Death of Rey Rivera

Ray Rivera.

On May 24, 2006, the body of Rey Rivera was found inside the historic Belvedere Hotel in the Mount Vernon neighborhood of Baltimore, Maryland. Although the event was ruled a probable suicide by the Baltimore Police Department, the circumstances of Rivera's death are mysterious and disputed.

Rey Omar Rivera was born on June 10, 1973, to Angel and Maria Rivera. At the time of his disappearance, Rivera was a 32-year-old finance writer for The Oxford Club as a video contractor. Rivera and his wife Allison had relocated from California to Baltimore to work for his longtime friend Porter Stansberry as a writer and videographer for Stansberry's investment company, Stansberry & Associates Investment Research, a subsidiary of Agora Publishing. Rivera had stopped working for the company six months prior to his death in May 2006, but according to Stansberry, did freelance work for another subsidiary of Agora Publishing. Porter and ray had a long friendship stretching back years it was stated that both ray and porter had known each other since they were teenagers and had gone to prom together.

He was last seen leaving his Northwood home early on the evening of May 16, 2006.

The last person known to see him alive was his wife’s work colleague who was staying over as a houseguest. Allison, meanwhile, was out of town on a business trip in Richmond, Virginia.

According to the Allisons work colleague’s account Rivera seemed preoccupied with an assignment. At about 4 p.m., work colleague heard Rivera answer a call on his cellphone and reply, “oh shit,” and run out the back door as if he was late for an appointment.

He left driving his wife’s car only to come back briefly and run out again, leaving the lights and the computer on in his office.

Allison tried to reach her husband on his cellphone that day but couldn’t get ahold of him. She finally called work colleague at 10 p.m. to ask about her husband, but work colleague said she hadn’t seen him since he had left earlier that evening. At that point, Allison assumed her husband was just out drinking. It wasn’t until the next day that she began to worry.

After spending the whole day calling friends and family looking for Rivera, his wife filed a missing persons report at about 3 p.m. on May 17.

Then, on May 23, Allison’s car was discovered at a parking lot in Mount Vernon.

His decomposed body was found the next day in a closed meeting room of the Belvedere Hotel in Baltimore.

The Belvedere Hotel was built in the early 1900s and had a macabre history of unfortunate incidents on its grounds, including a number of suicides. In more recent years, it’s been largely converted into a condo building.

A hole in the meeting room roof and Rivera's injuries indicated he had probably come off the top of the Belvedere -- 14 stories up -- and crashed through the lower roof, officials said.

Baltimore city police said they have no witnesses that saw Rivera on or coming off the roof.

As police began to analyze the case, numerous aspects seemed odd about Rivera jumping off the main roof of the Belvedere Hotel. Partly due to the hotel's mansard roof, there was a considerable horizontal distance between the hotel tower and the location of the hole in the lower roof. The vertical fall of approximately 177 feet (building height 188 ft = 57 meters) would have taken approximately 3.3 seconds. This suggests if he did come from the roof, and traveled a horizontal distance of 101 feet (13 meters) before impact, he would have had to have a horizontal speed of 29 miles per hour, Rey was wearing flip flops or barefoot and would have had a maximum run up of just over 15 feet or 5 meters (2.5 seconds).

An additional theory is that Rivera may have jumped from a ledge several floors below the roof, but it would have been difficult for Rivera to access the ledge from the privately owned condominiums and offices that had windows onto the ledge.

Medical examiners determined he died from multiple and severe injuries consistent with a fall from a height. But they made no ruling as to homicide, suicide or an accident. Instead, they declared it undetermined, because the circumstances surrounding the incident were and still are unclear.

Allison also claimed she spoke with the medical examiner who told her that what wasn’t consistent with the fall was the way his shins were broken but she refused to say anything else.

Now this is where this case gets odd and spooky

Rays widow Allison gave him a money clip as a wedding gift that was engraved. This has never been found. She stated in the Netflix rebooted series of unsolved mysteries that she searched his car upside down for it and couldn’t find it and she found it weird that it was missing.

Another thing was Rivera's cell phone survived the apparent fall. It was found on top of the lower roof along with Rivera's sandals. The phone was intact and in working order. Now the puzzling aspect is how did the phone survive the fall and still be working if it fell with ray? I guarantee you you drop a phone from a great eight it won’t survive the fall and still be intact and in good working order. There was a theory it was placed there after rays death.

authorities were unable to retrieve video footage from the highly-secure building to see what happened when Rivera made his way to the higher floors due to a technical problem. Which I find extremely interesting. I mean you have this building that has a very complex and technical security system and it goes down on the very night that Rey dies? It could just be a coincidence but I find odd that it should be down. Because we can’t say that he didn’t go in there with others or that he did.

Then, there was the obscure note uncovered from Rivera’s computer. The note was typed in small print, folded up in plastic, and taped to his home computer screen along with a blank check.

The note was addressed to “brothers and sisters” and referred to “a well-played game.” It also named famous people who had died, including Christopher Reeve and Stanley Kubrick, as well as ordinary people who Rivera knew in real life. The note included a request to make them and himself five years younger.

The finding was so puzzling that investigators sent the letter to the FBI. The Feds determined it wasn’t a suicide note.

The cryptic letter pointed to another weird detail about Rey Rivera’s circumstances: his growing interest in the Free Masons. The note he left behind began and ended with phrases used in the Masonic order.

A representative at a local Maryland lodge confirmed that Rivera inquired about membership on the same day he went missing, but didn’t recall anything unusual about their conversation. Shortly before his death, Rivera was also reading books related to masonry, such as The Builders.

To muddy things further, his wife described a growing paranoia in Rivera in the weeks leading up to his disappearance.

She told police that Rivera was unusually anxious He was reportedly terrified in the days leading up to his death, according to his wife, but wouldn't confide in her about what was bothering him.

There was also the instance that the producer of that episode talked about how Allison was training for a triathlon and Rey waiting in the car as it was rain and as there weren’t many people on the track. Then these two men came out of nowhere onto the track and Rey sprinted out of the car so fast. Which indicates to me that he was trying to be there to protect Allison. The questions is what was he so afraid of?

Obviously he was scared someone would hurt his wife and he knew something was coming or was scared something was coming that much was for sure.

Allison then said that their security system was tripped twice in those few weeks, but no one was found breaking and entering into the house. Around 1am the alarm was tripped the first time. She said that ray raced downstairs wth a baseball bat in his hands and had such a look of fear and terror in his eyes that she had never seen before. She said that Rey feared nothing so to see him so scared was not only puzzling but very worrying.

She called the cops but all they said was that it was squirrels although Allison wasn’t convinced and neither am I. Had it been once I can see maybe but it happened again a week later at the same time 1am.

She claimed that someone had tried to break into their home. As evidenced by the fact that the window looked like it had been jimmied open.

Then there was the encounter with an unknown man at the park left her husband visibly distraught. Which I have only ever seen mentioned in one online article and wasn’t brought up in the unsolved mysteries episode or anywhere else so how that fits into this puzzle I’m not sure.

Rivera's last full-time job was to edit a financial newsletter called the Rebound Report published by a division of Agora Publishing, based in Mount Vernon. Family and friends said Rivera had expressed some unhappiness about his work because some of the stocks he wrote about weren't rebounding.

In the fall of 2005, Rivera left Agora full-time and began producing videos for the company under contract.

Long-time friend Porter Stansberry brought Rivera to Agora. Stansberry runs one of Agora's newsletter divisions and was mentioned several times in Rivera's bizarre note.

Which brings me to the mysterious company known as stansberry and associates.

The mystery call Rey had gotten the night he died that made him run out of his house originated from Stansberry & Associates, which was owned by Rey’s longtime friend, Porter Stansberry, who he was doing freelance work for. However, the call wasn’t able to be traced to a specific extension within the firm, so no one has any idea who called Rey. They also never come forward. The other interesting aspect is no one but Rey and the person who made the call know what it was all about.

Something about Stansberry & Associates felt off to me the more I dug into this case because there are so many questions I have and this company and porter stansberry keep cropping up over and over again. apparently according to the producer of the unsolved mysteries episode she spoke with him and he apparently made a claim to the media and lied saying that Rey and Allison were in therapy which wasn’t true and that Rey had some physiological issues which again wasn’t true.

My question is why would he lie about Rey like that especially to the media which the he made this statement to them sadly had the side effect of influencing the police of their opinions off of what porter said. In regards to Reys state of mind when he disappeared which made then lead to thinking he was suicidal or might have thought that way.

Porter also offered a measly $1000 dollars and wasn’t very interested in this case

"Stansberry & Associates also placed a gag order on all employees not to talk to anybody about the case. Stansberry also didn’t agree to speak with Unsolved Mysteries producers, so we may never know the connection the call that came from that firm had on Rey’s death, if any.

The other very interesting fact about stansberry and associates was that Stansberry sent a mass e-mail in 2002 offering to sell the Special Report, which claimed to have inside information about USEC dealings. The solicitation said investors could double their money if they bought and sold when told.

The information turned out to be wrong, and in April 2003, the SEC (Security And Exchange Commission) filed a lawsuit charging the defendants with securities fraud.

The suit focused on a "Special Report" Stansberry wrote - and Pirate published - along with e-mail advertising the document. They claimed investors could double their money if they paid $1,000 for a stock tip involving Bethesda energy company USEC Inc. In total, 1,217 people purchased the report, although 215 of them got their money back after complaining.

"Stansberry's conduct undoubtedly involved deliberate fraud, making statements [about a stock] that he knew to be false; Pirate acted in reckless disregard for regulations when it published Stansberry's unbelievable claims without a shred of confirmation," stated the 49-page ruling.

"The violation plainly involved the risk of substantial loss to those who bought the Special Report and relied upon Stansberry's false statements in their stock purchase decisions.”

Pirate was ordered to pay $801,600 in restitution, along with interest of $248,496, while Stansberry has to pay $200,400 in restitution and $62,124 in interest. Each party has also been assessed a penalty payment of $120,000.

According to the Stansberry & Associates Web site, Stansberry describes himself as the founder of the eight-year-old company. He writes a monthly newsletter, Porter Stansberry's Investment Advisory, that "deals with safe value investments poised to give subscribers years of exceptional returns.

Now to me my question is what else was stansberry and associates involved in becuase if a company is caught in one dodgy deal rule of thumb daces that’s not all that they are involved in. One has toast the question how many more things are going on behind. The scene that we don’t know about or that never came to light.

My ultimate theory is Rey found out about something or stumbled upon something he shouldn’t have and someone was worried about what he knew. Something that someone was willing to kill for to keep that something buried. Whatever it was Rey knew that these people could get to him and his wife it explains why he was so worried for her safety and why he was scared when his house was broken into. So they lured him out of his house with smoke type of phone call he somehow went through that hole in the roof.

there was also another call.

Radio Times reported that during an interview on the You Can’t Make This Up podcast, Unsolved Mysteries co-creator, Terry Dunn Meurer, introduced a second mystery caller to the case. While the police had Rey’s computer and were investigating it, someone called to inquire about it.

“When Alison (Rivera’s wife) went to the police station to pick up Rey’s computer, the detective mentioned someone had called a couple of times and asked to pick up the computers and was very interested in the status of the computers. Alison was very troubled.”

So who was that caller? Why did they want Rey’s computer? Do they have any connection to the first as-still-unknown caller from Stansberry & Associates?

As pointed out in the podcast, someone called Rey, and no one knows why.

There is also one other very interesting piece of information that I wasn’t aware of until I listened to this episode. The producer also said that This wasn’t included in the episode. Allison had found this heart shaped rock and gave it to Rey and told him if ever he he felt alone to hold this rock and it would signify that she would always be with him wherever he went. Now the odd part about that was he took that rock with him that night and it just like the money clip, has veer been found. The other question is why did he take that with him that night? Unless he knew he was in some type of danger or trouble?

The case today remains unsolved.

Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Rey_Rivera

https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-2007-08-10-0708100274-story.html

https://netflixlife.com/2020/08/08/unsolved-mysteries-second-mystery-caller-revealed-rey-rivera-case/

https://www.wbaltv.com/article/suicide-or-murder-evidence-reviewed/7054411

https://allthatsinteresting.com/rey-rivera-death

https://www.marieclaire.com/culture/a33510156/rey-rivera-case-update-computer/