It’s fairly clear what happened to FBI agent Stephen Ivens now. That day back in May (10th), he walked up into the foothills above Burbank, and for some unknown reason, went behind the St Francis Catholic Church and committed suicide with his own service revolver. Well, yea, I know, the official cause of death hasn’t been determined yet by the LA County Coroner’s Office, but you can bet, this is how it went down.
The real problem for those of us who want more out of our news than the what, is the why. Here’s the real story (that we seek) for some hungry, ambitious investigative journalist! The major news services (especially the Los Angeles Times) who have covered the discovery of Stephen Ivens body by two hikers (Monday evening) have done an excellent job giving us the facts surrounding this startling, and tragic conclusion to what most certainly occurred on May 10th.
The news footage from these Burbank foothills, provided by KTLA 5, was superb and gives us a clear picture of how this entire traumatizing event must have unfolded. Of course, we have to extract what we think happened from what we know actually did occur. Naturally enough (again), the FBI, or their spokesperson, whoever that might be, is not going to be very specific as to what may be behind this entire dark episode, probably citing national security as a reason for keeping the lid on tight.
Nor is this another high tech spy movie, with shadows moving about in a Cold War Era cat and mouse game, such as John Le Carre’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. And yet a casual reading of a chapter or two from that classic novel might do us some good, if we so choose to breach the barriers, penetrate the citadels of the mystery behind Stephen Ivens’ taking of his own life.
I’ll say it again. We have a verifiable body of corporeal facts surrounding Stephen leaving his home in the 1700 block of Scott Road, taking his FBI service revolver along, walking up a familiar hiking trail, then going behind this Catholic school (I can’t help but think this was intentional) and ending his life. Stephen was only 35 years old and seems to have had a pleasant or happy life with his family. This makes me believe, the source of his depression was work related. It’s got to be!
I have read some of Thea’s (Stephen’s wife) entries on a special website created by her to help find the missing FBI agent. I haven’t read all of her entries, but I didn’t see anything on there that would give me any conclusive insight as to what was behind his overwhelming depression. It had to be chronically malignant to cause him to go and kill himself over it. But what was it? A quote from the Daily News is in order.
“His family said the agent, who would have turned 36 last month, had been depressed and on the verge of a breakdown over events at work unrelated to his criminal caseload. His wife, Thea, has said he couldn’t sleep and had anxiety attacks each morning before work.”
Alright, so the key here, is ‘unrelated to his criminal caseload.’ This raises a major red flag! That would mean the psychological problems Stephen was having were caused by parties or situations created right there within the inner trappings of his FBI Office.
Or maybe they lie (the cause of his anxiety) deeper within the labyrinthian bureaucratic infrastructure of this secretive federal agency. Smiley had some misgivings too about Control’s role. If it is internal, as I write, a white out is taking place.
Gun found near body thought to be missing FBI agent; ‘a sad day’ – latimes.com
