Document 1: Zack's Handwritten Notes
[Photographed from notebook - Zack’s handwriting]
Page 47 - October 28, 2016
Irina Sterling - Columbia University Claims
Says applied 2010
"European private school" before that
Story changes: sometimes says 2011, sometimes 2013
Nsinga checked alumni database - NO IRINA STERLING
CRYSTAL
Twitter - @MalikJArt
December 12, 2016
Hey @AtlantaPD is this normally how you do business? A man goes missing and you just close his case because he had the ebony AUDACITY to write the word "crystal" in his notebook?
My partner was NOT a meth user! He didn't even drink coffee because "caffeine is a drug." But sure, he was secretly freebasing meth. Fuck all of you.
1,293 likes | 456 retweets | 89 comments
From: mconlon.investigations@protonmail.com
To: nbolton@columbia.edu
Date: July 16, 2017
Subject: Urgent - Information regarding Zack Nguyen
Hi Nsinga,
My name is Marcus Conlon. I'm a licensed private investigator in Texas and host of The Marcus Conlon Experience podcast (1.2M subscribers). I'm investigating the disappearances of multiple YouTube content creators, including Zack Chapel and Charlie Stine.
I'm working directly with Malik Reeves, Zack's partner, who provided your contact information. We found your name in Zack's handwritten notes, which reference conversations you had with him last October.
I need to know:
What information did you share with Zack regarding Columbia admissions/applicants?
Did any of that information involve a person, name, or reference to "crystal"?
When was your last contact with Zack?
This is not a fishing expedition. We have reason to believe Zack discovered something significant before his disappearance. Your cooperation could literally save lives.
I can verify my credentials and media platform if needed. Time is critical.
Marcus Conlon
TX PI License #7819
Host, The Marcus Conlon Experience
Document 4: Columbia University Application (Partial)
[HEAVILY REDACTED - FOIA Request #2017-4829]
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY
Undergraduate Application - Fall 2012
Name: BARNETT, Crystal M.
DOB: ████ ██, 1989
SSN: XXX-XX-████
Current Address: [REDACTED]
Permanent Address: [REDACTED] Memphis, TN 381██
Educational History:
Terrence Broward High School, Memphis, TN
Graduated: June 2007
GPA: [REDACTED]
Class Rank: [REDACTED]
Military Service:
Branch: United States Marine Corps
Dates of Service: August 2007 - September 2011
Rank at Discharge: E3 - LCPL
MOS: 5811
Duty Stations: MCRD Parris Island, SC, MCB Camp Foster, Okinawa, MCB Camp Lejeune, NC
Essays: [7 PAGES REDACTED]
References:
[REDACTED]
[REDACTED]
Capt. ████████, USMC
Application Status: ACCEPTED
Enrollment Status: DID NOT MATRICULATE
Reason: No response to acceptance
[END DOCUMENT COLLECTION]
The Devil You Don't Know
How a Missing YouTuber Led Me Into Humanity’s Darkest Corner
Rolling Stone | March 2018 | By Marcus Conlon
(Cont. from p. 37)
The moment Jackson and I opened that redacted Columbia application will stay with me forever. Part of me wishes I’d never gone to his loft, that I’d just let him sulk in peace. But I didn’t. I’d gone to pull him back on the case, and we were struggling to get a lead.
The PDF loaded slowly, since it had been sent as an image. It felt like the smoking gun, even before we opened it. But reading the top line felt like a letdown.
"Crystal Barnett," Jackson read aloud. The name meant nothing to him. Or to me. We had the connection of why Zack wrote Crystal in his notebook, and now we had a last name to go with it. But it didn’t seem to matter.
Our eyes drifted down the personal information, the high school, the extra-curriculars.
Then we got to the military service section.
"MOS 5811," I said. "Military Police."
Jackson went rigid. “Camp Lejeune. Discharged in 2011."
I didn’t have to ask Jackson why his face had turned the color of puked-up porridge. The math was simple and damning. Jackson had been stationed at Lejeune his last three years in the Marines, from 2006 to 2009, serving as an MP officer.
Camp Lejeune is a big place. The main base has several MP detachments, plus the smaller satellite bases. So there was no guarantee this girl had been one of his Marines. But it was one hell of a coincidence that this girl may have served at the same time, in the same place, under the same command, as Jackson.
"I don't remember anyone named Barnett," Jackson said, but his voice had gone hollow. How many junior Marines had passed through his command? Hundreds? "We don’t even know if it’s her..."
And we didn’t. For all we knew, this Crystal girl had nothing to do with Irina. She was just someone who applied and decided to go somewhere else. Someone with a birthday and an application date who lined up with Irina’s lies.
It’s honestly hard to describe Jackson's reaction. On the one hand, he had this zeal on his face, this excitement that he’d been right all along and he couldn’t wait to prove it. But his breath was coming fast and shallow, and it was obvious that if Irina was indeed Crystal, it meant their connection went deeper than a one-night stand after a book launch. It meant she'd known exactly who he was from the beginning.
Neither of us wanted that to be true.
In the aftermath of everything, there’s been some exceedingly weird fanfiction written on social media and in mainstream outlets about the discovery of Crystal Barnett. But for the record, Jackson did not immediately jump in his car and drive all night to Tennessee.
That didn’t come until the following day, after we’d contacted the Class of 2007 alumni association for Terrence Broward High School. They were kind enough to email the class picture of Crystal Barnett.
It was then that I had to physically restrain Jackson from bolting out the door.
“It’s Memphis! Holy shit it’s fucking Memphis!”
“Well yeah the school is in Memphis–”
“No, that’s what we called her!” Jackson was out of breath, damn near hyperventilating. “I didn’t even remember her real fucking name. We all called her Memphis.”
It wasn’t just the memory that had him spooked either.
It took a minute, but after taking a second and third look at that picture of a dumpy, fat-faced dishwater blonde with fucked up teeth and nearly non-existent eyebrows, I saw it.
The eyes.
You can get all kinds of surgery. Change your whole face and body if you want. But the eyes stay the same.
And looking back at me from that computer screen were the eyes of Irina Sterling.
Crystal Barnett.
That’s who she was. That’s who Jackson had slept with. Who had hacked him and ruined his life.
Who had probably killed at least two people.
Looking back now, the most intense emotion I felt was excitement. I felt like we had the key to the entire case. And we were going to win.
Like it was a fucking game.
[End excerpt]