Juneau, August 8, 2025
Photo: vk.com
After nearly six years, the body of a man dubbed “Juneau John Doe” was identified as Archpriest Alexander Valentinovich Popov from near St. Petersburg, Russia, though his cause of death remains unclear.
A body was found on the beach in Juneau in the area of Echo Cove on July 25, 2019, which is accessed by walking half a mile down a trail and another half mile along the beach, the Juneau Empire outlet reported with reference to an announcement from the Juneau Police Department.
The body was sent to the State Medical Examiner’s Office for autopsy and the police launched an investigation.
A follow-up article from August 7, 2019, discussed three recent deaths in the area, including that of the man found at Echo Cove. A spokesman for the Juneau Police Department said that none of the deaths were connected. He also said that “there are no allegations of wrongdoing in any of the three cases, and that none of the three bodies showed any signs of foul play. None of the deaths are considered suspicious at this time.” Autopsies were still ongoing at that time.
Unidentified Wiki, a resource run by volunteers and amateur researchers cataloguing John Doe cases, has an entry for a “Juneau John Doe” who was found on the shoreline of Juneau on July 25, 2019, claiming he was shot in the head and his body was found in a decomposed state.
However, this contradicts the information from the police, and the relevant page from the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, which is indicated as the source for the Unidentified Wiki article, is no longer accessible and none of the snapshots from the Wayback Machine provide any information.
The body was eventually buried as John Doe, and it wasn’t until 2025 that the remains were identified.
On March 17, the Feodorovsky Imperial Cathedral in Tsarskoe Selo reported on Russian social media:
On July 25, 2019, the former cleric and sacristan of the Feodorovsky Imperial Cathedral, Archpriest Alexander Popov, departed to the Lord. Unfortunately, news of his death only reached us a few days ago. We ask for prayers for Fr. Alexander. May the Lord rest his soul in the dwellings of the righteous!
Fr. Alexander, born July 5, 1961, was either 57 or 58 when he died. He was ordained to the diaconate on December 3, 1989, and the priesthood on October 17, 1990. He was elevated to the rank of archpriest in 2005. He was released from his full-time duties on May 28, 2019, and soon thereafter went to Alaska, where he died.
Echo Cove in Juneau. Photo: flickr.com
The letter from the Russian Ministry of Internal Affairs informing Fr. Alexander’s daughter of the identification of his remains was posted in the comments section to the church’s post. It reads:
Dear Ksenia Valentinovna!
I am informing you that based on the fact of the disappearance without a trace of your father, Popov Alexander Valentinovich, born 7/5/1961, a resident of Sverdlovsk Province, Krivograv, criminal case No. 19239601400026094 was initiated on 12.30.2019.
Criminal case No. 19239601400026294 regarding Popov A. V. was terminated on 3/12/2025, in connection with the identification of the body of an unknown man discovered on 7/25/2019 on the territory of Juneau (95 miles from Sitka), USA.
According to information received from the US Interpol database, the identity of Popov Alexander Valentinovich, born 07.05.1961, has been confirmed. The remains of Popov A. V. are buried at Northern Lights Cemetery, Garden of Prayer, Section D, Lot 79, Location #2. For repatriation of the remains, it is necessary to contact directly the funeral agency Legacy Heritage Chapel of Angelus, contact phone number 907-336-3588.
With respect,
Deputy Chief of Police G. M. Klebanov
However, as Dr. Scott Kenworthy, a professor in the History Department at Miami University (Ohio) who met and had personal correspondence with Fr. Alexander, notes, the Ministry letter gives no indication of cause of death. While the Juneau police reported no signs of foul play, there may be more to the story.
Prof. Kenworthy, who spent years researching and writing a soon-to-be-available book about Patriarch St. Tikhon’s ministry in North America, had corresponded for several years with Fr. Alexander, who himself produced a series of Russian-language books on St. Tikhon’s time in America.
Prof. Kenworthy reached out to Fr. Alexander in the spring of 2019 when planning a summer trip to St. Petersburg. As he told OrthoChristian, Fr. Alexander responded somewhat cryptically, “Okay, I’ll wait for you.”
Prof. Kenworthy recalls that when the two met that summer, Fr. Alexander told him that he wanted to transfer to faraway Sakhalin and take up fishing. He also noticed that the priest had no bank card or account but paid for everything in cash and that he used only a burner flip phone. “I had the sense he was someone who didn’t want to be tracked, that he wanted to go off the grid,” Dr. Kenworthy said. In fact, Fr. Alexander’s apartment was already packed up at that time.
Fr. Alexander provided Dr. Kenworthy with many valuable materials about St. Tikhon, and in return asked that he provide him with an invitation letter to the United States, as Fr. Alexander had always wanted to visit Alaska. Dr. Kenworthy provided him with the necessary letter and also gave him the contact of some people in Alaska. They last corresponded on June 21, 2019. Fr. Alexander’s body was found on July 25, though unidentified for many years.
At some point, Fr. Alexander’s brother reported him missing to Interpol, and in the summer of 2020, the organization sent the Oxford, Ohio police to speak with Dr. Kenworthy. As he had written the invitation letter for Fr. Alexander, they hoped he had heard from him. They had also reached out to the Alaskan contacts that Dr. Kenworthy suggested to Fr. Alexander, but it turns out he never met them.
“Hardly sounds like a ‘case closed, to me,” Dr. Kenworthy commented.
May Fr. Alexander’s memory be eternal!
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