# Three men freeze to death in a friend's backyard and aren't found for three days **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [January 16, 2024, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151 "2024-01-16T06:01:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![aurora\_maire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aurora_maire/32/328_2.png) [@aurora\_maire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aurora_maire)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 6:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/1 "2024-01-16T06:01:29Z")
What a bizarre story. The men were at the friend’s house watching football a week ago Sunday. When they didn’t return home, friends and relatives started looking for them. They tried to contact the friend but he didn’t respond. I was thinking that maybe he just didn’t realize they were missing but their cars were parked at his house. I’m curious how this could have happened. Probably copious amounts of alcohol are involved but the whole thing is very strange. [Friends Demand Answers After 3 Men Found Dead Outside Kansas City Home | Inside Edition](https://www.insideedition.com/kansas-city-dead-outside-home-clayton-mcgeeney-ricky-johnson-david-harrington) ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/2 "2024-01-16T06:44:23Z")
> [@aurora\_maire](#): > > I’m curious how this could have happened. Homicide. Or fentanyl OD. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 7:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/3 "2024-01-16T07:39:20Z")
My WAG; the three friends go out back to toss a ball around after the game, the homeowner decides he’s too drunk and goes to sleep, friends realize the door is locked and they can’t get out and their phones are all inside, they pound on the door to try to get the homeowner’s attention but he’s out cold. It was 36 degrees that night, so they probably succumbed to hypothermia after an hour or two, maybe faster if they were also very drunk, and when the owner woke up the next morning and found his pals dead he panicked and decided not to tell anyone and wait until things blew over before he tried to do something with the bodies. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/4 "2024-01-16T08:00:38Z")
Sounds like drugs to me. They went to his place because he’s the guy who has them. They went out back while he made a deal with someone scary. By the time he remembered them, they were gone. He’s been drunk and high ever since. The tox screens will tell the tale. Another possibility is home brew. It’s not difficult to poison people without realizing it when you are making your own beer and wine. Methyl alcohol can form and act just like ethyl right up until you swallow it. But it just doesn’t make sense that this guy never realized these cars were still in his driveway, even as people blew up his phone looking for their loved ones. ---
**Author:** ![tofor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tofor/32/13727_2.png) [@tofor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tofor)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/5 "2024-01-16T12:03:33Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > Another possibility is home brew. It’s not difficult to poison people without realizing it when you are making your own beer and wine. Methyl alcohol can form and act just like ethyl right up until you swallow it. A small amount of methanol is always produced in any fermentation, but not generally enough to harm anybody. I’ve made my own beer and wine and this is not a risk I’ve ever been aware of. I think the maker would have to do something very, very wrong to make either that had deadly amounts of Methyl Alcohol in it. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/6 "2024-01-16T12:07:20Z")
It’s not common, but it does happen: > **[List of methanol poisoning incidents](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_methanol_poisoning_incidents)** > > Outbreaks of methanol poisoning have occurred when methanol is used to lace moonshine (bootleg liquor). > Methanol is toxic to humans via ingestion due to metabolism. If as little as 10 ml of pure methanol is ingested, for example, it can break down into formic acid, which can cause permanent blindness by destruction of the optic nerve, and 30 ml is potentially fatal, although the median lethal dose is typically 100 ml (3.4 fl oz) (i.e. 1–2 ml/kg body weight) of pure methanol. This does not happe... ---
**Author:** ![tofor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tofor/32/13727_2.png) [@tofor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tofor)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/7 "2024-01-16T12:22:52Z")
I didn’t check every entry in that list, but nothing I saw suggested accidental production of methanol when fermenting wine or beer. I saw “Store intentionally sold Sterno for drinking” and “Fraud perpetrated by adulterating table wine”, but none of that supports your contention that > [@TruCelt](#): > > It’s not difficult to poison people without realizing it when you are making your own beer and wine. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/8 "2024-01-16T12:26:36Z")
I believe you’ve confused homebrewing with home distillation. ---
**Author:** ![TruCelt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/trucelt/32/523_2.png) [@TruCelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TruCelt)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/9 "2024-01-16T12:39:19Z")
You are probably right. It’s true I don’t know a whole lot about it. But I was sure there was this whole step in making whisky that if you didn’t bleed off enough methyl at the beginning you’d poison people. That’s what I was thinking of. Maybe there’s really no such problem with making home beer and wine. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/10 "2024-01-16T12:41:15Z")
I’ll be astounded if alcohol was not a factor in this matter. Other intoxicants seem likely, and it would seem there is more to this story, but the power of alcohol to cloud men’s minds is legendary. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/11 "2024-01-16T12:52:09Z")
I can’t imagine how it would unless you deliberately added an adulterant. Fermentation is simple chemistry - all you need is a sugary liquid, yeast, and a container with an airlock on it (which can be as simple as a balloon with a pinprick in it stretched over the neck of a bottle), and in a week or so you’ll have something drinkable. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/12 "2024-01-16T13:27:44Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > Sounds like drugs to me. Damned Amoxicillin!! ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/13 "2024-01-16T13:36:33Z")
> [@TruCelt](#): > > But I was sure there was this whole step in making whisky that if you didn’t bleed off enough methyl at the beginning you’d poison people. That’s what I was thinking of. Maybe there’s really no such problem with making home beer and wine. Both of these are right. _Fermentation_ produces a small amount of methanol along with a bunch of ethanol and other liquids, solids, and flavors. Which at that low concentration isn’t harmful; that’s called beer or wine. Or the precursor to booze. _Distillation_ takes that precursor liquid and concentrates out almost all most of the other stuff, leaving just the methanol & ethanol plus a tinge of flavorants. And delivers the methanol first in potentially dangerous concentrated form if that first bit is bottled separately. That’s called booze or moonshine depending on whether its pro’s or amateurs making it. Badly made moonshine _can_ be dangerous. Doesn’t have to be, but amateur chemistry isn’t a trustworthy source for anything. As any consumer of street drugs would know. Which is really what actual moonshine is: a lower-tech street drug perfected about a millennia ago after 2 millennia of experimentation. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/14 "2024-01-16T14:18:27Z")
Methanol is produced most by fermentation of things with pectin- i.e. fruit. But not in high enough concentrations to be a problem if just fermented. It takes distillation to even get close, and if you discard your heads and tails, even then it should be ok. ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/15 "2024-01-16T15:17:51Z")
Moonshine is something you associate with the mountainous areas of Georgia, North Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia and Kentucky–not Kansas City. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/16 "2024-01-16T15:44:20Z")
Some 160 miles away in Newton, KS: > **[Newton couple indicted for operating a moonshine still](https://www.ksn.com/news/newton-couple-indicted-for-operating-a-moonshine-still/)** > > A Newton couple was indicted in federal court on charges of operating a moonshine still in the basement of their home. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/17 "2024-01-16T16:10:56Z")
> [@](#): > > Police also will not comment on the claim being made by furious friends and family. Furious Friends and Family sounds like a retro cellphone plan. ---
**Author:** ![Spiff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiff/32/9852_2.png) [@Spiff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiff)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/18 "2024-01-16T16:27:19Z")
Or a band name. ---
**Author:** ![Common\_Tater](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/common_tater/32/13846_2.png) [@Common\_Tater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Common_Tater)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/19 "2024-01-16T16:29:29Z")
The lower boiling point alcohols - sometimes called “popskull” or fusel oil are distilled first in the process and discarded. Widely considered to contribute to more severe hangovers. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2024, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151/20 "2024-01-16T17:06:57Z")
I’ve read news about people found passed out in their cars from opiods. That’s probably what happened with the 3 men in the backyard. This cold 🥶 is brutal and deadly. Munchalfen had tried walking home from a friends house. > **[Woman Found Dead Outside Illinois Library in Freezing Conditions](https://www.countryherald.com/news/woman-found-dead-outside-illinois-library-in-freezing-conditions/)** > > Coal City, IL - Katherine Munchalfen, 41, was found dead outside the Coal City Public Library on Sunday morning, amidst harsh freezing [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/three-men-freeze-to-death-in-a-friends-backyard-and-arent-found-for-three-days/996151.md?page=2)