My Uncle Left Me A $200 Guitar — Then The FBI Knocked On My Door
Part 2
I felt all the blood drain from my face.
I gripped the edge of my kitchen counter just to steady my shaking legs.
I asked the agents what they meant by missing.
The female agent, who introduced herself as Agent Davis, instructed me to sit down on a stool.
She explained that David Harrison was one of the most famous folk musicians of the 1960s.
He sold out massive arenas across the entire country.
He had a massive record deal worth millions of dollars at the height of his career.
He played a custom acoustic guitar that was specifically built for his hands in 1965.
The luthier who crafted it died shortly after, meaning there was absolutely nothing else like it in the world.
In October of 1971, David Harrison walked out the back door of a venue after a sold-out show.
He told his manager he was going out into the alley for a quick smoke.
He never made it to his luxury tour bus.
He vanished into the night without leaving a single trace behind.
No body was ever recovered by the local authorities.
No ransom note was ever sent to his family or his record label.
The missing persons case had remained completely cold for more than five decades.
His custom guitar vanished with him that exact same night.
Obsessive fans, eccentric collectors, and private investigators had been hunting for it ever since.
I felt like the kitchen floor was violently tilting beneath my feet.
I pointed out that Uncle Brian was just a poor handyman who barely scraped by.
Agent Miller shook his head slowly.
He pulled a thick, yellowed file folder from his heavy leather briefcase.
He flipped it open and placed it flat on my coffee table.
He pointed to a grainy, black-and-white photograph taped to the first page.
It was my uncle, looking much younger and incredibly nervous in a police station waiting room.
Agent Miller explained that Uncle Brian’s name was heavily featured in the original police investigation files.
My uncle had been aggressively questioned by homicide detectives multiple times in 1971.
He was employed as a stagehand on that specific, fateful tour.
He was the absolute last person seen speaking with David Harrison before the musician disappeared into the dark alley.
I could not process the horrifying words coming out of the federal agent’s mouth.
I insisted it was entirely impossible for him to be involved.
Uncle Brian was a quiet, gentle old man who spent his weekends feeding stray cats behind the grocery store.
He was simply not capable of harming another human being.
Agent Davis leaned forward, ignoring my desperate defense entirely.
She asked if my uncle had left behind any other personal belongings or hidden documents.
I swallowed hard, a lump forming in my dry throat.
I told them about the massive, climate-controlled storage unit across town that I still had not gone through.
They immediately asked if they could accompany me there to look inside.
I grabbed my car keys with a trembling hand and led them out to the driveway.
We drove across town in complete, suffocating silence.
I pulled up to the facility and unlocked the heavy rolling metal door of the unit.
The space was packed to the ceiling with dusty cardboard boxes, tarp-covered furniture, and sealed plastic bins.
Agent Miller pulled a pair of blue latex gloves from his pocket and snapped them onto his wrists.
What exactly were we about to uncover in my uncle’s forgotten boxes?
