" Now I have come to The Crossroads in my life. I always knew what The Right Path was. Without exception, I knew. But I never took it. You know why...? It was TOO DAMN HARD. Now here's Charlie. He's come to The Crossroads. He has chosen a Path. It's The Right Path. It's a Path, made of PRINCIPLE -- That leads to CHARACTER. "
If we want to get out of here in one piece, we've got to get that cure, and we're got to get it fast.
PHLOX:
I could finish the antivirus in less time if I had a human host to replicate enough antibodies.
ARCHER:
I don't see any other humans around.
PHLOX:
Captain, I would have to expose you to the plague. I cannot predict what it might do to you.
ARCHER:
Will it give you the cure?
PHLOX:
Unquestionably.
ARCHER:
Let's get started.
Corona Doesn't Want to Kill You
“We Should Not Give-in to This Damn Virus.”
“As you might imagine, it was hard to sustain this level of controlled breakdown while running a business. My cometary rise was equaled by a fall; a plunge into dissolution. The more perverse and inhuman the enemies of the Invisibles became, the sicker I got. By the time I realized I’d become semifictional, it was too late to defend myself.
The downward spiral expressed itself in darker magic as the Invisibles faced bacterial gods from a diseased twin universe. After trying out a Voudon ritual in 1993, I found myself facing down an immense scorpion creature that tried to teach me how to psychically assassinate people by destroying their “auras.”
When the ritual was done, I switched on the TV to decompress and caught the last fifteen minutes of Howard the Duck, in which nightmarish extradimensional scorpion sorcerers attempted to clamber their way into eighties America.
These spooky coincidences were commonplace, but I had no idea what I was letting myself in for when I wrote King Mob into the hands of his “enemies. Tortured and drugged, he was made to believe his face was being disfigured by a necrotizing fasciitis bug.
Within three months, bacteria of a different kind had nibbled a hole in my cheek. My beautiful big house had degenerated into creepy, lightless squalor, with a duvet hung up in the bedroom window instead of curtains. I came out in boils, traditional signs of demon contact. Fortunately for me, I was physically fitter than I’d ever been, although it only delayed the inevitable for a few more months.
I’d been granted superpowers. I’d danced with monster gods and shaken souls with angels, but my end-of-act-2 reverse could no longer be denied. The Achilles’ heel revealed! The death trap sprung!
On the night before I was hustled into the hospital, with what I later found out was probably less than forty-eight hours to live, I hallucinated something I recognized immediately as “Christ.”
A column of light phased through the door, clear as day, then a powerful sermon seemed to download into my mind. I understood that this power I was facing was some kind of Gnostic Christ. A Christ of the Apocrypha. An almost pagan figure that I’d found at the bottom, at the last gasp. Here at the end, there was this light. Christ was with us, suffering right there with us and promising salvation. This living radiance was nothing like the morbid fever visions of hearses and twisted window frames I’d been having. This was what turned dead-end junkies into born-again Christians, but of the whole heart-melting experience, I remember only the first resonant words:
“I am not the god of your fathers, I am the hidden stone that breaks all hearts.
We have to break your heart to let the light out.”
These words sounded through my head, but they were bigger and more complete than any thoughts I was familiar with; more like a broadcast. The loving voice and its powerful words seemed not to be mine and offered me a stark choice there in the living room: I could die now of this disease or stay and “serve the light.”
I might as well have been recruited into the Green Lantern Corps, in what was for me a very genuine “cosmic” moment.
I did as most of us would and elected to live. Like Captain Marvel, I wanted to go back to Earth armed with Eon’s knowledge.
I felt I’d lived my own Arkham Asylum dark night of the soul, and without the understanding that I was on a well-trod and signposted “magical” path, I’m not sure if I could have handled my illness or recovery process quite as well.
I’d reached that point in the story where I’d survived the crisis and still had a chance to be reborn with a new costume and better powers, but it was touch and go; every passing second was the ticking clock to the ultimate life-and-death cliff-hanger.
How the fuck would I get out of this one?
As it happened, as in the best serials, it was some kind of dumb luck that saved me. The day after Jesus popped by, something odd occurred.
My sister was in London, and her boyfriend Gordon was on his way down for a visit. He’d just missed catching up with my mum, who’d been looking in on me, with increasing apprehension. She’d correctly diagnosed my appendicitis when I was twelve and now she was sure that the doctor’s flu remedy was not what my damaged lungs really needed.
She made it to her living room, looked out the window, and saw Gordon at the crossroads hailing a cab to take him to the station. She willed him to turn around, as she tells it, and he did.
Gordon came upstairs to collect a bundle of clothes for my sis. Mum told him about me, and he promised to mention it to his mate Graham, who had a good local doctor, apparently, a GP whose own bohemian temperament led him to specialize in the treatment of football stars, musicians, and artists.
When he got to London, Gordon was as good as his word. Graham immediately called his miracle doc, who agreed to visit me on short notice.
To my shame, I’m not sure that I would have acted so promptly (or at all) in the same circumstances.
Graham didn’t know me. He was five hundred miles away and had no idea how seriously ill I was.
The doctor checked my temperature and listened to my chest with growing alarm before contacting the hospital.
I felt safe at last, as if a true guardian angel had arrived to rescue me from the mire of disease where I could no longer function.
There were no beds at the Tropical Diseases Ward (my travel history made this the obvious first port of call), but with so many coincidences already flying around, another one was attracted to all the commotion: It just so happened that the receptionist had gone out with the doctor’s friend.
Charm and nepotism swung me a room. Within hours, I was in a private ward in Glasgow’s Ruchill Hospital with a drip in my arm, while frantic doctors held me down as if I were devil possessed. They had to get the needle in when the tremors were at their most intense, so I lay shuddering, freezing, barely able to breathe as my arm was secured and blood drawn.
I was quickly and efficiently diagnosed with a tempestuous Staphylococcus aureus infection that had settled in my lungs, collapsing one of them. I was septicemic and severely lacking in natural salts and minerals, but the good doctors pulled me back.
Two days later, I had a painful tube in my arm, the vein was hard as wood, but I was alive, and I could feel the venom of the scorpion loa succumbing to the mighty medicine of antibiotics.
Staph aureus, or golden staph, derives its distinctive color from carotene, and when the bugs had been flushed from my system, I succumbed to an epic lust for raw carrots that could be satisfied only by a daily three-pound bag from the greengrocer. Depleted, I had to consume my weight in the power elixir, the golden superfood.
Not even the junkies outside the window prowling the hospital grounds for used or discarded needles could intrude on my sense of having been rescued from the brink. I settled back to recuperate, imagining ocean sets, distant beaches, and health.
I counted the days between episodes of Father Ted and Fist of Fun, enduring a battery of painful tests to discover if the staph infection had spread to my heart, and reading comic books my friend Jim brought me from the Forbidden Planet store he owns on Buchanan Street. It was one of a growing chain of pop culture emporia that rewrote the comic shop idea for the High Street consumer.
For a few days, there was even an AIDS scare, followed by a test and then the obvious relief.
My dad visited every night and told me stories from the war, his presence a calm rock. He insisted that he was trying to bore me to sleep, but it never worked that way. I could have listened to him all night.
While the doctors got on with their work, I also decided to take matters into my own hands and elected to treat the living bacteria inside me as totem animals. If, I speculated, they had a physical existence and purpose, surely they could be endowed with a mythic or magical intent by a human intelligence.
In the wee small hours, with the alcoholic night nurse on duty, I spoke to the germs and promised them a starring role as the baddies in my current magnum opus, The Invisibles, if they left me alone.
This, I explained to them, would give them a far longer life and greater symbolic significance than any mere physical overthrow of my body could offer. I gave Staph aureus the chance to become fiction. It was a good deal, and they seemed to go for it.
As I waited nervously for test results, I wrote King Mob’s recovery into The Invisibles, spelling myself out of my own predicament by restoring the fiction suit to full health. If he could survive this and be stronger, so, naturally, would I.
I’d made a magical model of the world, and by tweaking the model, I could seem to be able to effect actual changes in the real world.”
“ I might as well have been recruited into the Green Lantern Corps.”
— Grant Morrison , Supergods
“ As you might imagine, it was hard to sustain this level of controlled breakdown while running a business. My cometary rise was equaled by a fall; a plunge into dissolution. The more perverse and inhuman the enemies of the Invisibles became, the sicker I got. By the time I realized I’d become semifictional, it was too late to defend myself.
The downward spiral expressed itself in darker magic as the Invisibles faced bacterial gods from a diseased twin universe. After trying out a Voudon ritual in 1993, I found myself facing down an immense scorpion creature that tried to teach me how to psychically assassinate people by destroying their “auras.”
When the ritual was done, I switched on the TV to decompress and caught the last fifteen minutes of Howard the Duck, in which nightmarish extradimensional scorpion sorcerers attempted to clamber their way into eighties America.
These spooky coincidences were commonplace, but I had no idea what I was letting myself in for when I wrote King Mob into the hands of his enemies. Tortured and drugged, he was made to believe his face was being disfigured by a necrotizing fasciitis bug.
Within three months, bacteria of a different kind had nibbled a hole in my cheek. My beautiful big house had degenerated into creepy, lightless squalor, with a duvet hung up in the bedroom window instead of curtains. I came out in boils, traditional signs of demon contact. Fortunately for me, I was physically fitter than I’d ever been, although it only delayed the inevitable for a few more months.
I’d been granted superpowers. I’d danced with monster gods and shaken souls with angels, but my end-of-act-2 reverse could no longer be denied. The Achilles’ heel revealed! The death trap sprung!
On the night before I was hustled into the hospital, with what I later found out was probably less than forty-eight hours to live, I hallucinated something I recognized immediately as “Christ.” A column of light phased through the door, clear as day, then a powerful sermon seemed to download into my mind. I understood that this power I was facing was some kind of Gnostic Christ. A Christ of the Apocrypha. An almost pagan figure that I’d found at the bottom, at the last gasp. Here at the end, there was this light. Christ was with us, suffering right there with us and promising salvation. This living radiance was nothing like the morbid fever visions of hearses and twisted window frames I’d been having. This was what turned dead-end junkies into born-again Christians, but of the whole heart-melting experience, I remember only the first resonant words:
“I am not the god of your fathers, I am the hidden stone that breaks all hearts.
We have to break your heart to let the light out.”
These words sounded through my head, but they were bigger and more complete than any thoughts I was familiar with; more like a broadcast.
The loving voice and its powerful words seemed not to be mine and offered me a stark choice there in the living room: I could die now of this disease or stay and “serve the light.” I might as well have been recruited into the Green Lantern Corps, in what was for me a very genuine “cosmic” moment.
I did as most of us would and elected to live. Like Captain Marvel, I wanted to go back to Earth armed with Eon’s knowledge. I felt I’d lived my own Arkham Asylum dark night of the soul, and without the understanding that I was on a well-trod and signposted “magical” path, I’m not sure if I could have handled my illness or recovery process quite as well. I’d reached that point in the story where I’d survived the crisis and still had a chance to be reborn with a new costume and better powers, but it was touch and go; every passing second was the ticking clock to the ultimate life-and-death cliff-hanger. How the fuck would I get out of this one?
As it happened, as in the best serials, it was some kind of dumb luck that saved me. The day after Jesus popped by, something odd occurred. My sister was in London, and her boyfriend Gordon was on his way down for a visit. He’d just missed catching up with my mum, who’d been looking in on me, with increasing apprehension. She’d correctly diagnosed my appendicitis when I was twelve and now she was sure that the doctor’s flu remedy was not what my damaged lungs really needed. She made it to her living room, looked out the window, and saw Gordon at the crossroads hailing a cab to take him to the station. She willed him to turn around, as she tells it, and he did. Gordon came upstairs to collect a bundle of clothes for my sis. Mum told him about me, and he promised to mention it to his mate Graham, who had a good local doctor, apparently, a GP whose own bohemian temperament led him to specialize in the treatment of football stars, musicians, and artists. When he got to London, Gordon was as good as his word. Graham immediately called his miracle doc, who agreed to visit me on short notice. To my shame, I’m not sure that I would have acted so promptly (or at all) in the same circumstances. Graham didn’t know me. He was five hundred miles away and had no idea how seriously ill I was. The doctor checked my temperature and listened to my chest with growing alarm before contacting the hospital. I felt safe at last, as if a true guardian angel had arrived to rescue me from the mire of disease where I could no longer function. There were no beds at the Tropical Diseases Ward (my travel history made this the obvious first port of call), but with so many coincidences already flying around, another one was attracted to all the commotion: It just so happened that the receptionist had gone out with the doctor’s friend. Charm and nepotism swung me a room. Within hours, I was in a private ward in Glasgow’s Ruchill Hospital with a drip in my arm, while frantic doctors held me down as if I were devil possessed. They had to get the needle in when the tremors were at their most intense, so I lay shuddering, freezing, barely able to breathe as my arm was secured and blood drawn. I was quickly and efficiently diagnosed with a tempestuous Staphylococcus aureus infection that had settled in my lungs, collapsing one of them. I was septicemic and severely lacking in natural salts and minerals, but the good doctors pulled me back. Two days later, I had a painful tube in my arm, the vein was hard as wood, but I was alive, and I could feel the venom of the scorpion loa succumbing to the mighty medicine of antibiotics. Staph aureus, or golden staph, derives its distinctive color from carotene, and when the bugs had been flushed from my system, I succumbed to an epic lust for raw carrots that could be satisfied only by a daily three-pound bag from the greengrocer. Depleted, I had to consume my weight in the power elixir, the golden superfood. Not even the junkies outside the window prowling the hospital grounds for used or discarded needles could intrude on my sense of having been rescued from the brink. I settled back to recuperate, imagining ocean sets, distant beaches, and health. I counted the days between episodes of Father Ted and Fist of Fun, enduring a battery of painful tests to discover if the staph infection had spread to my heart, and reading comic books my friend Jim brought me from the Forbidden Planet store he owns on Buchanan Street. It was one of a growing chain of pop culture emporia that rewrote the comic shop idea for the High Street consumer. For a few days, there was even an AIDS scare, followed by a test and then the obvious relief. My dad visited every night and told me stories from the war, his presence a calm rock. He insisted that he was trying to bore me to sleep, but it never worked that way. I could have listened to him all night. While the doctors got on with their work, I also decided to take matters into my own hands and elected to treat the living bacteria inside me as totem animals. If, I speculated, they had a physical existence and purpose, surely they could be endowed with a mythic or magical intent by a human intelligence. In the wee small hours, with the alcoholic night nurse on duty, I spoke to the germs and promised them a starring role as the baddies in my current magnum opus, The Invisibles, if they left me alone. This, I explained to them, would give them a far longer life and greater symbolic significance than any mere physical overthrow of my body could offer. I gave Staph aureus the chance to become fiction. It was a good deal, and they seemed to go for it.
As I waited nervously for test results, I wrote King Mob’s recovery into The Invisibles, spelling myself out of my own predicament by restoring the fiction suit to full health. If he could survive this and be stronger, so, naturally, would I. I’d made a magical model of the world, and by tweaking the model, I could seem to be able to effect actual changes in the real world.”
and everything... because it made me feel important.
You do it 'cause you mean it.
You got integrity, Charlie.
I don't know whether to shoot ya or adopt ya.
On major holidays, Willis, it's customary for the Lord of The Manor... to offer drippings to the poor
He dreamed that he stood in a shadowy Court,
Where the Snark, with a glass in its eye,
Dressed in gown, bands, and wig, was defending a pig
On the charge of deserting its sty.
The Witnesses proved, without error or flaw,
That the sty was deserted when found:
And the Judge kept explaining the state of the law
In a soft under-current of sound.
The indictment had never been clearly expressed,
And it seemed that the Snark had begun,
And had spoken three hours, before any one guessed
What the pig was supposed to have done.
The Jury had each formed a different view
(Long before the indictment was read),
And they all spoke at once, so that none of them knew
One word that the others had said.
"You must know —" said the Judge: but the Snark exclaimed "Fudge!
That statute is obsolete quite!
Let me tell you, my friends, the whole question depends
On an ancient manorial right.
Matron: [the Matron opens up the door to the girls' room]
Welcome back, girls.
Poppy: [realising help is there to wash her clothes]
Oh, good, staff! How quickly can you get all this stuff cleaned?
Matron: [realising who she is] Is she...?
Josie: [nodding]
Mm-hm. American.
Matron: [realising about the Americans once at the school]
Oh, yes. We had one of those in 1997.
[looking at Poppy]
Matron:
Not good.
[Poppy whines about her clothes]
Matron: [to the girls]
Accustom her to my rules
[noticing Poppy in her casual clothes]
Matron:
and she should be in the correct uniform for a start!
[collecting the mobile phones]
Matron: Mobile phones, please, girls!
[Kiki, Drippy, Kate and Josie put in their phones, unaware they are decoys and don't work]
Matron:
Thank you Kiki, thank you Josie. Thank you Kate!
Poppy:
[the Matron proceeds in confiscating the phones and takes both of Poppy's phones]
Whoa! Hands off, mama! I said, "Hands OFF!"
[speaking Spanish]
Poppy:
Hablas Espanol?
[Poppy attempts to speak Italian]
Poppy: Posito Italiano?
Matron: [offended]
I am Scottish, not remedial!
Poppy: [glad the Matron understood her]
Good, then you understand!
[Poppy dumps her wet clothes into the phone confiscation tray]
Poppy:
Line dry, press, no starch, and no creases!
Matron:
[really shocked and appalled at Poppy's behaviour]
How dare you! No mufti for a week!
[walking away]
Poppy: [doesn't know what she meant]
Fine! Mufti may be your thing, lady, but it sure ain't mine!
Kiki: [correcting Poppy]
She means no home clothes for a week!
Poppy: [scoffing]
Like I give a shit!
[Matron gasps]
Poppy:
I'll be gone by then!
Matron: [shocked by Poppy's language]
LANGUAGE!
[turning to the girls]
Matron:
Two Sundays detention. For the whole dorm!
[the girls groan]
Poppy: [to the girls] Look, I'll deal with this.
[to Matron]
Poppy: Look, hey! Hey!
[Matron grunts "Huh"?]
Poppy: [Poppy shows the Matron a green money note] Here's a Ben Franklin. Why don't you go out and buy yourself...
[looking at the Matron's clothes]
Poppy: well, anything!
[drops the money into the phone tray]
Poppy: Whatever you get will be a *serious* improvement!
Matron: [to the girls] *Three* Sundays!
[turning to them]
Matron: For everyone!
[the girls groan loudly, as the Matron leaves, and turn to Poppy angry]
Josie: Thanks a lot for that! You utter moron!
Drippy: What are you, mental?
Poppy: What? She was a grade-1 a-hole with a *severe* attitudinal problem!
Kate: [had enough with Poppy's nonsense]
The bell's going in a minute. Just put your uniform on!
[Poppy scoffs. The bell suddenly rings]
Kate/Drippy/Kiki/Josie: [in unison, yelling at Poppy] NOW!
[last lines]
Todd Anderson: [stands up on his desk]
O Captain! My Captain!
Mr. Nolan:
Sit down, Mr. Anderson! Do you hear me? Sit down! Sit down! This is your final warning, Anderson. How dare you? Do you hear me?
Knox Overstreet:
[climbs up onto his desk]
O Captain! My Captain!
Mr. Nolan: Mr. Overstreet, I warn you! Sit down!
[Pitts climbs onto his desk, followed by Meeks, then over half the class, one by one]
Mr. Nolan:
Sit down! Sit down. All of you. I want you seated. Sit down. Leave, Mr. Keating. All of you, down. I want you seated. Do you hear me? Sit down!
John Keating:
Thank you, boys. Thank you.
[Charlie refused to come clean with the names of the students responsible for the prank; Mr. Trask is furious]
Mr. Trask: [furious]
I am left with no real witness. Mr. Willis's testimony is not only vague, it is unsubstantiated. The substance I was looking for, Mr. Simms, was to come from you.
Charlie Simms: [remorseful]
I'm sorry.
Mr. Trask:
I'm sorry too, Mr. Simms, because you know what I am going to do. In as much as I can't punish Mr. Havemeyer, Mr. Potter, or Mr. Jameson, and I won't punish Mr. Willis. He's the only party to this incident who is still worthy of calling himself a Baird man. I'm going to recommend to the disciplinary committee that you be expelled. Mr. Simms, you are a cover-up artist and you are a liar.
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
But not a SNITCH.
Mr. Trask:
Excuse me?
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
No, I don't think I will.
Mr. Trask:
Mr. Slade...
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
This is such a crock of SHIT.
Mr. Trask:
Please watch your language, Mr. Slade. You are in the Baird School, not a barracks. Mr Simms, I will give you one last opportunity to speak up.
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
Mr. Simms doesn't want it. He desn't need to labeled, "Still worthy of being a Baird man". What the hell is that? What is your motto here? "Boys, inform on your classmates, save your hide. Anything short of that, we're gonna burn you at the stake"? Well, gentlemen, when the shit hits the fan, some guys run and some guys stay. Here's Charlie facing the fire and there's George hiding in Big Daddy's pocket. And what are you doing? You're gonna reward George and destroy Charlie.
Mr. Trask:
Are you finished, Mr. Slade?
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
No, I'm just gettin' warmed up. I don't know who went to this place, William Howard Taft, William Jennings Bryan, William Tell, whoever. Their spirit is dead, if they ever had one. It's gone. You're building a rat ship here. A vessel for seagoing snitches, and if you think you're preparing these minnows for manhood, you better think again, because I say you are killing the very spirit this institution proclaims it instills. What a sham. What kind of a show you guys are putting on here today? I mean, the only class in this act is sitting next to me, and I'm here to tell ya this boy's soul is intact. It's non-negotiable. You know how I know? Someone here, and I'm not gonna say who, offered to buy it. Only Charlie here wasn't selling.
Mr. Trask:
Sir, you're out of order.
[Trask hits the gavel; Col. Slade stands up angry]
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
Out of order. I'll show YOU "out of order"! You don't know what "out of order" is, Mr. Trask. I'd show you, but I'm too old, I'm too tired, I'm too fucking blind. If I were the man I was five years ago, I'd take a...
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
[slams his cane on the desk, screaming]
FLAMETHROWER to this place! Out of order? Who the hell do ya think you're talking to? I've been around, ya know? There was a time I could see. And I have seen. Boys like these, younger than these. Their arms torn out, their legs ripped off. But there is nothing like the sight of an amputated spirit. There's no prostetic for that. You think you're merely sending this splendid foot solder back home to Oregon with tail between his legs, but I say you are executing his SOUL! And why? Because he's not a Baird man. Baird men. You hurt this boy, you're gonna be Baird bums, the lot of ya. And Harry, Jimmy, Trent, wherever you are, fuck you too!
[the student body and the committee are in shock as Trask's anger is further aggravated]
Mr. Trask: [yells; hits the gavel three times]
Stand down, Mr. Slade!
Lt. Col. Frank Slade:
I'm not finished! As I came in here, I heard those words, "Cradle of Leadership". Well, when the bough breaks, the cradle will fall. And it has fallen here. It has fallen. Makers of men, Creators of leaders. Be careful what kind of leaders you're producing here. I don't know if Charlie's silence here today is right or wrong. I'm not a judge or jury, but I can tell you this: He won't sell anybody out to buy his future! And that, my friends, is called integrity. That's called courage. Now that's the stuff leaders should be made of. Now I have come to the crossroads in my life. I always knew what the right path was. Without exception, I knew. But I never took it. You know why? It was too damn hard. Now here's Charlie. He's come to the crossroads. He has chosen a path. It's the right path. It's a path made of principle that leads to character. Let him continue on his journey. You hold this boy's future in your hands, committee. It's a valuable future. Believe me. Don't destroy it. Protect it. Embrace it. It's gonna make you proud one day, I promise you.
" It is fairly common for people who disappear to want to make their escape look like a suicide. They could probably just as easily walk out the door into a new identity, but for some reason they want people to think they have died.
Perhaps they believe it will keep people from searching for them, or that it will be easier for their families to cope with death than with disappearance.
Then again, it may be a scam to collect on life insurance.
Dr. Richard Seiden of the University of California, an internationally known authority on suicide, has coined a new word for such fake deaths: Pseudocide.
Pseudocide
Di. Seidel investigated 100 cases of apparent suicide from the Golden Gate Bridge in which no body was recovered.
Of the 100, he easily found 26 that were alive and well and enjoying the finer side of life.
His investigative techniques were notvery sophisticated either, so it is likely that many of the remaining 74 "victims" are out walking the streets somewhere.
The very first suicide from the San Francisco Bay Bridge was actually a pseudocide. The person in question was a San Francisco Supervisor, similar to a councilman or alderman, who was embroiled in a little dispute with the accounting types over the disposal of some official funds.
When the situation got serious he took the easy way out and was written off the books as bridge suicide though his remains were never located. Sometime later he was discovered selling Bibles door-to-door down in Texas. "
Of the 100, he easily found 26 that were alive and well and enjoying the finer side of life.
His investigative techniques were notvery sophisticated either, so it is likely that many of the remaining 74 "victims" are out walking the streets somewhere.
Who Witnessed Each Jump...?
" An official suicide count was kept until the year 1995,sorted according to which of the bridge's 128 lamp posts the jumper was nearest when he or she jumped.
The official count ended on June 5, 1995 on the 997th jump;[1jumper No. 1000, Eric Atkinson (25), jumped on July 3, 1995.
Earlier in 1995, a local shock jock had offered a case of Snapple to the family of the 1000th suicide victim.
Consequently, Marin County coroner Ken Holmes asked local media to stop reporting the total number of jumpers.
By 2012 the unofficial count exceeded 1,600 (in which the body was recovered or someone saw the jump) and new suicides were occurring about once every two weeks, according to a San Francisco Chronicle analysis.
The most suicides in one month were in August 2013, when 10 jumped.
The total count for the year 2013 was 46, with an additional 118 attempts prevented, making it the year with the highest tally so far.
The rate of incidence of attempts has risen to nearly one every other day
Shortly after ten-thirty in the morning on Wednesday, March 19th, a real-estate agent named Paul Alarab began hiking across the Golden Gate Bridge. Midway along the walkway, which carries pedestrians and cyclists between San Francisco and Marin County, he stopped and climbed the four-foot safety railing. Then he lowered himself carefully onto the bridge’s outermost reach, a thirty-two-inch-wide beam known as “the chord.” It is on the chord, two hundred and twenty feet above San Francisco Bay, that people intending to kill themselves often pause. On a sunny day, as this day was, the view is glorious: Angel Island to the left, Alcatraz straight ahead, Treasure Island farther off, bisecting the long gray tangent of the Bay Bridge, and, layered across the hills to the south, San Francisco.
Alarab turned and looped a thick rope over the railing, then wound it around his right wrist five times and grabbed it with his gloved right hand. His weekday attire usually consisted of a business suit with a “Peace” T-shirt underneath, but today he wore black gloves, black shoes, black pants, a black T-shirt, and black sunglasses. Through the palings of the bridge rail and the rush of traffic, he could see the mouth of the Bay to the west and the Pacific beyond. Clasping a typed statement to his chest with his left hand, he leaned backward, away from the railing, and waited for help to arrive.
Alarab, a forty-four-year-old Iraqi-American, was a large, balding, friendly man who kept a “No Hate” sign in his office at Century 21 Heritage Real Estate in Lafayette, across the Bay. The day before, he’d told a co-worker that the prospect of civilian deaths in Iraq made him sick to his stomach. Alarab had chosen this day, the first of America’s war against Saddam Hussein, to make a statement of opposition.
Responding to a “10-31,” bridge code for a jumper, four uniformed California Highway Patrol officers soon arrived at the rail, joined by three ironworkers who had been repairing the bridge. Alarab told them that he wanted to speak to the media. As it happened, a number of TV crews were at the south end of the bridge, filming standups about heightened terrorism precautions. A Telemundo crew came out, and Alarab began to read a declaration about Iraq’s defenseless women, children, and elderly. “Wake up, America!” he said. “This war will be known as ‘the war of cowards and oil’ across the world!”
As a Coast Guard cutter idled in the fifty-five-degree water below, the bridge’s guardians tried to talk Alarab into coming up. “When CNN gets here, I’m back over the other side of the railing,” he promised. One Highway Patrol officer said, “Hey, don’t I know you?” Alarab squinted, and said, “Oh, sure!” They had met during Alarab’s previous adventure on the bridge: in 1988, seeking to publicize the plight of the handicapped and the elderly, Alarab had climbed down a sixty-foot nylon cord into a large plastic garbage can he’d suspended beneath the bridge. His weight proved too much for the apparatus, and the can broke free with him inside. “It seemed like the fall lasted forever,” Alarab said afterward. “I was praying for God to give me another chance.” The fall broke both of Alarab’s ankles and three of his ribs and collapsed his lungs, but he lived—becoming one of only twenty-six people to survive the plunge from the Golden Gate. “I’ll never put my life on the line again,” he said at the time.
Survivors often regret their decision in midair, if not before. Ken Baldwin and Kevin Hines both say they hurdled over the railing, afraid that if they stood on the chord they might lose their courage. Baldwin was twenty-eight and severely depressed on the August day in 1985 when he told his wife not to expect him home till late. “I wanted to disappear,” he said. “So the Golden Gate was the spot. I’d heard that the water just sweeps you under.” On the bridge, Baldwin counted to ten and stayed frozen. He counted to ten again, then vaulted over. “I still see my hands coming off the railing,” he said. As he crossed the chord in flight, Baldwin recalls, “I instantly realized that everything in my life that I’d thought was unfixable was totally fixable—except for having just jumped.”
Kevin Hines was eighteen when he took a municipal bus to the bridge one day in September, 2000. After treating himself to a last meal of Starbursts and Skittles, he paced back and forth and sobbed on the bridge walkway for half an hour. No one asked him what was wrong. A beautiful German tourist approached, handed him her camera, and asked him to take her picture, which he did. “I was like, ‘Fuck this, nobody cares,’ “ he told me. “So I jumped.” But after he crossed the chord, he recalls, “My first thought was What the hell did I just do? I don’t want to die.”
Paul Alarab never told his colleagues about his first experience on the bridge. He didn’t even tell his wife, whom he married in 1990 and divorced in 1995. The only hint of his fascination was his business card, which he resisted changing despite his boss’s complaint that it looked unprofessional. The card featured a photo of Alarab on the shore of the Bay; behind him lurked the Golden Gate.
On that March morning, facing the camera, Alarab read an ambiguous handwritten addendum to his statement: “I would sacrifice myself as a symbol of children that will die. If you are antiwar, e-mail me at alarabpaul@hotmail.com.” After forty minutes, CNN had not arrived and it seemed that Alarab had done all he could. It was 11:33 a.m. He bent to put his statement on the bridge, then placed his cell phone on it. He then unwound his wrist from the securing rope and stepped off the chord. The officers on the walkway craned their necks in a horrified line, watching him fall.
At a 1977 rally on the Golden Gate supporting the building of an anti-suicide barrier above the railing, a minister, speaking to six hundred of his followers, tried to explain the bridge’s power. Matchless in its Art Deco splendor, the Golden Gate is also unrivalled as a symbol: it is a threshold that presides over the end of the continent and a gangway to the void beyond. Just being there, the minister said, his words growing increasingly incoherent, left him in a rather suicidal mood. The Golden Gate, he said, is “a symbol of human ingenuity, technological genius, but social failure.”
Eighteen months later, that minister, the Reverend Jim Jones, who had decamped with his People’s Temple to Jonestown, Guyana, ordered his adherents to kill themselves by drinking grape Kool-Aid mixed with potassium cyanide. Nine hundred and twelve of them did.
Every two weeks, on average, someone jumps off the Golden Gate Bridge. It is the world’s leading suicide location. In the eighties, workers at a local lumberyard formed “the Golden Gate Leapers Association”—a sports pool in which bets were placed on which day of the week someone would jump. At least twelve hundred people have been seen jumping or have been found in the water since the bridge opened, in 1937, including Roy Raymond, the founder of Victoria’s Secret, in 1993, and Duane Garrett, a Democratic fund-raiser and a friend of Al Gore’s, in 1995. The actual toll is probably considerably higher, swelled by legions of the stealthy, who sneak onto the bridge after the walkway closes at sundown and are carried to sea with the neap tide. Many jumpers wrap suicide notes in plastic and tuck them into their pockets. “Survival of the fittest. Adios—unfit,” one seventy-year-old man said in his valedictory; another wrote, “Absolutely no reason except I have a toothache.”
There is a fatal grandeur to the place. Like Paul Alarab, who lived and worked in the East Bay, several people have crossed the Bay Bridge to jump from the Golden Gate; there is no record of anyone traversing the Golden Gate to leap from its unlovely sister bridge. Dr. Richard Seiden, a professor emeritus at the University of California at Berkeley’s School of Public Health and the leading researcher on suicide at the bridge, has written that studies reveal “a commonly held attitude that romanticizes suicide from the Golden Gate Bridge in such terms as aesthetically pleasing and beautiful, while regarding a Bay Bridge suicide as tacky.”
Unlike the Bay Bridge—or most bridges, for that matter—the Golden Gate has a footpath adjacent to a low exterior railing. “Jumping from the bridge is seen as sure, quick, clean, and available—which is the most potent factor,” Dr. Jerome Motto, a local psychiatrist and suicide expert, says. “It’s like having a loaded gun on your kitchen table.”
Almost everyone in the Bay Area knows someone who has jumped, and it is perhaps not surprising that the most common fear among San Franciscans is gephyrophobia, the fear of crossing bridges. Yet the locals take a peculiar pride in the bridge’s notoriety. “What makes the bridge so popular,” Gladys Hansen, the city’s unofficial historian, says, citing the ten million tourists who visit the bridge each year, “is that it’s a monument, a monument to death.” In 1993, a man named Steve Page threw his three-year-old daughter, Kellie, over the side of the bridge and followed her down; even after this widely publicized atrocity, an Examiner poll that year found that fifty-four per cent of the respondents opposed building a suicide barrier.
The idea of building a barrier was first proposed in the nineteen-fifties, and it has provoked controversy ever since. “The battle over a barrier is actually a battle of ideas,” Eve Meyer, the executive director of San Francisco Suicide Prevention, told me. “And some of the ideas are very old, ideas about whether suicidal people are people to fear and hate.” In centuries past, suicides were buried at night at a crossroads, under piles of stones, or had stakes driven through their hearts to prevent their unquiet spirits from troubling the rest of us. In the United States today, someone takes his own life every eighteen minutes, and suicide is much more common than homicide. Still, the issue is rarely examined. In the Bay Area, the topic is virtually taboo. One Golden Gate official told me repeatedly, “I hate that you’re writing about this.”
In 1976, an engineer named Roger Grimes began agitating for a barrier on the Golden Gate. He walked up and down the bridge wearing a sandwich board that said “Please Care. Support a Suicide Barrier.” He gave up a few years ago, stunned that in an area as famously liberal as San Francisco, where you can always find a constituency for the view that pets should be citizens or that poison oak has a right to exist, there was so little empathy for the depressed. “People were very hostile,” Grimes told me. “They would throw soda cans at me, or yell, ‘Jump!’ “
When Paul Alarab was pulled from the Bay at 11:34 a.m., he was unconscious and badly bruised. The impact had ripped off his left glove and his right shoe. The Coast Guard crew, wearing their standard jumper-retrieval garb to protect against leaking body fluids—Tyvex biohazard suits, masks, gloves, and safety goggles—began C.P.R. Half an hour later, Alarab was pronounced dead. Gary Tindel, the assistant coroner of Marin County, who examined the body on the dock at Fort Baker, at the north end of the bridge, observed that “massive bleeding had occurred in both ears, along with apparent grayish brain matter in and around the right ear.” Tindel brought Alarab’s antiwar statement and his cell phone back to the coroner’s office in San Rafael. Soon afterward, the cell phone rang. It was Alarab’s ex-wife, Rubina Coton: their nine-year-old son had been waiting more than two hours at school for his father to pick him up.
“May I speak with Paul?” Coton asked.
“I’m sorry,” Tindel said. “You can’t.” Tindel explained that he was with the coroner’s office and suggested that Coton call back on his office phone. When she did, he told her that her ex-husband had jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge.
“Please don’t joke,” Coton said.
Tindel described Alarab’s outfit, but Coton didn’t recognize the clothes. Then he told her that the corpse wore a yarn necklace. And she recalled, suddenly, that their daughter had made such a necklace for Paul.
Jumpers tend to idealize what will happen after they step off the bridge. “Suicidal people have transformation fantasies and are prone to magical thinking, like children and psychotics,” Dr. Lanny Berman, the executive director of the American Association of Suicidology, says. “Jumpers are drawn to the Golden Gate because they believe it’s a gateway to another place. They think that life will slow down in those final seconds, and then they’ll hit the water cleanly, like a high diver.”
In the four-second fall from the bridge, survivors say, time does seem to slow. On her way down in 1979, Ann McGuire said to herself, “I must be about to hit,” three times. But the impact is not clean: the coroner’s usual verdict, suicide caused by “multiple blunt-force injuries,” euphemizes the devastation. Many people don’t look down first, and so those who jump from the north end of the bridge hit the land instead of the water they saw farther out. Jumpers who hit the water do so at about seventy-five miles an hour and with a force of fifteen thousand pounds per square inch. Eighty-five per cent of them suffer broken ribs, which rip inward and tear through the spleen, the lungs, and the heart. Vertebrae snap, and the liver often ruptures. “It’s as if someone took an eggbeater to the organs of the body and ground everything up,” Ron Wilton, a Coast Guard officer, once observed.
Those who survive the impact usually die soon afterward. If they go straight in, they plunge so deeply into the water—which reaches a depth of three hundred and fifty feet—that they drown. (The rare survivors always hit feet first, and at a slight angle.) A number of bodies become trapped in the eddies stirred by the bridge’s massive stone piers, and sometimes wash up as far away as the Farallon Islands, about thirty miles off. These corpses suffer from “severe marine depredation”—shark attacks and, particularly, the attentions of crabs, which feed on the eyeballs first, then the loose flesh of the cheeks. Already this year, two bodies have vanished entirely.
When Milligan examined her daughter’s computer afterward, she discovered that Marissa had been visiting a how-to Web site about suicide that featured grisly autopsy photos. The site notes that many suicide methods are ineffective (poison is fatal only fifteen per cent of the time, drug overdose twelve per cent, and wrist cutting a mere five per cent) and therefore recommends bridges, noting that “jumps from higher than . . . 250 feet over water are almost always fatal.” Milligan bought the proprietor of the site’s book, “Suicide and Attempted Suicide,” and read the following sentence: “The Golden Gate Bridge is to suicides what Niagara Falls is to honeymooners.” She returned the book and gave the computer away.
Every year, Marissa had written her mother a Christmas letter reflecting on the year’s events. On Christmas Day that year, Milligan, going through her daughter’s things, found her suicide note. It was tucked into “The Chronicles of Narnia,” which sat beside a copy of “Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teenagers.” The note ended with a plea: “Please forgive me. Don’t shut yourselves off from the world. Everyone is better off without this fat, disgusting, boring girl. Move on.”
As Joseph Strauss, the chief engineer of the Golden Gate, watched his beloved suspension bridge rise over San Francisco Bay in the nineteen-thirties, he could not imagine that anyone would use it without due care for its designated purpose. “Who would want to jump from the Golden Gate Bridge?” he told reporters. At the bridge’s opening ceremony, in May of 1937, Strauss read a statement in a low voice, his hands trembling. “What Nature rent asunder long ago man has joined today,” he said. The class poet at Ohio University, class of ’91, Strauss also wrote an ode to mark the occasion:
As harps for the winds of heaven,
My web-like cables are spun;
I offer my span for the traffic of man,
At the gate of the setting sun.
Three months later, a forty-seven-year-old First World War veteran named Harold Wobber turned to a stranger on the walkway, announced, “This is as far as I go,” and hopped over the rail. His body was never found. The original design called for the rail to be five and a half feet high, but this was lowered to four feet in the final blueprint, for reasons that are lost to history. The bridge’s chief engineer, Mervin Giacomini, who recently retired, told me half seriously that Strauss’s stature—he was only five feet tall—may have been a factor in the decision. Known as “the little man who built the big bridge,” Strauss may simply have wanted to be able to see over its side.
In May, 1938, Strauss died of a heart attack, likely brought on by the stress of seeing the bridge to completion. A plaque dedicated to him at the southern end of the bridge a few months later declared the span “a promise indeed that the race of man shall endure unto the ages”; at that point, six people had already jumped off. And at the dedication ceremony A. R. O’Brien, the bridge’s director, delivered a notably dark eulogy. Strauss “put everything he had” into the bridge’s construction, O’Brien said, “and out of its completion he got so little. . . . The Golden Gate Bridge, for my dead friend, turned out to be a mute monument of misery.”
In the years since the bridge’s dedication, Harold Wobber’s flight path has become well worn. I spent a day reading through clippings about Golden Gate Bridge suicides in the San Francisco Public Library, hundreds of two- or three-inch tales of woe from the Chronicle, the Examiner, the Call-Bulletin: “police said he was despondent over domestic affairs”; “medical discharge from the army”; “jobless butcher”; “the upholstery still retaining the warmth of the driver’s body”; “saying ‘goodbye’ four times and looking ‘very sad’ “; “ ‘sick at heart’ over the treatment of Jewish relatives in Germany”; “the baby’s cries apparently irritated him past endurance”; “footprints on the fog-wet girders were found early today”; “using his last nickel to scratch a farewell on the guard railing.”
The coverage intensified in 1973, when the Chronicle and the Examiner initiated countdowns to the five-hundredth recorded jumper. Bridge officials turned back fourteen aspirants to the title, including one man who had “500” chalked on a cardboard sign pinned to his T-shirt. The eventual “winner,” who eluded both bridge personnel and local-television crews, was a commune-dweller tripping on LSD.
In 1995, as No. 1,000 approached, the frenzy was even greater. A local disk jockey went so far as to promise a case of Snapple to the family of the victim. That June, trying to stop the countdown fever, the California Highway Patrol halted its official count at 997. In early July, Eric Atkinson, age twenty-five, became the unofficial thousandth; he was seen jumping, but his body was never found.
Ken Holmes, the Marin County coroner, told me, “When the number got to around eight hundred and fifty, we went to the local papers and said, ‘You’ve got to stop reporting numbers.’ “ Within the last decade, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Association of Suicidology have also issued guidelines urging the media to downplay the suicides. The Bay Area media now usually report bridge jumps only if they involve a celebrity or tie up traffic. “We weaned them,” Holmes said. But, he added, “the lack of publicity hasn’t reduced the number of suicides at all.”
The Empire State Building, the Duomo, St. Peter’s Basilica, and Sydney Harbor Bridge were all suicide magnets before barriers were erected on them. So were Mt. Mihara, a volcano in Japan (more than six hundred people jumped into it in 1936 alone); the Arroyo Seco Bridge, in Pasadena; and the Eiffel Tower. At Prince Edward Viaduct, in Toronto, the site of nearly five hundred fatal jumps, engineers just finished constructing a four-million-dollar “luminous veil” of stainless-steel rods above the railing. At all of these places, after the barriers were in place the number of jumpers declined to a handful, or to zero.
“In the seventies, we were really mobilized for a barrier at the Golden Gate,” Dr. Richard Seiden, the Berkeley suicide expert, told me. In 1970, the board of the Golden Gate Bridge Highway and Transportation District began studying eighteen suicide-barrier proposals, including a nine-foot wire fence, a nylon safety net, and even high-voltage laser beams. The board’s criteria were cost, aesthetics, and effectiveness. In 1973, the nineteen-member board, most of them political appointees, declared that none of the options were “acceptable to the public.” (The laser-beam proposal was vetoed because of the likelihood of “severe burns, possibly fatal, to pedestrians and personnel.”)
In 1998, a company called Z-Clip suggested that one of its livestock fences serve as a barrier. The seven-foot-tall mesh of wires had originally been used in Chile to keep cattle out of pine-seedling plantations, and would cost a mere $2.3 million to $3.5 million. The bridge board would not approve it, however. Barbara Kaufman, a board member, said that the fence resembled the “barbed wire at concentration camps.”
Tom Ammiano, a leading candidate for the mayoralty of San Francisco this fall, is among the bridge’s most liberal supervisors. He says that a barrier is no longer being actively considered, and that only he and three or four other board members favor one. “There’s a lot of white Republicans on the board who resist change,” Ammiano told me. He laughed darkly, and added, “The Golden Gate is an icon, my dear.”
The most plausible reason for the board’s resistance is aesthetics. For the past twenty-five years, however, three hundred and fifty feet of the southern end of the bridge have been festooned with an eight-foot-tall cyclone fence, directly above the Fort Point National Park site on the shore of the Bay. This “debris fence” was erected to keep tourists from dropping things—including, at one point, bowling balls—on other tourists below. “It’s a public-safety issue,” the bridge’s former chief engineer, Mervin Giacomini, told me.
Another factor is cost, which would seem particularly important now that the Bridge District has a projected five-year shortfall of more than two hundred million dollars. Yet, in October, construction will be completed on a fifty-four-inch-high steel barrier between the walkway and the adjacent traffic lanes which is meant to prevent bicyclists from veering into traffic. No cyclist has ever been killed; nonetheless, the bridge’s chief engineer, Denis Mulligan, says that the five-million-dollar barrier was necessary: “It’s a public-safety issue.” Engineers are also considering erecting a movable median to prevent head-on collisions, at a cost of at least twenty million dollars. “It’s a public-safety issue,” Al Boro, a member of the Bridge District’s board of directors, said to me.
A familiar argument against a barrier is that thwarted jumpers will simply go elsewhere. In 1953, a bridge supervisor named Mervin Lewis rejected an early proposal for a barrier by saying it was preferable that suicides jump into the Bay than dive off a building “and maybe kill somebody else.” (It’s a public-safety issue.) Although this belief makes intuitive sense, it is demonstrably untrue. Dr. Seiden’s study, “Where Are They Now?,” published in 1978, followed up on five hundred and fifteen people who were prevented from attempting suicide at the bridge between 1937 and 1971. After, on average, more than twenty-six years, ninety-four per cent of the would-be suicides were either still alive or had died of natural causes. “The findings confirm previous observations that suicidal behavior is crisis-oriented and acute in nature,” Seiden concluded; if you can get a suicidal person through his crisis—Seiden put the high-risk period at ninety days—chances are extremely good that he won’t kill himself later.
The current system for preventing suicide on the bridge is what officials call “the non-physical barrier.” Its components include numerous security cameras and thirteen telephones, which potential suicides or alarmed passersby can use to reach the bridge’s control tower. The most important element is randomly scheduled patrols by California Highway patrolmen and Golden Gate Bridge personnel in squad cars and on foot, bicycle, and motorcycle.
In two visits to the bridge, I spent an hour and a half on the walkway and never saw a patrolman. Perhaps, on camera, I didn’t exhibit troubling behavior. The monitors look for people standing alone near the railing, and pay particular attention if they’ve left a backpack, a briefcase, or a wallet on the ground beside them. Kevin Briggs, a friendly, sandy-haired motorcycle patrolman, has a knack for spotting jumpers and talking them back from the edge; he has coaxed in more than two hundred potential jumpers without losing one over the side. He won the Highway Patrol’s Marin County Uniformed Employee of the Year Award last year. Briggs told me that he starts talking to a potential jumper by asking, “How are you feeling today?” Then, “What’s your plan for tomorrow?” If the person doesn’t have a plan, Briggs says, “Well, let’s make one. If it doesn’t work out, you can always come back here later.”
The non-physical barrier catches between fifty and eighty people each year, and misses about thirty. Responding to these figures, Al Boro said, “I think that’s positive, I think that’s effective. Of course, you’d like to do everything you can to make it zero, within reason.”
Despite the coroner’s verdict, Paul Alarab’s loved ones insist that he didn’t jump off the Golden Gate. Having viewed the Telemundo tape, they believe that when Alarab was putting down his antiwar statement he slipped and fell. An accident is easier for friends and family to accept, whereas suicide leaves behind nothing but guilt. It’s impossible to know whether any one suicide might have been prevented, but many suicidal people do indeed wish to be saved. As the eminent suicidologist E. S. Shneidman has said, “The paradigm is the man who cuts his throat and cries for help in the same breath.”
Those who work on the bridge learn to cope with the suicides they can’t prevent by keeping an emotional distance. Glen Sievert, an ironworker who has often helped rescue potential jumpers, told the Wall Street Journal, “I don’t like these people. I have my own problems.” Even Kevin Briggs, the empathic patrolman, was surprised to learn, when he and some colleagues had a week’s training with a psychiatrist earlier this year, that suicidal people “are real people—not crazy people but real people suffering from depression.” Nonetheless, Briggs remains opposed to a barrier. “The bridge is about beauty,” he told me. “They’re going to jump anyway, and you can’t stop them.”
Mary Currie, the bridge’s spokeswoman, is an intense woman with short dark-blond hair. Last February, she went on a foot patrol with five Golden Gate patrolmen so that she would understand that detail better. Currie told me that her group stopped to assess a handsome middle-aged man who’d been at the south tower for two hours. “He said he was just taking a walk. But we all had a feeling,” Currie said. “Still, you can’t gang-tackle a guy for taking a walk. Five minutes after our last contact with him, he walked to the mid-span and looked back. We all took off after him; I was only twenty feet away when he went over. We saw him go in, feet first.
“The other guys felt they’d followed procedure, done what they had to do, didn’t get him, and they’ve moved on. But I had nightmares for a week. Should I have grabbed his ankles? Should there be a barrier? I finally decided it was this guy’s choice. I have depression in my family—I’ve had some myself—and you just have to fight it.” After a second, she reversed herself. “You know, if my mother had succeeded in killing herself—and she tried—I would be much more devastated, and my thinking would be . . .” She shook her head, banishing doubt. “That bridge is more than a bridge: it’s alive, it speaks to people. Some people come here, find themselves, and leave; some come here, find themselves, and jump.”
The bridge comes into the lives of all Bay Area residents sooner or later, and it often stays. Dr. Jerome Motto, who has been part of two failed suicidebarrier coalitions, is now retired and living in San Mateo. When I visited him there, we spent three hours talking about the bridge. Motto had a patient who committed suicide from the Golden Gate in 1963, but the jump that affected him most occurred in the seventies. “I went to this guy’s apartment afterward with the assistant medical examiner,” he told me. “The guy was in his thirties, lived alone, pretty bare apartment. He’d written a note and left it on his bureau. It said, ‘I’m going to walk to the bridge. If one person smiles at me on the way, I will not jump.’ “
Motto sat back in his chair. “That was it,” he said. “It’s so needless, the number of people who are lost.”
As people who work on the bridge know, smiles and gentle words don’t always prevent suicides. A barrier would. But to build one would be to acknowledge that we do not understand each other; to acknowledge that much of life is lived on the chord, on the far side of the railing. Joseph Strauss believed that the Golden Gate would demonstrate man’s control over nature, and so it did. No engineer, however, has discovered a way to control the wildness within. ♦
" Of the 100, he easily found 26 that were alive and well and enjoying the finer side of life.
His investigative techniques were notvery sophisticated either, so it is likely that many of the remaining 74 "victims" are out walking the streets somewhere. "
When reading these names, please remember the distress and confusion the person was in during their time of crisis.
Count
Date
First Name
Last Name
Sex
Age
Residence
Comment
1
8/7/1937
Harold
Wobber
M
47
San Francisco
2
10/2/1937
Louis
Levin
M
San Francisco
3
10/5/1937
Rafaello
di Regolo
M
4
11/26/1937
Frank
Clevenger
M
62
San Francisco
carpenter
5
1/20/1938
John
Prohoroff
M
35
NSJ listed as 6th
6
3/9/1938
Agnes
Harrington
F
7
8/24/1938
Harold M
Juda
M
San Francisco
cash register salesman
8
10/1/1938
Edwin D
Pierson
M
Colorado
9
November
unidentified
M
30
Swiss immigrant
lost job and gambled all his money
away
10
December
unidentified
12/30/1938
unidentified
F
25
"young Jewess" bride guilty
11
February
unidentified
M
11
2/14/1939
J.M.
Silvey
M
San Jose
12(14)
3/27/1939
M
13
4/4/1939
Paul J.
Umland
M
25
14
5/15/1939
Mathew
Wuerstle
M
52
San Francisco
unemployed
15
6/9/1939
Arthur John
Fisher
M
26
San Francisco
nurse
16
6/9/1939
Ruth
Tumelty
F
26(36)
Stockton
art school supervisor
17
6/24/1939
George
Verhagen
M
San Francisco
June
unidentified
18
10/26/1939
Andrew O.
Glover
M
80
San Francisco
rancher
19
11/1/1939
Lloyd
James
M
27
Oakland
hardware salesman
20
11/3/1939
Mildred Louis
Gibbs
F
San Bruno
21
11/20/1939
Kathleen L.
Johnson
F
45
San Francisco
widow
2/29/1940
F
21
Model
4/2/1940
Joseph
Pricaso
M
San Francisco
15
4/3/1940
Joe
Tricaso
M
33
San Francisco
jobless singer/dancer
4/4/1940
M
25
10/21/1941
Julia B.
Hunter
F
65
April
unidentified
M
May
unidentified
M
5/29/1942
Julian B.
Haswell
M
60
San Francisco
retired exec in New York
3/22/1943
Charles Lee
Brewer
M
45
San Francisco
drafted
10/9/1943
John
Mariana
M
68
San Francisco
12/29/1943+B258
Eugene
Fagothey
M
Corte Madera
telephone co. employee
42
4/3/1944
Charles J.
Baltzer
M
69
San Francisco
elevator operator
7/27/1945
Marilyn
Demont
F
5
San Francisco
7/27/1945
August C
Demont
M
37
San Francisco
8/29/1945
F
had husband pull over on bridge
9/25/1945
M
elderly whitehaired main -
left note to Effie from Ed
55
11/1/1945
Justin Dimick
French
M
Vallejo
2:15 PM
56
11/1/1945
unidentified
M
57
11/2/1945
Leola
Myers
F
42
San Francisco
58
11/20/1945
James
McCowan
M
65
63
7/25/1946
Charlotte
Winton
F
48
64
8/14/1946
Marie C.
Percy
F
San Anselmo
73
3/22/1947
Ernest
Kloeres
M
68
San Francisco
76(81)
May
F
24
6/26/1947
Mrs Frederick
Murphy, Jr.
F
San Francisco
84
11/19/1947
Lugo
Winfield
M
52
Oakland
nurseryman
85
11/19/1947
Meyer
Brazer
M
56
meat salesman
86
11/19/1947
William K
Powell
M
60
Alameda
Attorney
89
2/11/1948
Alfred "Dusty"
Rhodes
M
38
Port Chicago
Hollywood stunt man
93
3/6/1948
Eulis K.
Williams
M
30
hotel clerk
94
3/12/1948
Philip H
Sheridan III
M
31
suffered "war neurosis",
grandson civil war
Gen Philip H Sheridan
3/31/1948
Leona
Strauss
F
55
Richmond
possible suicide
5/3/1948
M
young domestic
101
8/8/1948
Miner Waddington
Smith
M
36
San Jose
creamery owner
8/9/1948
unidentified
M
body washed up at Land's End
in water 24 hours
102
9/26/1948
Caspar T
Pelietier
M
39
104
10/6/1948
unidentified
M
left hat and coat with addresses
and recipe for corn beef
107
12/2/1948
G. H.
Derr
M
51
12/19/1948
unidentified
M
about 5:30 pm
108
12/21/1948
Albert C
Hartford
M
44
San Francisco
109
12/21/1948
unidentified
110
1/4/1949
unconfirmed
M
retired construction worker
115
8/3/1949
unconfirmed J.B.
Nathan
M
49
San Francisco
machine shop operator
116
8/4/1949
Glenn R
Burbank
M
~45
unknown
3/29/1950
M
Willits
logger
4/4/1950
M
23
sailor
123
4/14/1950
Henry
Feldman
M
42
Tiburon
8/10/1950
unidentified
M
use of dye to find body
11/15/1950
M
Los Angeles
truck driver
116
12/20/1950
3/16/1951
F
49
Berkeley
2/17/1952
F
52
4/20/1952
4/20/1952
4/20/1952
4/27/1952
Martin F.
McDonough
limousine service driver
5/2/1952
Eugene
Cronin
M
32
plasterer
5/12/1952
F
61
San Francisco
society photographer
8/1/1952
M
WW II veteran ill
8/1/1952
M
22
UC Davis student
140
9/9/1952
Gabrielie J
Leibbers
F
43
9/7/1952 BBD
2/13/1953
Bruce
McCollum
M
49
San Francisco
real estate
144
4/2/1953
Unidentified
M
4/17/1953
unidentified
M
photo of man jumping from bridge
145
5/4/1953
unidentified
M
147
6/12/1953
Murial
Whelan
F
Los Angeles
divorcee
8/1/1953
Morris
Hirsch
M
49
San Francisco
businessman
8/14/1953
Gene Lee
White
M
21
Maryland
11/20/1953
Arthur J.
Cohen, Jr.
M
39
San Francisco
prominent attorney
12/1/1953
Marie L.
McCormick
F
24
San Francisco
department store filing clerk
"55"
12/7/1953
Everett Lawrence
Hubbard
M
48
Willits
132
12/11/1953
Arthur R.
Burt
M
60
Redwood City
realtor/faces "morals charge"
12/18/1953
unidentified
M
134
12/19/1953
Gustav P.
Aguilar
M
65
Richmond
auto dealer
4/19/1954
William M.
Coulter, Jr.
M
28
7/7/1954
unidentified
M
elderly
140
9/27/1954
Charles S
Gallagher
M
64
credit manager - BBD
141
10/2/1954
Charles S
Gallagher, Jr.
M
24
pre-med student,
"I wanted to keep dad company"
142
10/22/1954
William
Roach
M
58
San Francisco
retired government electrical engineer
144
11/22/1954
John Thomas
Doyle
M
49
member Redwood City AFL Plumber/Steamfitter union
7/26/1955
Joseph R.
Eppler
M
59
San Francisco
suicide note in abandoned car
unidentified
abandoned car
8/3/1955
Earl
Burlingame
M
64
Oakland
Custodian
12/14/1955
Albert
Bender
M
51
San Francisco
contractor
159
4/3/1956
Doris Marie
Dickinson
F
60
Berkeley
retired school teacher
"62"
6/4/1956
George Clark
McConnell
M
23
San Francisco
salesman
9/4/1956
Charles Lee
Waters
M
24
Daly City
potato chip salesman/truck driver
9/19/1956
Michael
Wyatt
M
27
England
Stanford U professor
7/16/1957
unidentified
F
13
San Francisco
left note
12/3/1957
Joyce M.
Scheuer
F
33
Concord
unemployed
174
1/8/1958
Dave D.
Lala
M
33
Oakland
truck driver
175
1/13/1958
John H.
Pearson
M
25
North Highland
insurance trainee
178
8/12/1958
Howard S
Cook, Jr.
M
36
Admin Aide to UC Pres. Kerr
179
8/14/1958
Eilert
Johnson
M
70
Oakland
retired shipyard worker
4/1/1959
Fritz A.
Meyer
M
64
San Leandro
unemployed cook
10/6/1959
unidentified
F
10/9/1959
Sheldon K.
Goldfus
M
24
Berkeley
UC teaching assistant
10/13/1959
Madeline
Pera
F
191
11/26/1959
Clarence
TRUE
M
52
San Francisco
cabinet maker
1/30/1960
Jack H.
Cleaveland
M
33
San Francisco
grocery clerk
5/7/1960
Albert Lloyd
Keehn
M
21
Oakland
SFSC senior and student teacher
6/17/1960
Pyung
Chung
M
31
Berkeley
CPA
6/29/1960
Adolph
Uribe
M
29
San Francisco
1/4/1961
Betty Anne
Brown
F
38
Irvington
1st of the year
1/30/1961
Arthur G.
Irwin
M
51
Berkeley
heart patient
4/11/1961
Clifford A.
Cullis
M
50
San Francisco
shipyard worker
216
12/13/1961
Francis Patrick
Kennedy
M
20
Oakland
jumped 12/3/1961 and died of injuries
224
5/21/1962
unidentified
F
"older"
229
7/12/1962
Cecil P.
Herrman
M
34
San Francisco
unemployed bakery route salesman
231
9/9/1962
Vladimir
Valauykin
M
62
Carmichael
real estate broker
9/19/1962
Steven P.
Mason
M
73
San Francisco
ill health
2/18/1963
unidentified
Unidentified
242
5/1/1963
Clara K.
Levine
F
36
Hayward
wife of physician/owner Levine
Hospital Hayward
7/4/1963
baby girl
Buckleman
F
2
San Mateo
mother says she dropped
child off bridge
244
7/15/1963
Donald B.
Laquet
M
31
Sunnyvale
245
7/16/1963
Patricia
Williams
F
34
Hayward
on pass from Agnew State Hospital
246
July
unidentified
F
Novato
housewife
247
13 days later
unidentified
F
Novato
housewife
9/11/1963
Hickman
Price III
M
20
Stanford U student missing
since 9/3 car in lot; body floating 9/10
12/27/1963
Marshall N.
Israel
M
33
San Rafael
real estate tycoon left 7 million
to estranged wife
254
1/6/1964
Richard R.
Gray
M
42
San Francisco
coroner's clerk in SF
3/5/1964
Gary G.
Girton
M
20
Castle AFB, Merced
Air Force
261
5/26/1964
Mary E.
McKeegan
F
45
Santa Rosa
265
7/22/1964
Drake E.
Rogers
M
20
Petaluma
soldier
266 *
7/23/1964
Leonard M.
Jenkins
M
45
Sacramento
aircraft mechanic at McClellan AFB jumped with 4 yo son, Harold
266
7/27/1964
Richard H.
Gillespie, Jr.
M
24
left note - police looking for him
267
7/28/1964
Emma
Barsi
F
58
Sebastopol
took bus
268
7/29/1964
unidentified
M
55-60
269
8/3/1964
Carl B
Anderson
M
51
San Francisco
Lutheran Pastor : 5th suicide
in 11 days
270
8/7/1964
Merrell Augustus
Sisson
M
55
Sausalito
Pres SF radiological society
271
8/8/1964
unidentified
M
6th in 2 weeks
272
8/21/1964
Betty Lou Storm
Hunsucker
F
30
Mill Valley
273
8/23/1964
Morris
McClellan
M
56
San Francisco
279
1/13/1965
Murry R.
Baird
M
Redwood City
2nd in 2 days
281
2/25/1965
Stanley
Klopstock
M
54
Oakland
Army terminal employee
2/25/1965
Blossom Marie
Grim
F
38
San Francisco
unemployed bakery clerk
281
6/25/1965
Jill
Thompson
F
29
Sausalito
283
8/11/1965
Clyde F.
Casey
M
42
El Cerrito
unemployed carpenter
284
8/21/1965
Juanita R.
Daneri
F
42
San Francisco
cab - recent patient at Napa
state hospital
285
9/9-10/1965
F.P.
Johnson
M
CHP witnessed
286
11/11/1965
Karen
Silverstain
F
30
San Francisco
patient from Napa State Hospital
on leave
288
11/23/1965
Perry
Charlton
M
39
Oakland
merchant marine officer
292
2/20/1966
Otto Hermann
Weidanz
M
91
296
3/25/1966
unidentified
F
Thursday night
300
4/13/1966
Michael
Detata
M
20
San Francisco
bank clerk
302
5/6/1966
Ferdinand
Pechin, Jr.
M
26
7/13/1966
Russell F
King
M
58
Richmond
attorney/ quoted Shakespeare in note
7/20/1966
David Lee
Prescott, Jr.
M
28
San Francisco
308
1/14/1967
unidentified
M
~35
308
1/16/1967
Edward
Walsh
M
38
San Anselmo
unemployed musician
3/20/1967
Shirley Ann
Overmiller
F
34
Alameda
4/11/1967
Walter G.
Weeks
M
33
San Francisco
Radiolgist Oakland Peralta Hospital
car belonged to Charle R Gouker
4/19/1967
Paul
Mezei
M
44
San Francisco
CPA
319
5/13/1967
Lucinda
Cheney
F
25
San Francisco
5/17/1967
Maria
Caldera
F
76
Oakland
332
3/27/1968
unidentified
332 recorded
341
4/22/1968
unidentified
F
late 20s
J Doetts
342
5/1/1968
unidentified
F
30ish
361
4/17/1969
Michael J.
Dalton
M
22
San Bruno
365
6/15/1969
Daniel J.
Lenihan
M
34
San Francisco
370
10/24/1969
Karl E
Bybee
M
48
jumped while CBS News filming documentary on bridge
368
"
unidentified
M
369
"
unidentified
M
370
11/6/1969
Charles H.
Stebbins, Jr.
M
22
Campbell
375
2/17/1970
Raymond Joseph
Tanguay
M
59
Hoopa Valley Indian reservation
374
2/19/1970
Dennis John
Marinos
M
26
newspaper employee for examiner
383
unidentified
jumped while movie: "PS I love you"
was being filmed
403
10/26/1970
James Norman
Lest
M
26
Oakland
407
12/24/1970
unidentified
M
23
postal worker
408
12/31/1970
unidentified
M
his friend - thai waiter at Enrico's
2/12/1971
unidentified
F
24
San Francisco
6/17/1971
Michael P.
Lamm
M
Napa
suspected bomber(6/21/1971 OAK)
"
David
El Rae
M
31
San Francisco
415
7/7/1971
James L.
Decleur
M
20
Los Angeles
8/9/1971
Christiana A.
Luma
F
23
Santa Clara
"
William A.
McClanahan
M
44
San Francisco
421
8/30/1971
Darcy Jill
Van de Riet
F
18
Mountain View
8/31/1971
unidentified
M
~18
long haired
10/6/1971
Rhey Lee
Bartlett
M
32
San Francisco
427
October
unidentified
M
22
University of Oregon student
430
Dec
unidentified
431
12/5/1971
unidentified
M
432
12/5/1971
unidentified
F
433
12/16/1971
unidentified
M
4th this month
437
1/1/1972
unidentified
M
jumped within 35 mnutes of 438
438
1/8/1972
unidentified
M
~35
438
1/26/1972
Bruce McBain
Austin
M
25
Berkeley
computer analyst for Safeway
"
Frank A.
Basile
M
34
Santa Clara
445
2/26/1972
unidentified
M
hit a girder then crashed through
roof in Old Fort Point
441
2/27/1972
Richard J.
Grimm
M
21
Berkeley
found roof of Fort Point Museum
448
5/30/1972
Kathleen
Clancy
F
32
Oakland
454
6/8/1972
Douglas R.
Martin
M
21
Belmont
450
6/12/1972
unidentified
M
witnessed
459
10/11/1972
Peter
Weldon
M
23
Allston, Mass
tied dog, Jessi, to rail before jumping
460
10/15/1972
unidentified
M
36
kissed fiance and jumped
492
8/18/1973
Pierre Beal
Lee
M
27
Son of Lt. Gov Blair Lee III -same day SF churches rang bells in unisun for those lost by GGB jumps
9/9/1973
Candy
Polycove
F
24
legal secretary ?women who
jumped last week
496
9/9/1973
Ephram C.
Oliva
M
20
Hamilton AFB
498
9/12/1973
Nancy
Chisholm
F
56
Atherton
Socialite
499
9/12/1973
unidentified
M
500
10/11/1973
Stephen
Hoag
M
26
San Francisco
Blood technician
501
10/10/1973
unidentified
F
48
Corte Madre
housewife
1/1/1974
Heather
Forsythe
F
Sausalito
art gallery and waitress
511
4/16/1972
withheld
F
San Anselmo
5/6/1975
Ingebord
Raeth
F
50
North Tower Jane Doe #2
May
unidentified
M
cyclist
5/19/1975
Billy Bob
Strickland
M
29
6/11/1975
Alan Jay
Meinhofer
M
31
Lime Point
6/21/1975
Robert Russell
Kennedy
M
29
North Tower
552
9/8/1975
withheld
F
30
San Bruno
11/16/1975
Dennis Reid
Kneeland
M
32
Slide Ranch Beach -
undetermined cause
12/10/1975
David Lyle
Robbie
M
31
Lime Point
Susan
Hermeyer
F
26
North Tower Jane Doe #1
1/21/1976
unidentified
M
picture
1/24/1976
Rayman Earl
Hagerman
M
56
Racoon Straits MTI
2/16/1976
Sally Jane
Hanson
F
31
Big Beach/Muir Beach Jane Doe #2
4/16/1976
Douglas R.
Ranieri
M
29
East Side GGB
5/14/1976
Maracella E.
Buller
F
52
Beach So end Cronkite - Jane Doe #4
6/6/1976
Barbara
Greene
F
32
Lime Point
6/22/1976
Carol
Simon
F
32
Slide Ranch MTI
8/26/1976
Daniel
Alexander
M
beneath GGB
10/4/1976
unidentified
F
33
Sausilito
11/20/1976
Rev James
Halligan
M
44
Fairfax
Catholic priest
12/21/1976
John
Doe #15
M
North Beach Point Reyes
591?
2/10/1977
Marc
Salinger
M
28
father Pierre press sec to Kennedy
and Johnson
5/26/1977
unidentified
M
found with hunting knife in chest
600
5/30/1977
Sharon
Ungewitter
F
24
unemployed medical lab tech
6/10/1977
Richard B.
Hubbell
M
32
GGB MTI
7/16/1977
Friedhelm Will
Bially
M
25
Lime Point
7/21/1977
Stephen S.
Luskkow
M
26
FD Stinson Beach
8/31/1977
Margaret
Mocko
F
24
GGB
621
9/1/1977
Margaret
Mocko
F
28
Foster City
31st 1977
10/1/1977
Elizabeth M
Cocjin
F
23
beneath north end GGB
10/1/1977
Bayani
Mariano
M
28
"
612
10/3/1977
Unidentified
Couple
M
20's
asian
Kissed and jumped' found at
Lime Point
613
10/3/1977
"
"
F
"
"
"
10/2/1977
Robert Allen
Fast
M
35
Pacific Ocean MTI John Doe #6
1/10/1978
Linda Louise
Ryner
F
33
FD deep water 50ft GG ferry dock MTI
639
5/9/1978
Unidentified
F
44
unemployed
5/18/1978
Thomas S.
Davlin
M
19
SF Bay Water
8/2/1978
Robert
Escobar
M
34
SF Bay .5 mi N angel island
John Doe #2
1/9/1979
Ron Michael
Martello
M
27
East side GGB property
3/10/1979
Nicholas
Samaras
M
38
Pacific Ocean shore MTI
3/27/1979
Michael Joe
Canepa
M
26
Pacific Ocean John Doe #3
4/2/1979
James William
McAleer
M
72
open are neath north end GGB
5/7/1979
Elliot Scott
Helfer
M
Lime Point
5/26/1979
Josephine
Solorzano
F
2 mi west of GGB decomp
Jane Doe #2
9/24/1979
Scott William
Stalker
M
21
North Tower
10/31/1979
Neal Anthony
Zappa
M
24
Paradise Cay Tiburon (S-erased)
12/30/1979
John
Doe #15
M
Bolinas Beach undetermined
7/9/1980
Donna Lee
Howe
F
33
North Tower
7/9/1980
Unidentified
F
32
had recent skiing accident
7/20/1980
Menasse
Lorber
M
52
SF Bay waters
11/1/1980
Brian David
Boykin
M
20
Beach at Point Reyes
1981
John
Doe #2
mandible fd at Fort Baker
7/26/1981
Janet Suzanne
Hoch
F
18
Pacific Ocean GGNRA
8/21/1981
Patrick
McCullough
M
42
Lime Point - John Doe #7
8/31/1981
Michael J.
Murray
M
unk
Kirby Cove Beach John Doe #8
9/17/1981
Unidentified
F
38
German actress
700
10/8/1981
Unidentified
M
Marin
youth
10/8/1981
Daniel Robert
Hogg
M
19
North Tower
719
11/10/1981
Unidentified
M
720
11/10/1981
Unidentified
F
Rohnert Park
teenager
12/24/1981
Thomas L.
Boeninghausen
M
45
fd breakwater Presidio Yacht Club
Ft Baker
2/4/1982
Michael S.
Cox
M
31
fd Loch Lomond Marina decomp
4/3/1982
Clara Hiroko
Shitanishi
F
37
fd So beach Pt Reyes
4/12/1982
Ron A
Gubi
M
29
GGB
4/20/1982
Janice
White
F
31
fd Wildcat Beach decomp
Jane Doe #4
6/26/1982
Thomas Vincent
LaCoste
M
62
Drakes Beach Inverness
7/23/1982
John Alfred
Beyer
M
53
fd Pacific Ocean So Muir Beach
9/6/1982
Enrique
Martinez
M
16
fd Muir beach decomp John Doe #4
12/4/1982
Serge
Boutourline, Jr.
M
50
beach pt Reyes John Doe #6
2/21/1983
Joseph Francis
Coogan
M
28
N of McClure's beach,
Pt Reyes partial remains John Doe #3
10/6/1983
Catherine M.
Hafeez
F
33
Lime Point
10/18/1983
Richard Loweth
Plumb
M
39
fd Muir Beach
11/14/1983
William John
Murphy
M
35
Ocean at Slide Ranch MTI
3/27/1984
Timothy Craig
Stephens
M
38
Lime Point
5/2/1984
Michael Arnold
Fuchs
M
31
Pacific Ocean Bolinas John Doe #3
6/29/1984
Daniel Joseph
Curly
M
46
North Tower
8/14/1984
Unidentified
Doe
partial remains on Muir Beach
9/14/1984
Lawrence Robert
Heaton
M
36
SF bay Ft Baker Yacht Harbor
9/23/1984
Mildred
Minor
F
46
SF bay water Sausalito
2/19/1985
Norman Thomas
Luffman
M
34
east side North Tower
3/27/1985
Michael John
Casentini
M
71
Ayala Cove Angel Island
6/29/1985
Jean M.
Erickson
F
48
Ocean Beach Bolinas MTI
1985
John
Doe #3
foot ravine s Stinson beach
12/20/1985
Richard John
Fisch
M
34
pacific ocean Bolinas
8/17/1986
Wolfram Lothar
Fischer
M
23
Lime Point
5/12/1987
Irene
Rodriguez
F
39
Muir Beach
7/14/1987
Catherine
Chan
F
Lime Point Jane Doe #4
7/30/1987
Patricia Etta
Beeson
F
38
Lime Point Jane Doe #5
8/10/1987
Donald J.
Schinkel
M
56
North Tower
9/14/1987
Karen Virignia
Miller aka Arreola
F
44
Lime Point Jane Doe #6
11/27/1987
Karen Sue
Hoggatt
F
27
Pacific Ocean Bonita Lighthouse
Jane Doe #7
5/30/1988
Cathleen Ann
Hughes
F
30
North Tower
10/1/1988
Rik
Helmke
M
34
Ocean beach No Stinson beach
John Doe # 6
10/4/1988
William
Johntz
M
65
under North Tower
10/13/1988
Christopher J.
Stowe
M
23
Lime Point John Doe # 5 6/13/1988
10/18/1989
Richard S.
Woodside
M
34
North Tower
11/28/1989
Michael J.
Distaso
M
40
seashore Pt Reyes
11/29/1989
Keith Scott
Orner
M
42
seashore Pt Reyes
5 /21/1990 identified M 35 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /13/1990 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 8 /27/1990 identified M 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /5 /1991 identified M 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #3-2/05/91) 4 /1 /1991 identified F 35 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 900 6 /23/1991 identified M 38 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /25/1991 identified F 33 Apparent unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found floating in waters. (AKA Jane Doe #2 - 072591) 9 /26/1991 identified F 32 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/1 /1991 identified M 20 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 10/5 /1991 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /21/1992 identified F 50 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /9 /1992 identified F 34 Sat on railing of Golden Gate Bridge, fell backwards. 2 /10/1992 identified F 25 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /1 /1992 identified M 30 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /7 /1992 identified M 36 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /24/1992 identified M 36 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /14/1992 identified F 31 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #1). 7 /20/1992 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /9 /1992 identified F 62 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /12/1992 identified M 56 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /3 /1992 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /16/1992 identified F 19 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/29/1992 identified M 33 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge 11/4 /1992 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #5 - 11/04/92) 11/7 /1992 identified M 36 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found floating in bay waters (AKA John Doe #6 - 11/07/92). 1 /28/1993 identified M 32 with 3 yo daughter Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (Companion case #93028) 2 /12/1993 identified M 36 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /9 /1993 identified M 40 Witnessed jump, Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /21/1993 identified M 41 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #042193). 4 /30/1993 identified M 32 Apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /14/1993 identified F 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /9 /1993 identified F 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /12/1993 identified M 42 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /16/1993 identified M 30 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #061693) 6 /16/1993 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /6 /1993 identified F 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 7 /15/1993 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 8 /26/1993 identified M 46 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge; dec. left suicide note of intention to jump. 9 /7 /1993 identified M 58 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /27/1993 identified M 33 with 2 yo son Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/5 /1993 identified M 65 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/19/1993 identified F 20 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #101993). 11/26/1993 identified M 36 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/3 /1993 identified F 29 (AKA Jane Doe #120393) Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /4 /1994 identified F 66 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /6 /1994 identified F 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /21/1994 identified M 47 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #022194). 2 /26/1994 identified M 43 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 3 /15/1994 identified M 43 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 3 /27/1994 identified M 28 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #032794). 4 /6 /1994 identified F 44 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found floating in moat at base of south tower. 4 /14/1994 identified M 22 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #041494). 6 /2 /1994 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /24/1994 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #062494). 7 /5 /1994 identified M 28 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /8 /1994 identified F 20 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /5 /1994 identified M 41 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /9 /1994 identified F 63 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /7 /1994 identified M 20 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #090794). 9 /12/1994 identified M 47 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /13/1994 identified M 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #091394-A). 9 /13/1994 identified M 30 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #091394-B) 9 /17/1994 identified M 51 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 9 /29/1994 identified F 50 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #092994) 10/2 /1994 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #100294) 10/3 /1994 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/16/1994 identified M 83 Found in moat at South Tower of Golden Gate Bridge. 10/19/1994 identified M 44 Found in moat under Golden Gate Bridge. 11/5 /1994 identified F 45 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge 11/19/1994 identified M 47 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #111994). 12/25/1994 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #122594). 12/31/1994 identified M 41 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /12/1995 identified M 30 Found lying supine on ground. Witnessed jump from sidewalk of approach to Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /28/1995 identified M 24 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /6 /1995 identified M 68 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /19/1995 identified M 19 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /1 /1995 identified M 38 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /19/1995 identified M 30 Witnessed bridge jump, found in moat at South Tower of Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /1 /1995 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #050195). 5 /13/1995 identified M 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /23/1995 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #052395). 5 /26/1995 identified M 22 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, rescued, became comatose, transported to hospital (AKA John Doe #052695) 6 /5 /1995 identified F 35 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, recovered and transported to hospital. 6 /28/1995 identified M 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #062895) 7 /8 /1995 identified M 63 Found floating near Golden Gate Bridge, mid-span. 7 /26/1995 identified M 48 Unwitnessed jump from North Tower of Golden Gate Bridge; found in water east of North Tower (AKA John Doe #072695) 7 /27/1995 identified F 36 Unwitnessed bridge jump - found in water 50 yards west of South Tower of Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #072795) 7 /30/1995 identified M 42 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /9 /1995 identified F 43 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #080995). 8 /21/1995 identified M 41 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #082195). 8 /22/1995 identified M 38 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /31/1995 identified M 68 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /10/1995 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /10/1995 identified F 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #091095) 9 /21/1995 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /22/1995 identified M 24 Found floating under Golden Gate Bridge from unwitnessed apparent bridge jump (AKA John Doe #092295). 9 /29/1995 identified F 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /30/1995 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/1 /1995 identified F 41 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, shot herself during descent. 10/7 /1995 identified M 47 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/11/1995 identified M 23 Unwitnessed presumed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found in bay waters offshore Angel Island (AKA John Doe #10119). 10/11/1995 identified M 71 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/17/1995 identified F 69 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #101795). 10/27/1995 identified M 69 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #102795). 10/31/1995 identified M 45 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1000 12/19/1995 identified M 23 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found in water. 1 /25/1996 identified M 45 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found in water. (AKA John Doe #012596) 2 /19/1996 identified M 55 Found in water next to "rip rap," presumed to have jumped from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #021996) 3 /6 /1996 identified M 63 Found on hillside below approach to Golden Gate Bridge, east side, midway between north tower and anchorage. (AKA John Doe #030696) 3 /17/1996 identified M 46 Seen by private sailboat in waters near Angel Island; apparent Golden Gate Bridge jumper. (AKA John Doe #031796) 4 /6 /1996 identified F 59 Unwitnessed apparent Golden Gate Bridge jumper. (AKA Jane Doe #040696) 5 /13/1996 identified M 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /15/1996 identified M 42 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /27/1996 identified M 24 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /14/1996 identified F 32 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #081496) 8 /29/1996 identified M 62 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /31/1996 identified F 58 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /19/1996 identified F 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #091996). 9 /20/1996 identified F 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #092096). 10/18/1996 identified M 37 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found in moat of south tower (AKA John Doe #101896). 12/1 /1996 identified M 21 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #120196). 12/29/1996 identified F 23 Unwitnessed presumed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #123196; AKA ...) 2 /14/1997 identified M 22 Unwitnessed apparent Golden Gate Bridge jumper, hit land. Found by passerby. 2 /16/1997 identified F 59 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /12/1997 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /31/1997 identified M 32 Found in bay waters, presumed having jumped from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #033197) 4 /12/1997 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /16/1997 identified M 44 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /10/1997 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /4 /1997 identified M 47 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /5 /1997 identified F 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /9 /1997 identified M 35 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /9 /1997 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #060997) 6 /28/1997 identified M 25 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #062897) 7 /4 /1997 identified M 43 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /13/1997 identified M 20 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #071397) 8 /5 /1997 identified M 30 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /17/1997 identified M 47 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #081797). 8 /21/1997 identified M 54 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /25/1997 identified M 32 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /26/1997 identified M 26 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #082697) 9 /4 /1997 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /9 /1997 identified M 20 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #090997) 9 /17/1997 identified M 23 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /22/1997 identified F 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #092297) 9 /30/1997 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/30/1997 identified F 54 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/4 /1997 identified M 60 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/11/1997 identified M 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #121197). 12/22/1997 identified F 33 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /10/1998 identified M 35 Presumed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /20/1998 identified M 19 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #022098) 4 /4 /1998 identified F 41 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #040498) 4 /14/1998 identified F 57 Found floating 400 yds west of Alcatraz. (AKA Jane Doe #041498) (Unwitnessed probable jump from Golden Gate Bridge) 4 /23/1998 identified M 23 Found dead on beach behind Spindrift Drive, Stinson Beach. (AKA John Doe #042398) (Unwitnessed probably jump from Golden Gate Bridge.) 4 /24/1998 identified F 22 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #042498) 4 /24/1998 identified F 51 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /26/1998 identified F 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /14/1998 identified M 24 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 6 /20/1998 identified M 51 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /7 /1998 identified F 30 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #070798) 7 /10/1998 identified M 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /12/1998 identified F 33 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #081298) 8 /14/1998 identified M 51 Found in water; unwitnessed presumed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /31/1998 identified F 52 Apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /25/1998 identified M 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/1 /1998 identified M 26 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/11/1998 identified M 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/12/1998 identified M 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/18/1998 identified M 31 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/14/1998 identified M 56 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /6 /1999 identified M 28 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 2 /6 /1999 identified M 37 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /13/1999 identified M 45 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /16/1999 identified M 53 Witnessed jump from east side of Golden Gate Bridge near North Tower. 3 /25/1999 identified M 30 Apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge from north tower to construction area beneath. 3 /29/1999 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /4 /1999 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /8 /1999 identified M 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /28/1999 identified M 33 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /24/1999 identified M 45 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /7 /1999 identified F 56 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /14/1999 identified M 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /24/1999 identified M 19 Witnessed to have jumped from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/17/1999 identified M 32 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/15/1999 identified M 27 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/7 /1999 identified F 35 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/8 /1999 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #120899) 1 /8 /2000 identified M 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /22/2000 identified F 54 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #012200) 4 /29/2000 identified M 20 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /17/2000 identified M 39 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge, found at Pt. Cavallo by Coast Guard. 5 /24/2000 identified M 56 Witnessed to have jumped from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /8 /2000 identified M 21 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /19/2000 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge 7 /30/2000 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 9 /13/2000 identified M 28 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/22/2000 identified M 24 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #102200) 11/7 /2000 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /16/2001 identified M 53 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /19/2001 identified F 43 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA Jane Doe #031901) 4 /16/2001 identified F 63 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /14/2001 identified F 58 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /17/2001 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (John Doe #061701) 7 /19/2001 identified M 38 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #071901) 1100 8 /7 /2001 identified M 55 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 8 /28/2001 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 9 /6 /2001 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge onto roadway and rocks below. 10/8 /2001 identified M 49 Unwitnessed apparent jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #100801) 11/20/2001 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #112001) 12/9 /2001 identified M 58 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/17/2001 identified F 14 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /5 /2002 identified M 27 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /16/2002 identified M 32 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #011602) 2 /26/2002 identified M 28 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /7 /2002 identified M 20 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge; subsequently died at hospital. 3 /11/2002 identified F 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 3 /17/2002 identified F 59 Unwitnessed apparent jump from the Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /26/2002 identified M 43 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /24/2002 identified F 43 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /29/2002 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /25/2002 identified M 59 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #052502) 5 /27/2002 identified M 69 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 6 /8 /2002 identified M 23 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 7 /8 /2002 identified M 77 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #070802.) 9 /6 /2002 identified F 50 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /14/2002 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge onto roadway below. 9 /20/2002 identified M 38 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/13/2002 identified F 33 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/4 /2002 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA John Doe #120402). 12/12/2002 identified M 45 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /24/2003 identified F 35 (AKA Jane Doe #012403) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found on beach. 2 /6 /2003 identified F 55 (AKA Jane Doe #020603) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /6 /2003 identified M 76 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /2 /2003 identified F 27 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /12/2003 identified M 58 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /19/2003 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /18/2003 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #051803) 6 /5 /2003 identified M 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /6 /2003 identified M 35 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /19/2003 identified M 53 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /21/2003 identified F 33 Unwitnessed probable jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #062103). 6 /26/2003 identified M 32 (AKA John Doe #062603) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 7 /7 /2003 identified M 72 (AKA John Doe #070703) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /11/2003 identified F 54 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /30/2003 identified M 84 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 9 /8 /2003 identified M 53 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/26/2003 identified F 26 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/13/2003 identified M 38 (AKA John Doe #111303) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/21/2003 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 1 /16/2004 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /6 /2004 identified M 38 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /20/2004 identified M 63 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /7 /2004 identified F 20 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /9 /2004 identified M 55 (AKA John Doe #030904) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /11/2004 identified F 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /28/2004 identified M 49 (AKA John Doe #050204)Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found in ocean waters at Stinson Beach on 05/02/04. 5 /6 /2004 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /10/2004 identified F 35 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /11/2004 identified M 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /16/2004 identified M 41 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /2 /2004 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /20/2004 identified F 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge (AKA Jane Doe #082004) 9 /16/2004 identified M 55 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /28/2004 identified F 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/26/2004 identified M 33 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/11/2004 identified M 40 (AKA John Doe #111104) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/16/2004 identified F 58 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/29/2004 identified M 28 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /27/2005 identified M 59 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /1 /2005 identified M 18 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /6 /2005 identified M 37 (AKA John Doe #020605) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /18/2005 identified F 26 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /22/2005 identified F 33 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /28/2005 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /31/2005 identified M 27 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /14/2005 identified M 53 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /24/2005 identified F 75 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /6 /2005 identified F 19 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /19/2005 identified M 42 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /24/2005 identified M 18 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /10/2005 identified F 25 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /15/2005 identified M 85 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /29/2005 identified M 21 (AKA John Doe #092905) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/11/2005 identified M 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/14/2005 identified F 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/24/2005 identified M 36 Unwitnessed apparent jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/25/2005 identified F 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/29/2005 identified M 17 (AKA John Doe #112905) Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/6 /2005 identified F 54 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /13/2006 identified M 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /15/2006 identified M 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. (AKA John Doe #021406) 3 /2 /2006 identified F 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /11/2006 identified M 34 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /14/2006 identified M 47 Found washed ashore near Golden Gate Bridge 3 /22/2006 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /24/2006 identified M 65 Found on beach near Golden Gate Bridge; note of intent found at his residence. 4 /13/2006 identified M 54 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /15/2006 identified M 62 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /27/2006 identified M 48 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /1 /2006 identified M 35 (AKA John Doe #060106) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /14/2006 identified F 29 (AKA Jane Doe #061406) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /30/2006 identified M 35 (AKA John Doe #063006) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /7 /2006 identified F 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /17/2006 identified M 55 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1200 7 /24/2006 identified M 28 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /25/2006 identified M 42 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /22/2006 identified F 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /28/2006 identified M 51 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /1 /2006 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/16/2006 identified F 32 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/21/2006 identified M 60 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/9 /2006 identified F 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/10/2006 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/12/2006 identified M 0 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/20/2006 identified M 50 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/22/2006 identified F 65 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/23/2006 identified F 58 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 1 /1 /2007 identified M 52 Apparent unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found washed up on rocks at Angel Island (AKA John Doe #010107) 1 /7 /2007 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, falling onto rocks below. 2 /3 /2007 identified M 44 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /14/2007 identified M 52 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /16/2007 identified M 46 (AKA John Doe #021607) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /25/2007 identified M 47 (AKA John Doe #022507) Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /27/2007 identified M 38 (AKA John Doe #022707) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /4 /2007 identified M 36 (AKA John Doe #030407-B) Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /4 /2007 identified M 57 (AKA John Doe #030407-A) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /6 /2007 identified M 23 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /9 /2007 identified F 64 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /13/2007 identified M 50 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /28/2007 identified M 53 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /4 /2007 identified F 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /9 /2007 identified F 33 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge 5/8/2007 Henry Lew M 18 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. Rescued by boat and taken to San Francisco General Hospital. Died in surgery. Death Certificate does not mention bridge. 5 /12/2007 identified M 55 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /19/2007 identified M 37 (AKA John Doe #051907) Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /8 /2007 identified M 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /16/2007 identified M 39 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /25/2007 identified M 40 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /9 /2007 identified M 22 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /22/2007 identified F 57 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 7 /26/2007 identified M 40 (AKA John Doe #072607) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /7 /2007 identified M 45 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /7 /2007 identified M 27 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /21/2007 Unidentified M 0 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /9 /2007 identified F 59 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /25/2007 identified M 31 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /26/2007 identified M 47 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/1 /2007 identified M 26 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/2 /2007 identified M 23 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/2 /2007 identified M 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/11/2007 identified M 35 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/18/2007 identified F 39 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/19/2007 identified M 35 (AKA John Doe #111907) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/15/2007 identified M 46 (AKA John Doe #121507) Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 2 /13/2008 identified M 36 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 3 /18/2008 identified M 39 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 4 /16/2008 identified F 23 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 5 /25/2008 identified M 38 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /8 /2008 identified M 49 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 6 /18/2008 identified M 38 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /1 /2008 identified F 47 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 8 /13/2008 identified M 37 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /8 /2008 identified F 37 Unwitnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge, found on coastline 7 miles north of the bridge. 9 /16/2008 identified M 23 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 9 /26/2008 identified M 21 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/3 /2008 identified F 19 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 10/21/2008 identified F 29 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/23/2008 identified M 30 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 11/25/2008 identified M 46 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge(11/23/08), found on Angel Island (11/25/08). 12/1 /2008 identified M 59 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge. 12/15/2008 identified F 72 Witnessed jump from Golden Gate Bridge.
" Of the 100, he easily found 26 that were alive and well and enjoying the finer side of life.
His investigative techniques were notvery sophisticated either, so it is likely that many of the remaining 74 "victims" are out walking the streets somewhere. "