ISGP's Death List: Gary DeVore (June 1997)

ISGP section: Suspicious deaths index

Gary_Devore_Arnold_Schwarzenegger_Writer_with_no_Hands

Gary DeVore has been added to ISGP's Death List after a heads up from one of the primary persons behind the 2014 documentary The Writer With No Hands. The title is a reference to the previously little known fact that DeVore's body apparently was found without hands. Still need to check out the documentary, but the trailer looks impressive and at IMDB it has a very high rating of 8.3. An expanded version of the documentary should become available to the public in September 2015, but at the moment it is still unclear to what extent it will be distributed. As anyone can gather from this page alone, the subject is a little sensitive.

DeVore was a screenwriter/scriptwriter for Christopher Walken's The Dogs of War (1980), Arnold Schwarzenegger's Raw Deal (1986), Wesley Snipes' Passenger 57 (1992), and Jean Claude van Damme's Timecop (1994) and Sudden Death (1995).

Without a Trace

People: It's been a year since screenwriter Gary Devore disappeared, and friends, family and police are no closer to discovering what became of him.

Los Angeles Times
June 29, 1998

Oates-Devore also has had to grapple with the financial consequences of her husband's disappearance. Under California law, a person cannot be declared dead for five years. In the meantime, she has gone to court seeking permission to pay his bills.

"You have to preserve his assets," Oates-Devore said. "I may sign his name for things, but I don't decide what bills are to be paid, the court does. It's not like his wife becomes conservator and, therefore, can get her hands on everything."

In recent months, Oates-Devore has tried to pick up the threads of her life. An actress who bears a resemblance to Cher, she recently auditioned on "Baywatch" and has been out on three movie-of-the-week auditions. "I've had callbacks," she said. "It will happen."

"This has been such a horrible personal experience," she added. "It's not just that I lost the one I loved, but the behavior of people."

She recalled sitting inside a Starbucks one day when someone told her that Devore had been miserable in his marriage.

"Why this person chose to say that to me at this time, I don't know," Oates-Devore said. "You know what I said to him? 'Maybe you're right. I know I was really happy.' "

But while Devore's disappearance has caused people to bond as well as pull away, they all remain mystified by what might have befallen him.

Some of Devore's acquaintances even entertain the thought that there may have been a CIA connection behind his disappearance.

In the weeks before he vanished, Devore had been calling a longtime friend at the CIA in Langley, Va., asking him questions about the U.S. invasion of Panama, former Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega and about Noriega's involvement in drugs and money-laundering. Devore was basing his action-adventure screenplay on that invasion and wanted to know as much about it as possible for creative purposes.

"I remember talking to him about a lot of elements of Panama and Noriega's regime and the drug money that Noriega was alleged to have had stashed in safes in his offices and that's the money that, in [Devore's] script, soldiers stumble across and steal," said Chase Brandon, who works in public affairs at CIA headquarters.

"From that, we sort of drifted off and sort of talked about U.S. counter-narcotics programs in general," Brandon added. "I may have mentioned a couple things about the agency's role in providing increased U.S. intelligence efforts to provide support to U.S. law enforcement."

A 26-year veteran operations officer who has "experiences all over Latin America" for the CIA, Brandon said Devore asked if he would like to become a consultant on the movie if it was ever made. "I was considering doing that," Brandon said.

In a day-planner he left behind, Devore had written down Brandon's name and phone number frequently in the final weeks before he disappeared. Included was an entry on May 6, 1997, that read:

"Undersecretary for int'l narcotics makers. Chase [the name is crossed out]. Crime and narcotics center. CNC. Largest center in CIA. Espionage agents work with local police, gov't, etc. Do cover work on problems locals won't handle. Airfields, burn labs, fuel storage."

Brandon scoffed at suggestions that Devore was ever a CIA operative or that he may have dropped from sight to go on a mission for the agency.

"I will tell you with no uncertain terms, that is not the case," Brandon said. " . . . A lot of people would like to do this work and a lot of people in Hollywood say they do this work, in fact. But Gary was probably not either one of those."

Brandon, a cousin of actor Tommy Lee Jones, met Devore more than 15 years ago when he and the screenwriter were best men at Jones' wedding. One of Devore's first successes was the 1981 film "Back Roads," starring Jones.

"Gary was very happy," Brandon said. "He had reached a point where he was about to direct a movie. He was excited about that. The guy had the world by the coattails.

"His disappearance and probable death is just a horrible, horrible thing to come to terms with," Brandon said. "But I think, in my own sense of what logically happened to Gary, is that he was driving this new high-profile, flashy Ford Explorer with all the package options on it and that is a vehicle that law enforcement people will tell you is a highly sought-after car for carjackers. . . . My sense was Gary was one of those people who met a horrible, tragic quirk of fate. He was simply victimized by people who wanted that car."

Some of Devore's friends wrestle with whether to hold a memorial service.

Screenwriter's wife seeks answers in his mysterious death

CNN
July 15, 1998

On June 27, 1997, screenwriter Gary DeVore wrapped up some work in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and loaded his Ford Explorer to head back to his home in California. DeVore had spent the week with actress Marsha Mason and appeared excited about plans to remake "The Big Steal," a 1949 film about a man who engineers his own disappearance.

But on his way home, DeVore vanished. His publicist believed he was acting out the life of that film's main character. DeVore's wife, Wendy, offered a $100,000 reward. ... Then last week, the body of Gary DeVore, along with his Ford Explorer, were found in a California aqueduct, thanks to a tip from an amateur detective.

But many questions remain, and Wendy DeVore wants them answered. She spoke on Tuesday with Greta Van Susteren and Roger Cossack on CNN's "Burden of Proof." ...

DEVORE: May I clarify his situation? You are responding to things you only know from the press. Gary had a $2.5 million tax judgment against several years earlier that he had completely finished paying off. I don't think you would kill yourself before -- you know, after. I think you would kill yourself before.

Also, he had script problems and things, but he always did and was not in a serious depression.

VAN SUSTEREN: All right, Wendy, then take me back and tell me a little bit about your husband's mood in the days leading up to his disappearance.

DEVORE: He had been very disturbed over some of the things that he had been finding in his research. He was researching the United States invasion of Panama, because he was setting the actual story that he was writing against this; and the overthrow of Noriega and the enormous amounts of money laundering in the Panamanian banks, also our own government's money laundering.

He was disturbed by a lot of the things that he discovered, including the weaponry we used the way we dealt with Panama, when we were there invading them.

VAN SUSTEREN: Now, he left Santa Fe and was traveling, obviously, to California. Where there any sort of telltale signs along the way, did he stop for gas? ....

DEVORE: I called him back three times [when my television show was over 30 minutes later] between 1:00 and 1:10. Let the phone ring a long period of time, each time. He did not answer. ... At 1:15 a.m. my phone rang, and the first thing he said to me was, " Was that you calling me, sweetie?", which I later understand when I realized that something terrible had happened, that he had heard the phone and he was letting me know he had heard it. He did not elaborate on it... which is what he normally would have done. ...

Gary was a very precise person and he wouldn't answer me in generalities [and] normally [after what I said] he would have been flirtatious. ... I said to him, "Are you tired?" He said, "No, I'm pumping pure adrenalin here." I thought that was a large answer to a small question. This is a man who deals with words for a living. He knew exactly what he was saying. ... I got very, very alarmed in some way. I didn't understand why. And then he simply said, "See you later." ...

[I'm suspicious] because I had a conversation with him in which he had not said to me that he loved me at the end of the conversation, and this is a rule we had with each other. And it was the first time in four and a half years that he had not said it. And I became very alarmed and I had waited up. And I knew there was something wrong with the last phone call.

When it came through to us it was not on our cell phone, then I became terribly alarmed. And I did not know whether he had stopped by the side of the road to go to the bathroom and maybe someone got him. I didn't know what the circumstances were. If he had stopped somewhere, it would seem to me he would have told me, because he always would have said, "I went in to get a Coca-Cola, or I went to the truck stop." He was a talkative person and it was 1:00 in the morning.

... I spoke to my husband at 1:15. He was not tired, he was wide awake, and he was letting me know something was wrong.

EXCLUSIVE: Screenwriter mysteriously killed in 1997 after finishing script that revealed the 'real reason' for US invasion of Panama had been working for the CIA... and both his hands were missing

Gary Devore, writer of Raw Deal and Time Cop, disappeared in June 1997
He had finished script alleging ulterior motive for US invading Panama
Body was found a year later in California Aqueduct but raised questions
His hands were missing from the car, his script was never found
There was widespread speculation the CIA was connected to his death
Now a former White House official has confirmed Devore was working with the agency in Panama
Coroner revealed the hands sent for autopsy were 200 years old

By Mia De Graaf For Dailymail.com

Published: 00:23 GMT, 18 January 2015 | Updated: 02:27 GMT, 17 February 2015

When the skeletal remains of Hollywood screenwriter Gary Devore were found strapped into his Ford Explorer submerged beneath the California Aqueduct in 1998 it brought an end to one of America's most high profile missing person cases.

The fact that Devore was on his way to deliver a film script that promised to explain the 'real reason' why the US invaded Panama, has long given rise to a slew of conspiracies surrounding the nature of his 'accidental' death.

It didn't help that Devore's hands were missing from the crash scene, along with the script, and that investigators could offer no plausible explanation as to how a car could leave the highway and end up in the position it was found a year after he disappeared.

Now the Daily Mail can exclusively reveal that Devore was working with the CIA in Panama and even a White House source concedes his mysterious death bears all the hallmarks of a cover-up.

The findings, published in a new documentary The Writer With No Hands, are the first testimonies ever aired that give credence to the theories that surrounded the case in the late 90s.

Chillingly, the British research team - which was warned to drop the investigation by a Department of Defense contractor - has also secured testimony from the coroner which reveals the human hands said to be recovered from Devore's car were in fact around 200 years old.

'Someone in authority lied. Or made a shocking error,' producer Dr Matthew Alford tells DailyMail.com.

'There could be an innocent explanation for the hands but it is as extraordinary as the conspiracy theory and very suspicious.'

Devore, who wrote Dogs Of War, Raw Deal and Time Cop, had been working on his directorial debut: The Big Steal.

Once a truck driver, he had made a successful career shift into Hollywood. He was a friend to Arnold Schwarzenegger, Tommy Lee Jones's best man, and ex-boyfriend of Janet Jackson.

The Big Steal, he told friends, would be 'the hardest hitting film studios have ever seen', featuring 'disturbing details' about the US invasion of Panama.

The first draft of the script, shown exclusively to the Daily Mail, tells the story of American operatives robbing a Panamanian bank to cover up for 'something much more serious'.

One line reads: 'With good natured suspicion, Romos speculates on US intent. All this to pick up Noriega?'

Another: 'It sounds like the Pentagon planned the bank robbery and the war is just a diversion.'

Devore's research for the end product included an article from London's now defunct Sunday Correspondent alleging dictator General Manuel Noriega had compiled a stash of sex tapes featuring top-ranking US officials.

Noriega, the article explains, ran a well-known 'honey trap': inviting diplomats to his home filled with alcohol, drugs, beautiful women, and beautiful men - and covertly filming their antics.

After years of research, Dr Alford suggests the film may have implied the invasion was nothing more than a diversion that would allow the US into Panama to steal back incriminating photos of senior US officials that Noriega could have used as blackmail.

According to Devore's widow Wendy, there was a constant stream of phone calls from CIA officials in the month leading up to Devore's death.

She told DailyMail.com: 'When we first married he told me he got a lot of calls from government agencies. He told me to ignore it, so I did. If the phone rang, I could take a message or say he was out, but not to speak to them really.

'We had a few at first, then not very many. Then in the last month one man was calling all the time.

'He was dealing in things that you're not necessarily supposed to deal in.

'I found out a lot of people in Hollywood had these connections with the CIA and knew things that will never be made public.

'After he disappeared, things just didn't add up.

'It's very easy to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but when you're married to someone you know little things about them that seem insignificant but are actually crucial. I know there are things that don't add up.'

The CIA declined to comment.

However, a former White House official from the Regan/George HW Bush era has now confirmed to documentary producer Dr Matthew Alford, that Devore harbored a deep-rooted relationship with the agency and traveled with officials to Central American companies including Panama. Documents also reveal the relationship was investigated by the FBI.

Speaking on camera, he concedes the case has the hallmarks of a cover-up.

Devore's widow, who has since looked into the allegations, said she has discovered Gary traveled to Panama with a senior CIA official when he had said he was going to a location with his production team.

Wendy told DailyMail.com: 'I think the information that I have learned since he disappeared has pointed very strongly to the fact that he had another life and it points to the intelligence community certainly.

'I was never told about it beforehand because I think it was another method of keeping me safe and keeping me from asking questions.

'He told me he was going on location 'reckies'. I think sometimes he was but I have since found out he often wasn't with the crews he said he was.

'He went away a lot with members of the CIA special ops. They went to Panama together.'

On the night of his disappearance, Devore, aged 55, had gone to the Santa Fe home of his friend and long-time collaborator, actress Marsha Mason, on June 27, 1997, to finish the final draft of the script, carrying all his research on his Toshiba laptop.

He called Wendy late that night to say he had finished and was driving home with the finished piece.

At 1.15am, he said he was around four hours away and might stop at a motel to polish the script. Wendy told him to come home because he had a party planned for the next day to watch Mike Tyson's notorious fight against Evan Holyfield. That was the last contact anybody had with Devore.

Within a week of his disappearance, men from the FBI, CIA, NSA and DOD arrived at the couple's Santa Barbara home.

After an official went into his office, the computer was wiped of information. Devore's remaining research material disappeared during this period.

A search team spent a year tracking Devore's gas station stops and cell phone signal. They pinpointed his route on the Highway 14 south of the Mojave desert, and all the land around that route.

Finally, an amateur detective Douglas Crawford had a 'hunch' that he could be under the California Aqueduct, as that was the location of another recent death.

Although it had already been searched by helicopters and people on the ground, he was right: Devore was there.

When Devore's car was found, his Toshiba laptop was not in the car, nor was his gun or ammunition which had been under the seat.

Crawford refused DailyMail.com's request for a comment on this investigation.

A police report stated Devore had evidently driven off the aqueduct, which Dr Alford disputes.

'Newspapers speculated that Gary stopped for a break and then got back on the freeway travelling the wrong direction. However, to do this, Gary would have needed to have ignored 'Do Not Enter' signs and driven over two miles the wrong way on the freeway without realizing.

'Despite the crash happening at night and there being no lighting on the freeway, Gary's car headlights were found in the "OFF" position. I consequently tried driving like this and it's horrific and impossible.

'Gary had worked as a professional long haul driver, so friends and family do not believe he would have done anything daft on the road, even if he was tired.'

Wendy, whose request to read the confidential police files was refused, agrees.

'There are things that don't add up,' she said. 'When he called me the last time he sounded strange and agitated.

'When they found him in that aqueduct, which had been searched already by the way, he was wearing a seat belt with his wallet in his back pocket.

'Ask anyone who knew Gary: he never wore seat belts, and truck drivers never drive with their wallet in their back pocket.'

For 18 years Wendy has been calling to see the confidential reports done on her husband's disappearance, and broadcasting her belief that the CIA had a hand in it.

The agency is openly cooperative with Hollywood: in 1996, the role of Entertainment Liaison Officer was created to provide filmmakers with factual advice and authentic props.

Chase Brandon, a CIA operative who was a special operative in Panama for 25 years (and Tommy Lee Jones's cousin), was appointed.

The agency does not deny that, before Brandon's appointment, filmmakers gathered research on CIA language, style, systems, and even operations on an unofficial basis.

Indeed, Tricia Jenkins, author of The CIA In Hollywood, told DailyMail.com she has recently acquired new evidence showing how the CIA worked off-the-books to influence Hollywood scripts to an extent never previously known.

She said: 'In this documentation, concerning one major Hollywood movie, it is clear that the CIA functioned as the principle partner in shaping the original script and its influence exceeded that which would have been filled by an aggressive producer or studio executive.'

Devore's meetings however were 'beyond anything that could be considered normal for a screenwriter,' Alford says.

One of Hollywood's top private investigators Don Crutchfield, hired by Wendy Devore in 1997, attributes immense importance to the script.

'If I had that script in my hand, I could tell you what happened to Gary Devore,' said Crutchfield, who has worked for Michael Jackson and The Beatles after working as a bodyguard for Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra.

The Writer With No Hands and an accompanying book by Dr Matthew Alford will be released in September 2015.