Full story:
He was one of my best friends in high school but we were inseparable the first two years of college. He hated spending time at his home and always complained about how 'crazy' his parents were but I never really figured out how horrible his home life was until he was older.
Something was always 'off' about him, but it was difficult to put a finger on it exactly. He was one of the most loyal and amazing people you would ever meet yet he disappeared for weeks at a time, and refused to answer phone calls or texts. We all just assumed it was part of his personality to need alone time and gave him space. He was never violent and none of his friends ever believed him to be a danger to himself or others.
He had a passion for chemistry and was truly gifted at it but after a year of doing research in a prominent chemistry lab on campus he accused his principal investigator of using one of his ideas without crediting him and left the lab. He became increasingly reclusive and distant with his friends and became obsessed with completing this massive 'research paper' that he intended to send to research universities around the country. He felt that once the scientific community read his paper he would immediately be sought after by a graduate program and planned to drop out of undergrad at the end of his sophomore year. All of his friends, including myself, adamantly begged him to stick it out and finish his undergraduate degree before pursuing graduate school just as a backup which caused him to become even more distant. One day he simply left town and moved back home with his father (who was divorced from his mother). He soon deleted his facebook and changed his phone number thus becoming impossible to contact.
The next I heard of him he had assaulted his mother with a hammer and was in police custody. His friends and I worked to get bail money together but by the time we had the money the charges were dropped, he was released and he disappeared again. A year later, a few weeks ago, an article was posted in our local paper saying he had murdered his father in their home, stayed with the body for several days, and disappeared when his father's girlfriend came to check on his father and discovered the body.
His car was discovered by the police in our college town, four hours away from our home town in which he was living and murdered his father. After some searching they found his body in the woods several miles from the car.
His mother, who I have since discovered is beyond crazy, wont share his suicide note with any of his friends and the police would share neither the location of the suicide or the contents of the note. I have a personal connection with an officer in the area and, although she could not be of much help, said he wrote graffiti at the site before killing himself and I could find it under some power lines near a small lake. I tried to think of some his favorite spots in the area and with some help from google earth and a lot of leg work I found the spot. Even after three days of rain the smell of death was still rank in the air and his graffiti handwriting was unmistakable, I knew I found it.
He LOVED graffiti, and would tag virtually everything he could find. It was a real outlet for him. In high school he was caught tagging a local water tower but since he was a minor he was let off with a slap on the wrist. I was afraid he would be caught doing something big again so graffiti became something we did together. I would suggest abandoned buildings in less conspicuous places and we would tag them together. Just stupid stuff, I was never artistic and he wasn't either. His writing was unmistakable though which is why I'm positive this is the spot.
I know this story is long and I appreciate everyone being patient if they have read this far. The main reason I am posting here is because it looked as if the police tried to clean the graffiti on the concrete slab beneath the massive metal power line. Also, there was fresh silver paint above the shown graffiti on the metal pole covering up what looked to be more graffiti. I tried scraping it with rocks and stuff I could find but it wasn't coming off. I can't think of any solvents that wouldn't risk taking off the spray paint underneath. Can someone think of a way to expose the graffiti underneath? Because his mother is withholding his suicide note, this is the only message I may ever read from him.
Thank you for your time