FBI wants public help solving encrypted notes from murder mystery

[The Straight Story]

FBI wants public help solving encrypted notes from murder mystery
FBI cryptanalysis hasn’t decrypted notes from 1999 murder mystery

The FBI is seeking the public's help in breaking the encrypted code found in two notes discovered on the body of a murdered man in 1999.

The FBI says that officers in St. Louis, Missouri discovered the body of 41-year-old Ricky McCormick on June 30, 1999 in a field and the clues regarding the homicide were two encrypted notes found in the victim's pants pockets.

More cool stuff: The weirdest, wackiest and stupidest sci/tech stories of 2010

The FBI says that despite extensive work by its Cryptanalysis and Racketeering Records Unit (CRRU), and the American Cryptogram Association, the meanings of those two coded notes remain a mystery and McCormick's murderer has never been found. One has to wonder though, if the FBI can't figure this out, who can? But I digress.

From the FBI: "The more than 30 lines of coded material use a maddening variety of letters, numbers, dashes, and parentheses. McCormick was a high school dropout, but he was able to read and write and was said to be 'street smart.' According to members of his family, McCormick had used such encrypted notes since he was a boy, but apparently no one in his family knows how to decipher the codes, and it's unknown whether anyone besides McCormick could translate his secret language. Investigators believe the notes in McCormick's pockets were written up to three days before his death."

Notes are here:
http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2011/march/cryptanalysis_032911/image/gallery

http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/fbi-wants-public-help-solving-encrypted-notes

[nebenaube]

1. looks like a 4 char substitution code with injected noise.

ncbe appears to be either noise or a char.

[MineralMan]

3. There's also a repetitive use of

e as the end letter in groups, with a consonant preceding it.

Could be a clue there, but the pros have already considered that, I'm very certain. Cryptographers have already spent a lot of time on this, so the obvious things have no doubt been checked.

Those repetitive patterns have been looked at closely, but it hasn't seemed to have helped.

I'm thinking more and more that this is a unique encryption method created by the individual and carried in memory.

I like looking at the lists in the notes. Lists are always interesting, since you can often find sequential patterns in them, like numbers to order the list, and that sort of thing.

However, I'm not going to have time to spend puzzling over this, and I recognize that some very talented folks have already had a long crack at it. I think it's going to be a unique system that isn't going to get solved.

[MineralMan]

2. Well, I'm betting that it's based on some book or other

source for a key. If that's the case, it's unlikely it will ever be solved.

If it were me, I'd be looking through all the printed material in that person's personal space, hunting for something that had extensive use and wear. I'd also be looking for something that had numerical and symbolic characters on the same page, like a math text or something similar.

If that could be identified, it would still be a very, very difficult job, since the way that key was used could be very hard to interpret, and could be very complex.

For example, let's use the letter "W." The key could be to locate the first or second or third "W" in the key, then take the character that is n number of characters in any direction from that occurrence. Or, it could be any other method chosen by the person doing the encrypting.

The difficulty level here is extreme, even if you had the key text in your hand. It could be solvable, using word and letter occurrence frequency analysis, but still very difficult.

Even worse, it could be a variable random alphabetical substitution system that was known only to the encrypter, using anything as a randomizing trigger. If the person was autistic or had another, related disorder, this could be a very, very complex system of his own device. It could even be a word-substitution code, committed to memory by the encrypter.

I predict that the code will never be broken and that the text will remain encrypted.

[PATRICK]

4. The common letters

seem to be simple directional references(points of compass, Left, Right, etc.) and some visual key unknown, the letters of his name. Ouija board? The numbers, grammar breaks(word,sentence, parentheses,circlings where needed for clarity) are probably clear. The brevity of the message means little is wasted, possible short hand and run on words if they don't cause confusion. Knowing this guy a lot more might help but one would think simplicity is the rule here with difficulty being a long memorized eccentric personal key. The circled message looks like special emphasis on information and clarity. Letters slurred mean more recognizable and corrections might mean habitual spelling problems.

I can't even read my old college notes in personal shorthand. Though this is much simpler the eccentricity angle is the sticking point like a book code. Using a compass like direction to the alphabet with common letters having the appearance of ease and familiarity in scripting is my possible tip.

[Festivito]

5. Probably just shorthand memorandums to his self.

Such as he had something going on May 2nd from 9Am to 4PM a month before he was found in 1999.
The dates 71, 74, 75 may have been dates of his first dates and one of his bout with measles. Who knows. I doubt it would help solve his murder, poor bloke.

[Warren DeMontague]

6. Why don't they use some of the thousands of people they have on the pot smoking cancer granny cases?

I'm sorry, but if they're short handed, they can re-prioritize.