Original subtitles

HOST: Tonight, a fascinating new mystery.

For years, Jim Boumgarden had the oddest encounters

with people he had never seen before who were positive

that he was someone else.

Then his friends and family began to have odd run-ins

with a mysterious stranger who appeared

to be Jim's exact double.

Was someone impersonating Jim Boumgarden?

If so, who?

And why?

After he assassinated Abraham Lincoln,

history records that John Wilkes Booth

was tracked to a farm in Virginia

and killed by Union troops.

But history may be wrong.

A few eyewitness accounts suggest that the man

in the barn was not Booth.

And some historians now believe that Lincoln's assassin

was never brought to justice.

When Alex Cooper, a devoted father and grandfather,

disappeared, his family made an unsettling discovery.

There was no such person as Alex Cooper.

He had created a fictitious past and become

a man whom never was.

Join me for another edition of Unsolved Mysteries.

April, 1865.

The Civil War was over.

President Abraham Lincoln was dead.

For nearly two weeks, 2,000 union soldiers

scoured the countryside searching for his assassin.

On April 26, at 4 AM, a cavalry detachment

surrounded a tobacco barn on Garrett Farm in Virginia.

They had been told that inside was

one of the most notorious criminals of the century,

or of any age.

John Wilkes Booth, you are surrounded.

You and all with you.

HOST: 26-Year-old John Wilkes Booth

was an actor of national fame, considered

by some the handsomest man in America.

He was also deeply committed to the Confederate cause.

On April 14th, Booth had mortally

wounded President Lincoln at Ford's theater in Washington.

The man who had freed the slaves and given hope

to the disenfranchised was gone.

Abraham Lincoln, who had preserve

the Union through sheer force of will, now belong to the ages.

On April 26, 12 days after the assassination,

an informant directed union troops to the Garret Farm.

Come out with your hands held high!

Don't shoot.

HOST: The man who surrendered was not John Wilkes Booth,

but 21-year-old David Herold, known to be

one of Booth's co-consiprators.

Lieutenant Edward Dowdy grew impatient.

He gave the command to smoke out his quarry.

The soldiers are under strict orders to take Booth alive,

but an overzealous Sergeant named Boston Corbett took

matters into his own hands.

Two soldiers dragged the body from the raging inferno.

The nation was avenged.

Or was it?

NATE ORLOWEK: There is tremendous physical evidence

which proves beyond a doubt John Wilkes Booth, in reality,

was not killed by the federal government officers

as they claimed.

In fact, lived until January 13th, 1903,

when he died in Enid, Oklahoma territory.

HOST: According to official history,

John Wilkes Booth died on April 26, 1865.

Incredibly, this fact has given rise to an unlikely controversy

in historical circles.

The matter of Booth's life and death

has always seemed an indisputable chapter

in American history.

But even the Encyclopedia Britannica

states that the identification of the man shot in the barn

was equivocal at the time.

Those that question the official account

believe that in the confusion following the Civil War,

critical evidence may have been mistakenly

recorded or perhaps covered up.

Others dismiss these series as revisionist nonsense.

We'll examine both sides of this fascinating controversy, which

has been brewing for 125 years.

In 1866, Senator Charles Sumner argued

that the government reward for Booth's capture

should not be paid out.

He claimed that there was simply not enough evidence

to verify Booth's identity.

That same year, Senator Garrett Davis of Kentucky

complained that he had never seen any satisfactory evidence

that Booth had been killed.

And in the early 1900s, John Schumacher, General Counsel

to the Department of the Army, wrote,

"The evidence put forth by the government

to support the conclusion that the body was that of John

Wilkes Booth was so insubstantial that it would not

stand up in a court of law."

Nate Orlowek and Dr. Arthur Chitty

have spent years studying the Lincoln assassination.

Independently, they have arrived at the same conclusion.

The two who were together in New Orleans.

Right.

The most persuasive evidence to me at Garrett's barn

that the man in the barn was not Booth is

the fact that his friend David E. Herold came out of the barn,

and the first thing he said was, "The man in there

is not Booth."

The man inside that barn is not John Wilkes Booth!

His name is Boyd!

NATE ORLOWEK: And there was a Boyd

who was a wanted fugitive at this time,

for killing a Captain Watkins in Maryland.

Of course, Herold was not permitted

to testify in his trial, as was the case

with all the defendants.

None of them were permitted to testify.

His statement, of course, was kept

secret as all the others were.

So we don't really know, because Herold was

not permitted to say anything.

And of course, he was hanged.

So we don't know exactly who the man was.

I have heard the account that Herold

was pulled out of Garrett's barn and said,

"That's not Booth in there."

I have no source for that.

I don't know where the story came from, but I do--

HOST: Historian James Hall refutes this incident

by citing a 40 page statement made

by David Herold to government investigators 36 hours

after his arrest.

Herold referred to Booth 10 times

by name when he was discussing what went on in the barn

while it was being surrounded by the soldiers.

To me, that's conclusive.

I can't see where they get the idea that he'd come running out

and say, "It's not Booth."

By the time David E. Herold changed his testimony,

he was under such enormous pressure.

He was in fear of his life.

He had been incarcerated with a canvas bag over his head,

and just a little hole to be fed through.

He was under terrible emotional strain

and was trying to save his neck.

And so therefore, when he felt that he

would survive by changing his story, he changed his story.

HOST: According to Nate Orlowek, other witnesses also refuted

the government's identification of the man

killed at Garrett's Farm.

Colonel, this man is not Booth.

What's that, Lieutenant?

This man is not Booth.

This man has red hair.

Lieutenant.

NATE ORLOWEK: Lieutenant William C. Allen worked for the United

States Secret Service in 1865.

And in August of 1937, his widow, Mrs. Hannah Allen,

told a journalist that her husband had told her

that he saw the man at Garrett's Farm who had been killed

and that the man had red hair.

And that the government knew that that man was not Booth,

but they were determined to foist this man

on the nation as Booth.

HOST: By every historical account,

Booth's hair was jet black.

Steven's testimony about the red-haired man

was corroborated by two other union

soldiers, Private Joseph Zisgen and Quartermaster Wilson D.

Kenzie.

They surrounded Garrett's Barn.

They burned the barn down.

They shot John Wilkes Booth-- only it's not Booth.

How do you know?

It doesn't look like him.

No one will believe me. Come back--

NATE ORLOWEK: Kenzie and his buddy

Joseph Zisgen were friends of Booth in 1862

and '63 in New Orleans.

Kenzie was a quarter master and was

free to go wherever he wanted basically

within the military lines and so he went with Zisgen

to Garrett's Farm, because he had an interest in what

was going to happen to Booth

HOST: In 1922, when he was 77 years old,

Kenzie detailed what he saw at Garrett's Farm

in a sworn affidavit.

MAN: As I rode up, Joe Zisgen called, "Here.

Come here, sergeant.

This ain't John Wilkes Booth at all.

The face was exposed enough so I could see the color of his hair

and side of his face.

You men, move away from that body.

You two are under direct orders to speak to no one

to what you've seen here today. You understand me?

Yes, sir.

NATE ORLOWEK: And he said that the officers there

told him guards everyone has to keep this secret.

There'll be dire consequences for anyone who tells the truth.

The military really meant business

and they were not going to risk their lives just

to tell the truth.

HOST: The government autopsy was performed by a physician

who was acquainted with Booth.

Doctor John F. May was a Washington surgeon

who removed a tumor from the back of Booth's neck

a few months before the assassination, in 1865.

His statement is now in the National Archives.

Like all the other government records on the case,

it was held secret for 70 years.

The corpse bears no resemblance

to the actor John Wilkes Booth.

ARTHUR CHITTY: John and Frederick May

wanted to tell the truth.

And he recognized that this was not Booth,

but it was made pretty clear to him

very early on that this better be Booth.

He's freckled.

I do not remember Booth as being freckled.

ARTHUR CHITTY: And so we have the curious affidavit

which starts off saying, I'm sure this is Booth.

And then goes on to say, but it doesn't look like Booth.

And it goes on to say, I recall Booth as having black hair

and this man has sandy hair.

I recall that Booth had rather clear complexion,

and this man is freckled.

But this is certainly Booth, signed John Frederick May.

HOST: In 1906, Dr. May clarified his findings

in an article titled The mark of a scalpel he said he believed

the discrepancies he found were due

to the physical deterioration of both while he was on the run.

Dr. May also said there was a scar

on the neck which corresponded to the scar

left by his surgery in 1864.

Now, had the government really believed

that that body was Booth's, they would

have taken pictures of it.

They would have had many, many hundreds

of people to identify it.

But the War Department didn't do that.

The government knew that that man was not Booth.

HOST: Eventually, Booth's body was secretly

buried in the basement of the old naval prison in Washington.

It seems incredible that Union authorities would have

misidentified the assassin of President Lincoln,

but if John Wilkes Booth was not killed

at Garrett's Barn in 1865, then what became of him?

When we return, we will present evidence of Booth's escape,

his later years, and startling facts about the assassination

conspiracy.

In 1865, the government moved quickly to close the books

on the Lincoln assassination.

John Wilkes Booth had been hunted down and killed.

The trial of Booth's co-conspirators

resulted in four hangings and three life sentences.

As a nation began to rebuild, the details of the conspiracy

were classified as secret and hidden away.

Some believe, however, that John Wilkes

Booth escaped Union soldiers--

that he fled south under assumed names,

and lived another 38 years.

In 1970, an obscure attorney from Texas

named Finis Bates published this book, "The Escape and Suicide

of John Wilkes Booth."

In these pages, Bates claimed that he learned the true story

of Booth from one of his clients,

a man named John St. Helen, of Granbury, Texas.

In 1877, St. Helen fell grievously.

And thinking he was about to die,

made a startling confession to Finis Bates.

Finis.

John.

Finis.

My name is not John St. Helen.

It's really John Wilkes Booth, assassin of President Lincoln.

If I die, tell my brother Edwin I'm dead.

NATE ORLOWEK: Well Bates, of course,

thought this guy was crazy.

He had been told, as everyone else had,

that Booth had been killed in 1865.

So he thought he was just hallucinating.

TB Road.

And Booth said to him, no.

I really am John Wilkes Booth.

And now that I've told you my secret,

I want to give you the whole story.

So he poured out for Bates a very long confession,

detailing in great detail the kidnapping conspiracy,

the murder conspiracy, how he got out of Washington,

how he escaped altogether.

Escaped Washington DC using a password.

TB Road.

HOST: St. Helen explained that during the Civil War

all bridges out of Washington were closed after nightfall

and heavily guarded, making escape near impossible.

Halt.

But I must cross.

I'm sorry.

The bridge is closed.

I have a password.

Password.

T.B T.B Road.

All right, you may pass.

Corroborating Booth alias St. Helen telling Bates

of this password is the dramatic letter written by Frederick A.

Demond who was one of the guards at the Navy Yard Bridge

the night of the assassination.

On May 31st, 1916, Demond sent Bates a letter.

In that letter, Demond says that at about 10:00 PM that night,

a captain rode up to the bridge and said

if anyone comes up using a certain password,

let them through.

And that password was, TB.

TB Road.

Demond says that was very peculiar, because never before

had anyone been allowed to cross the bridge using a password.

Bridge out of Washington was closed after dark.

I don't know what happened there that night.

These were just a bunch of old soldiers

later on remembering it.

But Sergeant Silas Cobb, who was in charge

of the squad at the bridge, made a statement which

is in the National Archives.

And he also testified at the conspiracy trial.

He didn't say anything about passwords.

All he said was that I thought these people

were proper people to go across the bridge,

and I let them cross.

I can't tell you why these old soldiers

dreamed up this password.

HOST: St. Helen's narrative continued.

He told Bates that he joined up with co-conspirator David

Herold, and together they visited a doctor

who set his broken leg.

I'm gonna have to take your boot off so I can see your leg,

all right?

NATE ORLOWEK: Booth, alias St. Helen,

told Bates that when he was going

through the open country of Virginia,

he hid in the back of a wagon.

And at one point, he heard someone shout,

"Dars dem soldiers now."

They thought they were Northern soldiers.

So hurriedly, he was yanked out of the back of the wagon,

and hustled into the woods.

When that happened, his papers and other personal effects

fell out.

HOST: St. Helen claimed that while on his way

to the Garrett Plantation, he sent a man back

to retrieve his papers.

Before the man returned and while David Herold was

out seeking supplies, news came of an approaching Union troops.

Mr. Booth, Union soldiers are riding in from Bowling Green.

You need to be getting out of here.

How far behind you are they?

About two hours.

Thank you.

Thank you, gentlemen.

HOST: According to St. Helen, he immediately fled.

The man sent to retrieve his papers

was in the Garrett Barn with David Herold

when it was surrounded by Union troops on April 26.

Herold decided to surrender.

It's not Booth.

HOST: The other man was shot inside the barn.

Because a dead man carried Booth's papers,

he was identified as the assassin.

I believe you, John.

I want you to rest, all right?

HOST: Several weeks later, St. Helen

recovered from his illness.

Bates tried to dismiss the confession as hallucinations

brought on by the fever, but St. Helen later added

even more details to his story.

The following year, John St. Helen left Texas,

but Finis Bates was haunted by his confession.

JAMES HALL: Can you imagine a young lawyer talking

to a bar owner down in Texas--

a gullible young lawyer.

So he just fills him full of a great big long story.

And later on, Bates, that was the name of this young lawyer,

embroidered the story nicely and wrote a book about it.

But I think he just took a young lawyer and fed him a line.

It's that easy.

Certainly it wasn't Booth.

HOST: Is it possible that John St. Helen was

in reality John Wilkes Booth?

A comparison of photographs shows a striking resemblance.

On January 13th, 1903, while staying at a boarding house

in Enid, Oklahoma, John St. Helen

committed suicide by drinking a glass

of wine laced with strychnine.

Bates had the body preserved.

He took many pictures of the body,

and eventually he had the body mummified to preserve it

for posterity-- to prove once and for all the government

had fooled us all.

And he was going to not allow that cover up to stand.

HOST: In 1931, six Chicago physicians

examined the mummify body of John St. Helen

and recorded their findings in this affidavit.

They specifically noted a scarred

right eyebrow, a crushed right thumb, and a broken left leg.

John Wilkes Booth is known to have all three

of these unusual characteristics.

Did John Wilkes Booth escape Union troops at Garrett Farm,

only to kill himself 38 years later

in an Oklahoma boarding house?

The history books say no.

John Wilkes Booth died in 1865.

Four years later, his remains were returned to Maryland,

and buried in an unmarked grave in the family plot.

Perhaps there rests the definitive answer

to this unsolved mystery.

HOST: Imagine that there's someone

who looks exactly like you.

Walks the same way you do.

Talks the same way you do.

That has been the bizarre fact of life

for Jim Boumgarden, of Byron, Illinois.

For years, Jim has been haunted by the specter

of a strange double--

a man who seems to be everywhere, or at least

everywhere Jim isn't.

The place, Rockford, Illinois in 1984.

The occasion, a company softball game.

It is a typical Saturday morning,

except for an eerie event about to unfold.

Third baseman Rick Holder is coming up to bat.

Suddenly, his brother-in-law Jim Boumgarden,

who should be 20 miles away at home,

enters the game to pitch for the opposing team.

Hey, Jim!

Jim!

Hey, Jim!

You know, I would say hi to him.

I'd say hi, Jim.

Hello, Jim.

And I wasn't getting no response from the guy.

So I just thought, you know, after the game was over,

I'd go up and I'd talk to the guy.

Hey, Jim.

How's Cindy and the kids?

JIM BOUMGARDEN: After the game, he

said he went up and shook his hand,

thinking he was talking to me.

He said the guy just kind of looked at him weird,

give him a funny look, and turned around

and walked away from him.

HOST: Five years later, and just a few miles away,

Jim Boumgarden's father Ernie was leaving the doctor's

office when he saw his son.

JIM BOUMGARDEN: My dad came after this guy.

Was yelling at him.

Jim!

JIM BOUMGARDEN: This guy ignored him.

He got into a car, which he said was very similar to mine--

drove off and didn't even acknowledge him.

Now we had two people who knew me very well,

and they were both fooled.

Especially my dad, who reared me.

This guy fooled my dad.

He has to look almost identical to me.

HOST: Jim spent his childhood in a suburb of Rockford, Illinois.

He knew he had been given up at birth by his mother,

but he had no idea who she was.

Jim loved his adopted family, and his life

was happy and uneventful, except for one strange incident.

When Jim was 11, visiting his grandparents

in Rochelle, Illinois, he was approached by a group

of neighborhood boys.

Billy!

You talking to me?

Yeah, do you want to play basketball with us?

My name isn't Billy.

What are you talking about it's not Billy?

My name is Jimmy.

It's Billy.

Look, if you don't call me by my right name,

I won't play basketball with you.

JIM BOUMGARDEN: I couldn't understand why they wanted me

to play basketball so much and they

wouldn't call me by my name.

And why they are making this name up--

I could not understand that.

HOST: Jim filed incident away at the back of his mind.

After high school, he joined the army

and served a tour in Vietnam.

In 1978, Jim married Cindy Holder.

They settled near Rockford, Illinois and had two children.

Often in Rockford, people Jim didn't recognize

greeted him in an unusually friendly way.

How's it going, man?

Haven't seen you in a long time.

What's going on?

Not much.

I'll see you around, OK?

I met a lot of people, and there's no way that you can

remember every face you see.

So I kind of brushed off as nothing,

until some people would see me in places that I never was,

or I wasn't at that time.

HOST: Finally, on Christmas day, 1991,

the strange encounters culminated at a mini mart

just five blocks from Jim's house.

Sherli Herlien was behind the cash register.

SHERLI HERLIEN: I was working and this gentleman came in.

I assumed it was Jim.

No, not today.

15 Even.

SHERLI HERLIEN: He looked like him.

He walked the same.

Talked the same.

Same mannerisms.

I assumed it was Jim.

Within minutes, Jim and Cindy walk in.

Did you forget something?

No, why?

Well, you were just here a few minutes ago.

First time I've been here today.

And I looked over at Cindy and I said, he's kidding, right?

And she said, no, this is the first time he'd been out today.

And I said, then my god, There was somebody that came in--

looked just like you.

If I'd been just 15 minutes earlier,

just maybe we could have ran into each other

as he was coming out, and I was going in.

And met face to face.

How awesome that would have been, to see yourself.

The lady who was there said she

saw a man who looked exactly like Jim in there

not fifteen minutes ago.

She said he could have been Jim's twin.

HOST: Three weeks later, Jim's wife Cindy was visiting

his grandmother Sophie.

Sophie grew strangely quiet when Cindy

told her about the odd case of mistaken identity

at the mini mart.

Grandma, what's wrong?

Are you OK?

Ernie told me something a long time ago,

and I promised to keep it a secret.

HOST: Jim's father Ernie had died a few months earlier,

and Cindy had no idea she was about to hear

a long-held family secret.

Ernie told me that when he contacted

his lawyers about adopting Jimmy,

he learned that Jimmy had a brother.

A twin.

Jim had a twin?

CINDY BOUMGARDEN: She said that Ernie didn't like keeping it

a secret, but yet he figured that Jim

had never known his brother.

He would never miss him.

I was kind of hurt at Ernie, because he never told

us himself while he was alive.

But I was very relieved that we had somebody that could

confirm that there was a twin.

I was excited.

You know, all the speculations are now true.

I am looking for a twin brother.

HOST: Jim obtained a family history

from the adoption agency.

To his disappointment, no names were used.

But the report did give one clue.

His birth mother had a nephew who drowned at the age of 14.

Desperate for details, Jim spent hours in the library

until he found the story in a 1945 newspaper.

Finally, Jim had come up with a family name--

Hieronimus.

Through the phone book, Jim located a woman by that name,

living just 20 miles away.

May I help you?

Good afternoon.

My name is Jim Boumgarden, this is my wife Cindy.

And I apologize for disturbing you,

but I was wondering if you could help me.

Is your last name Hieronimus?

Yes.

I think we might be related.

You don't have to tell me we're related.

You look exactly like my brother Bud.

HOST: Jim had found his Aunt Myrtle,

his birth mother's sister--

the mother of the boy who had drowned in 1945.

That would have been taken sometime in the mid-forties.

She was about 33 or 34 at that time.

That's about the time I was born.

I tell you--

HOST: For the first time, Jim saw a photograph

of his mother Hazel, and learned that she

had died three years earlier.

Myrtle told Jim that his mother had cut herself off

from the family, and that they had known nothing of his birth

or his twin brothers.

Did you know my father?

Well, there was a man Hazel was seeing.

I think he might've been married.

I didn't really know him.

Hazel never told you about me and my brother?

No.

She never said anything about having had twin boys.

Of course, I knew about the little girls she had.

Little girl?

When?

Well, let's see, it was--

October, November-- 1945.

I was in the hospital myself.

HOST: Jim's aunt had dropped a bombshell.

Not only did Jim have a twin brother,

he had an older sister as well.

Now the mystery's even harder.

I've got two to find instead of one.

But I'm bound and determined.

I'm going to find them, one way or the other.

HOST: Finally, Jim was able to visit

his birth mother's family plot.

Her maiden name was Hazel Georgetta DeBaufer.

Eventually, she married a man named

Carner, also now deceased.

JIM BOUMGARDEN: I found out everything

except my brother and my sister, in finding my family.

It's the only part of the web that needs to be untangled now,

is finding them.

And then it will be complete, and I

will be satisfied and relaxed.

Jim Boumgarden and his brother,

whose first name might be Billy, were

born in the Salvation Army Hospital

in Cook County, Illinois on March 29, 1947.

His brother was adopted by a family in Rochelle, Illinois.

Their older sister was also born in Rockford,

at St. Anthony's hospital in October or November of 1945.

HOST: Next, the baffling disappearance

of a 65-year-old salesman from Canada.

Alex Cooper of Cranbrook, British Columbia, Canada,

was an accomplished musician.

A folksy, down to earth family man,

who enjoyed nothing more than fishing and camping

with his wife, Margaret, his five grown children,

and his three grandchildren.

Alex was a local businessman who worked in the cleaning industry

from 1974 to 1983.

Then, in 1986, he took a job as a salesman,

and began to spend some of his time on the road.

Everyone who knew him agreed, Alex Cooper

was the last person you'd expect to find

at the center of a mystery.

Then came the morning of April 4th, 1987.

When Alex's daughter Leila, and her husband Pete, left

Cranbrook for a shopping trip.

We left Cranbrook quite early that morning-- about 7:00--

7:30.

We were gonna drive to another city, which

was about a three hour drive.

And it was actually Pete that said, that's your dad's car.

And it was, obviously, his car.

Let's stop and see what he's doing.

OK. My dad and I are so close.

Pete would have known that if we didn't stop and say hello,

I was just going to sulk all day anyway, so we did.

We, right away, turned around.

And I just couldn't imagine driving by without stopping

and saying hello.

That's just the way we were.

So we just walked right by the car--

didn't really pay it any attention.

We walked by it.

Walked down the bank to the water.

We just assumed that he was fishing.

It's about time he got away on the weekend.

Yeah, that's true.

He's not down here.

Dad!

Dad!

At the water, I was curious.

When I got back to the car, I started to get a little bit--

that feeling in your stomach like, this is really unusual.

Past curious now.

HOST: Concerned because her father had a heart condition,

Leila called her mother.

Margaret Cooper had not seen her husband for more than 24 hours.

MARGARET COOPER: I felt a great deal of fear.

Leila suggested that she check out the hotel, which was close.

The hospitals.

And then, if she didn't find him,

that she would go to the police.

Do you know where he was headed to?

He was on a regular sales trip as far as we know, on his way

through the valley to sell some supplies.

What kind of supplies does he sell?

Restaurant equipment.

LARRY WILTSHIRE: There was no foot

prints or any other physical evidence

that may be around the vehicle.

The vehicle was locked.

He had a set of clothes that were left in the vehicle

along with some fishing tackle.

Nothing that we found around the vehicle

would suggest that foul play was involved in this.

We're gonna have to take the car too.

He's going to be towing it away.

They have to take the car?

That has to go back to our office.

We've got to check it to see if there's

any evidence at all on it.

MARGARET COOPER: I felt very lost seeing the car go away.

I wanted to make them leave it.

You really do have to take it.

It has to go.

MARGARET COOPER: I felt that if the car was there,

he would probably come back and get into it,

and this would end it.

But they took the car away, and he didn't come back.

HOST: The police launched an extensive air and land search,

but Alex Cooper had absolutely vanished.

Perplexed and heartbroken, his family desperately

searched for answers.

They learned that on the day Alex disappeared,

he ate lunch at a restaurant less than a mile

from where his car was found.

Hi.

MARGARET COOPER: Alex had a very bad

habit in that he carried his money in a roll

in his front pocket.

And if he was going to pay for anything, out came the roll.

He took off what he needed--

popped it back in.

And that worried me a great deal, afterwards.

Excuse me, sir?

You heading up the road this way?

Yeah.

I was wondering, could I catch a ride with you?

I'm just going up a little ways.

Sure, climb in.

HOST: Margaret Cooper feared the worst possible scenario.

Someone may have robbed her husband, killed him,

dumped his body in the Canadian wilderness.

Leila Cooper imagined an altogether

different course of events.

LEILA COOPER: I was thinking about all the things that

could have happened to him.

I focused on the water, number one.

That was my main thought-- that he had fallen into the water.

I could see him maybe going down to the creek-- to the water.

And being a fisherman, seeing what

the possibility was of maybe trying to catch something,

or drop a line in. And he fell in.

Or he had a heart attack and fell in.

HOST: Police divers dragged the creek, and found nothing.

The media picked up the story.

Newspaper and television coverage

provided yet another theory.

LARRY WILTSHIRE: After the broadcast,

we had numerous sightings.

People come to our office reporting

that they had seen a fellow matching a similar description

as Alex Cooper for height, weight, same type of clothing

they'd seen hitchhiking in the area of the vehicle.

The investigators theory was, he just left the area on his own.

For what reasons, we have no idea.

HOST: If Alex had indeed left by his own free will,

why did he leave his heart medication

and credit cards at home?

And why had he taken only the clothes he was wearing?

It was suggested that maybe he had staged the disappearance,

and just ran away from us.

I wasn't able to accept that at all.

Alex wasn't the kind of man who would

be capable of creating that kind of pain for his family.

LEILA COOPER: He was the best father anybody could ever want,

and he loved us all.

And he was-- he was funny and he was sincere, and he was honest.

And, you know, if I'm proven wrong,

I guess I'll have to eat my words.

But I believed everything he ever told me.

HOST: The Cooper family suffered through an entire year

with no word from Alex.

Eventually they had to face the painful reality

that he was gone forever.

Margaret Cooper petitioned the Supreme Court

of British Columbia to have her husband declared legally dead.

Her request was granted.

I'm calling in regards to Alex Cooper.

The birth certificate.

HOST: Margaret tried to obtain Alex's birth certificate,

and made a chilling discovery.

No information at all.

Did you check--

HOST: She was stunned to learn that a birth certificate was

never issued in Alex's name.

In fact, prior to his marriage to Margaret in 1952,

there were no official records of Alex Cooper.

No high school transcripts.

No military papers.

No medical history.

As far as anyone could tell, Alex Cooper simply

did not and had never existed.

MARGARET COOPER: Finding no record of him

made me feel very mixed up.

Unsure of myself and of him, because I guess,

I had to really admit for the first time

that he hadn't been completely honest with me in things.

Made me really wonder about his identity.

Didn't make me wonder about him as a person, though.

Because if he'd have been Joe Smith, I'd still love him.

HOST: Who was Alex Cooper?

Why had he assumed an alias, and in essence lived

a lie for more than 30 years?

And most important, was he still alive?

If so, why had he chosen to disappear?

For four long years, the Cooper family

lived in a constant state of uncertainty.

Then on May 27, 1991, the mystery of Alex Cooper

finally began to unravel.

Halfway across the country in Toronto,

another man was reported missing.

He was also a traveling salesman.

His name was David Cooper, and he bore an uncanny resemblance

to Alex Cooper.

Do you like saving money?

Everybody likes saving money.

You certainly sound like a sensible person.

HOST: The man known as David Cooper

had lived in a boarding house in Toronto for nearly a year.

Every week, he would venture out to a new community,

selling meat products to families via the telephone.

Yeah, that's right, half a cow.

We take the shell off it though.

All you get is--

HOST: During one of Cooper's business trips,

a friend reported him as missing.

Police searched Cooper's room and found this photograph.

David Cooper and Alex Cooper were one and the same.

LEILA COOPER: Sitting there, holding this Polaroid of him,

I couldn't believe every prayer that I'd ever made

and, you know, my dreams were answered because he was alive.

But I didn't have him.

He was there, but he wasn't there.

I had my 39th wedding anniversary

not too long ago, by myself.

[inaudible] I live in limbo.

AUBREY DOVE: On the 29th of May, when Mr. Cooper returned home,

he went up to his room.

And when he went in to his room or his flat,

he noticed that there was evidence of police presence.

The dust that's used to take fingerprints was on the wall,

and was on a couple of other places.

Mrs. Chase.

Mrs. Chase.

What happened to my room?

Mr. Cooper.

AUBREY DOVE: And at that time, his landlady

advised him that he'd been reported missing by the police.

And the police were trying to find out where he was.

Well, who reported me missing?

I have no idea, but I know I didn't.

I did all right, didn't I?

It's not your fault, Mrs. Chase.

HOST: By the time police returned to the boarding house,

Alex Cooper had disappeared once again, for reasons

known only to himself.

AUBREY DOVE: We have a person who has something

to hide to a point where he would

walk away and leave the family that he's been

with for the last 35 years.

So it has to be something that's very serious,

or at least he believes it's very serious.

LEILA COOPER: I'd love to get him back.

I want to give him a real big hug,

and then I kind of want to give him a kick in the butt.

And then another big hug.

But I'd love to have him back.

MARGARET COOPER: If he's running,

I don't know why he's running.

But it's time he quit.

He's got this family that care about him.

And if he's out there living among strangers,

he should rethink this thing.

We deserve it.

And so does he.

Shortly after this story aired,

a viewer in Hamilton, Canada recognized Alex Cooper

and immediately called authorities.

During questioning, the mystery surrounding his life

began to unravel.

Alex Cooper told police that his true name was Albin Arsenault.

In 1948, he was accused of robbing

an office of the Canadian Pacific Railroad, where

he was employed at the time.

ALEX COOPER: I was young, and I panicked.

And I said to myself, there is no way

I'm going to be taking the fall for this,

because I didn't do it.

I took off at that time, and I became

Alexander Cooper at that point.

HOST: Four years later, Alex married Margaret.

He had no idea that any criminal charges

that might have been filed against him

had probably been dropped.

For more than 35 years, his true identity remained a secret.

Then as his 65th birthday neared,

Alex Cooper's past began to catch up.

ALEX COOPER: I was due for pension,

and you're required to submit a birth certificate.

I knew I couldn't produce one.

Several months prior to this, I knew this was coming up.

I couldn't bring myself--

about to tell my family.

So I walked away.

It was a snap decision, and it was wrong.

HOST: Two days after he was questioned by Hamilton

authorities, Alex Cooper returned to British Columbia

and was reunited with his family after more than five years.

MARGARET COOPER: We were a very close family.

This had been very devastating for all of us.

And I'm really hoping that we can work through this

and put it back together.

If not the way it is, maybe something better.

We can't pick up where we left off,

because things have changed.

But we're going to start fresh.

Take it a day at a time.

The way I feel, I don't deserve for anybody

to accept my apology.

What I've done-- abandonment of your family,

to me, is one hell of a crime.

And the biggest job for me, at this point,

will be to make amends.

And I would say it'll probably take me the rest of my life.

HOST: On our next Unsolved Mysteries.

This is the legendary Shroud of Turin.

Believers say it is the actual burial cloth of Jesus Christ,

and that his image has been miraculously imprinted upon it.

Skeptics claim the image was somehow

etched on the cloth in the 14th century by a master painter.

What is the truth behind the mysterious shroud of Turin?

In 1989, Ethel Kidd began building her dream home

in rural Virginia, seeking the safety

and security of country living.

But in a fatal twist of fate Ethel soon fell prey

to the same kind of senseless crime

she had been trying to escape.

Joe Maloney was a master of deception,

and a master of manipulation.

He fashioned a devious plot against his estranged

wife in which the murder weapon was a party

drink laced with poison.

Join me, next time, for another edition of Unsolved Mysteries.