Former Pentagon UFO investigator Jay Stratton says an unidentified insider described living non-human beings allegedly recovered near Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947, with some reportedly dying after refusing food or contact.

The claim appears in Stratton’s memoir, ‘Out of the Shadows,’ released on 13 October 2026. He discussed it in an exclusive interview with People, but supplied no independently verified evidence of the alleged survivors.

Debris was recovered near Roswell in 1947. Official US Air Force investigations subsequently attributed the material to military balloon research, not an extraterrestrial spacecraft.

Jay Stratton’s Roswell Claim: ‘Alive’ Non-Human Occupants
Stratton writes that his unidentified source described a spacecraft breaking into two pieces near Roswell in 1947. Military personnel then allegedly recovered the wreckage and non-human bodies. Some occupants, the insider claimed, were still alive.

The memoir offers a description of their supposed fate.

‘Some were dead on arrival. Others, allegedly, were alive but later perished, refusing food or contact. Communication was limited and often futile.’

Stratton does not claim to have witnessed the recovery. The insider has not been publicly identified, and the published interview includes no independently authenticated records supporting the story. The allegation should not be mistaken for an established account of what happened at Roswell.

The Air Force reached a different explanation. Its 1994 investigation traced the debris to Project Mogul, a classified balloon-based programme designed to detect Soviet nuclear testing.

A later Air Force review examined reports of alien bodies. It connected some accounts to anthropomorphic test dummies and unrelated military accidents that occurred years after 1947. Neither investigation established that extraterrestrial occupants were recovered.

AARO Findings Undercut Wider Crash Retrieval Tales
Stratton’s allegations extend beyond Roswell. He claims military contractors possess at least a dozen crashed spacecraft in secure facilities across the United States. His book also describes covert teams recovering unusual craft and non-human remains.

In March 2024, the Pentagon’s All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office, or AARO, reported finding no verifiable evidence that government agencies or private companies possessed extraterrestrial technology. It also found no empirical evidence of programmes reverse-engineering alien spacecraft.

The findings do not resolve every unidentified sighting, but they directly challenge the broader recovery narrative Stratton recounts.

He also relays allegations that people involved in the purported discoveries suffered psychological distress, resigned or died by suicide. No independently corroborated individual cases are identified in the interview, and no causal connection has been established.

Stratton says his interest in unexplained objects began in autumn 2005, when a colleague showed him footage reportedly recorded near a nuclear missile silo. He recalls a triangular object with coloured lights accelerating rapidly and disappearing. The footage and his interpretation are not independently assessed in the published account.

The Pentagon approved its Unidentified Aerial Phenomena Task Force on 4 August 2020. Stratton served as its first director before retiring in 2022.

Security Fears, Family Encounters and a Life in Uap
The former investigator believes non-human intelligence exists on Earth. That remains his conclusion rather than a verified finding.

He also describes glowing orbs and dark figures allegedly appearing at his family home from 2010. Those experiences have not been independently substantiated.

Read More: Former Pentagon UFO chief claims Roswell included ‘non-human bodies’