Help Solve a Disappearance | The Feral Scribe

MADISON, WI –– Hello My Dear Fans,

I’ve been away for a very, very longtime and here is why: I’m in the final throes of nine-year project that began as an idea for a humble little book about a man named Amos Mortier, who had gone missing from my hometown of Madison, Wisconsin on Nov. 8, 2004.

After making some excellent progress on a story that has turned out to be more challenging than anything I’ve ever taken on, my life took an unexpected turn in New Mexico, when me and my ace, Sarah No, in our boredom, began a deadly dance with opiate painkillers on up to heroin. After Sarah died, I returned home and began the very long process of recovery. Despite all of the reporting I have done on issues around substance abuse, I quickly realized that I didn’t know shit. Nada. Zilch.

For the last three years I have kept my head down to focus on learning how to live life again, in a way that honors Sarah’s memory and with a healthy amount of self-respect. This is where Amos comes back into play. Having lost everything, I turned to the only thing heroin addiction had not taken from me: my years of research into his disappearance, which included more than 3,000 pages of leaked documents. In early 2015, filmmaker Kristina Motwani asked if I would like to collaborate on a film project. We decided to pursue Amos’s story.

In January, while going over the documents page-by-page, I discovered three pages that would break open my own investigation and lead me to answer the question what happened to amos? the title of the forthcoming documentary film. I have posted a synopsis of the film below.

This, my friends, is a critical juncture in the film’s production. We are raising $30,000 via KICKSTARTER TO FINISH THIS FILM. We have reached 25 percent of this goal with 20 days to go. We need your help.

Please follow the link below to view the film trailer and then make a contribution toward our goal. Kickstarter is an all-or-nothing platform so if we do not raise $30,000 we get nothing. If that happens, your contribution will be returned to you. We cannot let that happen however. We have numerous prizes to choose from based on the size of your contribution. Tell them The Feral Scribe sent you and receive a bonus prize.

And for those of you prodding me to get back to posting here, well, you won’t have to wait too much longer. I feel better than I ever have and eager to jump back into the game. Meanwhile, you can hear me over at THEVANISHEDPODCAST.COM, with host Marissa, as we investigate missing persons cases around the country.

To Consummate: Click, view, contribute, select your prize… nine months from now, we deliver a movie.

Investigative journalist Nathan J. Comp gets more than he bargained for in 2008, when an anonymous source leaks thousands of pages of confidential police reports, witness testimony, and various other records from secret state and federal probes into the disappearance of Amos Mortier, a shy 27-year-old known for his extraordinary kindness.

Mortier also led a double-life distributing cannabis for an upstate New York-based trafficking outfit.

Comp soon discovers critical information was overlooked or improperly vetted in the chaotic onset of the investigation. Consequently, detectives zero in on Mortier’s longtime associate, “Big Jake” Stadfeld, after learning he had stolen $90,000 worth of marijuana, putting Mortier in debt to his upstate New York supplier. Fixation on Stadfeld, and his suspected accessory after the fact, led to even more oversights.

When Comp writes an article raising questions about how detectives handled a lead on a different suspect who had allegedly confessed to stabbing Mortier and feeding him to pigs was handled, investigators denounce the story, claiming Comp is “trying to sell books.” But behind the scenes, witnesses suspected of speaking to Comp are visited by investigators.

Comp doubles down on his research when circumstances in his own life take an unexpected, and ultimately tragic, turn. Amid the struggle to bounce back following several brushes with death, Comp delves even deeper into the last year of Mortier’s life when a lucky hunch breaks the case wide open and the pieces fall quickly into place.