Stalked by Shadow People

I received a request from a reader who has an interest in personal experiences with 'Shadow People'. I decided to peruse my archives and post the most interesting accounts I've received from other readers over the years:

Shadow people are some of the most menacing and frightening entities around. I believe they are of a demonic nature. Not only do these dark shadowy figures cause anxiety and terror but often enjoy terrorizing people in their beds. Most shadow people are not alone but have partners in crime. The shadows that terrorized me were never alone. Sometimes my bedroom would be filled with dozens, big and small. Some could touch me. These shadows would pinch me. It wasn't till I was maybe about age 9 that I finally told my parents about these entities and it caused quite a stir in my family. As usual my parents thought I was suffering from nightmares and suggested I eat less before bed time.

Without fail these Shadows returned every night. It wasn't until one night I couldn't stand hearing their laughter that I resisted their powers to make people catatonic or in a paralyzed state that the reality of the situation was no longer a joke to my Mother as my bed began to shake violently as if a giant hand was shaking it. I jumped out of bed and ran so fast that I don't even remember running to my Mom's room. I jumped on her bed in the dark and her bed started shaking too. She held me in her arms as she prayed out loud to God and slowly the shaking resided. By the end of the month we moved out of that home.

Now this is what I gathered from that experience. One; That house was extremely old. I don't know if that had anything to do with it. But there was a bad vibe there from day one. A lot of crazy things happened there with my family fighting all the time. Never in the history of my family had there been soo many arguments and cases of domestic violence and abuse. Two; besides fights and arguments there was a vibe of mischievousness. When I played in that house it was almost as if all of us were in some kind of altered state, like some kind of dimensional trance. A good example of this was the movie ET where the kid gets aroused in the class room and he starts releasing the frogs. Yeah! I can't remember the whole thing. Let's just put it this way, I guess I went through intense puberty there. I remember having bad thoughts all the time. I remember my best friend Diana flirting with me and acting mature, but only in the house. When we played outside she was a normal kid. I swear this house had some effect on people's feelings and whatnot. The strange thing is that I don't remember much of my childhood in the house as I remembered most of my childhood in school or playing outside. I remember being cruel to my pets. I was never like that but I became a bad kid in the house. Outside I was quite normal.

The strange thing is that we moved about 5 blocks away from that house into a new apartment and I thought things were back to being normal for almost half a year with no incidents. No fights between Mom and Dad, when we all got together it was fun again. I noticed it right away the vibe change. I noticed that the old house was really dark inside. Half a year passed when I had my last incident one night.

It was early, maybe 2:30am I had woke up to use the restroom and I was maybe about 10 years old. I remember laying down in the bed and getting comfortable when I felt my bed got shoved from one side. At first I stood still as I thought maybe it was an earthquake. It passed and I played it off as just my imagination. As I began to fall asleep I had the sensation of being cold and clammy so I covered up. I felt feverish and I felt a small pinch on one of my toes. I became frightened as I looked around in the dark and saw 3 black outlines around my bed. The Shadows were back!

I became paralyzed as I screamed for help, I'm still not sure if I did try but nothing came out or if I imagined screaming out. The point is, I was freaking screaming! I felt some cold weight on my chest as I became face to face with one of these entities. Still paralyzed it looked me right in the eye and this is what I saw. It's eyes were black as black velvet and evil looking, but the outside rim of it's eyes was black line yellow line, black line yellow line all around the outside perimeter of it's eye in a pattern and it moved counter clockwise motion. It's two other Shadow friends had red and the other full yellow eyes. It was unreal as they all burst out in this wicked laughter and vanished and never bothered me like that again.

Shadow people can move objects and touch people. I believe they can physically hurt people. There are theories that Shadow people are alien beings. Some claim they are travelers from a different dimensional plane. Professor Stephen W. Hawkings has talked about shadow people being a real possible phenomena. Millions of people have had similar experiences and even video footage, photos of this phenomena. You are not alone, but the best we can do is share our experience and hope to learn as much as we can about this. I'm sorry about the sloppiness of my writing and spelling but hope that you can have a heads up to this strange phenomena. Good luck..Carlos

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Shadow People, Poltergeists or Demons?

My experiences took place in the early 80's in Toronto, Canada, and just like the fellow writing of his experiences on your site, mine also took place in a very old house. The house then was at least 75 yrs old and has since been razed to the ground and a brand new structure built in its place. When my family moved in there we experienced the same sort of events, arguments, abusive situations, strange phenomena but not to the point where we all noticed it right away. In fact my younger brother was a skeptic up to the point where things began happening to him as well. I think he took this attitude to allay the fears he must have had. Our father moved out of the house after the first year and away to another part of the country so just the three of us were left. At one point we had family come and live with us before they too departed.

My experiences began with an event I will never forget when I was 16. It was summer and I had difficulty sleeping. This went on for one month approximately. Then one night I had fallen into a light sleep when I was violently awakened. I recall hearing a sound that I thought was an explosion and thinking that our stove must have exploded in the kitchen below me. I opened my eyes and looked around the room in the darkness but saw nothing to indicate anything was happening. Suddenly my bed began to shake violently up and down and it felt as though I was being electrocuted through my solar plexus. I couldn't move but I could see my feet moving as the bed was jumping up and down. Some objects rose up off my dresser and shot towards the bed I thought they would hit me as they approached with such speed. In fact they stopped suddenly and began to swirl around in a counter clockwise direction above me and from the center of this swirl a bright white light appeared and some voices which were like high pitched shrieks or nails on a black board said quite clearly. "The message we bring is to tell the people he is still alive." And then everything stopped suddenly. I was terrified and basically thought I would end up in a nut house. I remember shaking from fear so much I could barely get out of bed. I made my way to my mom's room to tell her about it at which point she assured me I was having nightmares. Say your prayers and go back to sleep she said. I returned to my room after an hour or more but I couldn't sleep. It was a long time before I could sleep there in fact.

The next event happened the following January. I was coming home very late one night and decided to take the short cut through the alley way by our street. I passed a parked van with windows all around and I saw a movement in the van which made me feel somehow by its shape, size and response that it was doberman someone had left outside in their van. I kept walking but the thought pestered me that someone should leave their dog out in mid winter in the night. So I went back to the van cautiously peering in but there was nothing at all. Not even a cushion or anything hanging from the ceiling. Ok I thought I guess I imagined it. I happily kept walking home and when I was in the alley I suddenly heard footsteps behind me in the snow. I got a little freaked out and when I turned my head I didn't see anyone there. As I got to the end of the alleyway and turned onto my street I looked back to the entrance to see if anyone was following me. What I saw shocked and terrified me. There was a streetlight right at the corner and in the pool of its light was standing this enormous creature. It was at least 8 feet tall and huge. What struck me was that its form was completely black, there were no reflective surfaces on it whatsoever. In fact the light was shining directly on it and it seemed to absorb that light. It had large things on its head which I took to be horns or ears and its fingers ended in points like claws and the feet as well. Its eyes were red completely and staring right at me. I don't think my feet touched the ground I ran so fast.

After that experience I had a few others with the same creature. Another night I came home late again and I fell onto my bed after shutting the door just wanting to fall asleep. My cat was in the bed with me when we both heard a voice laughing in the room. A masculine voice. My cat freaked out and ran to the door scratching and miaowing loudly to get out ,I opened the door and she took off. I just didn't want to believe anything was in there with me so I pointedly turned my back to the rest of the room and went to sleep. Another night I turned over and opened my eyes early in the morning and there was the same creature , smaller though, standing in front of my closet staring at me. I recall I got really mad and told it to eff off and turned around and went back to sleep. Meanwhile my brother had seen the exact same creature but his had yellow eyes. He confided the story to me years later when we had left the house and had no knowledge of my experiences. He told me he had awakened early one morning and found that he had left the light on in his room, thinking that he should get up and turn it off he turned onto his back and opened his eyes and there sitting on his bed's headboard was the same creature, talons on feet and hands, completely black with no reflective surfaces, but his was he said about 4 ft tall and squatting on the headboard staring at him with yellow eyes. He said he was terrified and decided not to turn off the light after all. I don't remember if he said it vanished quickly or if he shut his eyes and when he opened them it was gone. He said he never saw it again but had other strange experiences in that house.

One day we decided that we should trade rooms. So I moved all my stuff out to his room and vice versa. I teased him and said he'd have to share my room with a visitor but he was disbelieving. After I had moved to his room I had my last experience in that house that was in the shadow people realm. I woke up one night to a sound in my room like rustling. I was wide awake because I thought it might be a mouse. I switched on my lamp and looked toward the other end of the room but seeing and hearing nothing I lay down again with the light still on. I turned to look at the clock and saw that it was 2:20 am then I saw these two large globes of light beyond my night stand. I was frozen up on one elbow because I had been about to turn out my light again. They moved in a way that reminded me of balloons falling. The larger of the two was golden yellow in colour and the smaller was blue. They looked like spheres lit from within and emanating a misty light from their forms. I somehow could sense that they were intelligent. They knew that I was looking at them and they wanted me to see. The larger golden one floated almost majestically to the door whereupon it flattened to a pancake shape in under half a second and slipped under the door. The second smaller one followed along and did the same. I was very nervous and scared at that point but only because I had to go to the bathroom and this meant I had to go out into the hallway where they had vanished to. Our hallway was very dark and without a proper light as the house was old and not renovated very well. I waited for as long as I could which was about 15 minutes and then I cautiously opened my door and went. The hallway was pitch black so my plan was to inch my way to the bathroom with my back to the wall so nothing could sneak up on me and once I got there I could turn on the bathroom light to illuminate the hallway. I followed my plan through and as it turned out when I turned on the bathroom light it shone down onto the stairs and the first landing. In the light were two shadow people. I've only ever thought of them that way because there was no other way to describe them. They looked like shadows, only they were in the light. They didn't look like the other creatures I had seen, in fact they looked like people in the sense that they had a head and arms and legs and torso and hands. They threw up their hands as though in surprise, like I'd caught them unexpectedly and then they flew down the stairs without a sound. It took me a long time to come out of that bathroom as I didn't want to encounter any of these things again.

Unlike your other poster, these creatures never touched me, at least to my knowledge and never tried to hurt me. Although they did scare the dickens out of me. I recall telling these stories to people years later in other parts of the world and hearing similar tales and wondering just what they could be. Somehow we don't seem that much closer to knowing. I would conjecture though that as is the case with plant and insect life here we certainly haven't got all the facts in yet. Perhaps these creatures share the world we live in but in a different way and we have learned to ignore them or pretend they don't exist. Maybe they are trying to tell us they do exist. Perhaps like us there are those with good intenetions and those with not so good intentions. Its my opinion that we are getting closer to the truth everyday.

A side note here: I read a book a year ago called 'Initiation' by Elizabeth Haich in which she distinctly mentions the shadow people and the effects they caused in the lives of people she knew including her own son prior to WWII. If this is true then perhaps these are beings who've been with us for a very long time. Then again if they are time travellers then all things are possible.

Sincerely, Pema

Spiritual / Paranormal Activity News: Baltimore's Original Investigator, Human Prediposition and the Clown Statue

Seeking out the supernatural in Baltimore

In December 1975, George and Kathy Lutz moved into a large house in Amityville, Long Island with their three children. Less than a month later, they fled from the house in a rush, leaving all their possessions behind. Throughout their brief stay there, they saw objects levitate, walls bleed and family members transform before their eyes.

The last night in the house they attempted an exorcism. Family members have subsequently refused to describe what followed the home-grown religious procedure, describing the events as "too frightening."

The Lutz's story entered mainstream culture when a popular book (The Amityville Horror: A True Story) and the subsequent film were released based on their experiences. Throughout the decades since publication, critics have repeatedly slammed the validity of the paranormal aspects of this "true story."

But Metropolitan Archbishop Daniel Romanos, a resident of Hopkins-owned apartment housing in Charles Village, is a true believer.

"Most of the things that you see on the screen actually occur," he said. "Just not all at once in the same place."

Romanos is a skinny man with a long gray beard with patches of color which flow into a goatee. His hair is done up in a long pigtail which snakes down the back of his shirt. He dresses in all black with the white of a priest's collar poking out at the bottom of his neck.

Growing up in Greek City, Baltimore, Romanos saw "flashes" - of people, of ghosts, of spirits.

"I believe children are more attuned to spiritual things," he said. "When we get older, we convince ourselves that nothing is there so no one will think we're crazy."

His interest in the occult only intensified after his mother took him to see Dr. Hans Holzer, an Austrian born paranormal researcher who served as a formal investigator on the Amityville case.

Later interactions with television documentaries (including In Search of . . . hosted by Leonard Nimoy) and magazine articles cemented his interest in the supernatural.

He says he graduated from high school early (he was only 15) and started Gargoyles Paranormal Investigations in 1984 - it has been running ever since.

"The mid 1980s was a time when there was a lot of talk about teenage satanic cults. So I was very active," he said. "I would attempt to give my so-called 'expertise' on the matter - which was more, in that time, than strictly supernatural. More along the lines of cults, graffiti on churches, that sort of thing."

Today, he is investigating the case of the "Mysterious Musician," a friendly ghost (although he is quick to disassociate it from Caspar) who has been known to play the piano at the Baltimore Theatre Project, a fringe theatre located on 45 West Preston Street.

He begins by noting that the large warehouse building which has been revamped for theater use was once the headquarters for a chapter of the Improved Order of Heptasophs (IOH), a fraternal organization from the early 19th century.

"There would have been a man with a sword at the entrance," Romanos said. "And as I understand it, the initiation sequences were pretty extreme."

Stained glass windows emblazoned with IOH acronyms still line the theatre, and the letters IOH are literally built into the ceiling, above the catwalk.

Romanos asks an official a few questions regarding the alleged spirit: Are there any unusual cold spots? Any reports of objects moving or levitating? Has anyone ever been murdered violently on the premises?

After a steady series of "no's" from the skeptical tour guide, Romanos sets about investigating the piano which reportedly is still visited by a musician from the early 1920s.

For the most part, Romanos eschews modern ghost hunting equipment, the likes of which can be seen on Ghost Hunters or other, more mainstream, ghost hunting media.

"I prefer to keep it spiritual, to reach out with my hands and my soul," he said.

The last person who heard the Mysterious Musician play left the theatre in 2000. Romanos inspects the piano, feeling for cold spots and trying to spiritually "feel" the presence of a supernatural force. Despite saying that he had the distinct impression of something "off" as he walked into the room housing the piano, Romanos eventually concludes, given the lack of spiritual or physical indicators and the sheer length of time since the last sighting, that this spirit had moved on to the "other side."

Today, Romanos knew that the spirit would be benign. When he suspects the spirit might be hostile, he comes prepared.

"When it is a negative entity I am called to deal with, I bring a few items," he said. "Holy water, anointing oil and crucifix, things of that sort."

And, according to Romanos, some of the legends surrounding ghosts and demonic spirits are devastatingly true.

"Since I have become a priest of my church, I have been called in on cases of very negative entities and things that have required - or I believe required - an exorcism," he said. "I had a case a few years ago where a lamp levitated a full three feet off of a table and threw itself at my head - and a lady who was there with me turned and told me: 'It doesn't like you.'"

When an alleged negative force invades a house (be they the spirits of deceased humans or demonic entities), Romanos turns to the writings of St. Basil the Great, who was a saint of the Greek Church and is recognized by the Roman-Catholic Church.

"[St. Basil] wrote prayers of exorcism and I [chant them]," he said. "An exorcism is just a prayer, a call to God to free the person or the building or whatever from the negative entities which are inhabiting it."

The Mother Virgin Mary is the strongest force to call upon against negative entities, according to Romanos, and the most dangerous type of spiritual infestation is that of a demon from another plane of existence.

"Demonic spirits, I believe from my experience, are more likely to constantly torture a person in various ways, in a form of spiritual-psychological warfare, you may say," he said. "But actual possession does occur.

"There are a few cases where [a person] is beyond repair - when a person is what we call 'perfectly possessed,'" he said. "That's a person who has willingly and completely invited demonic spirits into their body. This can happen to a person who is spiritually Satanist or [a] Devil Worshipper, or someone who wanted to sell their soul - and that is the only case where I believe a person could not be saved.

"I believe that Adolf Hitler was perfectly possessed."

Romanos draws many of his beliefs from the Book of Enoch, a non-canonical scripture from about 300 BCE.

"Its revelations were a bit too much for most people to take," he said. "The fallen angels themselves actually came down to earth and married human women. Perhaps one of the reasons that angels fell is because they wanted to experience things that human beings experiences - and they've found cases of demonic spirits that prey sexually on human beings."

But if demonic possession is possible, as Romanos asserts it is, then is our entire world at risk from an "invasion" from another plane of existence?

"It's definitely possible. The prophesy of Enoch is that the fallen angels will return to Earth one day," he said. "I'm not a fundamentalist and don't take it all literally, but spiritually I'd say it's very possible.

"There have been times in history when there were wars or other tragic events when evil has really been wholesale - and then I believe that could be a time when there could be an invasion, so to speak."

Perhaps there will be an invasion one day, but it isn't today - and after Romanos finishes his investigation, he leaves the Baltimore Theatre Project.

"My church takes up most of my time," he said. "But Gargoyle's Paranormal Investigations will continue to accept cases." - jhunewsletter

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Phrenology: August 1926

By 1926, phrenology, which sought to explain personality through the physical dimensions of the skull, was so disreputable that we couldn't publish this article without mentioning that "though scientists generally do not endorse it, the subject always has fascinated the layman." The writer of this article, William J. White, Jr., was a phrenology enthusiast who compared the brain to a business with 42 departments. Each section the brain corresponded to a section of the skull so that you could judge a person's character and capabilities by rubbing his skull.

Since the region of Individuality is on the bottom of your forehead, you could discern a strong personality by the top of the person's nose. To support his case, White pointed out how people have personality quirks despite being normal in every other aspect. If an otherwise rational person possesses hypochondriac tendencies, it's reasonable to assume that one of his 42 mental departments has shut down. - popsci

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The Clown Statue

“I have this friend of a friend who used to babysit as a teenager. Her clients were pretty wealthy and live in this absolutely huge house out near the country, on the outskirts of the town they live in. I think she’s a doctor and he’s a partner at some law firm, so we are talking huge income. It’s really nice out there, peaceful, but a bit out of the way.

The house is a bit ridiculous; an unbelievable number of rooms. You can easily get lost in the place. They’re a bit anal, especially about the house. They have a large number of inherited family heirlooms lying around the place, and the father is quite the ‘no nonsense’ father, if you know what I mean?

Anyway, this one night they go out for some posh-do dinner party and leave this girl to look after the kids. As I said, he’s pretty anal and doesn’t want her wandering around the house where she might damage some antiquated piece of armour or whatever, so he says she has to stay in this one reception room. It has a kitchen attached to it and has this huge screen TV, so it’s fully decked out to keep her entertained.

So they leave and, being a strict household, they soon obediently go to bed. She takes up residence in this specially designated room and starts watching TV, making herself a snack and what not. Before long she starts to feel uncomfortable. There, in the corner of the room, is this ugly, bulky clown statue. It looks like some grotesque antique piece from the 20’s or around that period and it’s all grimy, covered in what looks like oil.

She can’t help getting the feeling it’s watching her. It’s been said that we have this inbuilt ability to sense being watched, but it is not uncommon for it to play tricks on you. She tried to ignore it, but she can’t shake the sense that those eyes are burning into her. In the end she relents and takes her phone to the toilet in the hall outside. In her head she was telling herself that she’s insane, thinking the statue can hear her, what a ridiculous thought, but she leaves anyway.

‘Hey. It’s Sarah. Look, I’m really sorry to call you up like this but that clown statue you have in the reception room, it’s really making me uncomfortable. Would it be ok to move to another room or just stick a blanket over the thing of something?’

After a long pause he replies.

‘Okay Sarah, I need you to get the children from the room, get them into your car and take them to the nearest house. When you are there, call the police.’

I think it’s safe to say after hearing ‘call the police’ you aren’t about to ask questions. She grabbed the kids and ran.

It turns out the kids had complained of a clown had been watching them sleep in their room. The father put it down to silly stories and had basically disregarded what they had said until the babysitter had seen the thing too. Apparently a Psychiatric Unit had closed down recently in the area and not everyone had stable places to go. The story goes that the police seemed to try and hide their concern, though not very well after hearing the mention of a clown costume before heading over to the house. After a thorough search of the building, they failed to find the clown. It turns out that the patient had been treated for vivid and dangerous fantasies prior to release, but had not been able to complete his course before the closure of the unit.

They didn’t catch him.”

The fear of clowns, or Coulrophobia, is a relatively widespread fear, and relates back to the famous Stephen King novel, It, in which seven children are terrorized by an entity that mainly appears in the form of ‘Pennywise the Dancing Clown.’ The twisted smiles and make up of clowns have come so much more to represent twisted and insane evil over the innocent child’s entertainer in recent years, most famously in Batman’s arch-nemesis, the psychopathic Joker. It is perhaps the mask and facade of innocence that the make-up represents that makes the clown so scary.

There is also the link with pedophilia or sexual assault. This Urban Legend is terrifying for babysitters, playing on the fear of intruders, both as the invader that they are supposed to protect the children from, as well as being a potential threat to the babysitter herself. There are variations of the tale that both pose most threat to the children, or to the sitter. Either way, this is an Urban Legend that has haunted babysitters for years and deserves a place as one of the scariest of the Urban Legends.

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Coincidence? Lights Go Out While El Paso County Commissioners Talk About Ghost

During a discussion whether to allow a paranormal study to be conducted at the El Paso County Courthouse on Monday, the lights inside the building went out.

On the agenda, the County Commissioners’ court was to decide if they would allow a group of ghost hunters to investigate paranormal activity at the courthouse after hours.

The item came up around 11:20 a.m. at the courthouse located at 500 E. San Antonio Ave.

After the lights turned off commissioners agreed to allow GHOST-EP.

The study will be performed at no cost.

According to GHOST –EP's Facebook page, the group captures many types of phenomena by collecting evidence using a scientific method. All investigations according to the GHOST-EP will be held in a series of three nights and days. - kfoxtv

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Humans 'predisposed' to believe in gods and the afterlife

A three-year international research project, directed by two academics at the University of Oxford, finds that humans have natural tendencies to believe in gods and an afterlife.

The £1.9 million project involved 57 researchers who conducted over 40 separate studies in 20 countries representing a diverse range of cultures. The studies (both analytical and empirical) conclude that humans are predisposed to believe in gods and an afterlife, and that both theology and atheism are reasoned responses to what is a basic impulse of the human mind.

The researchers point out that the project was not setting out to prove the existence of god or otherwise, but sought to find out whether concepts such as gods and an afterlife appear to be entirely taught or basic expressions of human nature.

'The Cognition, Religion and Theology Project’ led by Dr. Justin Barrett, from the Centre for Anthropology and Mind at Oxford University, drew on research from a range of disciplines, including anthropology, psychology, philosophy, and theology. They directed an international body of researchers conducting studies in 20 different countries that represented both traditionally religious and atheist societies.

The findings are due to be published in two separate books by psychologist Dr. Barrett in Cognitive Science, Religion and Theology and Born Believers: The Science of Childhood Religion.

Project Co-director Professor Roger Trigg, from the Ian Ramsey Centre in the Theology Faculty at Oxford University, has also written a forthcoming book, applying the wider implications of the research to issues about freedom of religion in Equality, Freedom and Religion (OUP).

Main findings of the Cognition, Religion and Theology Project:

• Studies by Emily Reed Burdett and Justin Barrett, from the University of Oxford, suggest that children below the age of five find it easier to believe in some superhuman properties than to understand similar human limitations. Children were asked whether their mother would know the contents of a box in which she could not see. Children aged three believed that their mother and God would always know the contents, but by the age of four, children start to understand that their mothers are not all-seeing and all knowing. However, children may continue to believe in all-seeing, all-knowing supernatural agents, such as a god or gods.

• Deborah Kelemen from Boston University finds both children and adults imbue the natural world with ‘purpose’. For instance, respondents were provided with three possible answers to the question of why polar bears are white. Adult respondents, who were obliged to supply answers quickly without time to think, instinctively gave answers that implied ‘purpose’ in the natural world. They would reply that polar bears were white for reasons of camouflage, rather than the more scientifically accurate mechanistic explanation that a polar bear fur lacks pigment, or the silly answer that polar bears have been bleached by the sun. However, if the respondents were given more time to answer, they opted for a ‘mechanistic’ response i.e. that polar bears did not have pigment. The researchers conclude that the immediate, instinctive response was over-ridden by a scientific, reasoned response if participants had time to reflect. This research extends Kelemen’s previous research showing that children prefer purpose-based explanations: children were asked why rocks were pointed and were also found to choose answers that implied purpose, saying that rocks were pointed so the birds could sit on them.

• Experiments involving adults, conducted by Jing Zhu from Tsinghua University (China), and Natalie Emmons and Jesse Bering from The Queen’s University, Belfast, suggest that people across many different cultures instinctively believe that some part of their mind, soul or spirit lives on after-death. The studies demonstrate that people are natural 'dualists' finding it easy to conceive of the separation of the mind and the body.

Project Director Dr. Justin Barrett, from the University of Oxford’s Centre for Anthropology and Mind, said: "This project does not set out to prove god or gods exist. Just because we find it easier to think in a particular way does not mean that it is true in fact. If we look at why religious beliefs and practices persist in societies across the world, we conclude that individuals bound by religious ties might be more likely to cooperate as societies. Interestingly, we found that religion is less likely to thrive in populations living in cities in developed nations where there is already a strong social support network."

Project Co-Director Professor Roger Trigg, from the University of Oxford’s Ian Ramsey Centre, said: "This project suggests that religion is not just something for a peculiar few to do on Sundays instead of playing golf. We have gathered a body of evidence that suggests that religion is a common fact of human nature across different societies. This suggests that attempts to suppress religion are likely to be short-lived as human thought seems to be rooted to religious concepts, such as the existence of supernatural agents or gods, and the possibility of an afterlife or pre-life." - physorg

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THIS WEEK'S SPIRITUAL / PARANORMAL ACTIVITY LINKS

Stephen Hawking: 'There is no heaven; it's a fairy story'

Reincarnation: Believing in second chances

The Poltergeist Phenomenon

Mysterious Church Yard

Are Paranormal Personal Experiences Helpful?

A terrifying entity tears through man’s chest

Phantom Footsteps

Shadow People: What you need to know

The Nine Gates of Hell

"2012" and Electromagnetic Effects on Consciousness

The 100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People

Old Bryce Hospital for the Insane

Psychic detective tells his life story

Tales of the Unquiet Dead

The Astral Plane: A young man’s discovery of astral projection

Visions of Our Youth: Children, Early Memories, and the Unexplained

4 ghost hunters charged with trespassing in Maine

Paranormal Team Investigates The Old County Courthouse

Gossip influences our vision to protect us

Do Ghosts Haunt Mission Viejo?

'Haunted' building spooks KTVB reporter

The Shadow Knows: Thomas Drake, NSA, and SECRET Psychic Espionage

The Curse of Stull Cemetery

Demons take over Mdzimba High

Toyshop owner refuses to sell Harry Potter goods over fears they turn children to the occult

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The San Pedro Poltergeist

'Jackie Hernandez' during the investigation

One of the more infamous haunting investigations was the San Pedro Haunting or the Jackie Hernandez case. Dr. Barry Taff got involved in the case, along with cameraman Barry Conrad, in 1989 when he was asked to look into a house in San Pedro, California that was allegedly being haunted. The owner of the house was Jackie Hernandez, a young woman who also had some emotional problems in the past.

Recent images of the San Pedro, CA poltergeist house

The investigators were told of strange smells, unexplained sounds, moving objects, apparitions, a glowing cloud that tried to suffocate her (and which had appeared in front of other witnesses) and actually witnessed a peculiar, dripping substance dripping from the kitchen cabinets.

Barry Conrad hanging from a cord attached to a nail in the attic. This was the result of an attack by the entity

The events in the house grew stronger and even followed Jackie from place to place. Taff began to believe that she was creating the phenomena unconsciously because of her emotional problems and what became a strong romantic attachment to Barry Conrad. It seemed that anyone who might be perceived as threat to Jackie’s relationship with Barry ended up on the end of a violent attack by the poltergeist.

However, there are problems with the theory that this was strictly a haunting brought on by living subject. The unexplained lights are certainly odd and so would be the reports of male apparitions from witnesses. Also, as Taff found out later, Jackie’s house continued to be reported as haunted long after she moved out. According to the owners, no subsequent tenants stayed there for longer than 6 months. Could this be merely some residual from Jackie’s presence there or was there really a bonifide malevolent spirit?

Here is a link to a recent interview with Barry Conrad: 3-18-11 - San Pedro Haunting & Open Lines - Barry Conrad


Click for video

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Here is another brief version of the investigation:

On the night of August 8, 1989, Barry Conrad along with friend and photographer Jeff Wheatcraft, and Dr. Barry Taff, formerly with UCLA’s parapsychology lab and principal investigator of the now famous “Entity” case, would be witness to some of the most compelling and disturbing paranormal activity. Hernandez had told them stories of flying lamps, oozing blood-like gelatin from the walls, an apparition of a decaying old man, an invisible force that would hold her down as though trying to smother her, as well as a floating disembodied head in her attic. So before they left that evening Conrad suggested that Wheatcraft check out the attic. Not long after crawling through the small hole in the ceiling, Jeff’s camera was ripped from his hands into the darkness of the attic. Expectedly, quite shaken he bolted from the attic. Later he would venture back up into the attic in hopes of retrieving the camera. As he searched the empty attic he found an old dusty grape box, which when opened contained his camera, but strangely no lens. Continuing his search he found the surprisingly undamaged lens behind the trap door to the attic. Jeff decided to see if he could get a couple more shots before leaving. But as he began shooting a foul stench began to permeate the attic and without warning he was shoved by an invisible hand into the rafters. And this wasn’t the worst of the activity.

A month later on September 4th, they would be called back by a frantic Jackie Hernandez. The activity was escalating and getting more violent. Arriving around 1am, Jeff and friend Gary decided they should investigate the attic again. Jeff would pay for it, as he was attacked more brutally than the first encounter. Conrad down below with Hernandez heard a loud moan, it was Jeff. Something had grabbed Jeff by the neck and pulled him into the rafters. Somehow able to pull himself free, Jeff and Gary exited the attic. It was then that they all noticed an old cord wrapped around Jeffs neck. It was then that Gary explained that he actually had to pull Jeff off a nail in the rafter and if he hadn’t been there Jeff might have been strangled to death. But there was a plus to the attack, Gary snapped off a photo at the precise moment of the entity yanking Jeff into the rafters.

Jackie Hernandez would eventually move out of the house after the activity became so dangerous that she felt her children were in danger.

NOTE: I attempted to contact the current occupants of the house....no dice. I can understand their reluctance to comment...Lon

'The Entity' Investigation - Culver City, CA - 1974

A recent photograph of the house on 11547 Braddock Drive (2011)

On August 22, 1974 at 11547 Braddock Drive in Culver City, California an investigation began that was to be like no other that parapsychologists Kerry Gaynor and Barry Taff had ever experienced. "At the time I had a colleague named Barry Taff," said Gaynor. “We were working under the auspices of Dr. Thelma Moss, but Barry and I did most of the research on this case.” Believing that this would be an open and shut case they journeyed to Doris Bither’s house with few expectations.

While in a bookstore, Kerry Gaynor and Barry Taff were overheard talking about the paranormal when a woman approached and mentioned to them that her house was haunted. She gave Gaynor a few details of the haunting, in which Gaynor told her that he would discuss this with his associate. Gaynor and Taff made an appointment to meet at her home to discuss her situation.

Parapsychologist Kerry Gaynor 

Doris Bither, a petite thirtysomething woman, greeted them at her door. Bither lived in the small house with her six year-old daughter and her three sons, ages ten, thirteen and sixteen. The house was in squalor with substandard living conditions and had twice been condemned by the city. There was also an uneasy relationship between the mother and her sons, especially by the eldest. It seemed they harbored dark resentment towards their mother, most likely as a result of their living conditions. Young minds unconsciously troubled by physical and/or verbal abusive and in a negative environment are lightning rods for paranormal activity that can manifest into psychosomatic or poltergeist activity.

Gaynor said that during the initial meeting a two-hour interview was conducted. Gaynor realized fairly soon that she was holding something back. “I kept pushing her," said Gaynor. "Finally she said that a ghost had raped and beat her. Barry and I laughed when we left her home, and I thought she was probably off her rocker. But she called me back a few days later and said that several people visiting her had seen an apparition. This is what we're always looking for...independent verification of the phenomena. I'm a scientist and that's how I approach it. I don't take their stories at face value. Their story is the beginning and I don't discount it, but I'm there to experience the phenomena and document it."

Recent photo of Dr. Barry Taff

During the second visit by Gaynor and Taff, it was starting to become apparent that this was not a simple haunting. Doris claimed that spirits would physically attack her, either bumping into the ghosts while walking through the house or actual spectral rape on occasion. Gaynor and Taff were still skeptical of these claims until they saw the dark bruises on her inner thighs and over much of her body. Doris’ eldest son did admit to seeing his mother being tossed around the room. In one instance he tried to intervene and was thrown across the room by the unseen force. Doris claimed that the spectres were Asian men and that the children had also witnessed the manifestations. The sightings were so frequent that the children dubbed one of the more prominent spirits as “Mr. Whose-it.” People outside the family corroborated through testimony that they had also seen apparitions. Gaynor and Taff did witness some visual phenomena. "We were seeing little pops of light," said Gaynor. "It would happen quickly. We would try to shoot the camera, but they were happening too quickly and we just couldn't catch them. We were shooting with a Polaroid and with a 35mm camera."

How could these investigators prove “spectral rape” or even claim it? The team decided to setup at the location and brought in high-speed cameras and photographers as well as other investigators to help capture something on tape. In the report, all the investigators and equipment, as well as Doris, were in her small bedroom. Uncomfortable and anxious to see any paranormal activity, they decided to have Doris call out to the spirits. Doris began swearing and yelling at the spirits while the investigators hoped for any evidence. Very soon small lights started to manifest throughout the room. As Doris continued to bait the entities, a greenish mist started to form in a corner. The green mist started swirling and growing quickly forming a visible upper torso of a man...very large and defined with muscles was reported. One of the investigators fainted after witnessing the manifestation. Unfortunately, none of the equipment was able to capture the definition of the form, only free floating arcs of light.

The most famous of these photographs is the one that shows Doris sitting on a bed, investigators surrounding her and the free floating arc of light in the middle of the picture. The arc of light appears smooth, even though this is a room with corners and one would expect bends in the arc as when someone uses a projector to display an image and the image hits corners in a room. If this were the case, the image would bend. The photographic evidence produce by the team shows the arc of light floating above Doris with no bends, even though behind it is the room’s corner.

There was also more common poltergeist activity noted during the investigation. “I was standing in the kitchen talking to the woman's 16 year-old son when a lower cabinet door slammed open and a pan came flying out," said Gaynor. “It flew out and landed about three or four feet from the cabinet. I immediately tore the cabinet apart to see if there were any tricks, or if anyone was hiding in the cabinets. But there was nothing.” Not long after this occurred Doris screamed, “it's in the bedroom.” Gaynor explains “we ran in there and that's when all the lights started happening. That's when we got the Polaroid shots. Again Doris shouted, 'the ghost is in the comer'. We snapped the picture, but it was bleached out and not very interesting. She shouted again, 'it's in the corner' and again the photo was bleached. At this point, I thought the camera wasn't working. So I took two control pictures. I asked her if the ghost was gone. She said yes. The picture came out perfectly. A few seconds later I took another one….perfect picture. But then we got the most interesting Polaroid. Doris said, 'It is right in front of my face.' Those were her exact words. So we took a shot. And in the photo you can see the curtains and the buttons on her dress, but her whole face is obliterated. We took a second picture when she once again said, 'it's right in front of my face.' Amazingly, her face was obliterated again, but you could see details in the rest of the picture.”

The investigative team observed lights and poltergeist activity for about two and a half months. As time went by, the activities decreased. Doris was attacked about 15 times during the ten-week investigation. "But she got stronger," said Gaynor. "And she was able to realize that she wasn't crazy and that there really was something going on. She got stronger, and in my opinion, she outlasted it." Doris moved five times, but the attacking entity followed her. She eventually moved further away. "As she moved," Gaynor said, "the phenomena diminished, and after about two years the attacks stopped altogether.”

Regardless of the evidence a few factors must be pointed out. Barry Taff notes that Doris moved from Culver City to Carson, CA. Then from Carson to San Bernadino, CA , then from San Bernadino to Texas. She eventually found her way back to San Bernardino. Doris reported that the phenomenon followed her and the family to every place they moved. This seems to support the theory that the poltergeist activity was a manifestation of the unstable environment and diseased mind. Doris was addicted to alcohol and she was very abusive and belligerent on a daily basis. Her refusal to deal with her own personal issues intensified negative energy in the home that eventually manifested as poltergeist activity. According to the reports paranormal activity was more intense ONLY when Doris was present in the home. Doris’ intoxication would attract the desired phenomena. It was also noted there were times when Doris was present with the team and sober. As expected the activity did not manifest during these periods. Because of the negative energy provided by Doris’ addiction and temperament combined with the resentment of her son’s towards her because of the abuse and poor living conditions it is rather easy to see why dark entities were attracted to the location.

NOTE: According to her son, Brian Harris, Doris McGowan Bither had a very turbulent upbringing. Both her parents were alcoholics and were not suited in providing a well-rounded environment for a child even though she was raised in an upper middle-class family. Harris states, “living in that home was hell.”

“…we all experienced some form of attack.” “…there were about 4 entities in the home, and they made themselves known by appearing all the time.” “…we were so used to the poltergeist, that we just got to a point where we wouldn’t even care.” Harris continues, “The rapes were real. My room was right next door to my mother’s. I would hear the attacks happening. Things being thrown and her screaming.” “…she would come out of the bedroom and have all these bruises on her legs, her inner thighs.”“…there were times where we would see it happen in front of us. It was like if a man was standing in front of my mother and would start to beat her. You could see her being picked up and thrown around. Sounds of slaps…but there was no one there to actually do it.”

Actress Barbara Hershey played the role of Carla Moran in the Hollywood film version of "The Entity"

Harris disagrees with many of the assessments made by the investigation team as well as how they were treated. “…well it was hell. Between Barry’s team of 30 or so people crammed in a small, and I mean, small room. Cheering and yelling at this thing. I was in the next room trying to watch television. I tried to mind my own business.” Harris continues, “The investigation lasted about 2 or 3 months, but it wasn’t like Barry was there every single day. So for him to say that this could have been some sort of telekinetic thing that my mother was creating is all bullshit. She didn’t want to have this happen….it’s a possibility, but it’s not like he knew what we were really going through. He was only there for three months. And from that, he would show up every Thursday or so.” “…when the team would show up, I knew as soon as they left, they (the entities) would become so angry that the house would come alive!”“The place we moved to was hell….in the bad part of Carson, CA. There was very little paranormal activity happening. It was hell because of the neighborhood. It was a bad neighborhood and school. The paranormal stuff was very rare at that point.” Harris adds,

Harris says that his mother passed away in 1995, from pulmonary arrest.

The book 'The Entity' written by Frank deFelitta (and subsequent film by the same title) was based on this case.


Click for video
The video contains a segment on the Doris Bither / Entity case

Sources:
robertjrgraham.com
"Sightings: The Real Entity Case" - Susan Michaels - 1996
"Weird California: The Entity Haunting" - Greg Bishop, Joe Oesterle, Mike Marinacci, Mark Moran, Mark Sceurman - 2006
Orange Coast Magazine - 10/1989
barrytaff.net

Haunted Flat Exorcised? We'll See...

A few weeks back, I posted an article that referenced a young mother's poltergeist fears. Today, a followup was published:

wigantoday - Paranormal investigators say they have successfully exorcised a haunted Wigan flat after a terrifying all-night vigil.

The Dead Connections team offered their services to Pemberton young mum Holly Taylor after reading in the Wigan Evening Post about how she has been plagued by ghostly goings-on at her new home in Woodford Street, Pemberton.

She and toddler daughter Willow were refusing to spend the night there, having endured inexplicable happenings such as:

Plates flying off the kitchen work surface;

Ornaments and other objects being moved or knocked over while they were out;

Footsteps and knockings;

The smoke detector sounding without reason;

Lights coming on.

Neighbours had suffered from unexplained noises too and the flats’ predecessor – Pemberton Police Station – also had a reputation for being haunted.

An officer who used to serve there told the Evening Post that the footsteps and bangings that staff used to here were put down to the ghost of a former inspector, who had hanged himself in a cell many years ago.

But the investigators say that they believe the ghost was that of a woman, who had died in a fire.

Dead Connections team members Emma and Adam Butler, Robyn Davies and John Strickland spent the night in the flat with a variety of technological instruments including an electromagnetic field meter (which at times almost went off the scale despite being nowhere near electrical appliances), and a voice recorder.

Emma said they had spent many nights in allegedly haunted buildings, but this one had proved one of the most frightening and eventful.

The team, who were joined by Holly, Willow and Holly’s boyfriend Jordan O’Neill, heard breathing and clicking noises and also a series of tappings by which they attempted to communicate.

The taps appeared to be coming from Willow’s bedroom which was empty (the youngster was sleeping in another room).

And as the questions they asked about who was there were answered, the meter would leap from green to red.

They also used what is known as a Frank’s Box, which picks up radio station white noise and occasional words.

And through these two forms of communications, Emma and her team concluded that they were talking to a woman who had died in a fire and needed help to “cross over” – although, perplexingly, the name Simon kept coming through too.

Photographs taken during the night also showed grey orbs, about the size of tennis balls, floating in the air which no one had seen at the time.

Emma said: “We always go into situations like this trying to explain things normally first, but really there was a heck of a lot happening that we could not account for.

“There were all kinds of noises. A cupboard in Willow’s bedroom, which doesn’t have a weak catch on it, popped open at one point and the smoke detector kept bleeping even though there was no fire and there were new batteries in it.

“At one point, there was a very loud bang which took us all by surprise and it was tempting to run away.

“There has also been something weird happening with memory lapses.

“Robyn and I went to look round the flat a few days before we spent the night there, and then went back home and apparently had a long conversation with Adam and John about a cat.

“But when the lads reminded us of it the next day, neither of us had any recollection of the conversation.

“We mentioned this to Holly and she said that it was always happening to her too.

“Twenty-minute passages would just vanish from her memory.”

At the end of the night, the team carried out an hour-long blessing ceremony, which involved the use of sage – a herb associated with exorcism – and calling on the spirit to leave the family and the flat and move to the other side.

And it seems to have done the trick.

Emma said: “Holly says nothing has happened since.

“Her daughter has just spent her first uninterrupted sleep in the flat, the smoke alarm doesn’t bleep any more and even the clock which stopped after it fell off the wall has started working again.”

Holly said: “All the noises have stopped. It’s amazing and I’m very grateful to them.”

NOTE: Honestly, if this was a true haunting I seriously doubt that the procedures used by the paranormal group in this article moved the spirit along. The use of sage or 'smudging' has been used since the ancient Babylonians in rituals for healing and releasing negative energy. These rituals, including religious incantations, has become a popular 'cure all' for all degrees of haunting and possession. It may very well calm a location for awhile but most likely has not solved the problem...namely, clearing or moving the entity along. You may want to read excerpts from 'Among the Spirits' for further insight...Lon



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Holiday Poltergeist Activity Alarms Reader

I received the following anecdote from a reader:

Mr. Strickler - I wanted to communicate with you a few strange incidents I experienced this past week.

I am a collector of vintage Christmas ornaments and have done so for over 30 years. The day after Thanksgiving, I received a telephone call from a local auctioneer who had just received a consignment that included several rare handmade ornaments. The next week, I attended the auction and was delighted after obtaining several of these fine pieces at very reasonable prices. One ornament in particular stood out from the rest. It was a porcelain figure of a St.Bernard dog that was English and hand painted.

Each Christmas, I select my favorite ornaments from my collection to display on my tree. I was very proud of the new St. Bernard dog ornament and wanted to show it off to my friends and family.

One morning last week, I noticed that the ornament had fallen from the tree and was laying on the carpet. The string that attached it to the tree branch was not tore and felt fortunate that it had not broken. I just placed it back on the tree.

That evening, I was sitting in the living room reading a magazine when I started to hear a 'ringing' sound coming from the tree. It was like a the sound of a porcelain bell. The sound lasted for a few seconds then suddenly stopped. About an hour later, the ringing sound started again but this time it was a bit louder and lasted for almost a minute. I looked at the tree but could not tell where the sound was coming from. I just assumed it was coming from outside the house.

That night, I was laying in bed asleep (around 11:45 pm) when I thought I heard heavy footsteps coming down my upstairs hallways towards my bedroom. I got up, looked around the house and rechecked the intruder alarm. I was in the kitchen checking the outside door when I heard footsteps rapidly going up the stairs to the second floor. I live alone, so I was very concerned, so I called 911 just to be safe.

The police looked around the property to make sure it was safe. I live in a small community where everyone knows everyone else's business, so anything out of the ordinary is common knowledge the next day. The police assured me that they would not make a report. They soon left and told me to call back if I noticed anything unusual. I thought that was an odd statement but I appreciated their concern.

I walked up the stairs and turned towards my bedroom. As soon as I got to the bedroom door I noticed it. The St. Bernard ornament was setting on my nightstand. Now I was freaked out. I have never experienced any paranormal activity though I love to read about these things. Now it was happening to me.

I picked up the ornament, walked downstairs and placed it back on the tree. I looked at it for a minute or two and then noticed that two other ornaments were missing. I looked on the carpet but nothing was there. After looking around for several minutes I decided to go back to bed and look again in the morning.

The next morning, I woke and walked downstairs. I entered the living room and immediately noticed that the St. Bernard ornament was missing from the tree - but the two ornaments that were missing the night before were back on the tree. I looked all over the house, but the ornament was gone.

It has been almost a week and the St. Bernard ornament is still missing, but there has been no further activity since it disappeared. I cannot explain any of this. Are you familiar with this type of activity? I hesitate to speculate what is going on and really don't what anybody coming into my house to investigate.

If the ornament returns, I will notify you. Please feel free to publish my story if you like but I would appreciate anonymity. I have included a photo of a similar ornament I found in a dealer catalog. Thank you for your help.

NOTE: I referred the writer to Spirit Rescue International if they need further help. I suggested that these incidents resemble poltergeist activity but there could be other explanations as well. Any thoughts from the readers? Lon