Archive for the ‘Ghosts & Hauntings’ Category

A mother and her teenage son were among six people arrested early today “hunting for ghosts” amid the abandoned cluster of century-old brick wards at the former Essex County Hospital Center, officials said.

“There are no ghosts, goblins or boogie men at the old hospital complex,” Essex County Sheriff Armando Fontoura said after his officers and Cedar Grove police made the arrests.

The patrols came upon two empty vehicles parked on Upland Way on the sprawling campus, whose brick structures are being demolished to make way for a 90-acre passive park.

As they combed the dark grounds shortly after 1 a.m., they spotted a trespasser, dressed entirely in black, running through the adjacent woods, officials said. In minutes, four men and two women — all from Hudson County — were arrested.

The six said they were ghost-hunting, officials said.

“That’s what they told the officers,” Fontoura said. “People find weird ways to get kicks. … I hope people will come to their senses. The only thing you’re going to find is a uniformed cop, and that’s not a ghost.”

The suspects were identified as David Cerezo, 39, of Weehawken; Jose Marti, 25, of Union City; Michael Lyngholm, 18; Antoniett Degirolamo, 39, her son, Brian Degirolamo, 18; and his friend, Gina Ambrosio, 18, all of Secaucus, officials said.

They were charged with defiant trespass, criminal trespass and obstruction of the administration of law and issued summons to appear in municipal court in Cedar Grove.

Today, Armando said trespassers, who will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, can get injured in the darkened buildings and even fall through a floor.

In early 2007, Essex County moved the last of the patients out of the sprawling, 16-building complex in Cedar Grove to a new $83 million hospital less than a mile away.

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Amidst the rich wood paneling and the floral wallpaper at Chaska’s Peacock Inn, some say a man sits quietly in a cream upholstered chair on the landing of the stairs.

And though many pass by him each day, few notice his presence. Kathy Machowski is one of those few.
That’s because the man is not one of the living. He is a spirit and Machowski is a ghost hunter.

Machowski said she has had encounters with the paranormal since she was a little girl. Back then she didn’t seek out the encounters, but today, she is among a growing number of people who do.

Machowski, who lives in Jordan, started Minnesota’s Beyond the Veil
to gather a group of those who, like her, were interested in delving deeper into the possibility of ghosts and using equipment to investigate strange occurrences in houses, churches, prisons, hospital and other older buildings.

Buoyed by interest in television programs like “Ghost Hunters” and “Paranormal State,” Machowski said her group is now busier than ever, fielding requests to investigate possible paranormal activity and lead ghost hunting classes.

They recently visited the Peacock Inn and Carver’s Treasure Chest Antiques after hearing that people at both businesses had been witness to unexplained phenomena.

“Ghosts are real,” said Machowski. “A lot of people co-exist with ghosts and don’t even know it.”

Peacock Inn

Joyce Bohn has been well-aware of strange happenings at her business for years.

Guests at the Peacock Inn, located in a historic mansion off of City Square Park, have told her about rocking chairs rocking empty and cats jumping up on their beds in the middle of the night when there are no cats in the house. Flowers have fallen off of the wall for no good reason. And silverware has repeatedly gone missing at meals only to later be found back in the drawer.

“I’m a pretty logical person,” said Bohn. “But there are not logical explanations for everything.”

This spring, Joyce offered to open up the inn to Minnesota’s Beyond the Veil to see what they could uncover.

Using standard ghost-hunting equipment like cameras, tape recorders and EMF (electromagnetic fluctuation) meters, Machowski’s crew descended on the nearly 100-year-old building.

“I go in there expecting a ghost,” said Machowski. “I expect to hear a ghost, see a ghost. You have to expect the most and if you get nothing, it’s not haunted.”

A typical session includes a walk through of the building, identifying and examining paranormal hot spots. “You’re looking for things that shouldn’t be there,” said Machowski.

That can include things like unexplained levels of energy, random cold spots and anomalies on photographs. But ghost hunters also use their basic senses – listening for foot steps or watching for mists and shadows.

“Anyone can ghost hunt,” she said. “All you really need is a camera and a tape recorder.”

Machowski noted that there are several places that are now opening their doors to welcome ghost hunters. Bohn said she is considering letting in classes provided her “spirits” aren’t disturbed. Bohn would like to keep her friendly spirits in good spirits.

“I’ve been to places where you get hit with a ‘Get out!’ but here you get a welcome feeling,” Machowski said, of the Peacock Inn.
Her group got a chance to experience some of the activity Bohn and her guests have talked about. While going through the inn, the ghost hunters picked up some high EMF readings on a bed in one of the guest rooms.

“Half of the bed had a high EMF and half didn’t,” said Machowski, noting that spikes can often be explained by electrical current, but adding, “I couldn’t find an explanation for that.”

They captured some photographic anomalies downstairs – several photos taken during the investigation feature strange crescent moon-like images in unexpected places.

“I’m not going to say it’s a ghost,” said Machowski. “But it’s interesting.”

The most exciting part of their investigation took place upstairs, Machowski said, where they experienced an unexplained thump as if something had dropped. They also report picking up EVPs (electronic voice phenomena) on their tape recorders with a man’s voice telling them there were two spirits in the room and a little girl’s voice saying “yes” when asked if she liked the room.

Some of their findings didn’t make sense until after the crew had left though. During their investigation Kathy’s psychic in the group said she picked up on a man named Arthur who kept telling her that the Peacock Inn was his house and that he greeted people. Later, Bohn put two and two together as she took down a photo in the foyer of the house’s architect. His name was Arthur Klaussen.

“No one could have known that,” she said.

After reviewing all of their evidence, Machowski was able to come to a conclusion as to whether the Peacock Inn was haunted.

“The spirits that are connected to the house are good,” said Machowski. “They are protecting it. So I wouldn’t say it’s haunted. I would call it a spiritually protected house.”

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Veenu Sandal, tarot reader, was introduced to this world by her father, who was often summoned by people after they suddenly sighted a deceased family member in their midst.

Veenu claims there are various kinds of spirits and “Some are still attached to the people and the world they left behind and are suffering.”

“Veenu casually mentions one such ‘lady’ she takes care of, on her late father’s behalf. A not so pleasant lady, her family was glad to see the end of her… But, ‘Ammaji’ wasn’t done yet. She often overturned their beds or chopped someone’s hair for an act of indiscipline with scissors that appeared out of thin air.

“There are times when visitors ask me if I have a grandmother staying with me, and I can tell that they’ve caught a glimpse of Ammaji and her white malmal dupatta,” says Veenu. A much tamer version of Ammaji often travels with Veenu and is content for now. She once even transported Veenu and two others to a level that exists beyond.

Veenu recalls, “It’s a world I can’t describe. The fruits are so colourful. There are people… and back as suddenly as they were gone.

While Veenu has seen spirits in various forms – a divine goddess who appeared in a blaze of light and danced in a temple courtyard or a young diabetic woman who emerged in her home for a taste of sugary barfi – spiritual healer Rudrabhayananda sees them everywhere. He describes them as glowing lights, less than two inches high. It’s like having a rainbow in your room, he explains. He adds, “The spirit world follows a set of rules. You don’t disturb them and they don’t disturb you. We are spirits too, only our bodies are visible due to the refraction of light. The communication happens on an intuitive level.”

Veenu says, “I lost all fear of death. I could sense a strong energy in the air. For me, spirits are just people without bodies.” Their presence also makes her feel touched by divinity and ‘protected’.

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The three teens told police they heard the Old Salem Jail is haunted and wanted to take pictures.

Three Revere teens on the hunt for ghosts at the Old Salem Jail yesterday will tell a judge today why they should stay out of the current jail.

Police arrested Jeremy McCarthy, 18, Anthony Enriquez, 19, and Anthony Pio, 18, on charges of breaking and entering to commit a misdemeanor and trespassing. One of the teens did have a camera with him.

Police Lt. Scott Englehardt said police received a call at 6:20 p.m. to say three men jumped a fence at the old jail property, which is under construction.

Patrolmen James Johnson, Rafael Gonzales and Brian St. Pierre responded to the Old Salem Jail and jumped the fence themselves.

New Boston Ventures plans to convert the jail, a burned-out jail keeper’s house and a crumbling old barn, which will be replaced, into 23 residences.

In addition, they plan a restaurant and a jail exhibit space, which will display three of the old jail cells. Some of the cell doors will be inlaid into the walls of the corridors of the main jail building.

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“We’ve had ghost hunters from the Allegheny Mountains come in here on a regular basis, and they say there’s definitely a poltergeist up there with an ax,” said owner Karen Yoder.

It’s historical – and supposedly inhabited by ghosts. The U.S. Hotel Restaurant and Tavern in Hollidaysburg not only has a rich and storied past as a central Pennsylvania landmark, it’s also a mecca for ghost sightings and other paranormal phenomena – not the least of which is an ax-wielding apparition thought to inhabit one of the hotel’s upstairs bedrooms.

And that bodes well for area ghost aficionados, because the U.S. Hotel will play host to a paranormal event from 5 p.m. Aug. 1 to 2 a.m. Aug. 2. that includes a buffet dinner, lectures by nationally renowned paranormal investigators Kristyn Gartland and Brian Stephenson, both members of The Atlantic Para-normal Society; demonologists John Zaffis and Adam Blai; psychic Chip Coffey, who stars on the TV shows “Paranormal State” and “Psychic Kids”; and a meet-and-greet session with the investigators.

“One time, I was showing the dining room to a customer who wanted to have a party there,” she said. “As we were speaking, a fork flew off the table for no reason at all.”

She also recalled seeing chandeliers swaying in the dining room, adding she could then “feel a cold breeze go by … the hair on my arms stood up.”

Manager Kim Clark-Yoder, 37, of Hollidaysburg also believes the hotel is haunted.

“There are things that happen here that are unexplainable,” she said. “I’ve heard knocking sounds from inside the building when no one else was here, and I’ve seen things like glasses falling off shelves and the TV coming on for no reason. … We’ve also had customers who’ve seen apparitions.”

Zaffis, 52, from Stratford, Conn., conducted a paranormal investigation at the hotel years ago – and never forgot it.

“There was definitely a lot of spirit activity there,” he said. “I have no doubt whatsoever that the place is haunted.”

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By Tasnim Langry

Countless Hollywood blockbusters were based on the subject, books written on it, even Michael Jackson’s hit song Thriller was inspired by it… belief in ghosts, ghouls and evil spirits abound, but just as there are believers, there are also those who consider the subject to be hogwash.

However, the Naidoo family of Stanger Manor remain convinced they had close encounters with the paranormal which started to affect their family negatively… that is, until they had the destructive “spirit” exorcised.

In a candid interview with Post, Sathiya Naidoo, 34, a businessman described his family’s chilling experience.

“At first all I noticed was a feeling of darkness with intermittent sensations of heat moving through the house which we moved into in March this year. At night my family and I would hear furniture in the lounge being dragged across the floor. Taps which were closed would open while we were asleep, and kitchen utensils which were securely placed on the counter would fall while my wife Prisha cooked.”

Naidoo said the uneasy feeling continued unabated and the constant nightmares he started to experience in April this year, together with the mysterious illnesses that befell his family, forced him to seek help.

“My wife slumped into a depressed state and my daughter Vash, 10, started to look frail and terrified, which had doctors baffled as to the cause.

“I confided in relatives and friends who suggested I consult a local psychic healer who, after an initial visit to our home, said ‘there was no light’ in the home. That was when it dawned on me that the lamp we lit for prayer almost always went off by itself before the wick burnt out,” said the devout Hindu. During the cleansing process, the psychic, Lavina Govender, said she learnt through her spiritual guide “that the soul of an elderly, lost and angry man prowled the house.

“Using a bunch of white roses and a lit candle, I succeeded in guiding the lost soul out of the house, to its spiritual realm,” said Govender.

Naidoo said he and his family felt an immediate sense of relief after the cleansing prayer and had now decided to buy the home they rented.

He added that he tried to find out who had previously lived at the house and learnt that there were many former occupants, which made it difficult to identify the lost soul.

Laying the matter to rest, Naidoo discovered that the original owner had died after suffering a stroke, but the spirit could have been anyone’s.

Govender concluded: “Sometimes lost souls are confused and angry. They then create a negative atmosphere which can result in them manifesting themselves physically, moving objects or amplifying unnatural sounds. These wandering souls, commonly referred to as ghosts, need to be guided to their spiritual dimension.” The founder of the South African Society for Paranormal Research in Gauteng, Marius Nienaber, said places that were haunted “were usually ancestral land”.

Nienaber said he researched using clairvoyants together with cameras and electro magnetic field monitoring devices. He added most video footage they had of spirit activity came up as yellow, green or blue beams, which he said confirmed paranormal activity.

Many religious leaders espouse the belief that a pious conviction will keep away evil forces.

This article was originally published on page 3 of The Post on July 29, 2009

By Ian Dransfield on Wednesday, July 29, 2009 at 4:00pm
Heckler Spray

The day the forces of the undead and the deaddead join together in an unholy union has arrived. Live in fear, peons.

For you see, the recently (the other year) died-but-didn’t Amy Winehouse has been haunted by the ghost of the recently (the other month) died-but-did Michael Jackson.

But why did Jackson visit her, of all people? Why, to warn her of the dangers of drugs, obviously.

It would seem his spirit learned faster than his body did.

Following on from the life-changing news that Amy Winehouse (”nearly”) died in her ex-husband’s arms we were all fooled into believing it was Blake Fielder-Civil’s advice that weaned her off the smackjuice.

How foolish we were to believe such a half-plausible thought.

No, it was actually Winehouse’s visit to a spirit medium during her self-imposed exile in the Caribbean that prompted her to really kick the habit.

According to a friend – the most reliable of sources, as we all know – and reported through the paper-we-didn’t-even-realise-was-still-going The People:

“She heard Michael’s voice telling her if she didn’t sort herself out she’d lose everything.”

Good advice from the deceased King of Pop, no doubt, but it does raise a couple of issues.

Firstly – Michael Jackson only died last month, and Amy Winehouse was away trying to sort herself for about a year. What this means is she was most likely doing a very poor job, having to not only wait until someone famous died, but also that they chose to come to her and instruct her to stop being a prat.

Secondly – it would seem like a bit of confusion from both parties in assuming an addiction to heroin and crack is the same as (an alleged) one to prescription painkillers. One is the result of psychological issues brought about by a physically and mentally scarring event in earlier life, whereas the other is the behaviour of a massive wanker. We’ll let you decide which is which.

It’s hard to actually accept this as anything but the insane ramblings of a few morons wanting to fill column inches (hello!), and some may argue that the world of spirits, mediums and hocus pocus is nothing but nonsensical garbage. Again though, we’ll let you decide what to think about Amy Winehouse’s St Lucian adventure.

Nevertheless, it’s good to see the ghost of Jacko taking up a role in public speaking – we reckon he’ll really be able to heal the world from beyond the grave.

We haven’t had the chance to migrate all the stories and encounters from our other website yet.