The television show "Disappeared" focused on a 2004 missing person case from Maine earlier this month. Jeremy Alex, 28, disappeared from Northport almost 7 years ago. Since then, his father has started the Jeremy Alex Fund with the purpose of helping at-risk kids. Bangor Daily News revisits the story:
TV show to air about Maine man who disappeared in 2004Source: http://new.bangordailynews.com/2011/02/06/lifestyle/tv-show-to-air-about-maine-man-who-disappeared-in-2004/
By Abigail Curtis, BDN Staff
Posted Feb. 06, 2011, at 8:00 p.m.
Editor’s Note: This article is part of a feature called Follow-up in which BDN staff update stories from the past to inform readers of the status of subjects covered in initial reports and any new developments.
NORTHPORT, Maine — Almost seven years ago, Jeremy Alex disappeared in the woods of Northport under mysterious circumstances.
Despite a $20,000 reward for information on his whereabouts, his family is still left with many questions, no answers — and no Jeremy.
They hope that a television program about him that airs Monday night on the Investigation Discovery channel’s series “Disappeared” will change that.
“There’s not too many things left to do that will spark an interest again,” his father, Ted Alex, said Friday from Portsmouth, N.H., where he lives. “We’re optimistic … Hopefully, somebody will call and give us some information.”
Jeremy, a landscaper who was in the process of moving to Northport from Islesboro, was 28 when he last was seen running into the woods off Pound Hill Road the evening of April 24, 2004. Although the disappearance was treated initially as a missing-person case, his family believes that the man they describe as kind and a free spirit may have been murdered.
[...]
Deputies found Jeremy’s car nearby, but were unable to locate him. A search was mounted immediately, but nothing was found. After the public was notified that Jeremy was missing, a second witness recalled seeing a man who matched his description run across Route 1 near Northport Marine at about the same time. That area also was searched extensively, but nothing was found.
For years, there were no more reliable clues, Ted Alex said last week. But about 2½ years ago, Jeremy’s driver’s license surfaced at a home on the shore in Northport along with a story of missed opportunity.
In 2004, a Northport couple was building a house on the ocean, and about a month after Jeremy disappeared, money started washing up onshore. Workers found about $30 in all, according to Alex.
About two weeks after that, Jeremy’s driver’s license washed up, too.
The couple had a bowl on their coffee table that was filled with everything that had floated in on the tides, and they put the license and the money in that. They never made the connection to the missing man. After the husband died, friends came to a get-together after his funeral. A retired highway patrol officer saw the driver’s license in the bowl and remembered hearing about Jeremy Alex.
“He called the police,” Ted Alex said. “He ended up e-mailing me about it, saying ‘I have $30 of Jeremy’s money and his license,’ which was obviously really bizarre.”
[...]
The $20,000 reward, too, has led to nothing more tangible than rumors, he said.
[...]
He remembered his son as a nice guy who struggled with addiction but loved snowboarding, chess, music, gardening and Maine.
[...]
Anyone with information about Jeremy Alex should call Trundy at the Waldo County Sheriff’s Office at 338-2040.
For more information, visit www.jeremyalex.com.
The Jeremy Alex episode of “Disappeared” aired at 9 p.m. Monday, Feb. 7, on the Discovery channel. See below for videoclip:
