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HOME/CASES/DUFO-037 · LINDA NAPOLITANO / BROOKLYN BRIDGE
FILE OPENEDTIER B · CLASS — DECLASSIFIED
DUFO-037 · DOSSIER · 2026 EDITION
FILE DUFO-037·FIELD REPORT·USA·FILED 11.30.1989·UPDATED 05.06.2026
CASE FILE

LINDA.

New York City · USA · Linda Cortile Napolitano claimed she was floated out of her 12th-floor Manhattan apartment into a hovering craft.
declassifiedtier · BFILE COPY · 37 / 64
archive · abduction · 1989
EXHIBIT A · 01 / 07
“primary witness on record” — Linda Napolitano (Linda Cortile)
DEBRIS
PRESS
MAP
WITNESSES
GOV DOCS
MEDIA
// SUMMARY · BY THE DESK

In the early hours of November 30, 1989, Linda Napolitano (then known by the surname Cortile) reported being floated out of the bedroom window of her 12th-floor apartment in lower Manhattan, in a beam of light, into a hovering disc-shaped craft above the building.

In subsequent months, Hopkins received letters from two men identifying themselves only as "Richard" and "Dan" — alleged security or law enforcement personnel — claiming they had observed the entire event from a stalled limousine on the FDR Drive while escorting an unnamed VIP. The unnamed VIP was implied to be former UN Secretary-General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar, who had left office in December 1991. A retired New York City police sergeant separately came forward to Hopkins claiming he had seen the event from the Brooklyn Bridge.

The Napolitano case became an immediate subject of intense controversy within UFO research. Skeptical investigators including Joseph Stefula, Richard Butler and George P. Hansen issued a detailed critique arguing that the case had inconsistencies, that the additional witnesses' identities had not been independently verified, and that the methodology used to establish corroboration was flawed. Hopkins and Linda Napolitano disputed these conclusions. Pérez de Cuéllar denied any knowledge of the alleged event.

The Linda Napolitano case remains one of the most-discussed and most-divisive abduction cases in the modern record. Its inclusion here is for historical importance — it is frequently cited in any serious abduction-research literature. The reader should understand that the case rests primarily on the testimony of Linda Napolitano and on anonymous corroborating letters whose authors were never publicly identified. It should not be treated as established fact.

// CHRONOLOGY · KEY EVENTS
Nov 30 1989
Incident reported · primary record
1990
First independent investigation
2023
Senate UAP testimony reopens record
May 2026
Spielberg release · disclosure cycle
// WITNESSES · 3 ON RECORD
portrait
Linda Napolitano (Linda Cortile)
ON RECORD
▸ AFFIDAVIT →
portrait
"Richard" and "Dan" (anonymous)
ON RECORD
▸ AFFIDAVIT →
portrait
Anonymous retired NYPD sergeant
ON RECORD
▸ AFFIDAVIT →
// PRIMARY DOCUMENTS
Budd Hopkins — Witnessed: The True Story of the Brooklyn Bridge UFO Abductions (1996)▸ ARCHIVE
Stefula, Butler & Hansen — Critique of the Linda Cortile case (1993)▸ ARCHIVE
Carol Rainey — discussion of Hopkins methodology (post-2010)▸ ARCHIVE
Intruders Foundation case archive▸ ARCHIVE
FILE DUFO-037 · LINDA NAPOLITANO / BROOKLYN BRIDGE · DECLASSIFIED EDITION 2026PG 01 / 04
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