression on whether we're in fact talking about one in the same person brain and make sure that in your mindset we are talking about Jim yeah so this would have these would have been the dates are on the back of these I think well take a look at them yeah is there anybody in that photograph that you think might be your son it's just the aging it's the aging heart is so difficult yes this would have been 2000 2001 yes so probably 10 years after he disappeared is this one here what do you think man I already know what I think oh now there that's yeah I can see him there for sure that's the set of the the profile there's another picture worth it's from the back and just the way he's sitting it's just really clear to me there's a few things you pick up knowing somebody's so well and it's just his eyes are unmistakable yeah yeah this is how I remember him and this strike shirt down to the Carolinas that's me it's not even a question yeah you can see to me I look at that picture good good and there's no Timmy there's no doubt in my mind when I see that picture yeah because he left August long weekend night tonight she walked up the door and that was it we never saw him again was it expected or did you think I know he told me he was visiting friends in the state so we were home for the weekend and I had my baby daughter there and it's just like a regular events and you know kissed the baby and hugged me and said goodbye and he was off to see his friends and Syracuse and then we got a phone call because my father who had remarried living in England at the time had a massive heart attack so that I got on the phone to Jim's friend to say when he guessed there I haven't called me immediately and they never calls and I call back I said have you heard from him they hadn't heard from him so then with in a day or so we realized not only are we dealing with my father's passing my brother's a wall and figured like what the hell's going on here we don't know so we've reported him missing after I think 48 hours and then they found his car abandoned underneath the bridge and Buffalo everything was there except the passport Dylan so his wallet was there his personal effects were there so all his information was there and he left and that was it the police have a theory back then what what happened they ever tell you when it all happened there was um a suggestion that he had been involved in a white-collar crime related to some kind of scam image happening with either pension checks or unemployment insurance so after all this went down and the OPP and Hyuga got involved they came to the house and they essentially took away garbage bags full of his personal effects there's a lot of stuff that we never got back at one point not too long after that happened his mail was coming to the house and we discovered the fact that yes he had been receiving checks from the government so obviously we call the government said you know he's missing a and B you know that you know this isn't appropriate so they closed those accounts down so he went missing at 27 when Howard how old was he in his prime in 65 so yeah 27 years old at 26 I think I would have I don't know if I there's lots of people starting a lot younger yeah yeah I'm just Desilu the age doesn't surprise me no no I would expect the focus would be different you know cementing your career you know uh he was bored I think he was doing both cementing his career and being a little creative mm-hmm oh yeah but not the way we were thinking Holdings or yeah I mean Greg you know some mistakes that he made at a very young age that could have been very forgivable even by you the justice system yes we may never understand his way of thinking but it's always been my belief that his way of thinking was based on some financial issues and probably based on some other things he just he just wanted to hit the restart button on his life and it doesn't make it any easier on either view but that's what he chose to do I guess the the sad thing is is such a waste of life something that was so utterly forgivable we certainly would have embraced absolutely yeah and to make the restitution but to not be able to take the degrees and take the education and take all of the great hard and soft skills he had as an individual and it's just sad that he felt that was not it wasn't possible but sometimes people's perception of how we're all going to judge them is not clear and so they make these poor choices that's all was just a very poor choice yeah it's very emotional it is you know that's how I didn't know something but for me making that phone call to the two of you was really it's very moving for me just look great folk will never forget this it's just there was such a special person courage to I know it takes courage to make the call in to wonder if you're gonna hurt us or help us sir but we so appreciate this is there someone believable that has come to that we know something yeah that all this has come dude you know I did it's just unbelievable just a lot thanks so much after twelve years of searching I finally had answers my friends real name where he was from and why he went missing there are some new questions about those eight years between when he went missing and when I met him where was he who was he I'm not sure if I'll ever understand what he was thinking that moment he abandoned his car and walked out of his life forever he had some financial troubles sure but he also had a good education a loving family and a promising future what I do know is that there was truth to our friendship our small-town connection was real the memories we shared were real it'll take me a while to start thinking of him as Jim but for now I can finally say goodbye to Mike [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Real Stories

Views: 1,623,645

Rating: 4.8364773 out of 5

Keywords: BBC documentary, Extraordinary people, investigation, mystery stories, mysterious, missing person, Channel 4 documentary, documentary mystery, 2017 documentary, death, Full length Documentaries, timeline, true crime, BBC Three documentary, Amazing Stories, BBC Three, Full Documentary, Real Stories, Documentary Movies - Topic, Documentaries, crime scene, mystery documentary, TV Shows - Topic, BBC 3, Documentary, crime documentary, serial killer documentary, Amazing Documentaries

Id: nLQp1c4Ql00

Length: 43min 27sec (2607 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 16 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/Jellyfish2017]

You might like the movie “Who Took Johnny?” It’s a well done documentary about a boy who was kidnapped.

[u/kelsat84]

Watch Dear Zachary!

[u/FindThyName]

I have watched it..I cried. Very emotional and inspiring. I'd love to watch some more too

[u/DoctorWhiskey]

Just watched it. I really enjoyed it. I’m not crying, you’re crying. Shut up!

[u/fanoffzeph]

The video is not available in France ! Too bad, it seemed very interesting.

[u/LynneM007]

Watching now. Fascinating!

[u/happydayz02]

dear zachary made me cry the hardest i think i have ever cried. i sobbed for hours. i still think about it and think of john and kate and wonder how they are. it is the most heartbreaking film i haver ever watched.

[u/homesk00led]

What an intriguing story, thanks for sharing it!

[u/peasandcarrotsx]

Ooooo going to watch this now