Have Yourself a Very Mothman Christmas

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:10):
A haunted town, or just a town with the biggest
hoax of all time. The legend of the Mothman reached
a craze in a small town of Point Pleasant in
West Virginia in the sixties. It has everything from a
classic pulp science fiction movie from that time, UFOs, monsters
in the Sky, an abandoned chemical plant from the war,

(00:32):
and a black fifty seven Chevy. But what does that
have to do with Christmas? On December fifteenth, nineteen sixty seven,
the Silver Bridge collapsed. It connected Point Pleasant to Ohio.
When it collapsed under the weight of rush hour traffic,
it resulted in the death of forty six people and

(00:53):
wrapped packages dropping to the river. Sightings of the strange
monster had been spotted by many in the town before
the tragedy. Some saw the Mothman as a premonition of
the oncoming disaster, some saw it as the cause of it.
In any case, this spurred the legend that the Mothman
was an omen of doom. I'm Darren Marler and this

(01:18):
is Weird Darkness. Welcome Weirdos. I'm Darren Marler and this
is weird Darkness. Here you'll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore,

(01:39):
the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved and
unexplained coming up this hour. Most all of us think
of Christmas as a time of love, warmth, joy and charity.
But for some Christmas isn't merry at all. It's murderous.

(02:02):
We'll look at some horrific holiday murders and the killers
behind them, but first we visit Point Pleasant, West Virginia
during the holidays of nineteen sixty seven. But we don't
see a sleigh and reindeer in the sky. We see
a nightmare. If you're new here, welcome to the show.
And if you're already a member of this weird old family,

(02:23):
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(02:43):
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at Weirddarkness dot com. Now bult your doors, lock your windows,
churn off your lights, and come with me into the
Weird Darkness. It's not just ghosts that haunt the holidays.

(03:18):
Sometimes we get a monster. The legend of the Mothman
reached a craze and the small town of Point Pleasant
in West Virginia during the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays of
the nineteen sixties. It was November five grave diggers dug
a grave and a cemetery in West Virginia. One of
them was Kenneth Duncan, and he was digging the grave
for his father in law. It was the twelfth of

(03:40):
November nineteen sixty six and he was about to be
the first official witness to the Mothman. Suddenly he saw
something right above the trees. It was no bird. It
looked more like a human being, but at the same
time it wasn't. This creature had wings. It was wading
through the trees and was in sight for about a minute.

(04:02):
Duncan said. The four other men, together with Duncan did
not see the creature before it flew away, and the
men didn't talk about this strange encounter with others than
their close friends. Perhaps it would be forgotten had other
people not started reporting seeing the exact same thing. This
November siding was not to be the last. Perhaps the

(04:24):
most reported about and famous sighting was the Scarberry and
Mallett siding on November fifteenth, nineteen sixty six, in Point Pleasant,
West Virginia. This is the first sighting to be reported
to the media and get any public attention. Two couples,
Linda and Roger Scarberry and Steve and Mary Mallett, were
riding around north of the city in a place used

(04:46):
as a so called lover's lane. Joy Riding around, they
reached the abandoned North Power plant it's known as the
TNT Area or the TNT Plant. There they saw the
eyes of a creature reflected from the head lights of
their black fifty seven Chevy. There was no glowing about
it until the lights hit it, Linda said in her

(05:06):
handwritten account of the incident. They were glowing red after this,
belonging to a gray figure six or seven feet man
like with wings. They said the creature wobbled like it
couldn't keep its balance. Terrified at the sighting, they drove
off down Route sixty two, Linda yelling at Roger to
speed up. As they went around to curve, they saw
the creature on a hill by a large billboard, spreading

(05:29):
its wings. It started to fly, flying back and forth
over the car. We didn't know what it was. I
don't think we've ever been so scared, Linda said. Going
one hundred miles an hour, they tried to speed away
from the creature, but the mothman still managed to keep up.
They couldn't get away, hearing the wings hitting the top
of the car. They reported to have been scratch marks

(05:51):
on the Chevy. After the incident, it squeaked like a
big mouse. Mary Milette said it was first when they
reached the outskirts a point pleasant and they managed to
get away from the creature as it disappeared, veering off
into a nearby field. They stopped at the local dairy
land and tried to figure out what to do about
it all. Linda wanted to go to the police to

(06:11):
report it, but both Roger and Steve didn't want to
be laughed at. They wanted to go back to see
if the thing was still there, but the group was
too scared and turned back to Point Pleasant. When they did,
they noticed a dead dog along the road, where the
creature jumped out, going across the roof of the car
before it disappeared in the field again. It was gone

(06:32):
when they went back. Later, they drove back to town
and stopped at Tiny's Diner. There they contacted the police.
If I had seen it, while by myself, I wouldn't
have said anything, but there were four of us who
saw it, Roger later told the local papers. Deputy Millard
Halsted was the one that met them. The couples told

(06:54):
about a large winged creature with glowing red eyes. Halstead
didn't believe them at first. He knew they weren't troublemakers
and saw that they were terrified, so he went to investigate.
The couples went with the deputy to the area. Halstead
heard strange static disturbances from the radio, but found no
trace of the creature. The couples sat in the car

(07:16):
and said they saw shadows circling around nearby and dust
kick out from the coal yard nearby. The Malettes were
too scared to go home, and they stayed awake all
night in Scarbury's trailer, lights on terrified. The next day,
the couples went back to the area in the daylight.
They found tracks looking like two horseshoes put together. Steve

(07:37):
reported seeing something fly up when a door kicked open.
They left the place before they could see what it was.
The same day, the sheriff, George Johnson, held a press conference.
The local press attended and named the creature Mothman. Batman
had just gotten a television series at that time, so
they named him after one of the villains of the series.

(08:00):
After this, more and more sightings were reported, including Duncan's
at the cemetery. It sparked national, even international attention in
the media. Steve said to the local paper, we understand
people are laughing at us, but we wouldn't make all
of this up to make us look like fools. After
this particular sighting, several of the previous ones came forward,

(08:21):
and we'll hear about them when Weird Darkness returns. Welcome

(08:51):
back to Weird Darkness. I'm Darren Marler. We return now
to the Mothman and how he terrorized the holidays. In
nineteen sixty six in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, and once
the first report came out, others quickly flooded in. People
flocked to the wildlife area where the incident took place,
and the volunteer fire department had to direct traffic. Two

(09:14):
of them also came forward with tails of seeing a
large bird with red eyes. According to the Gettysburg Times,
one famous anecdote from this time must be Newell Partridge
and dismissing dog. He was a contractor living one hundred
miles north and claimed the mothman had something to do
with the disappearance of his German shepherd dog, Bannit. He
cited a thing in the meadow near his home only

(09:36):
ninety minutes before the sighting of the couples in Point Pleasant.
He took a flashlight and directed it towards the shadows.
Glowing red eyes looked back and Bannit started barking and
ran after the creature. The dog never returned, and the
next morning there was no trace of it. At the
time of the mothband's sidings, residents also reported chilling incidents

(09:57):
of unexplained paranormal activity, vanishing pets. Remember that dog laying
dead in the road also there were reports of television interference,
rumors of men in black UFOs, weird dreams, and shadows
in the corner of their eyes. That's just some of
the reported responses around this time in Point Pleasant and

(10:17):
the areas surrounding it. That's just some of the reported
responses around this time in Point Pleasant and the areas
surrounding it. According to newspaper clippings around the time, and
the legend spun grew and at last culminated in a
fatal tragedy of the people in Point Pleasant. On December fifteenth,
nineteen sixty seven, the Silver Bridge collapsed. It connected Point

(10:41):
Pleasant to Ohio and was an eyebar chain suspension bridge
built in nineteen twenty eight. When it collapsed under the
weight of rush hour traffic, it resulted in the deaths
of forty six people. Two of the victims were never found.
Analysis showed the bridge carried more weight than it had
been designed for and had been poorly maintained. The collapse
of the bridge made it so several other old bridges

(11:03):
were maintained and inspected. Historian Henry Petrowski called it a
cautionary tale for engineers of every kind. Several reports, including
John Keel, in his book The Mothman Prophecies, linked the
Mothman to the horrible disaster. As it was at the
height of the Mothman sightings. The bridge was full of
cars coming back from work or from Christmas shopping, and

(11:24):
they suddenly felt the bridge shake. Then came a moaning
of metal before the screeching of the collapse. Then the
bridge went down into the water. Many citizens, spooped by
the torrent of eerie occurrences, blamed the Mothman for this
unexpected disaster. It was only thirteen months since the first
Mothman sighting by Duncan. The strange thing about the connection

(11:48):
is that several reports claimed they had strange dreams and
nightmares about drowning and an oncoming disaster. This was also
reported by Mary Hyer. She was a reporter and wrote
the column Where the Water Mingles in the Athens Messenger.
She often reported on the weird occurrences in point Pleasant,
and often about the Mothman. She became therefore a good

(12:09):
friend of John Keel. There were also tales about men
in black coming down to her office to try and
shut her down. She told Kiel on November nineteenth, nineteen
sixty seven, a month before the disaster, had a terrible nightmare.
There were a lot of people drowning in the river,
and Christmas packages were floating everywhere in the water. It's
like something awful is going to happen. Some saw the

(12:30):
Mothman as a premonition of the upcoming disaster. Some saw
it as the cause of the disaster. In any case,
this spurred the legend that the Mothman was an omen
of doom. This has not been the last time horrible
disasters have been connected to citing some strange creatures. Both
before nine to eleven and before the Russian apartment bombings,

(12:51):
several claimed to have seen huge bird like creatures with
legs near the surrounding area of where the tragedies took place.
So was it just a hoax? Was it an actual thing?
Something in between? Cryptozoologist Mark A. Hall said it could
be an undiscovered species of giant owl, dubbing it big Hoot,

(13:12):
as evidence of reports of it have existed in the
Point Pleasant area long before and after the legend of
Mothman was born. So is that it was it an
enormous owl or other bird that terrify the inhabitants There's
also been theories about it being a big crane, as
the description could be fitted to the big sand Hill crane,
as it does have a wingspan of about seven feet

(13:34):
and can stand as tall as a man. That was
what doctor Robert L. Smith, professor in Wildlife biology at
WVU said at the time. Another theory is around the
abandoned TNT area the local leftover bunkers that were used
for storing toxic chemicals during the Great War. It was
used as an ammunition manufacturing facility that employed a few

(13:55):
thousand people at its peak. What really happened in there?
What exactly was stored in there? Could it be that
it interfered with the neighboring wildlife preserve creating something new?
In May of twenty ten, one of the igloos at TNT,
containing twenty thousand pounds of unstable materials, suddenly exploded. Fortunately

(14:16):
no one was injured, but the place had to be
shut down and cleaned out before opening again. Was that enough?
Is the danger gone now? Unfortunately or fortunately depending on
how you look at it. This is not the only
occurrences of Mothman. For the particularly interested, the moth band
fandom wiki has made a super interesting timeline of supposed

(14:37):
moth banded sightings, both before the sixties and after. Today,
the mothman is something of a legend, still living in
Point Pleasant as a memory the people keep alive. It
has its own museum dedicated to it, with a twenty
four hour webcam around the area. A diner called the
mothband Diner has been run for almost fifty years now.
It has its own statue in the town, even its

(14:59):
own festival every September dedicated to the one and only.
The legend. Has spun several books, movies, arn't toys, and
the occasional reported sighting. The last big sighting on camera
was in twenty sixteen. The man was driving down the
road and suddenly saw something jumping from the nearby trees.

(15:19):
The man had just moved to Point Pleasant and claimed
he didn't know anything about the legend and that he
did not edit the photos that he took of the
thing in the sky. Let's hope that the mothban in
fact is not an omen of doom then, and that
if it is, the sightings will stop entirely for the
sake of the people of Point Pleasant. Christmas nineteen twenty nine,

(15:52):
Charles Lawson murdered his wife and six of his seven children.
Charles Davis Lawson married Fanny Mannering and nineteen eleven. The
couple proceeded to have eight children. Their third child, William,
was born in nineteen fourteen, but tragically died in nineteen twenty.
Charles moved his family to Germanton, North Carolina in nineteen eighteen.

(16:13):
With his younger two brothers moved there. They worked as
tenant tobacco farmers and saved their money to purchase their
own farm. In nineteen twenty seven, a few months before
Christmas nineteen twenty nine, Charles sustained a head injury. Family
and friends believed his mental state had been altered, but
were never truly concerned. Fast forward to a week or

(16:33):
so before Christmas, Charles, now forty three, took his wife,
Fanny thirty seven, and their seven children, Marie seventeen, Arthur sixteen,
Carrie twelve, Maybell seven, James four, Raymond h two, and
Marylou four months old into town to buy new clothes
and have a family portrait taken. This was a rather

(16:54):
unusual occurrence for a working class rural family in that era. Still,
a loss a relative of the family. Overheard her mother
and aunts discussing a secret of Fanny Lawson and confided
in them. She was concerned about an incestuous relationship between
Charles and their oldest daughter, Marie. Ella May, a close
friend of Marie Lawson, had also been confided in a

(17:16):
few weeks before Christmas, Marie told her she was pregnant
with her father's baby, and that both her parents knew
about this. On the afternoon of December twenty fifth, nineteen
twenty nine, Charles sent his son Arthur into town on
an errand once Arthur was gone, Charles took his twelve
gage shotgun and waited by the tobacco barn. His daughters,

(17:36):
Carrie and Maybell were leaving to go to their uncle
and aunt's house when they were arranged. Charles shot them
then bludgeoned them, placing their bodies in the tobacco barn.
He returned to the house and shot his wife Fanny,
who was on the porch hearing the gunshot His daughter Marie,
who was inside the house, screamed. The two youngest boys,
James and Raymond, ran and hid. Charles went inside shot Marie,

(17:59):
then found the two boys and shot them as well.
He then took the baby and bludgeoned her to death.
He took the bodies of his family and carefully set
them out. He rested their heads on rocks and folded
their arms across their bodies. Charles left the house and
went off into the woods on his own. Several hours later,
he shot himself. The gunshot heard by the numerous people

(18:22):
who had gathered at his home, learning of the massacre
from Arthur and the police. On Christmas Eve, two thousand
and two, in Middletown, Pennsylvania, Scott Hoolab twenty eight drove

(18:44):
his brother, Ernest Hulab Junior, forty two, to the home
of his estranged wife and two children. Ernest broke into
the home and crept into the bedroom of Jean Hoolaver
forty three, and pulled out his twenty two caliber pistol.
He shot her in the head. He left her room
and crept into the bedroom of each of his daughters,
Elizabeth fifteen and Victoria twenty. He then shot each girl

(19:06):
in the head, leaving only Victoria's infant daughter, nine month
old Madison alive. Their bodies were not discovered until Christmas morning.
Madison found unharmed near her mother's body. Ernest was the
only suspect as he was about to be tried on
rape charges. Police alleged that he had been molesting both

(19:26):
his daughters for years. Ernest was acquitted of the rape
charges during the course of his murder trial, as all
three of his witnesses were now dead. In two thousand
and four, he was found guilty of all three murders
and given three consecutive death sentences. As of now, he
remains on death row. Scott Hulaver was sentenced to a

(19:47):
twelve and a half to twenty five year term in
prison on three counts of third degree murder. His most
recent appeal was dismissed on January eleventh, twenty eighteen, and
he remains in prison this day. Up next, it's Jeffrey Pardo,
The Killer Santa on Weird Darkness. Welcome back to Weird Darkness.

(20:34):
I'm dar Ron Marler. Christmas parties are a time for joy, laughs,
and family, a time to be shared with the ones
you love. But sometimes the ones who love us have
a different plan. That was the case of Bruce Jeffrey Pardo,

(20:57):
the Killer Santa. Bruce Jeffrey Pardo grew up in the
Sanfordando Valley in Los Angeles, California, graduated from John H.
Polytechnic High School and went on to study computer science
at California State Northridge. A bright man, he graduated and
secured himself a job as a software engineer for Jet
Propulsion Laboratory. Bruce was not the model employee, spending time

(21:21):
hacking the company system to access private personal information, including
but not limited to compensation, tax information, etc. He also
had very poor attendance. Despite all of this, by nineteen
eighty eight, at the age of twenty four, he found
himself engaged to Delia, a fellow employee. Bruce still lived

(21:43):
with his mother and he was not in the best
financial shape, so Delaiah agreed to pay for a wedding
reception at the country club, as well as a honeymoon
in Tahiti. Everything was set up, and both Dalaia and
Bruce's mother were excited. The big day arrived on June seventeenth,
nineteen eighty nine. Deliah waited at the church in nervous anticipation,

(22:05):
but Bruce never showed up. She later discovered that he
had withdrawn three thousand dollars from their joint bank account
and took a trip of his own to Palm Springs, Florida. Deliah,
of course, called off their engagement and things went back
to how they used to be. It wasn't until two
thousand and one that Bruce found himself in another difficult situation.

(22:28):
He was living with his girlfriend, Eleanor and their thirteen
month old son, Matthew, in Woodland Hills, California. It was
the most stable relationship Bruce had ever had, and things
were going really well. That is until the day Eleanor
went out, leaving Bruce home alone with the baby. Bruce
turned on the television and got sucked in. He wasn't

(22:50):
paying careful attention to Matthew, and the boy fell into
the backyard pool. When Eleanor returned home, she found Bruce
holding their son nearly hysterical. Was rushed to the hospital,
and after just a week of intense medical attention, the
doctors informed them that their son would never fully recover.
In fact, Matthew had sustained brain damage and was now

(23:12):
a paraplegic. As Bruce did when things got hard, he left,
never to see his son again. Despite his mother's continued
interest and support to the child. In two thousand and four,
a co worker of Bruce's introduced him to his sister
in law, Sylvia. Sylvia was a forty year old mother
of three, and they hit it off right from the start.

(23:34):
January twenty ninth, two thousand and six, the couple was married.
Bruce purchased a three bedroom, four hundred and fifty two
thousand dollars home in Montrose. The happy family attended church
together regularly. Bruce even volunteered as a n usher. But
things are not always as they seem, as we already
know with Bruce, the relationship was suffering under financial stress,

(23:58):
and then Bruce's mother, Nancy, decided she had to say something.
She was quite fond of Sylvia and knew her son
had his troubles. She told her about her son's past relationships,
including that with Eleanor and their son, Matthew. Sylvia was
shocked by this revelation, having not known anything about Matthew,

(24:18):
and further angered by Bruce's dishonesty and his lack of responsibility.
Then it was discovered that although Bruce had not seen
his son since that day in the hospital, he was
still continuing to claim him on his taxes as a dependent.
Sylvia filed for divorce in April two thousand and eight,
and Bruce spiraled into depression. In June, he purchased his

(24:41):
first gun, a nine millimeter handgun. On June eighteenth, in
divorce court, he was ordered to pay one thousand, seven
hundred eighty five dollars per month in spousal support. He
wrote his first check, which bounced, and that he stopped
payment on the second, making no further attempts to pay.
On July thirty first, he was fired from his job

(25:02):
for billing fraudulent hours. He applied for unemployment, but was
denied as workers who are fired are deemed ineligible. On
August eighth, Bruce purchased another nine millimeter handgun, followed by
another purchase on September eighth. He then contacted one of
his neighbors, Jerry, who happened to be a proprietor of
Jerry's costumes. He requested a custom sized Santa suit with

(25:26):
a little extra room for comfort, as he was six
foot four and two hundred seventy pounds, making a standard
suit too small. He told her that it was for
a children's party and paid a two hundred dollars deposit
with a promise to pick up and pay the rest
in November. Then on October eleventh, he purchased his fourth handgun.

(25:48):
He received a call from an old high school friend,
Steve Irwin, who asked him over to his home in
Iowa to celebrate his forty fifth birthday. Bruce accepted, and
while he was there, confided in Steve he was embarrassed
that his personal life was open and on display in court,
where everyone could see his finances and now knew of
his firing. Even more so, he was upset that he

(26:09):
and his mother hardly spoke, and during the divorce proceedings,
she chose to sit with Sylvia's family, not providing support
to her own son. November came and Bruce returned to
Jerry's costumes and paid the outstanding fee for his costume
and even left a twenty dollars tip. On the thirteenth,
he purchased yet another handgun, now totaling five. He had

(26:33):
also acquired a Dewault compressor, a fifty foot hose, and
a tank of high octane fuel. Just one week before Christmas.
On December eighteenth, two thousand and eight, Bruce's divorce from
Sylvia was final. He agreed to let her keep her
diamond engagement ring and agreed to pay her ten thousand dollars.
The next day, he went to a Montrose travel agency

(26:56):
where he booked a ticket to Iowa, where he would
visit his friend Steve. He paid six hundred fifty dollars
for a round trip flight that would depart at twelve
twenty am on Christmas Day and return two weeks later.
He rented a Dodge Caliber from budget, then rented a
Silver RAV four from a rent wreck. He loaded up
the RAF four with maps of the southwestern United States,

(27:18):
as well as water, food, clothing, a take of gas,
a laptop, and a desktop computer. Early evening on Christmas Eve,
he stopped to chat with a neighbor, saying he was
heading out to a Christmas party. He'd been signed up
to serve as a nusher for a midnight mass at
the church he attended, but didn't show up. Instead, at

(27:38):
approximately eleven thirty pm, dressed in his Santa suit, Bruce
knocked on the door of his former in law's house,
where he knew his ex wife would be. The door
was answered by eight year old Letitia Usufpolski, Sylvia's niece.
Excited to see Santa Claus. She rushed toward him. Bruce
didn't hesitate. He fired, hitting her in the face. He

(28:00):
went on to shoot indiscriminately at the frightened party guests.
When he felt he was done shooting, he unwrapped the
gift he had brought with him. He was a home
made flame thrower. He began to spray racing fuel around
the home, intent on lighting it with a flare. Unfortunately
for Bruce, the flames from two separate fireplaces triggered an explosion.

(28:21):
Bruce fled the house, dropping a pair of fake glasses
and his Sanna hat in the yard. He jumped into
the Dodge Caliber rental car and drove thirty miles to
Silmar Parking, about a block away from his brother's home.
He carefully peeled his shredded Santa suit off his body,
as it had melted into his skin from the explosion,
causing third degree burns. He used his suit to set

(28:42):
up a booby trap. If the suit was moved, a
trip wire would ignite a flash fire, exploding two hundred
rounds of ammunition. Bruce's brother returned home around three ten
in the morning and found him sprawled on the living
room couch with two handguns by his side. He was dead,
having shot himself back at the house. The fire soared

(29:05):
forty to fifty feet and took eighty firefighters an hour
and a half to extinguish. Nine people were dead and
three others wounded. Due to the intensity of the fire,
victims could only be identified with dental and medical records.
Sylvia Ortega, Pardo Bruce's ex wife, died from a gunshot.
Alicia Sodomayor Ortega, Sylvia's mother, died from a gunshot. Joseph

(29:30):
s Ortega, Sylvia's father, died from multiple gunshots. Charles Ortega,
Sylvia's brother, died from a combination of smoke inhalation and gunshots.
Sherry Lynn Ortega, Charles's wife, died from a combination of
smoke inhalation and gunshot wounds. James Ortega, Sylvia's brother, died
from a combination of smoke inhalation and gunshot wounds. Teresa Ortega,

(29:53):
James's wife, died from a combination a smoke inhalation and
gunshot wounds. Alicia Ortega or Tees, Sylvia's sister, died from
a combination of smoke inhalation and gunshot wounds, and Michael
Andre Ortiz, Alicia's son died in the fire. Sylvia's eight
year old niece, who had been shot in the face

(30:14):
at the very beginning of the incident, actually survived, but
she suffered severe, non life threatening injuries. A sixteen year
old girl was shot and wounded in the back, and
a twenty year old woman suffered a broken angle jumping
from a second floor window. Up next on Weird Darkness,

(30:35):
It's a Christmas horror starring a boy named Christy his
sister who did nothing but encourage his torture, accusations of
witchcraft and death. Christie Bamu's Cruel Christmas When Weird Darkness returns,

(31:19):
I'm Darren Marler. Welcome back to Weird Darkness. Christmas or
the holidays in general, are a time for friends and family.
Sometimes being together is wonderful and sometimes it's misery. When
Christie Bamu traveled from East London to visit his older
sister Mugai, he found nothing but misery. On December twentieth,

(31:41):
twenty ten, fifteen year old Christi Bahmu and four of
his siblings visited their older sister, Magali Bamu and her
boyfriend Eric Bakubi, who were both twenty eight at the time.
Everything was fine until Christy had to use the restroom
and found that he couldn't get in. He was such
a dire emergency he wet himself and then, out of embarrassment,

(32:03):
tried to hide the evidence by hiding his pants in
the kitchen. The Koubi, who had suffered brain damage, took
this as a sign that Christie had brought kindoki or
witchcraft into his home. He had no choice but to
exercise the boy. But it didn't stop with Christi. The
Kubi went after the other four as well. To say

(32:24):
it started with simple beatings is to make it sound
like beatings are acceptable, but compared with what Christy would
eventually suffer, the beatings would have been preferable. Over the
next four days, all five, three boys and two girls
were asked to prove that they were witches. Kelly, the

(32:44):
older sister, said they started talking about kindoki, witchcraft and this,
and that it was as if they were obsessed by witchcraft,
and then it became absolutely unbearable. They decided we had
to come there to kill them. It started with prayer
and fasting, and when that wasn't enough. The beatings began.

(33:05):
He began to hit Christy while my sister was watching
and didn't do anything. Kelly said, I begged him, We
didn't do anything. We are innocent. She didn't argue at all.
It was as if it was completely normal. She was
just sitting there as a spectator. They were beaten, attacked
with a knife, and one of the girls was even
forced to eat a light bulb. Mikubi told them to

(33:26):
jump out of a window so he could watch them fly.
They looked to Magali, their older sister, for help, but
all she did was encourage her boyfriend. He hit and
hit Christy. Kelly said he was not feeling well. He
was having trouble breathing and he fell over. As far
as Eric and mcgualay were concerned, that was the Kinoki
coming out of him. The sisters, ages eleven and twenty,

(33:49):
were accused of sorcery, black magic as well as witchcraft.
They chose to make false confessions. According to Kelly, Maggaline
and Bakubi asked if we were witches. I repeated again
and again that we were not witches. I did not
know what was going on in their minds. They decided
we had come there to kill them. Eventually, they all

(34:09):
admitted to being witches to end the attacks. While that
worked for four of them, Christie was not so lucky.
Kakubi ordered them to attack their brother. For Christie, the
beatings turned to torture. Christie asked for forgiveness. He asked
again and again. Magali did absolutely nothing. She didn't lift
a finger and said that she was convinced that we

(34:31):
did bad things. Kelly said. Christy was attacked, suffering more
than two hundred blows. His teeth were broken with a hammer,
he was hit with metal poles. Kikubi used a pair
of pliers to rip his ear, and heavy ceramic tiles
were dropped on his head. As one would expect, Christie
begged for death. He got his wish. On Christmas morning,

(34:55):
Magali and Pekubi called their father, Pierre Bamu, Dad, you
got to pick up the children because they're witches and
you're a witch too. Magali told her father, Bakuby said,
you got to come and pick up the children. You
got to pick up Christie because he's a witch and
he's practicing witchcraft on another child of the family. If
you don't I'm going to kill him. According to Pierre,

(35:16):
when he said that, I wanted to say something to him.
Then straight after that, I heard Christie's voice. Christy was
talking in a calm voice. He wasn't crying. He just
spoke to me in a voice like we're using now, Dad,
come and get me, otherwise Eric will kill me. And
then he was cut off when Eric said that. Knowing
Eric as I do, I said, it's not going to

(35:38):
come to that, because he's a nice person, a really
nice person. Mcgalliy and Mkooby put all the siblings into
the bathtub. Mkuby proceeded to hose them off with cold water.
When he saw that Christie was no longer moving, he
stopped and pulled him from the tub, only to discover
he had died. When the paramedics arrived, tried to say

(36:00):
I Christy, but were unsuccessful. He was gone. All were
standing in the living room hysterical, terrified, and soaking wet.
In a staggering act of depravity and cruelty, they both
forced the other to take part in the assaults upon Christie.
The children had no option other than to do as
they were told or risk the same violence to themselves.

(36:21):
As Christie's injuries became even more severe, he even pleaded
to be allowed to die. Eventually, Bikobi took him into
the bathroom, put him in the bath and started to
run the water. Christy was just too badly injured and
exhausted to resist or to keep his head above the water.
Christy had been the victim of a prolonged attack of

(36:42):
unspeakable savagery and brutality. Christy was killed in the name
of witchcraft. It's hard to believe in this day and
age anyone could believe someone was practicing witchcraft, said Brian Altman.
Police discovered blood all over the home, on the ceiling walls,
as well as on all the two rules they had
used in their attacks. Eric Bakubi and Magali Bamu were

(37:04):
arrested for their crimes. Bikubi claimed self defense, saying he
was defending himself because Christy was a witch. Magali claimed
Bikubi forced her to join in on the attack. Bikubi
would only admit to manslaughter on the grounds of diminished
responsibility from his reported brain damage. Mgali denied her involvement.
It's an unprecedented scenario where siblings are murdering another sibling.

(37:29):
The family have been very positive. They've pulled together remarkably well.
They were more than willing to give evidence and make
sure the perpetrators were dealt with appropriately, said Detective Inspector
Paul Mattock. It was prolonged torture involving mental and physical
suffering being inflicted before death, said Judge David Paget. While
he accepted Bikubi's claim that brain damage might have made

(37:51):
him more inclined to believe Christy was a witch, he
also added the belief in witchcraft, however, genuine cannot excuse
an assault to another, let alone the killing of another
human being. During the course of the trial, Judge David
Paget pointed out that at no point did Magali show
any remorse for her actions. Bakubi was sentenced to a

(38:14):
minimum of thirty years in prison. Mcgali was sentenced to
a minimum of twenty five Twenty six year old Zazelle

(38:37):
Preston of Anaheim, California, was taking classes at Cyprus College
in hopes of becoming a domestic violence counselor. Unfortunately, Preston's kind,
forgiving and compassionate demeanor caused her to become trapped in
a marriage where she herself suffered years of violence at

(38:57):
the hands of her husband, William Wallace. In two thousand
and eight, Wallace pleaded guilty to beating Preston and threatening
to kill her and served eighteen days in jail. Wallace
was later placed under a restraining order, but eventually persuaded
Preston to get back together with him. Wallace continued with

(39:17):
his threats to kill Preston for the next three years,
and sadly, during Christmas of twenty eleven, he followed through
with that promise. Wallace and Preston lived in an apartment
with their seven week old son and Preston's three and
eight year old daughters from a previous relationship. On December

(39:38):
twenty fourth, twenty eleven, the couple went to a neighbour's
Christmas Eve party, but when they returned home, an argument ensued,
and the confrontation quickly turned violent. Preston's eldest daughter later
testified that Wallace pushed her mother into a glass table,
then Wallace asked her to help pull the pieces of

(39:59):
glass from her mother's body. Wallace then attempted to clean
Preston up in the bathroom, but dropped her and knocked
her head into the side of the toilet seat. Wallace
then took Preston into a bedroom but never called for help.
Around one am, Preston died as a result of her injuries. However,

(40:20):
on Christmas Day, Wallace placed Preston on the couch with
sunglasses on and videotaped the children opening Christmas presents in
front of her body. He then told the children, Mommy
ruined Christmas. She got drunk and ruined Christmas. It wasn't
until approximately nine thirty am Christmas Day that Wallace called

(40:42):
nine one one, reporting that his wife was in need
of medical attention. When paramedics arrived, Preston was found unresponsive,
but given that there was no blood or evidence of
her beating, they attempted to perform CPR. Preston was later
pronounced dead at the Hot Spittle. Wallace was arrested the

(41:03):
same day, but claimed that Preston bit and hit him,
and that while he was defending himself, she fell on
to the table. His attorney also later argued that Preston's
death was a result of her drunkenly tripping and falling
down more than once. It wasn't until April seventh, twenty
twenty one that Wallace, now thirty nine years old, was

(41:25):
convicted of second degree murder on June fourth, twenty twenty one.
He was sentenced to fifteen years to life in prison,
but was given credit for the nine years he had
already spent behind bars. Thanks for listening. If you missed

(41:56):
any part of tonight's show, or if you'd like to
hear it again, you can subscribe to the podcast in
your favorite podcast app at weird Darkness dot com slash listen.
Not only will you hear a copy of tonight's show,
but you'll also get a daily episode of Weird Darkness
as I post seven days per week. Again. You can
subscribe to the podcast at weird Darkness dot com, slash listen,

(42:18):
or search for Weird Darkness wherever you listen to podcasts.
You can follow the show on Facebook and Twitter at
weird Darkness and please tell others about the show who
love the paranormal or strange stories, true crime, monsters, or
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you'd like to be a part of the show, you

(42:38):
can send in your own paranormal experiences by clicking on
tell your story at Weirddarkness dot com. You can also
email me anytime at Darren at Weird Darkness dot com.
Darren is d A R R E N. Weird Darkness
is a production and trademark of Marler House Productions, copyright
twenty twenty two. And now that we're coming out of

(42:59):
the dark, I'll leave you with a little light, Luke
Wan verses thirty through thirty three. But the angel said
to her, do not be afraid, Mary, you have found
favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to
a son, and you were to call him Jesus. He
will be great and will be called the Son of
the Most High. The Lord God will give him the

(43:20):
throne of his father David, and he will reign over
Jacob's descendants forever. His kingdom will never end. And a
final thought, bless us Lord this Christmas with quietness of mind.
Teach us to be patient and always to be kind.
Ellen Steiner Wrice, I'm Darren Marler. Thanks for joining me

(43:43):
in the Weird Darkness, and Merry Christmas. Towards the end

(44:21):
of each year, as fireplaces are lits and hot cocoa
has made Americans have made it a tradition to revisit
their favorite classic holiday books, movies, and songs, and though
ghost stories may seem out of place in present day
American holiday celebrations, they were once a Christmas staple, reaching

(44:41):
their peak of popularity in Victorian England. Like most longstanding
cultural customs, the precise origin of telling ghost stories at
the end of the year is unknown, largely because it
began as an oral tradition without written records. The season
around Winter Solstice has been of transition and change for

(45:02):
a very, very, very long time. The season has provoked
oral stories about spooky things in many different countries and
cultures all over the world. Spooky storytelling gave people something
to do during the long dark evenings. Before electricity, those
long midwinter nights met folks had to stop working early

(45:23):
and they spent their leisure hours huddled close to the fire.
So that's what we'll do for this Christmas edition of
Weird Darkness. I'll share the history of telling ghost stories
during the season, and then I'll share a few true
ghostly tales that take place during the holidays. I'm Deren Marler,

(45:43):
and this is Weird Darkness. Welcome Weirdos. I'm Deren Marler,
and this is Weird Darkness. Here you'll find stories of
the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre,

(46:10):
unsolved and unexplained coming up this hour. Christmas is supposed
to be the merry season with joy and light in
the darkness, but many places are haunted by ghosts and
paranormal activity during this time. In fact, many of the
ghost stories I'll share tonight are haunted especially around Christmas.

(46:32):
If you're new here, welcome to the show. And if
you're already a member of this weird o family, please
take a moment and invite someone else to listen. Recommending
Weird Darkness to others helps make it possible for me
to keep doing the show. And while you're listening, be
sure to follow Weird Darkness on Facebook and Twitter and
visit Weirddarkness dot com to find the daily Weird Darkness podcast.
Watch streaming be horror movies and horror hosts twenty four

(46:55):
to seven for free. Listen to free audiobooks that I've narrated.
Send me your own true story of something paranormal that's
happened to you or someone you know, and more. You
can find it all at weird Darkness dot com. Now
mult your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights,
and come with me into the Weird Darkness. It was

(47:28):
in Victorian England that telling supernatural tales at the end
of the year, specifically during the Christmas season, went from
an oral tradition to a timely trend. This was in
part due to the development of the steam powered printing
press during the Industrial Revolution that made the written word
more widely available. This gave Victorians the opportunity to commercialize

(47:50):
and commodify existing oral ghost stories, turning them into a
version they could sell. Higher literary rates. Cheaper printing costs,
and more period articles meant that editors needed to fill
pages around Christmas time. They figured they could convert the
old storytelling tradition to a printed version. People who moved

(48:10):
out of their towns and villages and into larger cities
still wanted access to the supernatural sagas they heard around
the fireplace growing up. Fortunately, Victorian authors like Elizabeth Gaskell,
Margaret Oliphant, and Arthur Conan Doyle worked through the fall
to cook up these stories and have them ready to
print in time for Christmas. Industrialization not only provided tools

(48:32):
to distribute spooky stories, Uncertainty during the era also a
fueled interest in the genre. According to Britney Warman, a
folklorist specializing in Gothic literature and the co founder of
the Cartonhaw School of Folklore and the Fantastic, interest was driven,
she says, by the rise of industrialization, the rise of science,
and the looming fall of Victorian Britain as a superpower.

(48:55):
All of these things were in people's minds and made
the world seem a little darker and a little bit scarier.
Telling horror filled holiday tales continued to be a family
affair in England, even when they were read rather than recited.
We know from illustrations and diaries that whole families read
these periodicals together. The popularity of Victorian Christmas ghost stories

(49:19):
also transcended socioeconomic status. They were available to read everywhere,
from cheap publications to expensive Christmas annuals that middle class
ladies would show off on their coffee tables. Their broad
audience was reflected in the stories themselves, which sometimes centered
around working class characters and other times took place in

(49:40):
haunted manor houses. These upper class settings were intended to
invite readers from all classes into an idealized upper crust Christmas,
the type today's fans of Downton Abbey still enjoy his entertainment.
Charles dickens eighteen forty three novella A Christmas Carol has
forever linked the British author with the holiday season, but

(50:01):
his contributions to Christmas in Victorian England, including the tradition
of telling and reading ghost stories, extend far beyond Jacob
Marley's Visit to Scrooge. In fact, Dickens played a huge
part in popularizing the genre in England. He wrote a
bunch of different Christmas novellas, several of which involved ghosts specifically,

(50:23):
and then he started editing more and more Christmas ghost
stories from other people and working those into the magazines
he was already editing, and that just caught like wildfire.
Dickens also helped shape Christmas literature in general by formalizing
expectations about themes like forgiveness and reunion during the holiday season.

(50:44):
I've actually narrated the entire novel A Christmas Carol, which
is free to listen to on the audiobooks page at
Weirddarkness dot com if you're interested in hearing it. Although
countless trends made their way from England to America during
the Victorian era, the telling of ghost stories during the
Christmas season was not one that really caught on. A
Christmas Carol was an immediate bestseller in the United States,

(51:08):
but at the time of its publication, Dickens was arguably
the most famous writer in the world and already wildly popular.
The novella's success in the US likely had more to
do with Dickens's existing massive fan base than it did
americans interest in incorporating the supernatural into Christmas. American Christmas

(51:28):
scenes and stories tended to be syrupy sweet. There were
a few American writers of the period trying to put
Victorian style Christmas ghost stories into American culture, including Ethangel
Hawthorne and Henry James Washington. Irving made a similar and
earlier attempt slipping the supernatural into Christmas themed short stories,

(51:48):
published in eighteen nineteen and eighteen twenty. Warman theorizes that
American's reluctance to embrace the Christmas story tradition had to
do at least in part with the country's attitudes towards
things like magic and superstitions. In America, we generally had
a bit of resistance to the supernatural in a way
that European countries didn't. When you came to America, you

(52:11):
came with a fresh start. You came with a secular
mindset and the idea that you were leaving the past behind,
and some of these spooky superstitions were thought of as
being part of the past. Another reason telling spooky stories
never took off as a Christmas tradition in the United
States was because it became more firmly established as a
Halloween tradition thanks to Irish and Scottish immigrants that really

(52:36):
impacted culture here because they brought with them a concept
similar to Halloween, and that became for America the time
period for ghosts other than a Christmas carol. There is
another piece of pop culture that reflects the Victorian Christmas
time tradition, a single line from a song written and

(52:56):
released in nineteen sixty three by American musicians, first recorded
by Andy Williams. The song It's the most Wonderful Time
of the Year lists scary ghost stories as one of
the highlights of the holiday season. Although It's unclear why
the writers of the song, Edward Pola and George wil
included this tradition. Plato says that it's possible the lyric

(53:19):
is a reference to Dickens, a Christmas carol. It's only
the Wan text, but it's such a big deal here
in the US and in the UK. It's pretty much
all that Americans know about Christmas ghost stories in isolation.
But we're about to change that as we continue this
Christmas episode of Weird Darkness. Welcome back to Weird Darkness.

(54:04):
I'm Darren Marler. The legend of the Mistletoe Bride is
a ghost tale that many big houses claim as their own.
Bramseill House is one of them, and the story of
the dead bride trapped in the chest haunts the already
haunted place. A girl will always remember her wedding day,
and making sure the wedding day will be held on

(54:26):
Christmas Day will surely make it easy to remember the
wedding anniversary, but more people will remember it if the
bride turns into a ghost. This is the case of
the Bride of Bramseill House in Hampshire, one of Britain's
most crowded paranormal places, and although many big houses try
to claim the ghost of the bride in the oak

(54:48):
chest as their own, Bramshill could be one of the choices,
with no less than fourteen ghosts they claim wander there.
In the early seventeenth century, a girl named Anne Cope
was to be married in this house, and is the
name in some accounts of the story, Genevive Vorcini and
others English in some accounts, while she was believed to

(55:09):
be Italian in other accounts. What remains, though, is the same.
It was Christmas Day and everyone was in a festive mood.
She and her husband, Sir Hugh Bethel celebrated after having
taken their vows, and as the old custom went, she
was to be escorted to the marital bed. But before
the party was over, the bride wanted to play around

(55:30):
of hide and seek, where the target to be found
was her, and after a five minute start, the search began,
but to no avail. Searching the whole house, the guests
came back empty with no sign of the bride. Perhaps
there was a trick from the bride, could she just
be exceptionally good at this game? But as time went on,

(55:53):
the innocent prank she could have played on the guests
turned into a dangerous one. Many believed the brone had
fled from her marriage. Her husband, Hugh, on the other hand,
spent decades searching for his bride that was lost. It
was only after fifty years the mystery surrounding her disappearance
came into light, but by then her haunting had already begun. Hugh,

(56:17):
now an old man, was in the attic, still searching.
Having been through the mansion so many times, one should
have thought that there could be no more things to
be found. But then, when knocking on some oak paneling,
a secret door he didn't know about suddenly opened. Inside
the door was a room with a wooden chest. It

(56:37):
was locked. Inside the chest. When he finally got it open,
the remains of the bride he had hoped to spend
his life with, still in her wedding dress, holding her
bouquet of wilted flowers, which had been by her side
all this time. In the lid of the chest the
bride had been trapped in. There were signs of nails scraping,
and her dying efforts to escape. To get out, but

(57:00):
she never would. So many accounts that the White Lady
have been reported at Bramshill House. Even Michael, the First
of Romania, asked to move rooms after the White Lady
kept passing his room during his stay there. And you
can sense her arrival by scent Lily of the Valley,
which was Anne's favorite. Not so many remember her wedding

(57:22):
and her death on one she is remembered as such,
although her real name is disputable. The name Mistletoe Bride, however,
remains poems, movies, books and folklore retell about the young
bride in the Oak Chest. The same story was retold
by Susan E. Wallace in eighteen eighty seven as The

(57:42):
Old Oak Chest and by Henry James as The Romance
of Certain Old Clothes in eighteen sixty eight. The old
tale was also made into a silver screen edition in
nineteen o four, when Percy Stowe made the short film
The Mistletoe Bow, But the Mistletoe b It's not the
only ghost from England that starts at a wedding during

(58:05):
Christmas time. A great hall during Christmas time, with good food,
merry guests, and an unmistakable sound of a harp playing
a love song. Scared, yet no sounds like the right
vibe for a cozy Christmas time, doesn't it. But if
the harp playing comes from nowhere and no one is
playing scared now, this is what festive guests might hear

(58:30):
echoing through the halls every Christmas Eve at Stubley Hall,
reminiscing about the tragedy of war and love. Not far
from Rochdale, Manchester in England, sits the Stubley Hall. Already
in the sixteen hundreds, the hall was known for being
an ancient mansion with stables, barns, dovecoats and watermill, so

(58:52):
you know it's old even by British standards. And such
an old place carries many tales within the stone walls,
and stories about the paranormal and sightings of ghosts have
been plentiful, and one of them is the story about
Fatima the Night. Ralph Distubly lived here once upon a time,

(59:13):
a knight who served Richard the Lionheart during the Crusades
and Jerusalem. At the beginning of the Crusades, Ralph joined
in on. They saw it as a successful mission as
they were able to capture Saladin, the first Sultan of
Egypt and Syria, but they never quite managed to seize Jerusalem,
which they saw as a spiritual symbol and as the
Holy City. One of the more romantic yet tragic tales

(59:36):
from the Crusade Wars was about one of Saladin's daughters.
Her name was Fatima, and she fell in love with
Ralph during the raging Battle of the Holy City. However,
in eleven ninety two, the British Crusaders had to pull
out after the Battle of Jaffa, and Ralph was forced
to leave Fatima behind, But before leaving, he swore his

(59:58):
undying love for her promised her he would return. As
a token, he gave her a diamond studded cross to
keep as a reminder of him. Three years went by
and Fatima heard nothing of the Knight who promised to
come back for her. Growing tired of just waiting, she
disguised herself as a troubadour and sailed across the ocean

(01:00:19):
in search of him, just bringing her harp she played
so well, but hadn't been able to play in her sorrow,
but she would never reach the shores of England to
return to her beloved Ralph. On the eve of Christmas,
she died. The plague had traveled with them on the ship,
and she and the rest of the passengers and crew perished.

(01:00:40):
The same night, there was a wedding at Stubley Hall,
Ralph's wedding. He was to marry a wealthy baron's daughter.
Maybe it was only to save the family who were
in need of money. Maybe he fell in love with
another one. Either way, the song of his past lover
came to the hall during the celebrations. He was standing
by the window, not enjoying the festivities. He was maybe

(01:01:04):
thinking of Fatima, the woman he truly wanted to marry,
And it was then that he heard the harp, the
familiar but now so nostalgic sound of Fatima playing the harp,
playing none other than the love song she had played
for him, a traditional Saracene love song. He rushed into
the grounds, thinking he would see her among the trees.

(01:01:26):
The guests noticed his disappearance and went after him and
found him under an oak tree, dead, clutching a diamond
studded cross. Forty six year old Della Kaligher fell ill
on the evening of December twenty fifth, twenty twelve, after
eating a four course turkey meal during a Christmas Day

(01:01:47):
pub lunch at the Railway Hotel in Hornchurch, East London.
Kaligher was one of seven people within their party of
sixteen who became sick after eating the turkey. But while
the others recovered, Kelligher's condition continued to deteriorate. On December
twenty sixth, twenty twelve, Boxing Day, Kelliger's husband, fifty one

(01:02:09):
year old John Calgar, took her to Queen's Hospital in Romford,
where she was examined in an ambulance. John stated that
Kaligher was given an injection, but that no blood test
was done and she was instructed to go home and
lie down. Unfortunately, Kelliger suffered cardiac arrest at home later
that day, so John called an ambulance, but stated by

(01:02:30):
that time Kaligher barely had a pulse. Sadly, she died
at the hospital on December twenty seventh, twenty twelve, leaving
behind her husband and a fourteen year old daughter. Kelliger's
family went on to file civil claims for negligence against
Mitchell's and Butler's, the chain which owns the Railway Hotel. However,

(01:02:50):
as a total of thirty three people fell ill, a
major investigation was also launched into the matter by police
and health safety authorities. During the investigation, it was discovered
that Kelligher's death was a result of Clostridium perfringens bacteria,
a common cause of food poisonings. The turkeys were prepared

(01:03:10):
on Christmas Eve, but were not cooled properly after cooking
and were not adequately reheated before being served to guests.
It was also later discovered that the pub's chef, thirty
seven year old Mamet Kaya, and the pub manager forty
year old and Marie McSweeney, falsified records in an attempt
to cover up the fact that the turkey meat had

(01:03:31):
been fatally undercooked. Both Kaya and McSweeney were found guilty
of perverting the course of justice on January twenty third,
twenty fifteen. Kaya was sentenced to a year in prison
and McSweeney was sentenced to eighteen months. The pub, Shane
Mitchell's and Butler's, was also fined one point nine million

(01:03:52):
dollars after being found guilty of selling unsafe food. When
Weird Darkness returns, Anne Boleyn is a ghost that spotted
across England, but during Christmas times. It's reported she is
haunting her childhood home at Heaver Castle. The Christmas Ghost

(01:04:12):
of Anne Bolin up next on Weird Darkness. I'm Darren Marler.

(01:04:44):
Welcome back to Weird Darkness. One of the more famous
Christmas as that know how to travel is the ghost
of the Infamous and Bolin, most known for the wedge

(01:05:06):
between the State of England and the Catholic Church in
the time of the Two Doors. The people's perception of
her at the time was awful and it would be
understandable if she felt some sort of resentment or sorrow
for how her life ended even in the afterlife. As
ghost sightings go, perhaps the Tower of London is a
more well known place for ghost sidings of her, as

(01:05:29):
this was the place she was held, imprisoned and executed,
but it is far from the only place paranormal sightings
of the former Queen have been spotted in the UK.
She's also been spotted in Windsor Castle, Hampton Court and
Roeford Hall, just to name a few. But in the
spirit of Christmas, we're going to have a look at
where the Royal ghost spends her Christmases in the afterlife.

(01:05:53):
Every Christmas she is said to make an appearance at
her castle at least it is now expected. Christmas was
supposedly her favorite time, and Hebber Castle was her childhood
home with good memories, and contrary to how her ghost
is seen at other locations, headless and darkly dressed, for instance,
it is said she is seen as more happy and

(01:06:14):
content when spotted here. The castle was built in twelve
seventy in the rural part of Kent, and although relatively
small compared to many other castles we see in England,
it came to play a big part in England's history
as it was the seat of the Bollyn family. This
is also the place where Anne and Henry first met

(01:06:35):
when he was still married to Queen Catherine of Aragon
and had an affair with her younger sister Mary. She's
often reported to be seen under a big oak tree
that stands on the castle grounds. This is the place
Anne and Henry spent a lot of time courting. Although
the ending for the couple was one of the most
dramatic breakups in British history, the courting seems to have

(01:06:56):
been genuine. Henry is said to have written her at
least seventeen letters begging her to be his, and the
length he went to marry her spoke to how much
he wanted her in his life. Although they did get
together in the end, their match was an unpopular one.
In order to divorce the queen, he had to part
with the Catholic Church, and Anne was in the public

(01:07:18):
eye a witch, a heretic and a seducer that was
a danger to the empire and people law. They never
had a son, but their child, Elizabeth the First, turned
out to be one of England's longest reigning queens. But
after several miscarriages, never ending gossiping and pressure from all sides,

(01:07:38):
their love turned sour and in the end Henry found
another one and decided to get rid of Anne in
a most dramatic way. On the charges of treason and
adultery and incest with her brother, she was sent to
the Tower of London and sentenced to death on May nineteenth.
In fifteen thirty six, she was executed by beheading at

(01:08:00):
the Tower. With such an accessible place, with such a
famous ghost, the reports about sightings has been plentiful, like
in twenty fifteen when a tourist at the castle captured
something on camera he was certain had to be the
former Queen by the fireplace. I believe there's something important
historically inside the fireplace she wants me to recover. Mister

(01:08:22):
Archer that took the picture told the papers at the time.
Who is to say for what reason Anne has to
haunt her childhood home, let alone England as a whole.
In any case, her imprints on the course of the history,
religion and the royal line were irrevocably shaken by her
life and work. It's also been said that she's been

(01:08:44):
seen walking across the beautiful bridge on the Premises that
crosses River Eden, perhaps on her way to the place
of her happy and innocent childhood. On a chilly Christmas Eve,

(01:09:27):
a woman and her father were riding in their carriage
down the road to Hawkhurst, Kent. In the eighteenth century,
highwaymen were notorious and feared in the English countryside. They
robbed whoever came their way, and sometimes the robbery went
more violently than necessary, and Hawkhurst housed some of the
most notorious gangs and smugglers at the time, making the

(01:09:49):
place feared along the English coast. This had been the
case of the young woman's brother, who had been killed
on maybe even the same road, but there was one
road to take to get anywhere, and the same family
was again meeting an unfortunate end. The carriage was stopped
by the highwayman Gilbert when they were around the village
of Martin and Kent. He ordered the father and daughter

(01:10:12):
out of the carriage to strip them of their possessions
and valuables, But as soon as the daughter stepped on
the ground, the horse bolted, carrying her father away, leaving
her all alone with the robber at the side of
the road, seemingly helpless. But the story comes with a
twist seldom seen in other horror stories like these. A
horror not only by being robbed, dawned on her. As

(01:10:35):
she laid eyes on the face of the man, she
recognized him Gilbert, as the one who had murdered her brother,
and she refused to see such a fate befall herself.
Enraged and afraid, she drew a knife and stabbed the
man before he could take more from her by reaching
for a hidden knife in her bag and planting it
in Gilbert's side, and fled into the bushes. When the

(01:11:00):
father and the driver managed to calm the horses, they
returned to the site of where they had left her. Alone. There,
all they could find was Gilbert's dead body that they
buried on the side of the road. It wasn't until
the next day the woman was found by the villagers
of Marden, wandering around after having stabbed a man to death,
all alone this cold Christmas eve. She had been fleeing

(01:11:23):
from the danger from the last night. But although she
escaped alive her body unharmed, it's told that during the
night she had gone completely mad. And every Christmas ever since,
the same scene the robbery the murder is repeated by
their ghosts, first by Gilbert himself, then later perhaps joined

(01:11:46):
by the woman when we're darkness returns. The Brown Lady
of Raynham Hall is probably one of the most iconic

(01:12:10):
ghost pictures out there. But is it real? Was it
just a double exposure? The picture of the Brown Lady
of Raynham Hall has been viral since nineteen thirty six.
A photographer that year took the infamous picture forever, putting
it in the mystery box for people to wonder about
ever since. But what is the story behind it and

(01:12:32):
who is that ghostly figure? According to legend, the Brown
Lady of Raynham Hall is the lost ghost of Dorothy
Walpole and she lived a very unhappy life with her
violent and bad tempered husband, and very often, especially during
Christmas time, the ghost of the Brown Lady is reported

(01:12:55):
to have been spotted. That story is up next on
Weird Darkness. Welcome back to Weird Darkness. I'm Darren Marler.

(01:13:32):
It was just another day in the upper class England
with their old and haunted mansions and stories. Up in
Norfolk lays the old Raynham Hall that was about to
become one of the most haunted places in Great Britain.
Captain Hubert C. Provand was working in London as a
photographer for the Country Life magazine. On September nineteenth, nineteen

(01:13:54):
thirty six, he and his assistant in Drashira were taking
photos of the Rayndom Hall for an artist. Inside the
three hundred year old mansion, they were setting up the
camera to take another of the old hall's main staircase.
Suddenly Shira saw a vapory form gradually assuming the appearance
of a woman. The figure was moving down the stairs

(01:14:16):
towards them. Shira directed Provand to take the cap off
the lens while Shira pressed the trigger to take the picture.
After the negative was developed for the article, they saw
more clear what they had gotten on camera that day,
and the famous legendary photo of the Brown Lady of
Raynham Hall was born. And after the photo, so was

(01:14:39):
the legend. So who was this lady? Or should we
rather say is this lady? According to legend, the Brown
Lady of Raynham Hall is the lost ghost of Dorothy Walpole.
She was born in sixteen eighty six and, according to gossip,
the prettiest sister of Robert Walpole see as the first

(01:15:00):
Prime Minister of Great Britain. Walpole was neighbors with Charles Townsend,
second Viscount Townshend to Norfolk, and it just so happened
that his sister Dorothy Mary Townsend and seventeen thirteen. Although
they were good neighbors and even brother in laws, there
was bad blood between the men, especially in politics. And

(01:15:20):
when Walpole built his own mansion, Houghton Hall, did this
affect poor Dorothy at all? What he knows is that
it wasn't a particularly happy marriage. Dorothy was Charles's second wife.
He looked upon the Hall as his pride, as Lord
Hervey said, Lord Townsend, looked upon his own seat at
Raynham as the metropolis of Norfolk, and considered every stone

(01:15:43):
that augmented the splendor of Houghton as a diminution of
the gradule of Raynham. Charles was also well known for
his violent temper. Dorothy was rumored to have been a
mistress of a Lord Wharton, a well known womanizer, and
that no woman could be twenty four hours under his
roof and walk out with her reputation intact. When Charles

(01:16:05):
discovered his wife and her affair with Lord Wharton, the
story says he punished her by locking her in her
rooms in the family Rayndam Hall to make matters worse.
There are still rumors that she was in fact entrapped
by the Countess of Wharton, inviting Dorothy to stay a
few days, knowing full well her husband wouldn't let her
walk out with a reputation intact. After this, she remained

(01:16:29):
at Raynham Hall until her death in seventeen twenty six,
dying a smallpox. But did she really leave the halls?
Is she still roaming the place, still locked up, still
trying to get out? Whatever the truth is, the legend
was there to stay, and the first recorded sighting in
the ghost was in eighteen thirty five. One Christmas, the

(01:16:52):
new Lord, Charles Townsend invited some guests to the hall
for celebrations. Among the guests were Colonel Loftus and another
guest named Hawkins. One night, as they approached their bedrooms,
they saw the brown Lady, noticing the dated and brown
dress she wore. The following night, Loftus claimed he saw
it again. He said that he was drawn to the

(01:17:14):
specter's empty eye sockets dark in the glowing face the
once so pretty Dorothy. After Loftus reported what he saw,
it ended with some of the staff permanently leaving Raynham Hall.
It was all recorded by another guest, Lucia C. Stone.
Just a year after, the Brown Lady was seen again.

(01:17:34):
This time it was Captain Frederick Marriott, a friend of
Charles Dickens. He originally wanted to prove a theory of
his that the hauntings were caused by local smugglers. According
to him, the smugglers spread the story to keep people
away from the area. That night, he requested he spend
the night in the haunted room at Raynham Hall. Mariette's

(01:17:55):
daughter Florence wrote about her father's experience in eighteen ninety one,
saying he took possession of the room in which the
portrait of the Apparition hung and in which she had
been often seen, and slept each night with a loaded
revolver under his pillow. For two days. Nephews of the
baronet knocked at his door as he was undressing to
go to bed, and asked him to step over to

(01:18:17):
their room, which was at the other end of the corridor,
and give them his opinion on a new gun just
arrived from London. My father was in his shirt and trousers,
but as the hour was late and everybody had retired
to rest except themselves, he prepared to accompany them as
he was. As they were leaving the room, he caught
up his revolver. In case you meet the brown lady,

(01:18:38):
he said, laughing. When the inspection of the gun was over,
the young men, in the same spirit declared they would
accompany my father back again. In case you meet the
brown lady, they repeated, laughing. Also the three gentlemen therefore
returned in company. The corridor was long and dark, for
the lights had been extinguished, but as they reached the

(01:18:59):
middle it, they saw the glimmer of a lamp coming
towards them from the other end. What are the ladies
going to visit the nurseries, whispered the young townshend to
my father. Now the bedroom doors and that corridor faced
each other, and each room had a double door with
a space between, as is the case in many old
fashioned houses. My father, as I have said, was in

(01:19:21):
shirt and trousers only, and his native modesty made him
feel uncomfortable, so he slipped within one of the outer doors,
his friends following his example in order to conceal himself
until the lady should have passed by. I heard him
describe how he wanted her approaching nearer and nearer through
the chink of the door, until as she was close

(01:19:41):
enough for him to distinguish the colors and style over costume,
he recognized the figure as the facsimile of the portrait
of the Brown Lady. He had his finger on the
trigger of his revolver and was about to demand it
to stop and give the reason for its presence there,
when the figure halted of its own accord before the
door behind which he stood, and holding the lighted lamp,

(01:20:02):
she carried to her features, grinned in a malicious and
diabolical manner at him. This act so infuriated my father
he was anything but lamb like in disposition, that he
sprang into the corridor with a bound and discharged the
revolver right in her face. The figure instantly disappeared, the
figure at which for several minutes three men had been

(01:20:24):
looking together, and the bullet passed through the outer door
of the room on the opposite side of the corridor
and lodged in the panel of the inner one. My
father never attempted again to interfere with the Brown lady
of Raynham. When the son of Lady Townsend and his
friend saw her next, they knew who she was. They

(01:20:45):
saw her on the staircase and identified the ghost with
the portrait hanging on the wall in the haunted room.
Of course, the portrait was of Lady Dorothy Walpole. After
Provend and Shira took the picture in Raynham Hall, they
published their experiences in Country Life Magazine December twenty sixth,
nineteen thirty six. They were published again in Life Magazine

(01:21:06):
on January fourth, nineteen thirty seven. So all in all
they did profit on this but could it be that
they just took a picture? After the picture was taken.
A paranormal investigator, Harry Price, interviewed both Provnd and Shira.
He said, I will see at once. I was impressed.
I was told a perfectly simple story. Mister Rashira saw

(01:21:29):
the apparition descending the stairs at the precise moment when
Captain Proven's head was under the black cloth. A shout,
and the cap was off, and the flashball fired with
the results which we now see. I could not shake
their story, and I had no right to disbelieve them.
Only collusion between the two would account for the ghosts.
If it's a fake. The negative is entirely innocent of

(01:21:51):
any faking, But there have been numerous attempts at debunking
the picture and its status as proof. Some claim Shira
faked the image by putting grease or something in the
lens in the shape of a lady, maybe moved down
the stairs himself during an exposure, or maybe it's simply
an accidental double exposure or light somehow getting into the camera.

(01:22:16):
Some even claim that the figure looks eerily like the
Virgin Mary statue, and that the images of her in
the staircase the statue that is not the Virgin Mary.
Among those examining trying to debunk the validity of the
picture is Joe Nichols, detailed writings that the photograph is
nothing more than double exposure, and the magician John Booth

(01:22:36):
wrote that the photograph could be easily made. Booth had
the magician Ron Wilson cover himself in a bedsheet and
walk down the staircase at the Magic Castle in Hollywood.
It apparently turned out very similar to the photograph. So
what is that debunked or proof? Christmas nineteen twenty nine,

(01:23:08):
Charles Lawson murdered his wife and six of his seven children.
Charles Davis Lawson married Fanny Mannring in nineteen eleven. The
couple proceeded to have eight children. Their third child, William,
was born in nineteen fourteen, but tragically died in nineteen twenty.
Charles moved his family to Germanton, North Carolina in nineteen eighteen.

(01:23:30):
With his younger two brothers moved there. They worked as
tenant tobacco farmers and saved their money to purchase their
own farm in nineteen twenty seven, a few months before
Christmas nineteen twenty nine, Charles sustained a head injury. Family
and friends believed his mental state had been altered, but
were never truly concerned. Fast forward to a week or

(01:23:51):
so before Christmas, Charles now forty three, took his wife,
Fanny thirty seven, and their seven children, Marie seventeen, Arthur sixteen,
Carrie twelve, May Bell seven, James four, Raymond aged two,
and marylou four months old, into town to buy new
clothes and have a family portrait taken. This was a

(01:24:12):
rather unusual occurrence for a working class, rural family in
that era. Stella Lawson, a relative of the family, overheard
her mother and aunts discussing a secret of Fanny Lawson
had confided in them. She was concerned about an incestuous
relationship between Charles and their oldest daughter, Marie. Ella May,
a close friend of Marie Lawson, had also been confided

(01:24:34):
in a few weeks before Christmas, Marie told her she
was pregnant with her father's baby, and that both her
parents knew about this. On the afternoon of December twenty fifth,
nineteen twenty nine, Charles sent his son Arthur into town
on an errand once Arthur was gone, Charles took his
twelve gage shotgun and waited by the tobacco barn. His daughters,

(01:24:56):
Carrie and Maybell were leaving to go to their uncle
and aunt's house. When they were arranged. Charles shot them,
then bludgeoned them, placing their bodies in the tobacco barn.
He returned to the house and shot his wife Fanny,
who was on the porch. Hearing the gunshot. His daughter Marie,
who was inside the house, screamed. The two youngest boys,
James and Raymond, ran and hid. Charles went inside shot Marie,

(01:25:20):
then found the two boys and shot them as well.
He then took the baby and bludgeoned her to death.
He took the bodies of his family and carefully set
them out. He rested their heads on rocks and folded
their arms across their bodies. Charles left the house and
went off into the woods on his own. Several hours later,

(01:25:41):
he shot himself. The gunshot heard by the numerous people
who had gathered at his home, learning of the massacre
from Arthur and the police. Thanks for listening. If you

(01:26:07):
missed any part of tonight's show, or if you'd like
to hear it again, you can subscribe to the podcast
in your favorite podcast app at weird Darkness dot com
slash listen. Not only will you hear a copy of
tonight's show, but you'll also get a daily episode of
Weird Darkness as I post seven days per week. Again,
you can subscribe to the podcast at weird Darkness dot com,
slash listen, or search for Weird Darkness wherever you listen

(01:26:30):
to podcasts. You can follow the show on Facebook and
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if you'd like to be a part of the show,
you can send in your own paranormal experiences by clicking

(01:26:52):
on tell your Story at Weirddarkness dot com. You can
also email me anytime at Darren at weird Darkness dot com.
R R E N. Weird Darkness is a production and
trademark of Marler House Productions, copyright twenty twenty two. And
now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave
you with a little light. Luke Wan Verses thirty through

(01:27:14):
thirty three, But the Angel said to her, do not
be afraid. Mary, you have found favor with God. You
will conceive and give birth to a son, and you
are to call him Jesus. He will be great and
will be called the Son of the Most High. The
Lord God will give him the throne of his father David,
and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever. His kingdom

(01:27:36):
will never end. And a final thought, bless us Lord
this Christmas with quietness of mind. Teach us to be
patient and always to be kind. Ellen Steiner Rice, I'm
Darren Marler. Thanks for joining me in the weird darkness
and Merry Christmas. Ah. Christmas the most wonderful time of

(01:28:39):
the year when friends and family get together share meals, memories,
and gifts. Generally speaking, people are gracious when they receive
a gift, but there's always that outlier who is less
than pleased as the gift giver. What do you do
when that person doesn't like your gift? Well, in the
case of Melissa Young, you kill them. It was Christmas

(01:29:03):
Day twenty thirteen when Alan Williamson visited his neighbor Melissa Young,
when she gave him his gift, a pair of unisex
trainers and a copy of The Sun newspaper's twenty fourteen calendar.
He was not pleased. Young proceeded to block him in
her home against his will. He managed to call nine
nine nine, the equivalent of nine one one in the
United States. Police could hear Alan shouting let me out,

(01:29:27):
but were unable to speak to him directly. Before police
arrived on the scene, Young made her own call. She
informed the police that she had stabbed someone about seven times.
I'm psychiatric. Could you take me to Royal Edinburgh Hospital, please,
she asked. When they arrived, police found Young covered in blood.
The power it gave me was amazing, She told them

(01:29:49):
what really happened behind closed doors. We may never know.
What we do know is that Alan was stabbed twenty
nine times, twelve on the left side of the chest,
twelve on the left upper limb, and five on his
lower left side. Several of the stab wounds went so
deep into his chest they pierced both his heart and

(01:30:10):
his lungs. The lower stab wounds caused injury to his pancreas, stomach,
and spleen. One of the stab wounds transsected the left
femoral vein. The deepest wound was eight and a half
centimeters or three point three five inches deep. As for
Melissa Young, she was immediately remanded to courtin Veil, a

(01:30:30):
women's prison in Sterling, Scotland. Toxicology reports indicated that blood
taken after her arrest showed trace amounts of four different drugs,
and she had also exceeded the legal alcohol drink drive limit. However,
in court, the judge concluded that given Young had a
history of both drug and alcohol abuse, it seems unlikely

(01:30:50):
that either drink or drugs played a big part in
what happened. Six consultant psychiatrists agreed that Young suffered from
a severe personality disorder. Doctor Lenihan described the disorder as
a mixed personality disorder with emotionally unstable, borderline narcissistic, histrionic,
and anti social traits. Another psychiatrist, doctor Kahn, diagnosed Young

(01:31:14):
with schizophrenia. Another doctor testified that Young was prone to
violent and dangerous outbursts, was on fourteen different prescription drugs,
inhaled solvent's daily, and was a known alcoholic. Making matters worse,
she had smoked heroine that very morning. Regarding Young having
diminished responsibility for her actions. The judge surmised the general

(01:31:39):
impression that one was left with from all the psychiatrists
doctor Cohn accepted was of someone who was manipulative and
prone to using psychiatric symptoms as a means to obtain
an end. When questioned, Melissa Young refused to accept that
she had stabbed Allan more than seven times, and claimed
that either he or the police inflicted the remaining stab

(01:32:00):
wounds as a personal vendetta against her. Worse, she stated
that she was indifferent to the fact that she had
taken his life, specifically, she didn't like him. Young also
claimed that the archangel Saint Michael had taken over her
body as an instrument of God to punish the unclean demon.
Further evidence of her dislike of Alliant Williamson is the

(01:32:23):
fact that earlier that same year, she abducted and assaulted him,
accusing him of stealing her house keys. She held him
against his will, waving a knife menacingly. Alan was in
such fear for his own safety he chose to jump
from the first floor balcony down to the garden below
just to escape. She told the court that if he

(01:32:43):
had only accepted her gifts, she would not have stabbed him.
After only five days, Melissa Young was given a life
sentence with the possibility of parole after twenty years. But
her troubles didn't stop there. While incarcerated, she attacked and
bit a female prison guard in twenty fourteen. She lunged
at the guard, grabbing her and pulling her to the

(01:33:05):
ground by her hair. She climbed on top of her
and bit her in the stomach, drawing blood. Her defense
claimed there was a substantial medical health background as she
is transgender. Despite this, she was given an additional six
months to her sentence. Melissa Young stood at six feet
three inches and had been born Richard McCabe. She transitioned

(01:33:28):
in two thousand and two. About a year after her transition,
Young took on a job at a sauna. Her employer,
a gay man going by the name of Cher, recalled
the time when she had told him about her teen
years when she was bullied for cross dressing. She showed
me nude pictures of herself as Richard, and he was beautiful.
She would dress as a woman. At the age of

(01:33:49):
fourteen or fifteen. Gangs of kids used to beat her
up in the street. He added she didn't have much
of a life after her transition. She suffered from paranoia
and thought everyone was all talking about her. Her smoking
cannabis on a daily basis didn't help that. Melissa never
had any relationships with men. It was all one night stands,
of which there were many. She was too unbalanced to

(01:34:12):
get close to. Cherer eventually parted ways with Young after
he discovered that she'd begun prostituting from her home. Then
I found out she had started turning tricks at her flat.
I was angry because she was trying to steal our customers.
After everything that had happened, I sacked her. She'd been
bragging about taking groups of drunken men, sometimes as many

(01:34:35):
as thirteen at a time, to the back of the
night club for relations. Though she has filed appeals, they've
all been denied, and Melissa Young remains in custody. Christmas

(01:34:59):
is typically known as the most wonderful time of the year,
and for good reason. This holiday season allows us to
not only spend time with family, friends, and those dearerts
to us, but it also provides an opportunity to spread
love and kindness as we celebrate our religious beliefs. Participate
in cultural traditions, and reflect on what is truly important

(01:35:20):
in life. Christmas is also known as a season of giving,
whether that be giving gifts to your children, spouse, or family,
or instead giving financially to charities and organizations that help
those less fortunate. However, in some stories, what should have
been a celebratory season quickly turned into a season of

(01:35:41):
unexpected mourning and tragedy, ultimately leaving families torn apart, grief stricken,
and unable to look at the Christmas holiday the same way.
Ever again, forty six year old Della Caligher fell ill
on the evening of December twenty fifth, twenty twelve, after

(01:36:02):
eating a four course turkey meal during a Christmas Day
pub lunch at the Railway Hotel in Hornchurch, East London.
Kaligher was one of seven people within their party of
sixteen who became sick after eating the turkey, but while
the others recovered, Kaligher's condition continued to deteriorate. On December

(01:36:22):
twenty sixth, twenty twelve, Boxing Day, Calgar's husband, fifty one
year old John Calgar, took her to Queen's Hospital in Romford,
where she was examined in an ambulance. John stated that
Kaligher was given an injection, but that no blood test
was done and she was instructed to go home and
lie down. Unfortunately, Kaligar suffered cardiac arrest at home later

(01:36:46):
that day, so John called an ambulance, but stated by
that time Kaliger barely had a pulse. Sadly, she died
at the hospital on December twenty seventh, twenty twelve, leaving
behind her husband and a fourteen year old daughter. Kelligher's
family went on to file civil claims for negligence against
Mitchell's and Butler's, the chain which owns the Railway hotel. However,

(01:37:10):
as a total of thirty three people fell ill, a
major investigation was also launched into the matter by police
and health safety authorities. During the investigation, it was discovered
that Kelligher's death was a result of Clostridium perfringence bacteria,
a common cause of food poisonings. The turkeys were prepared

(01:37:31):
on Christmas Eve, but were not cooled properly after cooking
and were not adequately reheated before being served to guests.
It was also later discovered that the pub's chef thirty
seven year old Mehmet Kaya, and the pub manager, forty
year old Anne Marie McSweeney, falsified records in an attempt
to cover up the fact that the turkey meat had

(01:37:53):
been fatally undercooked. Both Kaya and McSweeney were found guilty
of perverting the course of j justicie on January twenty third,
twenty fifteen. Kaya was sentenced to a year in prison
and McSweeney was sentenced to eighteen months. The pub, Chane
Mitchells and Butler's, was also fined one point nine million

(01:38:14):
dollars after being found guilty of selling unsafe food. Around
seven am on Christmas morning of twenty twenty two, thirty
seven year old Vern Chand of New Zealand went to
collect a yellow two seater canoe he had bought on
Facebook marketplace as a surprise gift for his family. Chand

(01:38:38):
returned later that morning and eventually took his two youngest children,
ages seven and twelve, to try the canoe out on
Lake Rao, a man made freshwater lake at Rochukuhutu Reserve
in the outskirts of mclen's Island and Herewood, christ Church.
Chand and his seven year old daughter were initially facing
each other in the canoe, but later moved to get
more comfortable. Fortunately, in doing so, the young girl's leg

(01:39:02):
became trapped under chans and when she tried to wiggle free,
the vessel overturned. After the canoe tipped over, Chand held
on to the two seater craft while his daughter, who
was thankfully wearing a life vest, swam and called for help.
Chan's daughter was eventually spotted and rescued, but unfortunately Chand
went under the water and did not resurface. Sadly, Chand

(01:39:27):
was also not wearing a life jacket. His body was
recovered on Boxing Day twenty two feet or seven meters underwater.
Not only did Chand leave behind his wife of fourteen years,
Sharon Shulman Dutt, and their three children, but Chan's younger
brother bisl stated that the yellow canoe would serve as
a symbol of another heartbreaking loss. The family had gone

(01:39:48):
that Christmas morning to visit the grave of their other brother,
thirty three year old Avinash, who was killed in a
car crash in June twenty twenty one. Margaret Shibley had
planned to go to her mother's fifty seven year old
Elaine Pfizer's home in Detroit, Michigan, on Christmas morning in

(01:40:09):
twenty twenty one, to help with dinner. However, after calling
her mother over and over and getting no response, Hiveley
and her family decided to go to Pfiser's home to
see what was going on. When they arrived, Pfiser did
not answer the door, so the family decided to look
through a window, and it was then that they saw
what appeared to be a body on the floor. The

(01:40:32):
family called the police, and Shibley's husband forced his way
into the home, but made a tragic discovery. Peiser and
her thirteen year old adopted daughter, Donia Fields, who was
nonverbal and in a wheelchair, had been shot inside the home.
Police later stated that the shooting had occurred at five
forty five a m. That morning, and that Pfiser's husband,

(01:40:54):
sixty two year old Dwayne McDonald, was a person of interest.
After fleeing the scene. On December twenty eighth, twenty twenty one,
police received information that McDonald was hiding in an apartment
building with two men he knew. Police then obtained a
search warrant, but upon entering the building, they were greeted
by McDonald, who was armed. A shot was then fired,

(01:41:16):
causing officers to return fire, killing McDonald at the scene.
Christmas Eve of two thousand and eight had been a
fun day for the Hughes family, visiting friends, shopping and
even purchasing a new television to replace the old one
kept in the first floora living room at their Code Poth,
Wrexham home. After returning home, Robert Hughes installed the new television.

(01:41:41):
Then he decided to move the old, heavy, deep bulky
widescreen television downstairs into the children's play area. Hughes's daughter,
four year old Emily, liked to take the Nintendo DS
game console she shared with her siblings to a quiet
place in order to play it alone. Unfortunately, Elly, unbeknownst
to her father, Emily was lying on her stomach at

(01:42:04):
the foot of the stairs, and as Hughes staggered down
carrying the old TV set, he tripped over Emily and
dropped the television on her head, pinning her down. Hughes
immediately got the TV off of Emily and carried her
into the kitchen, where his wife, Louise Sandra Hughes called
for an ambulance. Mister and missus Hughes attempted to resuscitate

(01:42:24):
Emily until paramedics arrived, but she never regained consciousness. Emily
was rushed to the Wrexham Maelor Hospital and later transferred
to Liverpool's alder Hay Hospital due to a lack of
oxygen and blood to her brain. Tragically, the accident fractured
Emily's skull and the brain damage she sustained stopped both

(01:42:45):
her pulse and blood pressure. She was pronounced dead at
ten ten pm on Christmas Day. When Sophia Aloa got
pregnant at sixteen years old, her mother, Tina Mendoza, naturally
worried that her daughter wouldn't finish high school. However, Mendoza stated, boy,

(01:43:07):
did that girl prove me wrong, as Aloah went on
to maintain good grades, hold down a job, graduate, and
take care of her baby. By the year two thousand,
twenty year old Aloa and her four year old daughter,
Jasmine had moved in with Mendoza and her Stockton, California home. Sadly,
what was supposed to be the best Christmas ever turned

(01:43:29):
into the worst and would tear their family apart. On
Christmas Eve of two thousand, Aloa decided to do some
last minute Christmas shopping in search of the perfect Christmas
gift for Jasmine, a new scooter. While Aloa went shopping,
Mendoza went to bed. However, just after midnight on December

(01:43:49):
twenty fourth, two thousand, Mendoza heard loud screams from outside
that woke her up. Mendoza ran outside to find Alloa
standing behind her car, holding her sign and saying, go
get him, I've been stabbed. Rather than running toward Aloa,
Mendoza went back into the house to call nine to
one one. When detectives arrived, they found Aloa lying next

(01:44:12):
to her car, which was full of Christmas presents for
her daughter. Stockton police began their search for a suspect,
but the only clue they had was that a light
colored for Thunderbird or Mercury cougar was seen leaving the
area at the time of the murder. Sadly, Aloa, their
only witness, was pronounced dead just after one am after

(01:44:34):
being rushed to the hospital. Aloa's best friend at the time,
Lisa Rosco, later claimed that the night before someone called
her Aloa and said that someone would kill her. However,
Ed Rodriguez, one of the lead detectives with the Stockton
Police Department stated he was never given any information about
the phone call Aroscoe claimed Aloa received. In two thousand

(01:44:58):
and one, Rodriguez conjunction with the California State Governor's Office
established a fifty thousand dollars reward for any information leading
to an arrest and conviction in a Loa's case. Unfortunately,
while countless people have been interviewed and re interviewed, no
suspect has ever been named. Aloah's daughter, Jasmine, is now

(01:45:20):
grown with a baby of her own, but every Christmas
Eve is a tragic reminder of Aloah's death and a
case that remains unsolved. Twelve year old Cason Hollwood of Winsford, Cheshire,
suffered from asthma and had a nut allergy. Due to
his asthma, Hallwood often spent Christmas in the hospital. However,

(01:45:44):
Christmas of twenty twenty was the one year Hallwood didn't
spend the holiday in the hospital, so naturally, the youngster
woke up very excited Christmas morning in anticipation of opening gifts.
Hallwood spent the day at home with his mother, Louise,
and his three brothers. Eighteen year old twins Cohen and Corley,
and thirteen year old Caden, before going to his grandparents'

(01:46:06):
house for dinner, where he licked his plate clean. After eating,
Halwood went to the Wharton Recreation Park with some of
his friends. Approximately twenty minutes later, Hallwood called his mother
to ask if she could send one of his brothers
to the park to bring his inhaler. One of the
Hollwood's twin brothers took the inhaler and reported that Hallwood

(01:46:26):
seemed fine. However, when Louise received a second phone call
from her son, she could tell the inhaler hadn't worked.
At that point, Louise ran to the park with an
EpiPen that had been kept at Hallwood's grandparents house, but
unfortunately it had expired. When Louise gone to the park,
Hallwood's eyes were puffy, signaling an allergic reaction, but the

(01:46:48):
EpiPen injection made no difference in his condition. Louise called
for an ambulance and Hallwood was rushed to Lighton Hospital
and crew. Unfortunately, he died a short time later as
a resis re salt of anaphylactic fatal asthma that was
caused by peanut ingestion with bilateral pneumonia or collapsed lungs
as a contributing factor. In a heartbreaking turn of events,

(01:47:11):
It was later discovered that Hallwood's grandfather, Albert, had prepped
a beef joint and a gammon joint for Christmas dinner
the night before, but had forgotten about Hollwood's nut allergy.
He used a gammon glaze that had nuts in it.
Twenty eight year old Cody Headick Spencer Township, Michigan, described

(01:47:34):
his wife, twenty seven year old Sasha Headach as a
ridiculously smart woman, a fantastic mom, and a great wife.
Sasha loved cooking, canning vegetables, and baking, enjoyed gathering with friends,
and even made sure to put extra time into doing
things for her children. Sasha began to struggle with postpartum

(01:47:55):
depression after the birth of their daughter, but thankfully she
received treatment and recovered. Unfortunately, Sasha again began struggling a
few months before the birth of their son in July
twenty fifteen. Despite counseling and therapy through a support group,
her mental health never recovered. On Christmas Day in twenty fifteen,

(01:48:16):
Sasha told Cody that she and their three year old
daughter and five month old son were going to Starbucks.
Cody stayed behind to clean up at home. However, Sasha
was gone much longer than expected, and Cody reported her
missing later that night. Sadly, around ten thirty am December
twenty sixth, twenty fifteen, Sasha was found at a remote

(01:48:39):
area dead from a self inflicted gunshot wound. Their daughter
was snuggled up against Sasha's body, and their infant son
was found strapped inside her vehicle shivering. Both children were
treated for hypothermia, and by December twenty ninth to twenty fifteen,
they were back at home doing well. Although Cody stated

(01:48:59):
this isn't something that a healthy Sasha would have done.
He never could have anticipated her tragic, untimely death or
just how serious her thoughts had become. And if you're
suffering from depression during this holiday season, I would encourage
you to go to Weird Darkness dot com and click
on the Hope in the Darkness page for free resources

(01:49:20):
to help you get through your depression. That's Weirddarkness dot
Com slash hope. Lauren Cafard of Bryn Mauer, Wales, was
diagnosed with severe epilepsy at the age of fourteen. Despite
her condition, the nineteen year old dedicated her life to
helping others, volunteering with their local Saint John Ambulance Group,

(01:49:42):
church youth club, and food bank. On Christmas Eve twenty eighteen,
the family shared a meal of Chinese food, which was
Cabard's favorite. Afterward, Cayford went upstairs to her bedroom to
finish wrapping Christmas presents. Approximately twenty minutes later, Caefrid's father, Robert,
went up stairs but found his daughter based down on

(01:50:02):
her bed, not breathing. Robert began performing CPR while Cayford's mother, Dell,
called for an ambulance. Robert continued performing CPR, and when
the paramedics arrived, they were able to resuscitate Cayford. Unfortunately,
when she arrived at Nevill Hall Hospital, it was discovered
that Cayford had suffered irreparable brain damage. She died December

(01:50:25):
twenty sixth, twenty eighteen, and was laid to rest in
one of her Christmas presents, mint green fleece pajamas and
fluffy socks. Despite Cayford's tragic death, she went on to
fulfill her dream of helping others and has saved three
lives through an organ donation. Forty year old Gareth Blankens

(01:50:47):
of Armley, Leeds was described as someone strong, protective and
the type of person who would do anything for anybody.
In fact, if someone was sad, he'd often asked, do
you need a Blankin's cuddle? Sadly, this loving father tragically
died on Christmas Day in twenty twenty two after suffering

(01:51:08):
a heart attack. Blncoln's was enjoying the holiday with his
family and coddingly. As the evening began to wind down,
Blankins decided to go outside for a cigarette. All seemed
well as Blankin's returned inside, laughing and joking, but all
of a sudden, he clutched his chest, fell to the
floor and began having a fit. Blankins was rushed to

(01:51:30):
the hospital, but given that his brain went for too
long without oxygen, he did not survive. Blankins left behind
a fifteen year old son who he lived for

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