I have finally found the time to offer an explanation of the circumstances behind my recent letter to Mr. Carlos Swett.
I must apologize for the delay in doing so, but as you will soon see by this posting, I very much prefer to be as specific as possible, and I wanted to give this matter the time and attention it deserved. So here we go...
A few weeks ago, I thought that I had finally completed going through the piles of prize applications I had begun working on in March upon my arrival here at JREF. I had responded to each letter in the massive backlog of inquiries (or so I thought), properly filed all "closed" applications, put all current and "open" claims in good order, and seen many applicants who were waiting for preliminary testing put in direct contact with scientific
investigators around the globe. A good job well done, or so I thought to myself. I even took myself out for sushi deluxe and patted myself on the back thrice before bed.
Then, a day or two later, I made the big move from a desk in a hallway near Randi's office door to my new digs in a semi-private area of the JREF previously occupied by Andrew Harter, my predecessor in this capacity.
That is where I found a drawer full of applications up to 5 years old that pre-dated our filing system. All were unfiled, and many seemed to have quite possibly been put aside before having been properly responded to. The horror, the horror.
Upon reading some of these claim letters, the reasons for the seeming lack of response appeared self-evident; I would say that at least 95% of these letters contained claims involving alleged demon phenomenon, cloudbusting, ghosts and apparitions,
possession, and many varied and highly creative promises of the forthcoming grisly death and mutilation of Randi and the destruction of the JREF offices from "the angry spirit of the christ in response to your rejection of HIM", and similar nonsense.
I cannot possibly slight Mr. Harter for having chosen to ignore some of these so-called "claim letters", and the fact that most of these were not accompanied by prize applications only supports MY support of Andrew in his decision to cast these aside in favor of the more reasonable and scientifically viable claims that could actually be tested (should the applicant be amiable in negotiating a mutually agreeable test protocol, the results of which could not possibly be debated).
So I approached Randi and inquired as to his feelings regarding the existence of these letters, and the problem presented by their discovery. The following was his opinion, which I repeat here verbatim:
"I don't care what the claim is, and I don't care how long ago it was received. It is our poilicy to respond to each and every inquiry, application and claim letter, regardless of its' nature, regardless of its' content, no matter how reasonable or how silly and absurd it may seem. Every letter gets a response. Do it."
I then told Randi that there was some indication (in the form of attached "stick'ems") that suggested that some of these may have been responded to already, and that some had even been accepted, processed and forwarded to investigators for preliminary testing, despite the fact that no actual files on any of these letters I had found existed. Again, Randi's response:
"Then write to the applicants and ask them if they ever received a reply from us. Just do it."
"That's a lot of letters, Randi. I'd wager that most will be returned to us with a "MOVED - NO FORWARDING ADDRESS" stamp on the front."
"Do it anyway!" was Randi's final comment on the matter.
I did as instructed, and over the next few weeks, I did indeed receive the great majority of those letters back stamped as I had suspected they would be. How very intuitive of me. Psychic, some might even say.
However, one letter I sent out was to a Mr. CARLOS SWETT, whose claim had something to do with UFO's being directly involved in the horrific 9-11 attacks. Very silly stuff.
But, as instructed, it is not my job to judge. It is my job to receive and respond to claims of a paranormal nature, no matter the content.
So, not knowing how much had transpired between Randi, JREF and Mr. Swett (much of it centering on the JREF Forums and its' members), I wrote Mr. Swett a polite letter inquiring as to whether or not he had ever received a response to his inquiry.
I believe that he has posted this letter on many alternate forums, so I will not re-print it here, as I have clearly stated the crux of its' contents.
To date, I have received no response to my inquiry, and I have recently learned that Mr. Swett has posted my letter to him in other forums, erroneously proclaiming that his case had been
"re-opened". That is not the case.
Now that I have been made aware of our previous dealings with this gentleman, it is quite clear that my letter to him was sent in error. It would certainly never have been sent, had I known of the nature of his correspondences, or of his forum postings of the past.
Hence, the letter in question was mistakenly sent, and should be ignored.
I would happily write to Mr. Swett again to advise him so, but, as I received no response to my inquiry, I feel no need to write to him again, and it is my understanding that certain inquiring forum members are already quite anxious to forward this posting to the forums in which he has chosen to advertise my mistake as an authentic re-establishing of contact between himself and JREF.
So, in conclusion and "for the record", JREF is in no way
re-opening the file on Mr. Swett, and any notion that my letter to him is an indication of any renewed interest in his "claim" would be entirely erroneous.
I hope that this posting sufficiently explains the conditions under which my letter to Mr. Swett was sent, the reasoning behind having sent it (being JREF policy and protocol), and the evidence supporting my statement that it was sent in error and should hence be wholly ignored.
Done.
I must apologize for the delay in doing so, but as you will soon see by this posting, I very much prefer to be as specific as possible, and I wanted to give this matter the time and attention it deserved. So here we go...
A few weeks ago, I thought that I had finally completed going through the piles of prize applications I had begun working on in March upon my arrival here at JREF. I had responded to each letter in the massive backlog of inquiries (or so I thought), properly filed all "closed" applications, put all current and "open" claims in good order, and seen many applicants who were waiting for preliminary testing put in direct contact with scientific
investigators around the globe. A good job well done, or so I thought to myself. I even took myself out for sushi deluxe and patted myself on the back thrice before bed.
Then, a day or two later, I made the big move from a desk in a hallway near Randi's office door to my new digs in a semi-private area of the JREF previously occupied by Andrew Harter, my predecessor in this capacity.
That is where I found a drawer full of applications up to 5 years old that pre-dated our filing system. All were unfiled, and many seemed to have quite possibly been put aside before having been properly responded to. The horror, the horror.
Upon reading some of these claim letters, the reasons for the seeming lack of response appeared self-evident; I would say that at least 95% of these letters contained claims involving alleged demon phenomenon, cloudbusting, ghosts and apparitions,
possession, and many varied and highly creative promises of the forthcoming grisly death and mutilation of Randi and the destruction of the JREF offices from "the angry spirit of the christ in response to your rejection of HIM", and similar nonsense.
I cannot possibly slight Mr. Harter for having chosen to ignore some of these so-called "claim letters", and the fact that most of these were not accompanied by prize applications only supports MY support of Andrew in his decision to cast these aside in favor of the more reasonable and scientifically viable claims that could actually be tested (should the applicant be amiable in negotiating a mutually agreeable test protocol, the results of which could not possibly be debated).
So I approached Randi and inquired as to his feelings regarding the existence of these letters, and the problem presented by their discovery. The following was his opinion, which I repeat here verbatim:
"I don't care what the claim is, and I don't care how long ago it was received. It is our poilicy to respond to each and every inquiry, application and claim letter, regardless of its' nature, regardless of its' content, no matter how reasonable or how silly and absurd it may seem. Every letter gets a response. Do it."
I then told Randi that there was some indication (in the form of attached "stick'ems") that suggested that some of these may have been responded to already, and that some had even been accepted, processed and forwarded to investigators for preliminary testing, despite the fact that no actual files on any of these letters I had found existed. Again, Randi's response:
"Then write to the applicants and ask them if they ever received a reply from us. Just do it."
"That's a lot of letters, Randi. I'd wager that most will be returned to us with a "MOVED - NO FORWARDING ADDRESS" stamp on the front."
"Do it anyway!" was Randi's final comment on the matter.
I did as instructed, and over the next few weeks, I did indeed receive the great majority of those letters back stamped as I had suspected they would be. How very intuitive of me. Psychic, some might even say.
However, one letter I sent out was to a Mr. CARLOS SWETT, whose claim had something to do with UFO's being directly involved in the horrific 9-11 attacks. Very silly stuff.
But, as instructed, it is not my job to judge. It is my job to receive and respond to claims of a paranormal nature, no matter the content.
So, not knowing how much had transpired between Randi, JREF and Mr. Swett (much of it centering on the JREF Forums and its' members), I wrote Mr. Swett a polite letter inquiring as to whether or not he had ever received a response to his inquiry.
I believe that he has posted this letter on many alternate forums, so I will not re-print it here, as I have clearly stated the crux of its' contents.
To date, I have received no response to my inquiry, and I have recently learned that Mr. Swett has posted my letter to him in other forums, erroneously proclaiming that his case had been
"re-opened". That is not the case.
Now that I have been made aware of our previous dealings with this gentleman, it is quite clear that my letter to him was sent in error. It would certainly never have been sent, had I known of the nature of his correspondences, or of his forum postings of the past.
Hence, the letter in question was mistakenly sent, and should be ignored.
I would happily write to Mr. Swett again to advise him so, but, as I received no response to my inquiry, I feel no need to write to him again, and it is my understanding that certain inquiring forum members are already quite anxious to forward this posting to the forums in which he has chosen to advertise my mistake as an authentic re-establishing of contact between himself and JREF.
So, in conclusion and "for the record", JREF is in no way
re-opening the file on Mr. Swett, and any notion that my letter to him is an indication of any renewed interest in his "claim" would be entirely erroneous.
I hope that this posting sufficiently explains the conditions under which my letter to Mr. Swett was sent, the reasoning behind having sent it (being JREF policy and protocol), and the evidence supporting my statement that it was sent in error and should hence be wholly ignored.
Done.
