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## Ben Perkins, 402 Months, and the Unexplained Notes
Among the details that drew the most attention from those who followed the case in the period between 2013 and 2016 was the content of the handwritten notes found in the lockbox. The notes contained a series of references that seemed to gesture toward some prior history — connections that investigators could not make.
The name “Ben Perkins” appeared. Law enforcement located a lawyer by that name. The man they found had been disbarred in 1989 — a detail that aligned, in terms of timing, with the period when Kimberly McLean had been becoming Lori Kennedy. He did not recall ever having represented anyone connected to the case, and investigators found no documented connection between him and the woman they were trying to identify.
The notation “402 months” — which works out to approximately thirty-three and a half years — did not correspond to any obvious legal or institutional reference that investigators could confirm. Speculation suggested it might refer to a prison sentence (though no associated name or case number was found), a debt, a contract term, or some other quantity measured in months for reasons that were personally significant to the woman who wrote it. No interpretation was confirmed.
The reference to “North Hollywood police” was similarly inconclusive. The North Hollywood Police Division in Los Angeles has jurisdiction over part of the San Fernando Valley. Whether the notation referred to a contact, a report, a record, or something else entirely was not established.
The mail-forwarding arrangement through Boulder City, Nevada, was documented but not fully explained. A P.O. box in Nevada forwarding mail to a Dallas address was a common method for someone who moved frequently or who wanted an additional layer of geographic privacy. It fit the pattern of someone who had established practical systems for maintaining privacy, but it did not by itself explain what she had been protecting.