Doctors Watch in Horror as Bite Marks Appear on Girl's Body

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
Welcome Weirdos. I'm Darren Marler and this is Weird Darkness.
Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lure, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre,
unsolved and unexplained coming up in this episode. It's been

(00:28):
said that the average person walks past at least sixteen
murderers in their lifetime. A chilling thought. But when you
know that a serial killer is on the loose, you
look at each stranger you meet as a potentially dangerous encounter.
And right now in the UK they have a serial
killer still at large, targeting easy victims the country's elderly.

(00:52):
When the spiritualism movement caught fire in the eighteen forties,
beginning with the Fox Sisters, and stayed fairly strong for
some time. After the nineteen twenties, most of the teachings
and those soaking it in began to dwindle. Strangely, though,
there seems to be a kind of researching interest in
one particular man's writings. Here in the twenty first century,

(01:13):
many are intrigued by the secret teachings of Manly P. Hall.
In May nineteen eighty seven, Kenneth Parks walked into a
police station and confessed, I just killed two people. I've
just killed my mother and father in law. I stabbed
and beat them to death. It's all my fault. Case
closed right, Well, no, because it appears he might have

(01:36):
been sleepwalking when he committed the murders. When the body
of Elva Shoe was found next to her bed, it
was assumed to be an accident, but her spirit refused
to rest until someone investigated further. Her ghost was crying murder.
But first, Clarita Villanueva was orphaned before she was a teenager.

(02:00):
With no one to care for her, Clarita began living
on the streets of Manila, dancing for money and prostituting
herself to degenerates. But things were about to get even
worse for the poor girl, demonically worse. We begin with
that story. Now, bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn

(02:21):
off your lights, and come with me into the weird darkness.
In the nineteen fifties, seventeen year old Clarita Villanueva had

(02:44):
a rather colorful, yet strange life. She grew up in
the streets of Manila, Philippines, without a father, and from
a young age she was already surrounded by the paranormal
in order to make ends meet her mother, An alleged
psychic would hold seances and fortune telling readings in their
hovel of a home, and it was enough to get
them by Tragedy would strike when, at the tender age

(03:07):
of twelve, Clarita's mother passed away, leaving her to fend
for herself on the dangerous streets. She had no one
to guide her or take care of her, so she
began walking the streets as a vagrant, prostitute and taxi dancer,
meaning she would perform dances for money. It was not
the way a young girl should grow up, yet things

(03:28):
were about to get even worse, so would begin one
of the strangest paranormal cases ever to hit the Philippines.
By the time she was seventeen, Clarita knew the streets
and her trade very well, and she had taken the
hanging out at bars trying to lure men in. And
in May of nineteen fifty three, it seemed she approached

(03:50):
the wrong guy. Her would be customer turned out to
be an undercover policeman, and she was arrested right then
and there for vagrancy. Her age didn't seem to matter
as She was brought to the city's notorious Bilavet Prison,
now known as the Manila City Jail, which is a
three hundred year old fortress like structure steeped in violent history,

(04:12):
its walls long permeated by torment and suffering. It also
had a reputation for being rather haunted, and it was
to this ominous dank place that Chlorita was thrown into
one of the gloomy cells to languish awaiting trial. Little
did anyone know that as that cage was slammed shut,

(04:33):
things were about to spiral way out into the weird.
It began with the girl screaming out in utter agony
in the middle of the night, her tormented cries echoing
throughout the jail to bring the guards running. They found
her cowering in her cell, bloodied and sporting bite wounds
on her body in places where she could not have

(04:54):
inflicted them herself. When asked what had happened, she claimed
that she'd been attacked by phantom and toi, one which
she described as a very big dark man with curly
hair all over the body, and the other a small
one with an angelic face and a big mustache. There
was no one else in the cell with her, no

(05:14):
way that anyone could have entered and gotten out, and
despite the anomalous bite marks, the guards just assumed she
was having a panic episode and merely left her there
in the cell. However, this was not the end of it,
not by a long shot. Over the next week, Clarita
would be relentlessly attacked by these unseen demonic creatures, with

(05:37):
other prisoners claiming that they could sometimes see her writhing
about and being tossed around her cell during these mysterious attacks,
yet the assailants were invisible to them. It was all
bizarre enough that it came to the attention of the
Mayor of Manila, Arsineo Laxon, who had the girl brought
to his office to have official medical examiners look at her.

(05:59):
So soon as she arrived, it could be seen by
all present that something very unusual was going on when
she flew into one of her episodes, bucking and writhing
as the medical team tried to hold her down. As
they did this, they claimed that they could see the
indentations of bite marks appearing on Clarita's skin as they
looked on in horror, with some of the bites even

(06:22):
inflicted on flesh beneath where the team's hands covered. Through
all of this, she screamed that the entities were laughing
and taking turns biting her, and no one could explain
it at all. Laxon would say, what it is is
beyond me. This is something that goes way back to
the dark, dim past. When Clarida calmed down and the

(06:44):
episode passed, the mayor asked her to try and draw
a picture of the things that had attacked her, but
she was unable to do so, as every time she tried,
the pencil would fly from her hand to go rattling
across the floor. Some reports even claimed she felt compelled
to shove the paper into her mouth and chew it up,
with no recollection of why she had done so. Clarita

(07:07):
was taken to be examined by psychiatrists and doctors, and
while she was found mentally sound, no one could account
for how these bite marks were appearing on her body
or what was happening to her. In the meantime, the
story was starting to hit the news, and she would
allegedly have one of her episodes during a press conference
attended by hundreds of journalists and medical professionals, and this

(07:30):
launched it into the spotlight, before long being splashed all
over newspapers. Even as the bizarre attacks grew in frequency
and intensity. Pastor Lester Sumrall, who will come into the
story soon, would write of this in his book The
True Story of Cloria Villadeueva, saying these strange demonic bindings

(07:50):
began to occur daily, baffling all who saw it. Doctor Laura,
the prison physician, appealed for help through the media and
permitted many to view the strange phenomenon. Filipino, Chinese, and
American doctors, university professors, and other professionals were called in
to analyze the situation. The news media soon caught wind

(08:11):
of the occurrence and set reporters out to investigate. The newspapers,
radio stations, and magazines found it their kind of story
and began to publicize it. Even the cartoonists were soon
drawing pictures of the entities from Clarita's descriptions. As the
bitings continued day by day, the UPI and other world
news services began to report the phenomenon worldwide. In my

(08:35):
travels throughout the world, I have not been in any
country in which the newspapers did not give this story
front page coverage. Switzerland, France, Germany, England, Canada, the United States.
Everywhere this strange phenomenon was front page news at the time.
As all of this was going on, there were those
trying to explain it rationally. Eight Doctor Zaguire and doctor Gaduso,

(08:59):
both from the National Center for Mental Health, concluded that
it could all be explained by a nervous disorder known
as hysterical fugue or hysteria psychoneurosis, which they surmised was
causing discoloration of the skin that was merely being mistaken
for bite marks. Others tried to chalk it up to
an act and a magic trick the girl was putting

(09:20):
on in order to escape her miserable life and seek attention.
But there was still the fact that many had witnessed
these bitemarks appear, and it could not be explained how
she could get such injuries in places where she could
not reach, especially since she was kept in a cell
by herself under constant observation. The prison doctor would say

(09:41):
the injuries were the work of some unearthly being. There
were also other sinister and frightening paranormal occurrences orbiting the girl,
of which some raw would say. One doctor accused the
girl of putting on an act in order only to
get publicity. Clarita gazed at the doctor with her snake
life eyes. She said, you will die. He didn't feel

(10:03):
anything at the moment, but the following day the doctor
expired without even getting sick. He simply died. Fear struck
the city when that news was spread about the girl
was not only a harlot. They said she was also
a witch who could speak curses upon human beings and
they would die. The chief jailer had a confrontation with
the girl. He had kicked her for something she had

(10:26):
done wrong. While rebelling against him, Clarita looked at the
jailer in cold, inhuman hate and said, you will die.
Within four days, the man was dead and buried, the
second person to fall victim to her curse. By now
people were talking about demonic possession, and this is what
would ultimately draw some Rowle to the case. After hearing

(10:48):
all of the stories, he made his way out of
the Philippines and Bilbard Prison to see Clarida for himself,
and was immediately aware of how frightened the prison staff was.
He then asked the staff to scribe her attackers to him,
and some Raw would write, who were these alien entities?
The large one, Clarita said, was a monster in size.

(11:08):
He was black and very hairy. He had fangs that
came down on each side of his mouth, plus a
set of buck teeth all the way around. The doctors
verified her description by the teeth marks on her body,
buck teeth solid all the way around the bite, rather
than sharp teeth in the front. The smaller entity was
almost like a dwarf. He would climb up her body

(11:29):
to bite her upper torso. Both of these spirits liked
to bite her where there was a lot of flesh,
like the back of her leg, the back of her neck,
the fleshy part of her upper arms. They would bite
deep into her, leaving ugly, painful bruises. Some Raw was
fairly sure at this point he was dealing with some
sort of demonic possession, and so he prepared himself to

(11:52):
come face to face with Clarida herself. He was granted
permission to meet with her, and when she was led
into the room, things would escalate very quickly, turning into
a spiritual brawl between some raw and the evil forces
accosting Clarita. Some ral says of this confrontation. As Clorita
was being led into the room, she looked at them
and said nothing, But when she saw me, she screamed violently.

(12:16):
I hate you. Instantly, I anserted, I know you hate me.
I have come to cast you out. That was the
beginning of the confrontation. There was a raging battle with
the girl blaspheming God, the Father, God the Son, and
God the Holy Spirit. Her eyes were burning coals of
fire and full of hate. I commanded the evil spirit
to loose her. After a three day confrontation with the

(12:38):
devil in her, the miracle of God came upon her.
She relaxed, smiled, and said he's gone. After this, it
seems that the case just sort of faded away and
was forgotten, and it's unclear just what happened to Clarita
after that. It's all a very spectacular account and has
managed to be written of in countless articles and books since,

(13:02):
notably appearing in Fate magazine and Frank Edward's popular nineteen
fifty four book Stranger Than Science. But this is part
of the problem with it. Over the years, the story
has been added to and sensationalized to the point that
it's difficult to parse out what might be true and
what is not. The original report given by some role,

(13:23):
which is where most of the available information comes from,
is loaded with religious imagery and talk of devils and God,
as well as much patting of his own back at
how he drove away Satan and saved the poor girl,
and so it's unclear how much of his account is
even true or not. Even the newspaper reports all add different,

(13:43):
sometimes conflicting details, and while here I have given the
most common version of events, there are other variations as well,
and so we're left to wonder just where fantasy ends
and reality begins. What happened to Clarita Villanueva. Were their
strange forces out to get her? And if so, why

(14:05):
was she possessed or under attack by forces beyond our comprehension.
We may never know the answers, and it remains a
very unusual case and historical loddity coming up. It's been

(14:29):
said that the average person walks past at least sixteen
murderers in their lifetime. Chilling thought. But when you know
that a serial killer is on the loose. You look
at each stranger you meet as a potentially dangerous encounter,
and right now in the United Kingdom they have a
serial killer still at large, targeting easy victims the country's elderly. Also,

(14:53):
while the spiritualism movement caught fire in the eighteen forties
with the Fox Sisters and stayed fairly strong for some
time after the nineteen twenties, most of the teachings and
those soaking it in began to dwindle. Strangely, though, there
seems to be a kind of resurging interest in one
particular man's writings. Now in the twenty first century, many

(15:13):
are intrigued by the secret teachings of Manly p Hull,
these stories and more when weird darkness returns. There are

(15:46):
at least three different police forces in the UK that
believe they may be seeking a serial killer in connection
with the violent deaths of five elderly couples in northern England.
A special investigation team has been set up by police
to reinvestigate a series of deaths that were originally believed
to have been murder suicides in Manchester, Cheshire and Cumbria.

(16:10):
Stephanie Davies, a senior member of the Coroner's office in
Cheshire has compiled a one hundred and seventy nine page
secret report looking at the five murder suicides, in which
she suggests that actually the killings were murder plain and simple,
and in fact were most likely the work of a
serial killer. The senior coroner says that there are striking

(16:31):
similarities between the deaths of the five couples between nineteen
ninety six and twenty eleven. In all five of the cases,
it was originally said that the husband went berserk, struck
his wife on the head, stabbed her, then killed himself.
In all of the cases, the cases were recorded as
murder suicides by the coroners. The report says that at

(16:54):
least two of the cases were so similar they could
have only been carried out by the same offender. The
first of these cases features Howard and Beatrice Ainsworth, who
lived in a semi detached property in Gravel Lane, Wimslow, Cheshire.
On Sunday, April twenty eighth, nineteen ninety six, when neighbors
tried to visit the couple, there was no reply to

(17:14):
the door and the curtains all remained closed, despite it
being eleven thirty a m. The neighbors became very concerned
and called the police. They had no idea of the
gruesome scene that awaited the officers when they entered the house.
Seventy eight year old Beatrice, known to friends as B,
had a bread knife embedded into her forehead. She had

(17:36):
been severely bludgeoned with a hammer, and her face was
partially covered by a pillow. Her devoted husband, Howard seventy nine,
was laying next to her with a plastic bag over
his head. The police decided that Howard had killed his
wife in a fit of rage, then taking his own life.
There was indeed a suicide note on the sideboard next

(17:57):
to the bed. It seemed that B had been quite
ill and that Howard had struggled to cope. But now
it's been suggested that in fact Howard had been forced
to write the note, and that the couple has been murdered.
There was a great deal of inconsistencies at the crime
scene in the Ainsworth House. Howard had ended his note

(18:17):
saying we have had a good life together, but the
words did not match with the heinous and vicious killing
and the fact that Bee's night dress had been lifted
up to her hips, thus showing her most intimate areas.
This was clearly not the act of a desperate, loving
husband who simply wanted to quickly end his wife's life
then commit suicide himself. The report from the couple's GP

(18:41):
makes things all the more confusing, as it indicated that
the only illness Beatrice had suffered prior to her death
was a stomach bug, and that Howard Ainsworth was in
relatively good health for his age. According to the suicide
note left by Howard, he said that he had given
his wife a quantity of sleeping pills and there was
a tub containing such tablets on the sideboard, but the

(19:02):
toxicology report states that neither of the couple had consumed
any tablets prior to death. Then, just three years later,
on November twenty sixth, nineteen ninety nine, another elderly couple,
Donald and oriole Ward, were found lying dead in their
bed in Lacey Grove, Wilmslow, which was just a six
minute drive away. What are the realistic chances of another

(19:27):
murder suicide in such similar circumstances involving another frail old
couple Oriol aged sixty eight had been bludgeoned about the head,
then stabbed in an almost identical manner to Beatrice Ainsworth.
She had also been suffocated and her face partially covered
by a pillow. Seventy three year old Donald had a

(19:47):
knife sticking out of his chest and his throat had
been cut. According to family members and friends, Donald and
Oriol had been married for forty five years and were
absolutely devoted to one another. They had grandchildren who they adored.
The coroner who presided over that case, Nicholas Weinberg, considered
that Donald's mind must have been disturbed when he had

(20:08):
killed his wife then gone on to commit suicide. There
was absolutely no evidence to suggest any sort of heightened
stress in Donald's life, and no mental illness. So how
Reinberg was able to reach such a verdict, I really
have no idea. Next, I turned to Kenneth and Eileen Martin,
ages seventy seven and seventy six, respectively, who were killed

(20:31):
in two thousand and eight. The couple died in their garage.
Eileen had severe head injuries with cuts to her neck
and wrists, whilst Kenneth's throat had been cut, his wrists
had been slashed. Then he'd been hanged. Here is the
biggest indication in this case that it was not a
murder suicide. Firstly, why would a man cut his own

(20:52):
throat and wrists then hang himself. He would have been
bleeding heavily and would ultimately have bled to death. Besides
which the wounds would have made him very weak. Thus
he would have found great difficulty in completing his own
unnecessary hanging. The injuries to Eileen Martin were clearly of
a pretty vicious nature and acts of extreme violence. So

(21:13):
whilst I understand the killing may very well have been
carried out by a man who was not in control
of his mind, it was still his wife he was murdering.
Frail couple ninety two year old Stanley Wilson and his
eighty nine year old wife Peggy were found dead in
their bedroom in Kendall, Cumbria. It was claimed that Stanley
had been badly affected by an operation and had begun

(21:35):
to believe that his wife was trying to kill him
by poisoning him, and that other members of the family
were in on it. He also allegedly believed that Peggy
was trying to somehow alter his thinking in order that
he would change his will Now this is the curious
part in this killing. Kenneth was ninety two and was
losing his sight despite having had surgery to correct a

(21:58):
detached retina. Yet the pathologist report reads this frail old
lady died as a result of a sustained and violent assault.
Peggy died as a result of multiple injuries, including a
number of knife wounds to her neck, one of which
severed the jugular vein, as well as blunt trauma injuries
to her neck and face consistent with punching. There were

(22:20):
also indications that she had been asphyxiated. Stanley allegedly went
on to stab himself in the neck and other places
multiple times so that he bled to death. Are these
really the actions of a partially cited ninety two year
old man with problems of the mind. I doubt it.
Despite the family saying that they had concerns about Stanley's

(22:41):
mental health and indicating that he'd accused his wife of
trying to kill him, a staff nurse from Saint Paul's
Hospital said in her statement to the inquest that she
had not noticed any psychotic symptoms in mister Wilson, particularly
no changes caused by medication. Michael Higgins, aged just fifty nine,
was suffering from Parkinson's disease, Yet we're supposed to believe

(23:04):
that he badly beat his seventy six year old wife
with a rolling pin and stabbed her with scissors whilst
she was bed. In twenty twenty, an inquest was told
that mister Higgins had apparently beaten his wife, who was
herself a retired police officer and thus more than capable
of defending herself, then gone on to strangle himself. Members

(23:25):
of the Higgins family told The Sunday Times that they never,
for a moment, believed Michael to be capable of such
a dreadful murder. A statement for Michael's brother and sister,
Daniel and Betty, says, we welcome the report as we've
always believed that Michael was incapable of committing the acts
described in the coroner's report. Michael was suffering from advanced

(23:45):
Parkinson's and had become very frail. He also suffered from
cancer which affected his sight. We knew Michael was a kind,
gentle and intelligent man who was devoted to Violet. The
Sunday Times newspaper revealed that a chief suspect had been
identified earlier in twenty twenty, but he cannot be named
for legal reasons. He strongly denies any involvement in any

(24:08):
of the killings. So to sum up a little here,
we have at least five couples who have died in
very similar circumstances, with two killings of the female victims
being almost identical and in the same area. We have
evidence to suggest that there has been foul play, and
we have evidence that doesn't add up when it comes

(24:29):
to the claims of murder suicide. So was it a
serial killer? Is he still out there roaming loose? If
a prime suspect has been identified, and he is after
all connected in any way, and it's very likely that
there may very well not be anymore for a while.
But if he or she is still alive and active,

(24:50):
then eventually the hunger to kill will be overwhelming and
there will be another similar murder. The late nineteenth and

(25:16):
early twentieth centuries saw an explosion of spiritual teachers and
impresarios dealing in secret wisdom. Their ranks included hacks and frauds,
as well as more than a few genuine scholars of
esoteric traditions. Most have vanished from memory their writings. A
historical footnote. There exists one distinct figure, though, whose movement

(25:39):
and teachings not only survived his passing, but are even
experiencing a revival in our day. His name is Manly P. Hall.
While few academics will ever know of him, Hall was
among the twentieth centuries, and perhaps any centuries, most commanding
and unusual scholars of esoteric and mythological lore. Yet the

(26:00):
source of his knowledge and the extent of his virtuosity
can justly be called a mystery. While working as a
clerk at a Wall Street banking firm, the outstanding event
of which involved witnessing a man depressed over investment losses
take his life, the twenty eight year old Hall self
published one of the most complex and thoroughgoing works ever

(26:22):
to catalog the esoteric wisdom of Antiquity, The Secret Teachings
of All Ages. Pull's Secret Teachings is almost impossible to classify.
Written and compiled on an Alexandrian scale, its hundreds of
entries shine a rare light on some of the most
fascinating and little understood aspects of myth religion, and philosophy. Today,

(26:45):
more than seventy five years after its initial publication. The
book's range of material astonishes the thagorea in mathematics, alchemical formulae,
prometic doctrine, the workings of Kabbalah, the geometry of ancient Egypt,
the Native American myths, the uses of cryptograms, an analysis
of the taro, the symbols of Rosicrucianism, the esotericism of

(27:09):
the Shakespearean dramas. These are just a few of Hall's topics,
Yet his background betrays little clue to his virtuosity. Hall
was born in Petersborough, Ontario, in nineteen oh one, to
parents who would shortly divorce, leaving the young manly in
the care of a grandmother who raised him and Sioux Falls,
South Dakota. He had little formal schooling, but there was

(27:31):
a spark of some indefinable brilliance in this young man,
which his grandmother tried to nurture in trips to museums
in Chicago and New York. Tragedy struck early when his
grandmother died when he was sixteen. Afterward, a self styled
Rosicrucian community in California took him in at age nineteen.
Suspicious of the community's claims to ancient wisdom. Manly moved

(27:54):
on his own to Los Angeles, where he began a
precocious career in public speaking, first giving an address on
reincarnation in a small room above a bank in Santa Monica,
and soon rising to the rank of minister at a
liberal evangelical congregation called the Church at the People. Words
spread of the Boys, wonders, mastery of arcane and metaphysical

(28:16):
subject matter, he attracted benefactors and eventually began traveling the
world in search of hidden wisdom. Yet Hall's early letters
from Japan, Egypt, China, and India are in many respects
fairly ordinary that contain little of the eye opening detail
or wonder of discovery that one finds in the writings
of other early twentieth century seekers encountering the East for

(28:38):
the first time. More often they read like prosaic, if
somewhat sensitive, linear travelogues of their day. Like a bolt
from the blue, however, one is astounded to discover a
short work of immense power from the young Hall, a
book that seems to prefigure that which would come. In
nineteen twenty two, at the age of twenty one, Paul

(29:01):
wrote a luminescent gem on the mystery Schools of Antiquity.
Initiates of the Flame, though brief, one sees it in
the outline of what would become the Secret Teachings of
All Ages. On its frontispiece, Initiates of the Flame boldly
announces he who lives the life shall know the doctrine.
The short book goes on to expound passionately and in

(29:23):
detail along Egyptian rites, Arthurian myths, and the secrets of alchemy,
among other subjects. Feeling the power and ease in its pages,
the reader can almost sense the seeds of greatness that
were beginning to take hold in Hall's grasp of esoteric subjects.
Hal soon returned to America, where he tried his hand
at banking, though he found his true path in the

(29:45):
Beaux Arts Reading room of the New York Public Library.
Entering this cavernous space today, it's not difficult to picture
the large framed young manly p Hall, surrounded by books
of myth and symbol at one of the room's huge
oaken tables. Like a monk in the Middle Ages, Hall copiously,
almost superhumanly, poured over hundreds of the great works of antiquity,

(30:08):
distilling their esoteric lore into his volume. By the age
of twenty eight, having pre sold subscriptions for nearly one
thousand copies and printing twelve hundred more, Hall published what
would become known as the Great Book, and it has
never gone out of print since. Indeed, Hall is an
exception to most of his contemporaries as someone whose work

(30:30):
is actually building an influence today. In its day, The
Secret Teachings was expensive, hefty, and cumbersome. As a result,
the book spent much of its existence as an underground classic.
In late two thousand and three, however, the Secret Teachings
found new life in a reset and redesigned reader's edition,
which sold a remarkable forty thousand copies in less than

(30:53):
three years. A little known nineteen twenty nine companion volume
by Hall called Lectures on Ancient Fell Lifelosophy, has also
been recently reissued. After publishing his magnum opus, Hall opened
a campus in nineteen thirty four in the Griffith Park
neighborhood of Los Angeles, called the Philosophical Research Society PRS,
where he spent the rest of his life teaching, writing,

(31:16):
and amassing a remarkable library of Esoterica, a self contained
property designed in a pastiche of Mayan, Egyptian and Art
Deco styles. PRS remains a popular destination for las spiritually curious.
Following Hall's death in nineteen ninety, PRS barely survived simultaneous
legal battles, one with Hall's widow, who claimed the group

(31:38):
owed her money, and another with a bizarre father son
team of con artists who, in the estimation of a
civil court judge, had befriended an ailing octogenarian Hall to
pill for his assets. The Los Angeles Police Department considered
Hall's death sufficiently suspicious to keep it under investigation for
several years. For all its literary output, Hall revealed little

(32:02):
about his private life. His most lasting record as a
frequently trite, unrevealing childhood memoir called Growing Up with Grandmother,
in which he refers to his guardian as Missus Arthur
Whitney Palmer. As an adult, Hall's close relations were few.
He did not marry until well into middle age, in
a union. Some surmise was never even consummated. Hence, when

(32:26):
Hall disclosed something about his background, it was purposeful. He
wrote this in a PRS newsletter in nineteen fifty nine.
As a result of a confused and insecure childhood, it
was necessary for me to formulate a personal philosophy with
which to handle immediate situations. Here was someone with a
tremendous interest in the arcane philosophies of the world, in

(32:48):
the occult and metaphysical philosophies. But he wasn't fixated on
immortality or a will to power, or on discovering keys
that unlocked the universe. Rather, he focused on harnessing inner
truths in a very practical way. How he wondered, could
such ideas lend clarity to daily life. We'll take a

(33:10):
byroad that steers us in another direction before returning to
this point. Our byroad involves one of the most famous
novels in history, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. The work has many facets,
among them a portrait not sympathetic, but not as unsympathetic
as one might suppose, of the European occult in the
Enlightenment era. The portrait comes in the character of a

(33:32):
young Victor von Frankenstein, a budding scientist torn between the
occult teachings that drew him to science as a child
and the prevailing rationalism of his teachers. Victor confids his
interest in the great alchemists and occult philosophers, such as
the Renaissance era magus Cornelius Agrippa, but his professors dismiss
him with complete condescension. One day, in his room, Victor

(33:55):
ponders the unbridgable gap between his magical visions and the
scholasticism of his peers. I had a contempt for the
uses of modern natural philosophy. It was very different when
the masters of science sought immortality and power. Such views,
although futile, were grand. But now the scene was changed.
The ambition of the inquirer seemed to limit itself to

(34:16):
the annihilation of those visions on which my interest in
science was chiefly founded. I was required to exchange chimeras
of boundless grandeur for realities of little worth. In a sense,
Victor spoke for generations of occultists when describing his ideal
of boundless grandeur, immortality, power, and visions. Who wouldn't sympathize

(34:39):
with the rebellious young Victor, whose dreams and ambitions, while hopeless,
exist on a grand scale versus the certainties of his
crusty professors and a cult scholar born at the cusp
of the twentieth century, manly P. Hall signaled a different
kind of ideal. Hall told of a personal philosophy with

(34:59):
which to handle immediate situations. After Hall's death, a reporter
in the Los Angeles Times noted followers say he believed
in reincarnation and in a mixture of the Golden Rule
and living in moderation. For Hall, the very act of
writing The Secret Teachings of All Ages was an attempt
at formulating an ethical response to the age he lived in.

(35:21):
While the book is at times speculative and some of
its sources are limited by the constraints of their era,
it is the only codex to esoteric ideas that treats
its subject with total seriousness. Contemporaneous works such as The
Golden Bough regarded indigenous religious traditions as superstition, interesting museum

(35:41):
pieces worthy of anthropological study, but of no direct relevance
to our current lives. Hall, on the other hand, felt
himself on a mission to re establish a connection to
the mystery traditions at a time when America, as he
saw it, had given itself over to jazz age materialism.
He witnessed at his banking. After I thought the matter over,

(36:02):
he wrote a few years before his death, it seemed
necessary to establish some kind of firm ground upon which
personal idealism could mingle its hopes and aspirations with the
wisdom of the ages. In this sense, the prodigious scholar
achieved more than a cataloging of esoteric truths. He turned
the study of occult ideas into an ethical cause when

(36:36):
weird Darkness returns. In May nineteen eighty seven, Kenneth Parks
walked into a police station and confessed, I just killed
two people. I've just killed my mother and father in law.
I stabbed and beat them to death. It's all my fault.
Case closed right, Well, no, because it appears he might
have been sleepwalking when he committed the crime, and when

(36:59):
the body of all of the shoe was found next
to her bed, it was assumed to be an accident,
but her spirit refused to rest until someone investigated further.
Her ghost was crying murder. Those stories are up next.

(37:37):
On May twenty fourth, nineteen eighty seven, twenty three year
old Kenneth James Parks left his home in Pickering, Ontario,
and drove more than twenty kilometers to the home of
his in laws, Barbara Ann and Dennis Woods. Since it
was still early morning, his in laws were sleeping when
Parks let himself into the house with the key that
they'd given him. On entering their bedroom, he then bludgeoned

(37:59):
his mother in law to death with the tire iron
that he'd been carrying. While he managed to seriously injure
Dennis Woods. Parks left the house and returned to his car.
He then drove to a nearby police station, where, still
covered in blood, he told the officers, I just killed
someone with my bare hands. Oh my god, I just
killed someone. I've just killed two people. My god, I've

(38:21):
just killed two people with my hands. My god, I've
just killed two people my hands. I just killed two people.
I killed them. I just killed two people. I've just
killed my mother and father in law. I stabbed and
beat them to death. It's all my fault. Arrested for
the first degree murder of Barbara Ann Woods and the
attempted murder of her husband, Parks seemed destined for conviction

(38:42):
and life imprisonment. That is until the case came to
trial and his defense attorney put forward a rather unique
legal defense. Kenneth James Parks could not be held liable
for his actions because he'd committed them while sleepwalking. Long
classified as a sleep disorder, somnambulism represents a twilight state

(39:03):
between sleep and wakefulness, during which sleepers could engage in
complex activities usually seen during wakefulness. This includes activities such
as carrying on phantom conversations, wandering around or outside the home, eating,
even potentially dangerous activities such as swimming or driving. And yes,

(39:23):
there have been cases of homicides committed by people while sleepwalking,
though they tend to be very rare. While somnambulism had
been successfully used as a legal defense in previous criminal
trials in other countries, there were no legal precedents under
Canadian law, so convincing a jury remained a major challenge
for Park's defense attorney. During the trial, the court heard

(39:45):
testimony about Park's long history of deep sleep, including difficulty
waking up on many occasions. In the year leading up
to the murder, Parks had reportedly been under intense stress
due to having to work ten hours a day at
his job as a project coordinator for an electric company.
He was also experiencing financial problems resulting from heavy losses

(40:06):
from his gambling on horse races. This resulted in his
embezzling thirty thousand dollars from his employer, the discovery of
which led to his being fired from his job and
facing charges as well. He would later make full restitution.
His wife and in laws were fully aware of all
of this and were reportedly supportive. Parks had an especially

(40:27):
strong relationship with his mother in law, though referred to
him as the gentle Giant, though his father in law
was more distant. Park's in laws were willing to help
him and his wife financially. As a result, there was
no motive for the murder and attempted murder, something which
undermined the prosecution's case against him. To bolster the defense case,
the court had also heard testimony that other members of

(40:50):
the Park's family also suffered from sleep problems, such as sleepwalking,
adult and eurrosses, nightmares, and sleep talking. The defense also
brought in different medical experts in psychiatry and neurology who
testified about the validity of the sleepwalking defense, as well
as EEG measurements of Park's brain activity while asleep and
awake that was consistent with findings from other somnambulists. Despite

(41:14):
the initial skepticism about Parks's claim that he was not
criminally liable due to his somnambulism, he was unanimously acquitted
of murder in May nineteen eighty eight. Also because somnambulism
was not ruled to be a disease of the mind,
he was also not deemed to be mentally ill. The
Crown later appealed this decision and argued that Parks should

(41:36):
have been committed to a psychiatric hospital by reason of insanity,
as he had been in a state of automatism at
the time of the murder. This included re examining the
medical evidence, including testimony from five physicians. Were heard. Doctor
Roger Brames Broughton, a neurophysiologist and specialist in sleep and
sleep disorders, doctor John Gordon Edmeads, matorrologist, doctor Ronald Frederick Billings,

(41:59):
a psychiat doctor Robert wood Hill, a forensic psychiatrist, and
doctor Frank Raymond Irvin, a neurologist and psychiatrist, all of
whom reaffirmed their beliefs that Parks wasn't mentally ill and
that somnambulists who committed criminal acts while asleep rarely reoffended.
In a decision that was later upheld by the Canadian

(42:19):
Supreme Court, the original acquittal was deemed to be valid
since there was reasonable doubt that Kenneth Clarke had voluntarily
attacked his in laws. As for the question of whether
his somnambulism was due to a disease of the mind,
the Supreme Court ruled that the Crown had failed to
provide sufficient proof that he had been insane at the
time of the murder, and as such, no legal mistakes

(42:41):
had been made that might have overturned the earlier court decision.
The court then ruled that there was insufficient evidence to
show that the defendant posed a recurring danger to the
public or that special precautions, including placement in a psychiatric hospital,
would be needed to reduce the risk of his reoffending.
The Crown was also deemed to have failed in proving
that Clark's somnambulism stemmed from an internal cause, that is,

(43:05):
it had been due to psychological or emotional factors that
might reflect mental health concerns. Along with setting legal history
in Canada, the decision generated headlines around the world. Even
the Supreme Court judges handing down their decision recognized that
problematic nature of the sleepwalking defense when they wrote, some
will regard the exoneration of an accused through the defense

(43:27):
of somnambulism as an impairment of the credibility of our
justice system. However, these views are contrary to certain fundamental
precepts of our criminal law. Only those who act voluntarily
with the requisite intent to commit an offense should be
punished by criminal sanction. The concern of those who reject
these underlying values of our system of criminal justice should

(43:47):
accordingly be discounted. In nineteen ninety father June Cowwood wrote
a book on the Parks case titled The Sleepwalker, The
Trial that made Canadian Legal History, which quickly became a
true classic. She also championed similar criminal cases, including Dorothy Jowdrey,
who attempted to kill her estranged husband in nineteen ninety five.

(44:09):
While Jowdrey's legal defense focused on temporary insanity stemming from
abuse rather than somnambulism, the circumstances seemed close enough to
evoke the specter of the Park's decision of just a
few years earlier, Jowdrey was acquitted, though the decision continues
to be controversial. Colwood also helped write a nineteen ninety
seven film, The Sleepwalker Killing, which was loosely based on

(44:31):
the Park's case. In the years since Kenneth Parks was acquitted,
there had been at least five known cases in which
homicidal sleepwalking has been invoked as a defense in a
criminal trial. The circumstances of these crimes and how they
were treated by the courts varied widely, ranging from outright
acquittal to life imprisonment, typically in cases where the killer's

(44:52):
actions were seen as too complex to justify a somnambulism defense.
Despite many of the concerns raised by the arts versus
Park's decision, homicidal sleepwalking hasn't proved particularly popular as a
criminal defense, largely due to the difficulties involved in providing
adequate proof to satisfy the courts. As for Kenneth Parks,

(45:13):
he has returned to his normal life, and, aside from
the continuing public interest in his case, has largely remained
out of the public eye. No word on whether he
still walks in his sleep. It looked like an accident.

(45:41):
The young boy who found the body said so, as
did the doctor who examined the body. To all visual evidence,
Zona Elva hester Shue, had, as the doctor said, experienced
an everlasting feint and fallen at the foot of the
bed some sources say at the bottom of a staircase
in her house in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. It was

(46:01):
January twenty third, eighteen ninety seven. Earlier in the day,
Elva's husband, Edward, had gone to work at a local
blacksmith's shop. As usual, in the middle of the day,
Edward sent an errand boy to his house to ask
Elva if she needed Edward to pick up anything from
the store. On his way home. The boy dutifully ran
to Edward's house and discovered Elva's body. He ran with

(46:22):
the awful news to his mother, who called for the
local doctor coroner. Before the doctor arrived, Edward heard the
news and ran to his house. Seeing the body, he
sobbed uncontrollably and placed Elva's body on the bed. He
proceeded to dress the corpse, which was odd at that
time in rural West Virginia. It was customary for the
nearby women to wash and dress the body of a

(46:43):
female who had died, but Edward insisted on doing this himself,
choosing a dress with a very high collar. When the
doctor arrived, Edward became hysterical, barely letting the doctor touch
the body. Unable to continue with the examination, the doctor
proclaimed that Elva had done died from natural causes and
quickly left the house. Elva's body was buried soon after

(47:06):
with a small ceremony. The case may have ended there
had Elva not decided to come back from the dead
and tell the true story. Elda's mother, Mary Jane Hester,
always hated Edward. She was convinced that he was behind
her daughter's death. Her first proof came the day at
the funeral. After taking a white sheet from inside the coffin,

(47:28):
she attempted to wash it, but when she put it
into the water, the water turned red. Mary Jane thought
this was an indication of something, but she didn't know what.
She prayed for a month that somehow she would get
some kind of sign that Elva had died at her
husband's hands. She got more than she bargained for. About

(47:48):
one month after her daughter's death, Mary Jane woke to
find Elva floating in the bedroom, The ghost told Mary
Jane that Edward was a cruel man who had attacked
her and broken her neck because he believed she had
not cooked any meat for dinner. To prove her claim,
Elva turned her head around until she was looking backward.
The visit repeated itself for the next three nights. Having

(48:12):
had enough and now believing for sure that Edward did
kill Elva, Mary Jane went to the local prosecutor. She
demanded Elva's body be dug up and re examined. The
prosecutor was unconvinced to take such action until the doctor
confessed he had not done a thorough autopsy, especially considering
Edward's extreme protectiveness of the body. On February twenty second,

(48:36):
they exhumed Elva's body, despite Edward's numerous protests. At the examination,
it was easily determined that Elva's neck had been broken.
They quickly charged Edward with murder. One of the key
prosecution witnesses at the subsequent trial was Mary Jane. She
testified to the four visitations by the Greenbriar ghost. The

(48:57):
defense tried to make her look like she was crazy,
but the jury evidently believed Elva through Mary Jane, they
found Edward guilty of Elva's death. After that, they took
him to the local jail. A cluster of men in
the area believed justice wasn't served. A lynch bob formed
and started towards the jail. Edward escaped that fate, but

(49:18):
eventually died in jail only three years later, still proclaiming
his innocence. The Greenbriar Ghost, however, never appeared again and
is presumably resting in peace. Thanks for listening. All stories

(49:43):
in Weird Darkness are purported to be true unless stated otherwise,
and you can find source links or links to the
authors in the show notes. The Girl Bitten by Devils
was written by Brett Swanzer for a Mysterious Universe. The
UK's Senior Citizens serial Killer is from Lolly True Crime
for Mystery Confidential. The Secret Teachings of Manly P. Hall

(50:05):
is by Mitch Horowitz for New Dawn Magazine. The Ghost
That Solved a Murder is by Doug McGowan for Paranorms
dot Com. And The Sleepwalker Defense was written by Romeo
Vatelli for Providentia. And Now that We're coming out of
the Dark I'll leave you with a little light. Third
John one, verse eleven. Dear friend, do not imitate what

(50:27):
is evil, but what is good. Anyone who does what
is good is from God. Anyone who does what is
evil has not seen God. And a final thought, keep
the faith. Some of the most amazing things in life
tend to happen right at the moment you're about to
give up. I'm Darren Marler. Thanks for joining me in

(50:50):
the weird darkness.

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