The Lets Read Podcast - 80: Episode 071 | Christmas & Family Stories | 18 True Scary Horror Stories

Episode Date: September 21, 2020

Welcome to the seventy-first episode of The Lets Read Podcast! This podcast includes narrations of true creepy encounters submitted by normal folks just like yourself. Today you'll experience horrifying stories about Christmas, Birth Families & The Unsolved Tragedy of Jilly Dando... HAVE A STORY TO SUBMIT?► www.Reddit.com/r/LetsReadOfficial FOLLOW ME ON - ► Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/letsread.official/ ► Twitter - https://twitter.com/LetsReadCreepy ►YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/c/letsreadofficial ♫ Background Music: Iron Cthulhu Apocalypse https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFvrqVSJE8E PATREON for EARLY ACCESS!►http://patreon.com/LetsRead 

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please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. About ten years ago, I graduated college, was unable to find immediate work, and got pretty desperate around Christmas time. So I took on the iconic role of Santa Claus at my local mall. But since Christmas is probably my favorite holiday, I never had a problem getting into character. And well, thanks to my love of pizza and beer, I've never had a problem looking the part either. All it took was the addition of one of those glossy fake white beards and the iconic red suit itself and I was making myself feel festive just by looking in the mirror. I had the voice down, the suit, the beard and if I'm being honest I was pretty proud of how good a Santa I was. Outside of the holiday season I now work as an admin assistant for a shipping company.

Not exactly the most exciting job in the world, but it pays alright. So when the annual opportunity to don the red suit and make some kids smile comes around, I jump at the chance. However, during my time on the job, the most valuable lesson I learned was that you can never, ever promise the kids anything. There will be some children that ask for unrealistic gifts for Christmas. Some are just impossible to procure, like I want a dragon, a horse, a tank. But sometimes they'll ask for other things that are a little more sensible, just way out of their parents' holiday budget. So I'd learn to give them my best, Santa will try his very best for you,

before moving the topic of conversation onto something else. Christmas last year was pretty rough though, mainly because I had made the decision to make it the final one I'd play Santa. But it was rough for other reasons too. I'd developed quite the working relationship with some of the mall employees, both short and long term, so it was quite emotional when I announced that I'd be hanging out the Santa hat to spend more time with my family around the holidays. Anyway, Friday December 22nd was my last shift before the switch over to the new guy playing

Santa Claus and the mall was way way busier than expected. I mean it always gets pretty hectic the closer you get to Christmas but even I've never seen anything like it in all the years I've been playing the role. This final day of festivities was easily the toughest one to date as I knew after that day I'd be moving on from playing Santa Claus. I know this seems kind of suspect. Most people feel liberated when they leave a job like that. But at the risk of sounding sort of sappy I didn't have many good Christmases growing up so I felt like a lot of the festive spirit was me making up for lost time.

They say that time flies when you're having fun. Never was a truer word said. That last day flew by quicker than I could have ever expected. They say that time flies when you're having fun. Never was a truer word said. That last day flew by quicker than I could have ever expected. One minute it was lunchtime, the next the sun had set and it was fast approaching the time when I'd have to wrap everything up. But just as I was beginning to leave, I noticed a little girl slowly approaching me. Why hello there, little one. And where are your parents? I kept the voice on giving her my warmest Santa smile. She didn't say a word she just gave me this tired look and kept walking toward me with her arms held aloft as if she wanted to be picked up. I looked around for

her parents but I didn't see anyone that was obviously accompanying her. So I picked the little girl up and plopped her down on my lap, just as I'd done a thousand times before. And what might your name be, young lady? My name is Holly. Holly? Well, I never. What an adorable festive name. "'The Holly and the Ivy is one of my favorite Christmas songs. "'And may I ask, what is your last name, Holly?' "'Donaghy. It's Donaghy.' "'I nodded to the nearby mall security to have the name Holly Donaghy "'broadcast over the mall's speaker system.

"'That way her parents would come and find her. No doubt they'd be extremely worried at this point. But all the while this was happening, I would keep her company. And what is it that Santa can get you for Christmas, Holly? Again, she didn't answer. She looked off into the distance as if she were staring at nothing, like the thousand yard stare you hear about NAMM vets having. She then looked up at me with the saddest set of blue-green eyes I'd ever seen.

All I want for Christmas is a friend. I was dumbstruck. In all my years of playing Santa Claus, I'd never had any kids say they wanted a friend for Christmas. It was absolutely heart-wrenching. All I could think to do was pat her on the head. Well, I can be your friend, Holly. Santa Claus will always be your friend,

and I'm sure a little girl as lovely as you will have no trouble finding herself a friend. She gave me a weak smile, hugged me, and then hopped down off my lap. I tried to stop her from just running off, but I was hesitant to actually grab her by the arm, lest I upset her. I called her name a few times, but she didn't seem to listen. She just disappeared into the throngs of festive shoppers. I tried to follow but there was no sign of her. So I started asking around if anyone had seen a little girl, about four feet tall, long brown hair, those almost luminous blue-green eyes, kind of a shabby appearance. Not a single person had any idea what I was talking about.

It took a fair few minutes for members of the mall's security staff to actually wade through the sea of people and make it to the Santa's Grotto. When I told them that she ran off into the department store, they started to become worried. Have any parents showed up looking for her? I asked. No, no one. Maybe she just wandered here after getting out of the house or something. Parents don't even know to look here. I was getting increasingly anxious as time went on, but after a thorough search of the mall and some intense studying of the CCTV camera, there were no signs of little Holly. It was like she just dropped off the face of the earth.

I suppose that should have been the last of it, but for some reason I couldn't keep this little girl off my mind. The way she acted when questioned about her parents compared to how forthcoming she was with all the other stuff I'd asked her left a really bad taste in my mouth. So one morning after a dog walk and a little breakfast, I sat down on my computer and plugged the little girl's name into Google. I don't quite know what I was expecting to find. Nothing, if I'm being honest, but what I did find absolutely horrified me. December 23rd. Desperate mother pleads for return of missing girl. Nine-year-old Holly Grace Donaghy was reported missing by her mother, Lily Rose Donaghy. At the time of her disappearance,

the little girl was wearing a blue and white dress, white tights, and said her hair was in bunches. She is approximately four feet two inches tall, weighing at 60 pounds and has brown hair and blue-green eyes. If you have any information regarding the whereabouts of any missing person, please contact the Suffolk County Police Department at 617-635-1100. I was stunned. I just saw her a few weeks before on the 22nd. Perhaps it was a typo, but the more I researched, the more uneasy I became. The next article sent shivers down my spine.

January 4th. Breaking. The remains of the missing 9-year-old girl, Holly Donachie, were found today. January 4th, in a wooded area about three miles away from her home. Suffolk County police are investigating the cause of death, which appears to be an act of foul play. Holly was gone. She died just a few weeks after I met her, and all she ever wanted Was a friend. Back when it was originally released, I really, really wanted to get my hands on a new Xbox One X. You know the one. It was 4K ready with a considerably faster processor. So naturally, I tried absolutely everything in my

power to get one as immediately as I could. My local Walmart was having one of those Black Friday sales and like so many others I stood patiently in line waiting to try and beat the rush to grab one. But I was nowhere near sprightly or fortunate enough to actually get one that way. So after failing to get one in person, I then tried getting one online. But as rapidly as I wanted one to own, the users who were reselling them were asking way way too much money and I simply couldn't afford to shell out double or sometimes triple the price. After weeks of trying to find a way to get a hold of one, I had to come to the conclusion that it just wasn't to be. It was then that I had something of a stroke of luck. Although I had resorted to Craigslist in my desperation, I did actually find someone that was selling their Xbox One X at no

more than the original buying price of the console. Naturally, I was skeptical. For the life of me, I simply couldn't fathom why they would do something like that. But one thought overrode all others. If I didn't put in a bid now, someone else would and I could kiss my chance of owning a 1x good buy. I immediately emailed the seller and let them know that I was very interested. Not only that, but I had the cash on hand and was ready to go. I also offered to pay for gas or whatever it would take to get the console delivered to my door. I figured that

would be a pretty appealing offer to someone who I guess was just strapped for cash around the holidays. I was stunned to get an almost instantaneous response, stating that they did still have the Xbox and were in fact still waiting for a proper bid from a serious buyer. They politely asked for a delivery address so they could bring it over as soon as possible. I was sort of hesitant to divulge such personal information and asked if it would be a better idea to first meet in public since it was much safer that way. I'll be honest, I wasn't too pleased with the idea of a total stranger coming over to my house, but he informed me that he was going to be very busy running holiday errands all

day and that there would only be some pretty specific windows of opportunity to drop it off. It would be much more convenient for him if he was about to come over to my house. I was still not particularly ecstatic about the idea but oh man, I really really wanted that new 4K Xbox. So in the end I agreed and texted the dude my home address. I figured it was safer than me going over to his place, at least this way I'd be on home turf. I was so happy and eager to get my hands on that new console and that excitement only grew as I began waiting for the guy to turn up. But he took his sweet time. I mean hours and hours passed by before I began to suspect that he wasn't going to

actually show. Around 1 in the afternoon, 4 hours after he was due I was seriously losing my cool, thinking it was a prank or something. I tried texting the guy back, asking him where he was. Previously I had gotten pretty timely responses from the guy, but this time I didn't hear a single thing from him. By six that evening, I just lost all hope. I assumed that he got a better offer from someone else and didn't have the heart to tell me he picked a new buyer. I was disappointed, more than words can possibly describe.

I'd gotten myself so psyched and I can't even tell you how deflated I was. It's one thing not to have gotten the item from the store, I could come to terms with that, but I was so close to having one in my hands it sucked having my hopes dash so cruelly like that, and that didn't mean I'd given up entirely. So for the rest of the night I kept looking around on Craigslist and other sites to find a new Xbox One X that was within my price range. But as I was getting ready to wind down for bed, I heard something. At first I had dismissed it as the wind or something, that it was maybe just my imagination. But then I heard it again. Someone knocking. Not at my front door, but lightly on the TV room window. I walked up to the

bedroom window and peer out into the driveway, seeing this strange looking dude at my front door looking around as if checking the coast is clear. I'm suspicious, but I go downstairs to see what he wants. He identified himself as the guy who had the Xbox, apologized for being so late, and explained he had gotten backtracked with errands during his day. Then, he casually asked if I still had the money. I opened the door all the way, but still kept the screen door closed as a precaution.

Something just didn't feel right like at all. I told him that yeah I still had the cash on me but I didn't see that he had anything with him so I calmly asked if he had brought the xbox with him like if it's still in his car or anything. As expected he told me it was out in his van. He told me to get the money and come out to the van with him and he would get it for me. I let him know that I wasn't really comfortable walking out to his van but he seems to understand and tells me it was all good. I briefly look over the guy's shoulder and see that there is in fact someone else sitting there in the van. Not only that, but the dude at my door has been keeping his hands concealed in the little front pouch of his hoodie the whole time while talking to me, and there was definitely something more than just his hands in there. Don't ask me how I could tell, I just could. You know when you just get a gut feeling about something?

Yeah, that. I try to stay as chill as possible as I lie to him that I'd just go fetch my wallet and return in a minute. His mood immediately changed as I closed the door in his face before locking it. I then make the split second decision, better to be safe than sorry, so I pull my phone out of my shorts and dial 911. But as I do, I heard a loud thud on my front door, then the sound of the van's engine revving before it zooms off into the night. When I went to check and see if he had damaged my door, I nearly peed my pants when I saw a rusty old hatchet buried in the wood. I was right that he had something in his sweatshirt and that I shouldn't go out to the van with him. Be careful who you're buying from, folks for all of us who work the holiday shifts.

It was impossible to get that job without being an intensely enthusiastic, happy, smiley kind of person. Like 80% of the staff were entertainers or had come from some kind of performance background and we were living the dream so to speak. We were actually getting paid to play with toys, joke with kids and above all Christmas was the best time of the year for that. A toy shop at Christmas time has such a magical feeling about it, especially if all the staff have the Christmas spirit about them. Now our store was hugely into Christmas, to the point where our smart casual uniforms even had assistance to Santa Claus or Santa's Little Helpers or other various things written in big writing over the back. This of course led to some fantastic interactions with kids asking about if we'd met him and things like that. Being the only staff member who had actually worked with children for years, these questions were normally sent my way to be answered because I always had one ready. So that's the backstory out of the way.

One weekday at an oddly quiet moment I was on my own on the shop floor while the other staff members restocked after the afternoon rush. A boy comes in unaccompanied, must have been about 9 or 10, smiles briefly at me and starts walking around. I gave him a couple of minutes to take a look at things before asking him if he wants to play with the new air-powered rocket launcher we had. No thanks. I know Santa. I don't need your help, he replies flatly. This was mildly unusual, but hey, he was a pretty sweet kid otherwise. Unfortunately, I don't know much in there that would have been good for a kid his age. I figured it'll probably be his dad or someone paying for it so I start showing him some of the limited stuff that would be suitable for some of the older kids. I show him a few things and he sees something he likes, this big massage slipper.

It's one big slipper that you put both feet into and it has various massage settings. Not the kind of thing I'd imagine him to pick out but a fairly cool gift nonetheless. So he asks how much it is and I tell him it's like $20 or whatever the price was. He then instantly looks angry and frustrated. Is that a bit too expensive bud? I ask. Keeping the tone friendly I don't want this kid to be upset and he nods. So I show him some other things and he starts getting more and more difficult to deal with. He's frowning breathing all heavy through his nose like he's building up to some kind of temper tantrum. He starts telling me again how he knows Santa, how Santa gives toys away to good kids and doesn't ask for

money in return. I just calmly explain that I can't just give stuff away for free, then politely leave him to it to browse the rest of the toys. A couple more minutes go by, I'm just sitting by the cash register reading a book since the store is so quiet. It's only me and the kid with my manager up in the office. I remember looking up for my book and the store is so quiet. It's only me and the kid with my manager up in the office. I remember looking up for my book and the kid is at the register just staring up at me with this angry look on his face. Once again I apologize and explain to the kid that as much as I'd like to I can't just give stock away otherwise I'll get fired. Your boss is mean, the kid says, seething with anger at this point. Now this probably wasn't the best thing to do but since the kid was so on the money with

this little statement, my boss was indeed a jerk, I just laugh. Like not hysterically, just like this little involuntary giggle. The kid does not take this well. He thinks I'm laughing at him. Why are you laughing at me? He asks, practically shaking with rage. I begin to explain that I'm not actually laughing at him, but I soon realize it's not getting through to him. He just storms out of the store, disappearing among the crowds of middle-aged women that are clogging up the mall. As the afternoon draws on, the store gets a little busier and I get to actually do some work. Like I said, the work was fun, so it was never a problem. Being busy meant the hours go quicker, which means I get to go home quicker. Win-win.

So I make a few sales, get to test out some of the fancy new nerf guns we had in the store, and the weird kid eventually just slips from my mind. Nothing remotely eventful happens for the rest of the day. Right up until closing time when I'm starting my stock take and working on closing down the store. Someone is standing at the register. I look up for my worksheet and it's the kid. I give him parents? I ask, but the kid refuses to answer. He just glares at me again. Kid, where are your parents? I don't want to have to call them all security, but you can't be wandering around on your own, okay? He knows when you are sleeping.

The kid mutters. I roll my eyes, but the way he says it has me really creeped out. He knows when you're awake. He knows when you've been bad or good. And you've been really, really bad. Uh, where's your pop, kid? I ask again, trying to remain calm. North Pole.

Yeah, very funny, but seriously, you gotta go. The store is closing. He's gonna climb down your chimney, covered in soot, all while you're asleep, the kid said. I didn't say a word in reply. He'll know when you're asleep, and he'll be able to creep, creep, creep up right next to your bed. I reach for the store's phone, dialing the mall security's short number. I try not to listen to the kid, but I can't help but hear his words over the phone's dial tone. He's gonna stuff your mouth with coal until you choke and die. I turn, ready to scream at this creepy little brat. It's one thing to be a spoiled kid, it's another to say such threatening things to someone who's only trying to help.

But when I turn around, the kid was gone. Not a sign of him, even outside the store in the emptying mall. I've only told this story a handful of times, but it never fails to creep me out. The idea of such a kid having such a skewed idea of Santa as some weird avenging angel, having a warped view of the holiday season, never, ever fails to make my skin crawl. Bruce Jeffrey Pardo. A name you may have never heard of before, but in ten minutes or so,

it'll be a name you'll never, ever forget. Bruce Pardo spent his formative years in the San Fernando Valley, graduating from John H. Francis Polytechnic High School in Sun Valley, Los Angeles. After earning a degree from the California State University, Northridge, he was gainfully employed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and La Canada Flintridge for many years. It was working at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and La Canada Flintridge for many years. It was working at the Flintridge lab in 2004 that he has a chance encounter with one Sylvia Orzo, the woman who would become his wife in early 2006. However, the marriage was far from a blissful one. In less than a year into the betrothal, Sylvia filed for a divorce.

She cited that Mr. Pardo refused to open a joint bank account with her, that he also expected Sylvia to take care of her own three children with her own finances. One can understand why Miss Orzo would be so quick to seek a separation. Despite the official reasons given in Orzo's application for the divorce, it seems that there were other things at work that motivated her to file for one. This includes the rumor that Pardo had abandoned his previous family after their child was crippled in a hideous swimming accident, refusing to pony up the money for hospital and rehab fees. In June of 2008, a divorce court had ordered Bruce Pardo to pay

almost $2,000 a month in spousal support. During the divorce proceeding, Bruce had angrily confided to a close friend his wife was taking him to the cleaners. Then just a month later in July, disaster struck when Pardo was fired from his job as an electrical engineer at ITT Electronic Systems for billing false hours. As a result, the court suspended the support payments due to job hardship, but according to court documents, Pardo was still required to pay Sylvia Orzo a lump sum of $10,000 as part of the divorce settlement. Sylvia Orzo had already kept the diamond-studded wedding ring as well as the family dog, and in a court declaration, Pardo complained that Sylvia was living with her parents,

not paying rent, and had spent lavishly on a luxury car, gambling trips to Las Vegas, meals at fine restaurants, massages, and other luxuries. All of this left Pardo with an intense desire for revenge, and on Christmas Eve of 2008, he made a terrifying, fateful decision. At approximately 11.30 p.m. Pacific Standard Time, Bruce Jeffrey Pardo was dressed in a Santa Claus suit when he knocked on the door of his former in-law's house, occupied by about 25 people. A Christmas Eve party was in full swing, spirits were high. Although the revelers were not expecting

to see Pardo at the party, they were pleased to see him nonetheless. His eight-year-old niece, Katrina Yusupolsky, the daughter of Letitia Yusupolsky, a sister of Sylvia Pardo, ran to greet him, obviously overjoyed to see her uncle wearing such festive garb. As she bounded towards him, arms either side of her as she prepared to give Santa a big hug, Pardo pulled out a handgun and shot her in the face. The horror that the party experienced in that moment is hard to fathom. As Pardo began firing indiscriminately at the fleeing revelers, those that had been cut down find Pardo looming over them, pistol in hand, before he brutally executes them with shots to their heads.

In the initial aftermath of the attack, one of the house was clear of all but the dead and dying Pardo took a package from his parked car Inside it was something he'd been working on for months A homemade flamethrower An accomplished engineer, what Pardo has created was an effective weapon indeed And he used it to spray burning gasoline all over the building. Nine people died from either gunfire or flames and three others were wounded. The eight-year-old niece who was

shot in the face with severe but non-life-threatening injuries, a 16-year-old girl shot and wounded in the back, and the 20-year-old woman who suffered a broken ankle jumping out of the second floor window. There was one survivor who called the authorities during the attack after escaping to a neighbor's house. The resulting fire soared approximately 40 to 50 feet and took almost 100 firefighters almost two hours to extinguish. Due to the intensity of the fire, identification of the victims was only possible with dental and medical records. After the attack, Pardo swapped the Santa outfit for his regular clothes and drove his Dodge Caliber rental car to his brother's house in Silmar, about 30 miles away from the crime scene. It was here that he was later found dead from a

single, self-inflicted gunshot wound. It was initially believed that Pardo intended to flee to Canada by plane since he had bought an airline ticket to a flight on Air Canada. However, it was subsequently discovered that the flight itinerary on Northwest Airlines was from Los Angeles to Moline, Illinois, with a layover in Minnesota. Pardo had called days before to tell a high school friend that he was planning to visit, but investigators were unsure if he was actually intending to visit or if the flight was simply to throw investigators off the scent. However, he had visited the friend before in October of 2008, so it is likely he was going to attempt a lay low in Illinois before he escaped over the border. Other reports stated that the Santa suit had melted during the flamethrower portion of the attack and had adhered to his skin so not all of it could be removed.

Given that he was suffering from severe third degree burns on his arms stemming from the blaze, Pardo decided to go against the initial plan. Police found $17,000 in cash, cling-wrapped on his legs inside a girdle. His rental car, parked one block from his brother's house, had been rigged with remnants of his Santa suit that would detonate the car with black powder if removed. Also recovered from the scene were four 13-round capacity handguns that were empty and at least 200 rounds of ammunition, suggesting that what had been inside the car was being treated as a threat. A bomb squad fired an incendiary device inside it, burning and destroying it. At Pardo's house in Montrose, police had recovered five empty boxes for semi-automatic handguns, a Benelli M2 tactical shotgun, and a container for high-octane fuel tank gasoline. They also found what was described as a virtual bomb factory in his home.

Pardo's act of insane vengeance left a lasting legacy. Polly Styrene, the lead singer of the 70s post-punk band X-Ray Specs, recorded a song in 2010 called Black Christmas, which contains references to the massacre. All alone drowning in my sorrows, Christmas time always brings my sadness home. A child is born on Christmas day, but they crucified him away. It stands to reason that there is no good day to find a dead body, but perhaps the very worst time to find one is on Christmas Day. A celebration of life and love stands in stark contrast to the brutal realities of life and

death, but sometimes real life is much stranger and much more disturbing than fiction. This is the story of Joanne Yeats. Joanna Claire Yeats was born on the 19th of April, 1985, to David and Teresa Yeats in Hampshire, England. She was privately educated and studied for her A-levels at Peter Simmons College, graduating with a degree in landscape architecture. She later received her postgraduate diploma in landscape architecture from the University of Gloucestershire, the golden ticket to her dream of a career in horticulture. In December 2008, Yeats met 25-year-old architect Greg Reardon, and the pair quickly began dating. The couple moved in together the following year, opting to settle in a nearby Bristol, when the company that they were employed by relocated there. By October of 2010, Yeats and Reardon had moved into a flat at 44 Canyi Road in the city's Clifton suburb, happily cohabiting with a view to starting a family. However, at approximately 8pm on the 19th of December 2010, Reardon returned home from

a weekend visit to Sheffield to find their new apartment completely deserted. Reardon tried to contact her by phone, but had no success. Shortly after, Reardon called her again, but her mobile phone rang from a pocket of her coat which was still in the flat. He also found that her purse and keys had also been left and that their cat appeared to have been neglected. Greg began to worry at this point. Joanna doted on that cat. It was extremely out of character for her to fail to care for it. Shortly after half past midnight, Reardon contacted the police and Yeats' parents to report her missing. A police investigation came to the conclusion that Yeats had attended a staff Christmas party with colleagues on December 17th at the Bristol Ram Pub on Park Street, leaving at around 8 in the evening to begin the short walk home. Yeats was seen on CCTV at around 8.10pm leaving a Waitrose supermarket without purchasing anything. Phone records showed that she called a friend, Rebecca Scott,

at 8.30pm to arrange a meeting on Christmas Eve. The last known footage of Yeats recorded her buying a pizza from a branch of Tesco Express at around 8.40pm. She had also bought two small bottles of cider at a nearby off-license bargain booze. On the 21st of December, Greg Reardon, along with Joanne's parents, made a public appeal for her safe return at a police press conference. In another press conference, broadcast live on the BBC, Yeats' father David commented on her disappearance. I think she was abducted after getting home to her flat. I have no idea of the circumstances of the abduction because of what was left behind. I feel sure she would not have gone out by herself leaving all these things behind and she was taken away somewhere.

Detectives retrieve a receipt for a pizza but found no sign of it or of its packaging. Both bottles of cider were found with one of them partially consumed as there was no evidence of forced entry or a struggle. Investigators began to examine the possibility that Yeats may have known her abductor. On Christmas Day of 2010, a fully clothed body was found in the snow by a couple walking their dogs along Longwood Lane near a golf course and next to the entrance of a quarry in Fairland, approximately three miles from Joanne and Greg's flat. To the absolute heartbreak of her friends and family, the body was identified by police as that of Joanne's. Reardon and the Yeats family visited the site of the discovery on the 27th of December.

David Yeats said that the family had been told to prepare for the worst and express relief that her daughter's body had been recovered. Shortly after 7am on the 30th of December, Christopher Jeffries, Yeats' landlord who lived in the same building, was arrested on suspicion of her murder. But on the 4th of March 2011, after a thorough investigation, police stated he was no longer a suspect. He subsequently won an undisclosed sum in libel damages for defamatory news articles published following his arrest, and received an apology from Avon and Somerset Police for any distress caused to him during the investigation. In January of 2011, a reconstruction of the case was filmed on location in Bristol for a broadcast of the BBC television program Crime Watch. Snow Business, a Gloucestershire-based firm that has been involved

in the production of the Harry Potter films, was contracted to reproduce the snowy conditions at the time of Yeats' disappearance. Within 24 hours of news coverage about the production, over 300 people contacted the police. A breakthrough led investigators to believe that Yeats' body might have been transported in a large hold-all or suitcase. On the morning of the 20th of January, Avon and Somerset police arrested 32-year-old engineer Vincent Tabak, who lived with his girlfriend in the flat next door to Yeats. But authorities declined to reveal additional details while the suspect was being interrogated due to concerns over controversial media coverage of Jeffrey's arrest.

The Tabak arrest followed an anonymous tip from a female caller, shortly after a televised appeal by Yeats' parents on Crimewatch. Cannon's Road was closed by police while scaffolding was constructed around Yeats' home, and officers sealed off Tabak's adjacent flat. Investigators also searched the nearby townhouse of a friend where Tabak was believed to have been staying about a mile away. Tabak had previously been ruled out as a suspect during an earlier stage of the investigation, and had returned to Britain from a holiday visit to his family in the Netherlands. The trial of Vincent Tabak started on October 4th, 2011 at Bristol Crown Court where he pleaded guilty to manslaughter but denied murder. The prosecution's case was that Tabak had strangled Yeats at her flat within minutes of her arrival home, using sufficient force to kill her.

The prosecutor stated that Tabak, who was around a foot taller than Yeats, had used his height and build to overpower her, pinning her to the floor by the wrists, and that she had suffered more than 40 separate injuries to her head, neck, torso, and arms during the struggle. These injuries included cuts, bruises, and a fractured nose. The court heard that the struggle was lengthy and her death would have been slow and painful. However, no explanation was offered for the reasoning behind Tabak's initial attack on Yitz. Evidence was presented that Tabak had then tried to conceal the crime by disposing of her body. The court heard that DNA swabs taken from Yats' body had provided a match with Tabak. Samples found behind the knees of her jeans indicated she may have been held by the legs as she was carried,

while fibers suggested contact with Tabak's coat and car. Bloodstains were found on a wall overlooking a quarry close to where Yeats was discovered. The prosecution also said that Tabak attempted to implicate the landlord, Chris Jeffries, for the murder during the police investigation, and that in the days following Yeats' death, he had made internet searches for topics that included the length of time a body takes to decompose and the dates of refuse collections in the Clifton area. In his defense, he had told the court that he had killed Yates while trying to silence her after she screamed when he tried to kiss her. He claimed that Yates had made a flirty comment and invited him to drink with her. He said that after she screamed he held his hands over her mouth and around her neck to

silence her, but he denied suggestions of a struggle, claiming to have held Yeats by the neck with only minimal force and for about 20 seconds. He told the court that after dumping the body, he was in a state of panic. The jury was sent out to deliberate on the 26th of October and returned with a verdict two days later. On the 28th of October 2011, Tavuk was found guilty of Joanna Yeats' murder by a 10-2 majority verdict. He was jailed for life with a minimum term of 20 years. Passing sentence, Mr. Justice Field referred to a

carnal element to the killing. Jean-Bernay Ramsey was born in 1990 in Atlanta, Georgia, the younger of two children of Patsy and John Ramsey. John Ramsey was a successful businessman who was the president of Access Graphics, a computer system company that would later be bought up and absorbed by the titanic Lockheed Martin. So in 1991, John and Patsy moved their family to Boulder, Colorado, where Access Graphics' new headquarters was to be located. Patsy Ramsey was a regular on the junior pageant scene and entered their daughter

in various child beauty pageants that were held in Boulder. Jean Benet would prove popular on the pageant scene, winning the titles of America's Royal Miss, Little Miss Charlevoix, Little Miss Colorado, Colorado State All-Star Kids Cover Girl, and National Tiny Miss Beauty. Jean Benet's active role in child beauty pageants and Patsy's reported pageant mother behavior were common knowledge among their friends, family, and fellow contestants. According to the statement that Patsy gave to authorities on December 26, 1996, she realized that her daughter was missing after she found a two-page handwritten ransom note on the kitchen staircase. The hastily scrawled note written in black marker pen demanded $118,000 for their child's safe return. John pointed out to police that the amount was nearly identical to his Christmas bonus of the prior year, which suggested that someone who would have access to

that information would be involved in the crime. Investigators looked at several theories behind the dollar amount demanded and seriously considered employees at Access Graphics who may have known of the amount of John's prior bonus as suspects. By most standards, the ransom note was unusually long. The FBI told the police that it was very unusual for such a note to be actually written at the crime scene during the crime itself. This led police to believe that the note was staged, due to it not having any fingerprints except for patsies and authorities who had handled it, and because it included an unusual use of exclamation marks and initialisms. The note and a practice draft were written with a pen and pad of paper from the Ramsey home.

According to a Colorado Bureau of Investigation report, there were indicators that the author of the ransom note was Patricia Ramsey herself. However, a federal court ruled it highly unlikely that Patsy wrote the note, citing six certified handwriting experts. Meanwhile, John Ramsey made arrangements to pay the ransom as a forensics team was dispatched to the house. The team initially believed that the child had been kidnapped and John Bonnet's bedroom was the only room in that house that was cordoned off to prevent contamination of evidence. Boulder Police Detective Linda Arndt arrived early the next morning with the goal of awaiting the kidnappers' instructions, but there was never an attempt by anyone to claim the money.

It was then that detectives made a horrifying discovery. One of the plain-clothed detectives asked John Ramsey and Fleet White, a family friend, to search the house to see if anything seemed suspicious. They started their search in the basement. John opened the latch door and was horrified to find his daughter's body in one of the rooms. Jean Benet's mouth was gagged with duct tape. A nylon cord had bound her wrists and neck, while her torso was covered by a white blanket in an attempt to conceal the corpse, but it could not mask the smell. John Ramsey picked up the child's body and took it upstairs. The autopsy revealed that Jean Benet had been killed

on Christmas Day by strangulation and skull fracture. There was no evidence of conventional carnal abuse of any kind, although police refused to rule it out for the murder. Although no bodily fluid was found, there was evidence that there had been an injury to the girl's private parts. At the time of the autopsy, the pathologist recorded that it appeared her private area had been wiped with a cloth. A garrote that was made from nylon cord had been tied around Jean Benet's neck and had apparently used to strangle her. The autopsy revealed a vegetable or fruit material which may represent pineapple, which Jean Benet had eaten a few hours before her death. Photographs of the home taken on the day when Jean Benet's body was found show a bowl of pineapple on the kitchen table with

a spoon in it. However, neither John nor Patsy said they remembered putting the bowl on the table or feeding pineapple to Jean Benet. If this was true, then Jean Benet had been fed by whatever stranger had murdered her. A highly disturbing detail indeed. Boulder police initially focused almost exclusively upon John and Patsy as suspects in their daughter's killing, but by October of 1997, police had over a thousand people in their index a person of interest for the case. However, a grand jury was convened on September 15, 1998, the main being to consider indicting the Ramseys for charges related to the case. In 1999, the grand jury returned a true bill to charge the Ramseys with placing the child at risk in a way that led to her death and with obstructing an investigation

of murder based on the probable cause standard applied in such grand jury proceedings. But Boulder County District Attorney Alex Hunter did not prosecute them because he did not believe that he could meet the higher standard of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt that is required for a criminal conviction in the state of Colorado. However, many years later in 2015, Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner disagreed with completely exonerating the Ramseys, stating, Exonerating anyone based on a small piece of evidence that has not yet been proved to even be connected to the crime is absurd. He also stated that the unknown DNA from Jean Benet's clothing has got to be the focus of the investigation.

At this point in time and that, until one can prove otherwise, the suspect is the donator of that unknown DNA. In 2016, Gordon Combs, a former investigator for the Boulder County District Attorney's Office, also questioned total absolution of the Ramseys, stating, We all shed DNA all the time with our skin cells. It can be deposited anywhere at any time for various reasons that are benign. To clear somebody just on the premise of touch DNA, especially when you have a situation where the crime scene wasn't secure at the beginning, it really is a stretch.

Stephen E. Pitt, a forensic psychiatrist hired by Boulder authorities, said, The public exoneration of the Ramseys was a big slap in the face to Chief Beckner and the core group of detectives who had been working on the case for years. However, it seems the twists and turns in the case never stopped. John Mark Carr, a 41-year-old elementary school teacher, was arrested in Bangkok, Thailand on August 15, 2016, when he falsely confessed to murdering Jean Benet. He claimed that he had drugged, assaulted, and accidentally killed her. Yet, authorities also said they did not find any evidence linking Carr to the crime. In confession, Carr had provided only basic facts that were publicly known and failed to provide any convincing details.

His claim that he had drugged John Bonnet was doubted because the autopsy indicated that no drugs were found in her body. What's more, DNA samples that were taken from Carr did not match DNA found on JohnBenet's body. We may never know who actually murdered JonBenet Ramsey, but one thing is certain. What should have been a jolly family holiday was turned into a living nightmare by a killer who may never face justice for their crimes. This time of year, nothing pairs better with too much food and alcohol than grim, macabre tales of murder and mayhem. This particular ghastly tale takes place on Christmas Day, 1929, on a farm outside Germantown, North Carolina. Charlie Lawson's big Christmas surprise for his adoring family of nine began with a trip into town. Sparing no expense, Charlie Lawson agreed to buy each and every member of his family an outfit of

their choice before taking them over to a local photographer and having a family portrait taken. Quite a costly affair for a modest tobacco farmer. Just over a week later, it would be Christmas Day, 1929. One might get the impression that Charlie was a good father, who tried to bring his family the best Christmas possible, even on his meager income. But you'd be wrong. On the day itself, 17-year-old Marie Lawson had been busy in the kitchen preparing a fruitcake for after dinner that evening, while the younger sisters, 12-year-old Carrie and the 7-year-old Maybel, wandered over to their aunt and uncle's house to celebrate the holidays and relieve some of the pressure on Charlie and his wife. Fanny Lawson, Charlie's spouse of 17 years, had been tending to her and Charlie's younger children, while Charlie and his oldest son,

16-year-old Arthur, nicknamed Buck, had planned a very special Christmas Day hunting trip, something of a yearly tradition for the pair. As Charlie and Arthur prepared to set out on their holiday hunting trip, they soon realized that they needed more shotgun shells if they were to have a successful hunt. Charlie sent Arthur up to the store to pick up some more ammo while he waited patiently in the tobacco barn. But when Charlie saw Carrie and Maybel walking down the path on their way back from their aunt and uncle's home, he shouldered his shotgun, aimed in the direction of his two young children, and pulled the trigger. There was simply no telling of the absolute terror and confusion experienced by those poor girls.

The instant hit of agony as clusters their own father walk slowly over to their bodies, expecting him to help as any good father should, only to have him smash the butt of his shotgun over and over again into their skulls, cracking them open in the driveway of their own home. Charlie then set off towards the family home, his trusty shotgun firmly in his grip. Fanny, who had been out on the front porch to investigate the gunfire, attempted to flee, but it was no good. There's no outrunning a shotgun blast. Hearing the gunshots from outside, the teenage Marie screamed bloody murder, trapped in a state of abject panic, as her father racked the shotgun and gunned her down in the kitchen. The youngest children heard the commotion and, fearing for their lives, attempted to hide.

Charlie quickly found them and brutally bludgeoned them to death with the butt of his shotgun. Even the newborn Mary Lou was shown no quarter. Charlie killed her without hesitation, leaving a horrific mess in the child's crib. Then, for some unknown reason, he then placed rocks under the heads of his dead wife and children and wandered off into the woods as if in a daze. Concerned neighbors of the Lawsons initially walking over to wish them a Merry Christmas heard the gunshots and hurried to check on them. Instead of the festive merriment they had come to expect,

they stumbled onto a grisly tableau of blood, buckshot, and shattered bone. Before they could set out to find Charlie, they heard a single gunshot in the woods. Charlie had shot himself. By the time Arthur made it back from his trip into town, his entire family had been murdered. Folks at the town's general store had gotten worried that something awful had happened and someone in town offered to give Arthur a ride back to the family farm. When he reached his home, the police had already arrived and a crowd began to gather. In the woods, police found footprints indicating that Charlie had been pacing around a tree for some time before taking his own life. Next to his body were letters to both his parents.

Some accounts reported that Charlie had placed stones over the eyes of his dead family members, as well as cushioning their heads with them. To this very day, no one is certain what exactly drove Charlie Lawson to slaughter his entire family, with the exception of young Arthur, before taking his own life. Some speculate that Lawson had been abusing Marie, and that she may well have been pregnant with an inbred child at the time of her death. Others have insisted that Charlie could not have had the capacity to commit the heinous acts that occurred on the family farm that Christmas day, and that the entire thing had been staged to commit the heinous acts that occurred on the family farm that Christmas day, and that the entire thing had been staged to frame Charlie. A more credible explanation is that Charlie had developed a medical condition that affected his actions and caused him to experience a psychotic break.

Perhaps he'd knocked a screw loose after suffering a head injury while digging a ditch on the farm, or as some reported, he had some kind of painful growth on his chest that had him in constant agony, and he decided to end it all and take his family with him. The killing attracted so much attention that an estimated 5,000 curiosity seekers attended the Lawson family funeral. They were all buried in a single large plot in the private Browder family Cemetery just outside of Germantown. The house became a macabre tourist attraction after the murder-suicide and Charlie's brother decided to open the house to the public, charging admission for tours of the property. Still on the counter sat the cake that Marie had been making.

Even after the house had been closed, the cake made its rounds in traveling dime museums. Protective plastic had been used to cover the cake after several ornleckers swiped some raisins. The cake tore for at least a decade before surviving family members buried the cake, along with the awful memories that came with it. Though the home was later demolished, the area still has enough spooky history to have inspired ghost sightings of the doomed Lawson children and of murderous Charlie Lawson. Unbelievably, the tragedy of the Lawson family didn't end in 1929. In 1945, James Arthur Lawson, the only child to survive the Christmas Day bloodshed,

died at the age of 31 in a truck accident in Walnut Cove, North Carolina, quite near Germantown. He was buried in the same cemetery as the rest of his family, leaving behind four children of his own. When news of Arthur's death reached the local community, rumors of a family curse abounded. They insisted that Charlie had reached out to claim his son from beyond the grave. The murders also inspired the famed bluegrass duo the Stanley Brothers to pen a suitably morbid tune recounting the loss in family's fate. The song includes the following lyrics. They say he killed his wife at first, while the little ones did cry. Please, Papa, won't you spare our lives? It is

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Please play responsibly. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. I'm now a 27-year-old woman in Louisville, Kentucky. This story technically begins at birth when I was taken from the hospital into foster care, but it wasn't until the age of 21 that I finally got the identifying information I needed to find my birth family. If you're adopted, you know that your entire life is feeling a sense of emptiness

and loneliness just waiting for the day to see your blood for the first time. It didn't help that I grew up in an abusive, overly religious household with my adopted family. So at 21 I found them, finally. I got the paperwork from the Kenton County Courthouse. I was only ever told that I was half Filipina and had to be put into a Catholic household. At 18 I was told, non-identifying information, that I had five siblings at birth. My mother, whom we'll call Misha, loved to write and knit. My father, who we'll call Lin, was a bass fisherman who wrote love songs on his boat. So the idea in my mind was this Catholic family who just didn't have the funds for a sixth child and wanted to give them the best life. Boy, was I wrong. I first Facebooked Misha and find out her last name was different.

Okay, they got a divorce. I googled first and maiden name and there it was. She was currently in prison for cooking meth. I focused on her first because I couldn't find my birth father anywhere at first. My mindset was, well, if she is in prison for cooking, I'm sure she's been arrested before. I'm not in the slightest a judgmental person, but merely wanted to see more photos of the woman who gave birth to me. I press enter on the Google search and this became the beginning of something that has haunted me until this day. She was on the deviant offender registry for life. I looked more into finding a court document about it. She allowed several men including family members to abuse all of my siblings including the boys. I can't contain myself and feel like I'm in a nightmare. She

would get off to men doing this to her children but this is something I later learned. I finally find Lynn, also in prison. Five charges of inter-familial relations, carnal assault and a few others. I was in shock. My entire childhood and life changed. This idea of what I always believed vanished. Long story short, I find my youngest sister that at first I believed was a cousin. Her number was on her Facebook. I call her and she almost immediately asks, do you know what happened with our parents or... I tell her

no so she can speak her truth freely. My brother, a year older than me, had a learning problem and Lynn took his anger out on him. He was thrown down steps and his arm broke. He was fed his own feces when his teacher told her birth parents that he had told her that he said that he was hungry and wasn't fed. My older brother was trained to beat up my younger brother for their sick enjoyment. They both were taken advantage of, but the younger one went through literal torture. The older brother was the favorite, if you can even call it that. They locked the younger brother in a room for days at a time, to starve and beat him. My siblings would feed him scraps under the door. As for my sisters, my older sister was Lynn's pet and was always in love with her.

She had it worse because she would try to protect our younger siblings so they wouldn't endure it the way she did. Still to this day, she believes that she saved the youngest sister but she doesn't have the heart to tell her she was still abused. They would be drugged and terrible things would be done to them by anyone that would give Misha and Lynn money. They never had a steady place and sometimes only had a home of logs over a ditch to cover them from weather. They were later taken away after Lynn's brother ended his own life after finding out because he believed that he could have saved them since Lin had done terrible things to him as a child. He ended his own life and our aunt and uncle finally somehow found out and got them out of there. The CPS workers who had been working there for 30 plus years proclaimed that she had never seen anything like it. I also heard that when he was in the military that he had ended the life of a streetwalker by strangling her and leaving her to

die. That's a whole other story. This is only scraping the surface but I have never seen so much evil in my life. I am not religious by any means but I can say that I was thankful to be saved from that. My story starts back in 2016. I'm a 23 year old girl. At the time all of this took place, I was 20. I was working at a cafe near my house as a cashier. I managed to make some really good friends which helped the work days go by very quickly. We would all hang out after work and drink and then go back to work the next day and repeat the process. One day I was working the morning shift with a few of my

friends. I was the only cashier on the clock because my friend was on break and it was pretty slow. I was goofing off with my friend Andy when a guy around my age came up to the register. Andy knew him somehow though I didn't think to ask how at the time. They exchanged a quick friendly ketchup and he ordered a soda that she just gave him for free. I remember thinking it was kind of odd to come into a cafe just to get a soda but I assume since he knew his friend worked there he knew he could score some free stuff. Andy and I quickly resumed goofing off behind the counter and I didn't give it another thought. A few days later I got a text from a random number that said,

Hey, it's Patrick. I saw you at work with my friend the other day and I thought you were really cute. I was hoping I could ask you out on a date. I assumed Andy had given the guy my number. I made a mental note to let her know that I would prefer she ask me next time, but I went ahead and responded because he was a friend of hers. He wasn't the usual type I would go for and I had just gotten out of a relationship but I didn't want to be rude. I responded with a quick, oh hey I remember. Thank you I appreciate the compliment but I'm not in the right place to start dating right now. I just kind of got out of a relationship. We can be friends though, right?

He said he was cool with it and started asking me questions about my last relationship. I explained that I was in a very restricting and controlling relationship. He was really supportive at first and completely took my side. After a few days of texting on and off, he continued to ask me random questions about my ex-boyfriend. And this is when things got a little bit weird because he started to sympathize with my ex, saying subtle things like, Yeah, I wouldn't want you to hang out with other guys either because they all probably like you. Or, I would probably be mad if other guys got to see you in short skirts. I chalked it up to him attempting to be cute and

compliment me and I decided to just ignore it. Things seemed normal for a while and he would stop by the cafe to get a soda every once in a while. He was a little guilty of holding up the line with conversation and I would have to politely ask him to let me take the rest of the customers. About a week and a half had gone by since he had first texted me and he started to send me messages like, are you ready to date yet? Or do you like me enough to give me a chance? That's when I started to get really concerned because I realized he had no interest in being friends and that he was secretly hoping he could change my mind. I wasn't ready to date after a week and a half, especially not someone who sympathized with the

things that I hated so much about my last relationship. I told him this and he got really upset but seemed to understand. Things began to escalate when he started showing up at the beginning of every single shift I worked. The time didn't seem to matter. If I opened he would show up at 5am and demand I let him in the store even though the store wasn't open yet. The worst time was when he showed up at 5am with a soccer ball. I told him for the millionth time that I couldn't let him in because we weren't open yet. He began to kick the soccer ball up against the glass while I was completing my opening duties. It was extremely distracting and would startle me every time the ball hit the glass.

On that particular day we were getting a large produce shipment and he dribbled his soccer ball into the truck and was running around trying to evade the delivery drivers who were attempting to get him to go away. My manager didn't notice him standing around the door and unlocked it so that the drivers could bring their deliveries into our storage cooler. He slipped in through the door while they were in the back and began to play soccer all around the store while yelling, go on a date with me, over and over again. Thank god my manager heard the commotion and yelled at him to leave the store. As soon as the doors were open for business though he decided to hang around the register and say really inappropriate things when customers were trying to order. I was more annoyed than anything that he somehow knew my schedule and I decided to confront Andy about this. When she came into work he was sitting at a table watching

me. I asked Andy to help me with something and we went into the back of the cafe. As soon as we turned the corner I quietly yelled, Andy why would you give that guy my schedule? She had no idea who or what I was talking about. I told her that Patrick had been coming in every day at my scheduled times and she swore she didn't give him my schedule or my phone number. This was when I got really freaked out because she told me they aren't even friends. The only reason she was nice to him that day was because he used to date her friend and he's a really bad guy and she was scared of him she told me that I should completely cut off all contact and do my best to avoid him but didn't go into details of his relationship with her friend I blocked his number right then and there and when I left for work I left out the back

door so that he wouldn't see me. Later that night I got a call from a random number. I was waiting to hear back from my doctor because I had a hospital visit earlier that year and they checked some blood samples earlier that week to make sure everything was good. The area code was right so I answered it. To my horror I heard Patrick's voice on the other end saying, why did you block me? He sounded really angry and I didn't know what to say because I was afraid. Before I could even think of anything to say he went off on a really angry rant. Do you think you're too good for me? No wonder your relationship didn't work out. You're

just a tease. All you had to do was go on one date with me. Is that too hard for you? This is your last chance. Go on a date with me. You will regret it if you don't. Then in a completely calm voice he said, I'll hurt something if you don't. I sat there completely stunned. I was absolutely not going on a date with this psycho but I was afraid of what he would say or do if I said no. I guess I remained quiet too long for his liking because he said, wrong choice, in a low voice and hung up. I was supposed to work the next day but I get really bad anxiety that makes me feel really nauseous so I told Andy what was going on and asked her if she would cover my shift because I was freaking out. Thank God she said yes because according to Andy,

Patrick came barreling into the cafe demanding to know where I was. When Andy told him I was at home sick, he asked her where. Obviously, Andy didn't tell him where I lived and got the manager to tell him to leave and that he wasn't allowed to come back to that cafe again or they would involve the police. Andy also mentioned that as he left, he looked like he was gripping something shiny and long on his side. She only got a quick look but believed it to be a knife. I ended up quitting my job at the cafe because I couldn't handle the anxiety of walking through those doors every day and I absolutely don't answer unknown numbers.

I don't know what I was planning to do or what would have happened if I had gone to work at all but all I can say is Andy possibly saved me from serious injury and maybe even saved my life by taking that shift. Something was seriously wrong with Patrick and I hope I never have to hear his voice or see his face again. I'm posting this for a friend who had a terrifying experience when she was in high school. She isn't part of this thread and doesn't listen to the podcast but has asked me to keep it anonymous so let's call her Rachel. Rachel's parents owned a business and would often work late until 9 to 10 at night. Sometimes one of them would be off early but often times they would both be gone until after she went to bed. Rachel hated being alone at night and sometimes I'd come over after school to hang out and have dinner until I reached my curfew.

Sometimes I'd stay in the guest room if I stayed out too late. Most of the time though she would just call me for peace of mind and someone to talk to I didn't mind because we had great conversations and felt bad for her that she had to be alone and uncomfortable one night she called me like normal and I was telling her about an upcoming wrestling match out of state. As I was mid-sentence, she said with a shaky voice, I think someone just knocked on my downstairs door. I told her not to worry because it was probably just a neighbor telling her that her outdoor or indoor cat had made its way into their yard again, which it had a habit of doing so this wasn't an uncommon case. I said for her to go downstairs and look through the peephole to make sure it was someone she knew.

Rachel set the phone down to go downstairs to look. A couple of minutes went by before she picked up the phone and said there's a creepy looking old woman outside my door pounding on it and not saying anything else. I didn't know what to say at first. I eventually said, oh that's really strange. At least it's not a man or someone who could easily hurt you I guess. I should add that it was winter time and although it was only around six it had already gotten dark. Rachel lived in a safe upper class neighborhood with a low crime rate. After I

asked Rachel if she was going to call the police or just wait to see if the woman left, about five minutes had gone by and she said, I think she's gone, the banging stopped. We were both silent for a few minutes before Rachel said something horrifying. I noticed her voice lowered to almost a whisper as she exclaimed, oh no, I don't remember if I locked the back door. I then told her to lock her bedroom door and call the police to be safe. Whatever the woman wanted and as harmless as she may be, you can never really know someone's full intentions. I think we can all agree that it's also strange for an elderly woman to be outside

in the freezing cold darkness knocking on random people's doors. I told Rachel to stay on the phone and that I was coming over but the police should be there before me. I put her on speakerphone in the car and asked her if she could hear anything outside. No, I don't hear anything, she said. See, I said. I highly doubt that a woman would break in even if you left the back or side door unlocked. A few moments went by before, through my speaker, I could hear a loud banging on what I assumed to be Rachel's door. I heard Rachel start to cry and yell out, asking who was there. Is it the police? I yelled asking who it is. Who is that? Rachel yelled.

No answer, only continued banging. I could hear Rachel crying and yelling at her door and then the phone was silent. I sped to her house where thankfully out front I could see police lights and Rachel talking to a couple of officers. Rachel's mom arrived shortly after me which was when I got the full story. There was a skilled nursing home nearby where Rachel lived. Apparently one of the residents had somehow gotten out of the locked wing where she lived. She wasn't known to be violent by the employees but was in the advanced stages of Alzheimer's and would often forget where she lived and would try to get the staff to take her back to her home with her husband. Her husband had passed years back and Rachel's parents had bought the house new when she was born. I guess it's not a very dramatic way to end the story

and actually rather sad. However, being a young girl knowing someone is outside your room banging on the door, not saying a word, has to be terrifying. You could say I had a rough childhood growing up. Things which happened in the past still haunt me to this day.

I'm 25, female, anxiety-ridden due to multiple past traumas. This story takes place when I was about 13 to 14. At the time my parents had just separated, my father was fighting his illness of alcoholism, my mother a pathological liar, cheater and unbeknownst to me and my younger sister at the time fighting a drug addiction. As I said childhood was not easy. When my parents were together they always fought due to their opposing addictions. So after they separated my dad met and fell in love with my stepmother and moved far away and lost all contact with us. A few years down the road my mom met a man named Cowboy and we had moved in with him in a terrible house in a new town about an hour's drive from the rest of our family. Catboy had his own issues with drugs and alcohol and mental

issues as well. He had never been around kids, teenagers and definitely shouldn't have been. My mom at the time had issues with men. Always had to have a man in her life no matter how bad they were. There's this condition where a woman needs to be with a significant other even if she is treated horribly. It's basically like they need to be the fixer in trying to improve that person although it sometimes ends in abuse. The house we lived in scared me. I had to sleep with the door open in order to have light shining from the hall. Yes, I know now a fire hazard but at the time the only way I could sleep. My mom's and cowboy's room was across the hall from mine, my sister's in the basement of the bungalow where we were living in.

Cowboy was up late one night with their bedroom door open, very rare that it was, as they would hide away from me and my sister and do god knows what in the confines of their room. It was about midnight or later on a school night so I politely asked if he could close the door so I could try and sleep or turn down their TV. This angered him. He gets up in a rage, walks across the hall and slams my door telling me to F off, mind my business and keep my door closed. I retort and opening my door up again and explain I'm scared of my door being closed. Again, this time he slams the door in my face, breaking my nose.

As blood of course is running down my face, my mom takes one look at me and screams at him to get out of this house now, look what you did to her nose. My sister, mom and myself rush to the hospital to get my nose checked out, then drive to my family's house an hour away for the night. Me and my sister get pulled out of school we were in, not knowing what was going on in our house as we're now staying at my grandmother's house. We find out we're going to live with my grandparents as my mom packs up our stuff, worried for our safety. One day my mom comes to my grandparents after work and tells us to get into our car in hysterics. My grandma sees us out of the kitchen window and ushers us to our friend's house next door. Scared watching in our friend's house at the exchange going on outside with my

mom and my grandma, my mom races off, never to be seen again for a few months. At the time it was confusing the way my mom was acting and what had happened between her and my grandma to make her leave us for months with no contact. These questions would not be answered until I turned 18. My mom was packing up her belongings from our old house, upset and depressed that she had made her boyfriend leave her because of him breaking my nose. So, she shot up drugs, takes our two dogs at the time and dumps them off the side of the road. We had been told she took them to a shelter. She's driving around under the influence without shoes or her glasses and she's blind as a bat. She thinks to herself seeing it's her kids fault this man had left her she should pick up

her kids and drive into a pole and end us all. But on the road she calls my grandma and tells her goodbye she's about to die. So as she pulls up to take me and my sister my grandma races out knowing her plan and tells me and my sister to go and hang out with our friends next door as she had already informed their mother of her plans grandma talks my mom down enough for her to drive to the hospital and admit herself she then goes on to get help for her drug abuse. She's clean now and a very loving mother and grandmother. I'm so thankful for my wonderful grandma for jumping into action so fast before we got into my mom's car and God knows what could have happened to us. Sometimes people need to work through things to get better.

I am a volunteer firefighter in a very small town in West Virginia, and have been for just over three years, being 16, male, when I I joined and 20 now. Our station was built in 1974 and since then we had had eight deaths of members of the department, two since I had been there. We lost two great men in March of 2018 on the line of duty in a fire truck wreck. In the fire truck that was wrecked there are two seats in the front and between them is the motor of the truck. Directly behind the front seats are two more seats that face out of the back of the truck on either side of the motor. There are also two seats in the middle rear of the cab that face out of the front. Our chief at the time, retired now, was driving the truck that day in March. Assistant chief, deceased, was in the hot seat, passenger. Lieutenant,

deceased, was in the officer seat, rear-facing seat on passenger's side. Chief Engineer was in the rear-facing seat on the driver's side and one of our younger firefighters, 17, was in the middle seat facing out the front. Anyone who has knowledge of the fire service or fire trucks will know that this type of engine is called a custom. Our assistant chief and lieutenant that were on the passenger side of the truck were both killed in the fire truck when it went off the road and hit a rock outcrop on the side of a mountain. They were killed instantly. Everyone else survived with two serious life-threatening injuries and the other with a broken arm. I told you that to tell you this. This is not my story but my former fire chief who was

driving the truck that day. One day chief was asleep on the couch in our station when he was awoken by a former chief telling him to wake up because we had a call. Chief awoke and saw no one around, there was no radio traffic and the siren on the building was silent. Thinking it was a dream he went back to sleep. After around 30 seconds he was awoken to our station tones going off and the dispatcher coming across the radio saying that our station had a structure fire. The weirdest part about this is that the former chief that woke him up had died in 1996. This story took place in 2007. Now knowing that the station is haunted, not by bad spirits but spirits of our fallen brothers,

I get a lot of comfort knowing that when I go on calls, they are watching over us all. We even leave a spot open for them on the trucks when we roll out. Being a small volunteer station we don't have a large membership. Remember we don't get paid for this and we all have our other full-time jobs. So now onto my story on the night of Halloween 2019. Me and one of our probationary members were at the fire station upstairs in our pool room. We were sitting at the pool table and I was helping him study to take his mod 1 test the next evening. We were the only people in the building at the time this night. While studying, the nighttime officer in town texted us and asked us to come down and let him

in to get a snack from the vending machine. We both went down and while we were talking to him there was a break in the conversation where the building was silent except something broke through the silence. When we came downstairs we had all left all the pool balls in the pockets of the table and the cover on the table. From downstairs we started hearing the pool balls clacking against each other as if someone had started a game of pool. But we were the only people in the building and there was no other way for anyone to get in other than the door we were standing in front of. When we walked back upstairs, officer with us, we searched everywhere in the upper level of the building to find nothing. Nothing but the cover of the pool table on the floor and the balls scattered across the table

as if someone had started a game even though no one had touched it. I know it was one of the guys who hang around the station in the afterlife but it's still just a little eerie knowing that they are there and can play pranks on us to intentionally scare us, not to get us to leave, just to mess with us. It was their thing when they were alive. I guess I should also clarify in my experience at the station that I think it was the two guys that died in the crash I mentioned earlier. They were both very big pranksters. It was the spring of 2016. I was 17 years old and

let's just say I was a very rebellious teenager. I started getting tattoos behind my parents back in someone's basement. Stupid, I know. Well, I was getting two pieces done with my tattoo artist. He invited some of his friends over while working on my leg piece. The piece on my leg required me to pull up my shorts. One of his friends, we'll call him Tyler, started hitting on me and I tried my best to be short and see if he would get the message that I wasn't in the mood to talk. My artist finished my two tattoos and I was outside smoking a cigarette. Tyler came up to me and started asking me questions like, do you have a boyfriend? And can I get your number? Well I'm going to admit he was very attractive and I had given him my number. I did eventually meet up with Tyler

that night and he asked me about my age. I told him I was 17 and he grew quiet. The pause was red flags but of course I was young and ignorant. Tyler then proceeded to tell me he was 31 and that my age didn't really bother him. At this time I was too young and reckless to care that this dude was twice my age. Fast forward four months later and we began dating. Everything went well until one day Tyler got really high and started accusing me of cheating and got in my face and started screaming. I was shaking and didn't know how to reply to his accusations that were false. I had never given him a reason not to trust me but of course I ignored the red flags. Another two months had passed and Tyler started to get obsessive and

he would start driving by my house and asking me where I was at and why I wasn't home. This freaked me out and I had went off on him calling him a creep. Within that same week Tyler started befriending my neighbors and would watch my house from their porches and I had no clue he was doing this until one day he texted me, I see you and where are you going? I freaked out because I couldn't see his jeep anywhere and I had texted him and asked him where he was and he told me to turn around and look up. There he was sitting next to my neighbor waving at me. This made me mad and I stormed inside calling him and going off. Our relationship only got worse and I was so stupid not to leave him. Tyler used to purposely drug me to steal money off me and he still drove by my

house. He would start calling me names and still even accuse me of cheating and then I pushed him to putting his hands on me. It was September by then and I was so terrified to leave. That same month Tyler wanted me to go to this festival and I agreed because it would make me feel easy if people were around and he wouldn't be so abusive. Boy was I wrong. The first night we went, Tyler got so drunk he started putting his anger towards me for no reason at all. I wasn't about to argue with him and I walked away and got into his truck to ease my mind. Then all of a sudden I felt the door open and two big hands wrap around my arm and I was slammed up against the truck, and it was Tyler with hatred and fury written all over his face. He smacked me and dragged me into the tent and locked the outside of it so I couldn't

get out. At this time I was panicking and I was screaming to be let out. No one could hear me over the loud music and it was quite dark. I started crying and I begged and pleaded to be let out. Tyler then came in and started to caress my face and told me how sorry he was. That was his go-to move to calm me down and make up for what he did. That same year Tyler did the unthinkable. I found out he was a married man of 10 years to the mother of his children. He lied and told me he was divorced and lived with his grandparents and I had been to their house multiple times which I had believed. His wife called me and asked me questions and I felt she deserved to know. I told her everything

and she told me she was going to court to gain complete custody of the kids and let him have no access to them. Tyler was so angry and furious by this and he threatened to shoot up my job. He threatened to end my own life and himself. That day after work I went to the police and filed out a report, blocked him from everything and Tyler never made an attempt to contact me again. If you're seeing this, be aware of who you let into your life and run away from people who give off red flags from the beginning. I was just a kid of about 15 or 16 when this happened. This was in the days when just about every kid in school

or around the neighborhood had some type of part-time job. It was just a given that once you were old enough to push a lawnmower, shovel a driveway, or rake leaves, you spent a portion of your day working for your own money. As this was decades before the invention of the internet, having a job was something kids just accepted and some jumped into with relish. It was a great excuse to get out of the house and make a little pocket money in the process. My first part-time job was typical for that era. I had a newspaper route. That will tell you how long ago it was. I'm in my late 40s now but can still remember riding my bicycle to the corner to

collect the bundle of papers that had been dropped there, counting them out to make sure I hadn't been shorted, insert whatever flyer or ads were included for that day, and peddling door to door for blocks to deliver them. Right here I can tell you that all that old movie stuff you see of the kid on his bike zipping merrily down the street, chucking newspapers blindly in the directions of homes as he passes is complete nonsense. If a kid back then went meandering around the neighborhood flinging newspapers from his bag all willy-nilly, he'd get fired in a hurry. It was kind of a big deal to be a good paperboy. You knew not to ride on the grass, let your bike drop onto

anyone's bushes after hopping off, and to keep clear of the flower beds. This was the suburbs, where practically everyone obsessed over how nice their yard looked, so the better you treated your customers and their yards, the better the tips were when you collected the money each month, and some even bigger ones come Christmas. They even had trophies for the best paperboy in the county. I even won a trophy once. The thing was two feet tall, made of fake gold and marble with a figurine of a paperboy on top, delivering bag and all, holding a rolled newspaper raised to the sky. This stuff was taken seriously. Monday to Friday, the papers were delivered in the afternoon.

Saturday and Sunday were the only days back then that the newspaper was delivered in the morning. When I figured out that the bundles were usually dropped as early as 5am that's when I get to start my route. It wasn't that I was gunning for another trophy it's just that if you got up that early it'd still be dark by the time you came home. Then you could just crash back into bed and wake up at your leisure to a free Saturday or Sunday, as if you've never had to get up in the first place. Paperboy logic. This took place on a Sunday. The Sunday papers sucked to the extent that they were the thickest and required the most inserts, including the comics section which we still called the funnies. So I often had to take true trips, leaving half of my

bundle by the street post on the corner to deliver the first part for the route and then go back for the rest. It could be a huge pain but it was better than getting a hernia dragging a two-ton newspaper bag along behind you. The first half of my route was almost entirely apartments. This made for quick deliveries. I could zip into these small two-story apartment buildings, set the paper down in front of each door and zip right back out. Eight deliveries in less than a minute. The second half of my route had houses spread out and around the then sparsely developed area. Right in the middle of my route was what was called the horseshoe. It was a dirt road that formed a U-shape with the upper prongs connecting to the main road.

You go down the horseshoe on one side to curve around and go up the other side when on my route. There was only five houses spread along the horseshoe with large gaps between them. There was maybe one or two streetlights along the way, mostly obscured by the branches of overhanging trees. So it was usually pretty dark. If you didn't know the way by heart, you'd be riding into a grove of trees or roll right into a ditch. That was the main reason that I loved nights with a full moon. The light of the moon shone down on the houses along this dirt road making it easier to see. Sometimes it wouldn't even seem like it was still night time if the moon was really bright and

there wasn't any cloud cover. In the winter with all the fresh snow everywhere a full moon meant a very well lit route. What follows is the one time I wasn't all that crazy about there being a full moon. Dead center of the horseshoe's curve was a single house perched on a small hill. It was a nice two-story job with flowers running the length of the porch, a bench swing at one end near the front door, a two-car garage, the works. Ideal suburbia. The only thing about this house was that it had the steepest driveway in the neighborhood, so getting up the darn thing was a chore even if you had good momentum on your bike starting out. Once to the top of a mountain driveway, I'd just roll up the paper, slide it into the mail slot in the side door by the garage,

give it a quick tap to send it inside, and then turn around and enjoy a fast glide down the driveway at top speed even without pedaling. It didn't go quite like that this time. As there was a full moon that night, it was pretty bright, even for five in the morning. Lots of houses were painted white or light colors, so they reflected the moonlight well. There was also no wind which was a huge plus. No worry about the wind yanking the paper out of your hand before you could get it rolled up and no fight against the wind either going through the route or coming home.

When I rounded the curve at the end of the horseshoe I was making good time. Even with the Sunday supplement doing its best to weigh me down, I'd already delivered the first half of the route and was looking forward to finishing quick so I could return home to bed. I pedaled up the steep driveway, only having to stop once to push myself along with my sneakers. I dropped the kickstand and dismounted, already digging into my bag for a paper. At the top of the driveway the whole front of the house practically glowed in the moonlight. Bright white paint, red shutters, all those flowers. It looked kind of pretty.

That's when I heard the creak. I stopped, not certain what I heard. It was definitely metal, like the hinges on a gate being opened. But there were no gates nearby that I heard of and none of the houses on the horseshoe had fenced in yards. Then I heard the creak again, which rose and pitched to a squeak. This time I recognized the sound immediately. It was the sound of a swing moving. I had been to every playground in town growing up, so I knew the sound that chains make when you

used a swing. There was a kid's playground not far from where I was but I doubted I could hear one of the swings from that distance. Besides a quick glance confirmed that the playground was deserted as it would be at five in the morning. The moonlight made that view clear. Then I heard the squeak again lasting a bit longer. The hair stood up on the back of my neck as I realized that the sound was close. I looked back to the house and saw the bench swing at the end of the porch, suspended from two chains. It was rocking back and forth. There was no wind to push it, and there would have to be quite a gust to budge something that heavy anyway.

Then the swing picked up speed as if someone on it was pumping their legs to get it going. My heart started pounding like crazy. There was nobody on the swing, not a soul. It was empty and there was no place to hide beneath it where someone could reach up to push it as a prank. The swing was just swinging back and forth on its own. I was completely terrified but couldn't look away. What was I seeing? There in the light of the full moon an empty bench swing was rocking higher and higher back and forth with nobody sitting in it.

That's when I heard it. A giggle. I heard the giggle of a little girl, perhaps four or five years old at the oldest. My jaw dropped open and I was physically shaking. Let me emphasize that there was nothing sinister about this giggle at all. This wasn't a menacing laugh or a piercing cackle. This was the mischievous, tittering giggle of a very young girl at play. It was coming right from the empty bench swing. I couldn't breathe. I had never felt so frightened in my life. Anybody else at that point would have just run, or ridden away pedaling as fast as he could go. But no. I was a good paperboy and I had the trophy to prove it. Acting solely on reflex, for want of another way to explain it, I yanked one of the bulky Sunday papers from my bag and

fumbled with it trying desperately to roll it. I needed to get rid of that thing fast so I could get out of there. The dead air just above the swing let out what sounded like a short chuckle, as if whatever was laughing had tried to cover its mouth. The swing kept swinging. I was jivering like some kind of lunatic as I fought with the paper. Fold, fold, why would you fold over? I eventually turned with half-rolled newspaper to push it through the mail slot. It wouldn't fit, it was way too thick. Why did the Sunday papers have to be so huge? I pushed, pulled back, pushed again, doing little more than shredding the front page with failed attempt after failed attempt. Frantically, I kept glancing back at the swing to see if anyone was there, but there was no one, just the empty swing still rocking

steadily. I gave up and just rammed the stupid paper into the slot as hard as I could. Squashed into a rumpled mess, half in and half out of the slot. I abandoned the newspaper and scrambled for my bike. I couldn't even get on it. I was shaking so badly and freaking out so much that it was like I had forgotten how to ride a bike. I ran down that steep driveway, dragging the bike behind me with one of the handlebars. Once I reached the dirt road, I finally was able to get onto my bike, but it felt like something had grabbed it, holding it back. I looked down to see the kickstand was still down, digging a thin rut into the dirt beside me. I smashed the thing back with my heel and pedaled for all I was worth. There wasn't another sound of giggling, but the swing rocked a little higher, as if my terror was providing great

amusement for whatever sat there. I could still hear the chains on the swing squeak as I took off. At the next house, I didn't give a tinker's care about paperboy delivery protocol. I just chucked the fat sundae edition at the door by their garage and was already zooming off before the thing hit the ground. Same for the next house and the next one. Just like in the movies, right? I think by the time I completed my route that morning I may have gone back to delivering the newspapers properly. I don't remember now. I didn't remember then. All I could remember was that empty bench swing, that disembodied giggle. When I got home, I did fall back into bed, but I didn't go to sleep. I just stared at the ceiling and felt terrified until the sun came up.

The following week, it was business as usual. Afternoon deliveries, same as normal, and come the weekend I made sure that there were fresh batteries in my Walkman so that I could drown out any unearthly giggling with the songs of Kenny Loggins and Michael Jackson. I never did hear the giggle again not that I wanted to. The swing only ever rocked when a person was in it or when we were in the midst of a January blizzard. Even then, it only moved a little under the pounding wind. Like I said, it was heavy. Nothing else creepy or unusual ever happened on my paper route again. Even with what had happened, I realized it could have been worse. I mean, that giggling wasn't followed by any sudden

footsteps as an invisible ghost child leapt off the swing to come running after me. That would have made for one heck of a story, but most likely one that ended with me suffering heart failure or winding up in a mental institution. To this day I have no explanation for that giggle. Some say I was being pranked. Others tell me it was a spirit or sprite of some kind. All I can tell you is I know what it's like to be scared by a prank or unnerved by a ghost story. Later in life, I even had a panic attack a few times, so I know what it's like to feel scared. But nothing, ever, has left me as scared as I was that Sunday morning under the

full moon when I heard that giggle. For context, I'm a female that attends a Northern California community college. It's an overall great college, but the downside to this campus is the location. The layout of this building in particular has four floors total and also has stairs that point directly to the street and to the other parts of the campus. Let's just say our city ranks number 8 in 10 murder capitals of California. Crimes are the norm here, and with with that included we have your average creeps. Since I work 40 hours a week I end up taking night classes because of how well they fit my work schedule. Recently at our campus we had a homeless man expose himself to one of my classmates after class. Evidently was caught due to the security footage and obviously that wasn't

a smart move. We also had another unrelated incidents where a man was hanging around the woman's restroom and evidently was caught as well. Since the specific incident has occurred, I've been checking my emails for updates on this recent incident that happened on our campus but no luck. As I was exiting out my chemistry class feeling dazed after taking our third exam of the semester I call my boyfriend because we planned after class to get groceries. I usually take the stairs that are directly near the street because it's a quicker way to get to the parking lot. My boyfriend mentions that we should meet up at a Walmart store and I agreed. As I was going to hang up the phone

I noticed a lone man on the first floor with his bike just standing there. I did a double take to see if he was waiting for anyone in particular but was just standing there with no expression. My boyfriend mentioned that he'll be at the store in 10 minutes and suddenly I hear the man laugh maniacally. It is strange resemblance to the Joker, like the recent Joaquin Phoenix movie, and thoroughly sent chills down my spine. Stay on the line, please, don't hang up. There's a man on the first floor laughing at what seems to be nothing.

Oh god, it's so creepy, he's just standing there. Okay, I can hear it too. I'll stay on the phone. I head across the building to head to the other stair exit and as I'm doing so, I still hear the man laughing. My boyfriend told me it's wise to find another classmate or a student so I'll be able to buddy up but due to having an afternoon class, most students have already returned home. As I'm heading downstairs, and out of the corner of my eye, I can see the man is now heading to my direction, and I bolt back up. Forget that, and head back to my classroom,

and report it to my professor, which then reported it to campus police. So far, no email has been sent back to me about the incident, but ever since this happened, I can still hear the man's mortifying laugh. I'd like to start this off by saying I'm a 19 year old girl about 5'5 weighing 110 pounds. To many people I'm considered tiny and approachable. To give a little backstory I've worked at a pharmacy for the last year and a half mainly doing grunt work i.e. garbage runs, filing, making boxes and the like along with my normal prescription filling duties. My office is located in a sketchy part of downtown in a major city. It is on the third floor of a four-story building that faces a busy road in the

front and an older run-down residential area to the back where the garbage bins are fenced in next to the underground parking entrance. Directly across the alley that the bins are in is a worn down yellow house that rarely sees the light through the overgrown trees and vegetation in the yard behind the gate. I'd never seen anyone in or around that house during my daily garbage runs though I did notice two very large cane corso dogs that were caged on the rickety deck. I kept getting that feeling of being watched during one of my more recent trips to the bins and I hesitantly glanced towards the creepy yellow house to find nothing out of the ordinary. Now I'm an avid horror

fan, used to being a little bit spooked by cliches like creepy houses and spend my days being paranoid over everyday circumstances, constantly looking behind my shoulder and being suspicious of everyone that moves around me, so I chalked it up to me being paranoid. The feeling never subsided so as I rushed to finish the job I took one last peek behind me and saw a very tall slender man with unkempt shaggy gray hair wearing a tattered white tank top with holes and stains peering out the bay window over the deck and straight at me. At this point I had never known someone that lived there as I had never seen anyone and my customer service instinct kicked in and I gave him the best polite smile I could form. He did not return it and continued to burn his eyes into my being, and after what seemed like hours, he slowly retreated

back out of sight, never breaking eye contact. This was just my first encounter with this man, but by god do I wish it was my only one. The next few times were normal, with me glancing every now and then to see nothing but the pitch black inside the house and a few birds fluttering around his yard, until the day that has burned into my brain forever. It was a hot and sunny Tuesday and I had worn a navy dress to keep me cool during the day. The time comes for me to do my garbage trip and I grab my exacto knife, used to break down cardboard, and slipped into my dress pocket. Pulling my small cart of cardboard and garbage around the fence and into the partially enclosed area of bins, I look across the alleyway and see the man standing on his deck. He walks over to the cages and lets the dogs out,

and they sprint down the stairs of the deck and up to the chain-link fence surrounding the yard and begin barking ferociously in my direction. After getting refocused on my job at hand, I periodically peered over my shoulder and out of the corner of my eye to keep tabs on this man. Until the last time I did so when I could no longer see him standing on his deck, but rather he was slinking along the sidewalk outside of his fence in the shadows of the trees from his yard. He paced back and forth about thirty feet in each direction before spinning back around to go the other way. I began panicking and rushing, catapulting the cardboard into the bin, and that's when I heard the sound.

Rocks from the gravel alley being scuffled under heavy footsteps. I mustered up all the courage I could and turned my entire body to face the man, my hand in my pocket gripping the knife tightly ready to defend myself. To my horror the man was less than 10 feet in front of me, head down staring at the ground with one hand behind his back the other in his pocket. As he closed the gap between us I heard a voice from behind me to my left. I turned to investigate the voice and it was a young man, a tall gawky man probably around 23 or 24 that I recognized from the cafe on the first floor with a garbage bag in his hand. He asked me, is that your cart? I glanced towards the cart and dumbfounded I responded with, yes. He struck up a conversation with me and came close and rested his hand on my shoulder and

looked me in the eyes and whispered, come with me. He grabbed my cart and began walking towards the building. This is when I turned back to look at the man who had scurried back across the alleyway to his fence, scrambling to open the latch while shoving something into his pocket and cursing under his breath, shooting daggers at the cafe man. When we made it back into the parking lot adjacent to our building, he stopped and he said, I was on my way to the bins when I noticed the man coming toward you. I hoped asking about your cart and being near you

would deter him from whatever he was thinking of doing. Now you be safe and bring a partner every time you're down here or you can come grab me if no one else can. We said our goodbyes and I thanked him profusely. I never went down alone again after telling my co-workers what had happened. To the young men in the cafe at the time, your small talk seemed meaningless in force, but it very well could have been the reason I'm still alive to thank you for being my hero and saving me from a possible life-threatening attack.

I am forever grateful. So this happened about two years ago when I was 20. I'm quite a small female. I was doing some shopping in town alone. I still remember that it was a warm Sunday afternoon. People were out with families and it was quite busy in the city center. I had some free time so I decided on paying my grandma a visit. To get to her place you need to take a 20 minute bus ride from where I was. I was waiting for my bus and I noticed this man staring at me. He wasn't much older than I was and I still remember he had on a bright yellow hat. I usually don't really care when someone looks at me but this man was staring at me with a sort of anger like I had done something to him. Most people in the bus stop were either facing the traffic or looking at the coming buses but not him. He had his back to the traffic and was just staring at me. I had a weird feeling about him, but I saw my bus coming and just hoped he wouldn't get on it.

Except he did. I quickly sat in the window seat and luckily for me, this old lady sat next to me. This old lady was like a shield between me and this guy. He stood next to our seat almost the whole ride except for pacing around oddly a couple of times. I was already quite freaked out and was texting my at the time boyfriend throughout it. While he hadn't actually done anything to me, I just had a really bad gut feeling. A few stops before mine the old lady sadly got off the bus. The guy's behavior became even weirder. He sat next to me which made me completely tense up. I refused to

even look at my phone or text anyone in case he saw something he could use to look me up later. I think he sensed me tensing up so he got up and went back to either standing next to my seat or pacing around the bus. My stop came and I waited until the last moment to get off the bus. Sadly he also managed to get off the bus. What followed confirmed that he was indeed after me. I guess in an attempt to put me off again, he ran ahead of me on the road and kept glancing back. Him doing so actually gave me the only out from the situation. You see, if he would have kept walking behind me, I would have been forced forced to a either make a run for the apartment

door and hope I was fast enough to close the door before him or b run in another direction and just hope I would have reached any place safe before him. I was out of the city center now and there weren't many people around either to help me so in that split moment I decided to turn around walk in the other direction and dial my mom. It's pretty bad but I decided to turn around, walk in the other direction and dial my mom. It's pretty bad, but I decided to call my mom in case anything happens to me so she would know who it was. I told my mom what happened and she told me to make a run for it.

Down the road there was a small burger place that would have a security guard. She told me to run for it and just tell them what was going on, so I did. I glanced back and saw the guy running after me, which almost made me cry. Luckily, I reached the burger place before he caught me. From the window, I saw him crossing the road. I guess him seeing me get into the burger place threw him off. I have no idea why he was so fixated on me or what his plans were if he caught me. I'm not even sure. I want to know. On the 9th of November 1961, in the sleepy seaside town of Weston-Super-Mare, a woman named Winifred went into labor. Her husband Jack rushed to Ashcombe House Maternity Home and was at his wife's side as she gave birth to their one and only daughter.

They would name her Jill Wendy Dando Jill's early years were an uphill struggle when she was just three years old it was discovered that she had a blocked pulmonary artery as well as a hole in her tiny heart the pulmonary artery carries deoxygenated blood from the right side of the heart to the lungs where it will be loaded up with oxygen again before circulating the body. Unless the blockage was cleared, the infant Jill's lungs would be unable to form even the most basic of functions. Her young life was in grave danger, but thanks to the budding national health service, the infant Jill was taken care of. Doctors from all over the former

British Empire took part in the delicate operation to set up and unblock her tiny, still beating heart. The operation was a complete success and Jill grew up to be a healthy, happy girl. After her comprehensive education, Jill went on to study journalism at the South Glamorgan Institute of Higher Education in nearby Cardiff, Wales. It was there she would be filled with a passion for dramatics and media, taking part in local amateur dramatics and theater companies and even volunteering for Sunshine Hospital Radio, a non-profit organization that wished to bring a little ray of sunshine into the lives of sick and injured patients.

It appears that Jill never, ever forgot the debt she owed to her nation's medical professionals. Journalism was something of a family business for the Dandos. Jill's father and brother worked for the local weekly newspaper, the Weston Mercury, and this is where Jill found her first paid reporter's job. For five whole years she worked as a print journalist for the Mercury, covering the community events and helping to promote local and regional business. But Jill always knew she was destined for the big time. So in 1985, when the call came from the British Broadcasting Corporation that they were looking for a newsreader for BBC Radio Devon,

Jill jumped at the chance, beat out her male competitors and secured her place in the next highest rung on the media ladder. Her meteoric rise was simply unstoppable. Dando was fresh-faced, enthusiastic, intelligent and beautiful. She exuded the girl-next-door type of vibe that her listeners found endearing and informative. She was media dynamite, so naturally it didn't take long for her to transition from local radio to local television and then on to national television. The bright-eyed young blonde from Somerset packed her bags and made the journey from her small, humble seaside home to the big lights of London. She had finally made it. After brief stints on breakfast TV and nightly news programs, Jill managed to land a more casual, more personal role as the presenter

of the holiday program. It was this job that gained Dando most of her fame and public affection. Each week, viewers would tune in and join Jill on whichever sun-soaked adventure she was on. Island-hopping in the crisp blue Aegean Sea, hiking in the baking Spanish Sierras, or feasting on all the culinary delights that Italy had to offer, the British public lived almost vicariously through the woman they felt as if they knew personally. So much of Dando's politeness, her lust for life, her Britishness shone through in

ways that had the British people falling head over heels for her. She was a devout Baptist, and her wholesomeness earned her guests presenting spots on BBC's Songs of Praise, a religious program that presents Christian hymns sung in churches of varying denominations from around the UK. But it was in 1995 that Dando landed the role that would, without a doubt, have the biggest effect on her life. Ten years prior, BBC directors were racking their brains for new ideas on new fresh entertainment. A new German TV show called Ochtenzeichen XY Ungelost was taking the continental airwaves by storm. On the show, law enforcement officials as well as media personalities would appeal to the general

public for information on unsolved crimes. This actually helped to put a few dangerous German fugitives behind bars, and this was celebrated on the show with presenters thanking the public for their assistance. It was a national phenomena, and soon plans were in the show with presenters thanking the public for their assistance. It was a national phenomenon, and soon plans were in the works for a British version of the show that would simply be called Crime Watch UK. So when a female presenter's position opened up on the show, Dando once again found herself on primetime television. The wholesome girl next door, who was already adored by the public, was now a symbol of hope and justice to the criminally victimized. Before she was adored, but now she was the nation's darling, perhaps the biggest female televisual persona in British

history. She had seemingly fulfilled her lifelong destiny, but tragedy was right around the corner. On the morning of April 26th, 1999, the then 37-year-old Jill Dando left her partner's home in Chiswick, West London, and traveled home by far to her house in Fulham, just over three miles away. It is important to note that Dando did not visit this Fulham home often. She was in the process of selling the home to move in with her partner, Alan Farthing, and he was generally only present at the address to pick up odd personal items and to meet the estate agents. As Jill reached the front door of the house at around 11.32am, a single shot rang out around the neighborhood. Jill collapsed to the floor as blood pooled beneath her, her life draining away. Less than 15 minutes later, a neighbor by the name of Helen Doble was walking along the street when she saw the fallen Dando

lying in a substantial puddle of her own blood. In records of the 999 call that Dobble made to the police, her voice can be heard breaking up. Quivering, the realization hits her that the nation's darling had been murdered on her doorstep of her own home. Dobble describes the huge amount of blood at the scene, responding to the dispatcher's questions about vital signs with I don't think she's breathing anymore, oh god, her lips are blue, I think she's dead. Police and ambulance crews arrived on scene just before noon, but it was too late. Danda was declared dead on arrival at 1.03pm when her body arrived at Charing Cross Hospital. The nation went into mourning there was

intense media coverage of the murder the people were outraged furious that such a heartless act could have been perpetrated against someone who had only ever worked for the public's good it was barely 24 hours before details of the murder began to emerge and just weeks later jill's murder was reconstructed on her own show, Crime Watch, in the hope that the public could help bring her killer to justice. In a special edition of the TV show, the results of the Metropolitan Police Forensic Study was shared with viewers. Dando had been shot by a single bullet from a 9mm pistol, pressed right up against her temple

the moment the weapon was fired. Richard Hughes, another one of her next door neighbors, heard Dando exclaim something, a surprised cry like someone greeting a friend, but did not hear the shot fired. He claimed he looked out of his front window and saw a tall Caucasian man aged around 40 rapidly walking down from Dando's house. Investigative journalist Bob Wolfenden reported the following. As Dando was about to put her keys in the lock to open the front door of her home in Fulham, she was grabbed from behind. With his right arm, the assailant held her and forced her to the ground

so that her face was almost touching the tiled step of the porch. Then, with his left hand, he fired a single shot at her temple, killing her instantly. The bullet entered her head just above her ear, parallel to the ground, and came out the right side of her head. The details of the case were harrowing, and the British public angrily demanded justice, but the subsequent investigation came up against a few problems. Firstly, Dando was a well-known television personality who was known to millions upon millions of people. Naturally, there was a great deal of speculation regarding the motives for her murder, which led to literally thousands of people being interviewed by police with

over a thousand lengthy written statements taken from the interviewees. Initially, theories surfaced that a jealous lover or ex-partner had murdered Dando, but interviews with friends and family, as well as phone records investigated by police, quickly ruled this out. Some investigators even suggested that this could have been a case of mistaken identity, but the fact that the murder occurred on the doorstep of her home eliminated this as a possibility. It was even thought that a business rival or an ex-colleague with a grudge could be to blame. This line of inquiry was not so easily dismissed by investigators, given Dando's exceptionally successful career.

When her former agent John Roseman was questioned by the police he was horrified to learn that he was being interviewed under caution. Effectively he'd found himself as a suspect of his former client's murder. However much to his relief nothing suspicious was found and he was never again part of the investigation. The most likely theory that the Metropolitan Police entertained was that the murder was committed by an obsessive or mentally deranged fan of Dando's. Jill was known to politely decline any invitations of marriage from male admirers. It could be the case that one had taken her well-mannered rejection just a little too hard. This idea was only cemented when Jill's brother and fellow journalist, Nigel, had informed police

investigators that she had become increasingly concerned by some guy who was pestering her in the final few days before her murder. When Nigel's claim was investigated by detectives, they made a horrifying discovery. A short walk away from Jill Dando's Fulham home, less than half a mile away from the place she was murdered, lived a man named Barry George. Barry George was a highly disturbed individual, often giving false names to those he met. In 1980, he was convicted and fined for impersonating a policeman, having obtained false identification after a failed attempt to join the force for real. At his court appearance, George eschewed the usual suit and tie in favor of glam rock attire

and falsely stated his name as Paul Gad, the real name of convicted child deviant Gary Glitter. Around the same time, he was exposed by a local newspaper when he claimed to be the winner of the British Karate Championship, his tale unraveling when the real champion soon stepped forward to expose him as a charlatan. These were all fairly light-hearted offenses, but they preceded darker crimes that would expose Barry George as the vile psychopath he is. In 1981, after adopting the persona of a special forces operative, George was charged with two counts of indecent assault. He was found not guilty of one charge but a conviction for the other assault resulted in a suspended prison sentence of three months. Two years later, Barry George once again found himself before a judge, this time for attempting to force himself upon a woman in Acton, West London.

He was found guilty and served just half of a 33-month prison sentence, but these were not isolated incidents. His 1989 marriage to a Japanese student by the name of Itsuko Toida ended less than a year after it began. Toida went on to describe her ex-husband as terrifying and violent, a man with a fractured personal identity who could fly into a rage at any perceived slight. She also confessed he has assaulted her on numerous occasions just months into their new marriage. It is Barry George's lengthy criminal history that led him to become the subject of such intense police investigation. He was soon put under surveillance after details of his previous offenses emerged. When it became apparent that George was trying to lie low, only leaving his residence at night

and displaying paranoid behavior, police swept in for the arrest. During his trial, the prosecution leveled four serious accusations against George. Firstly, police had noticed some glaring inconsistencies in George's statement and accused him of lying to cover his involvement. It was also alleged that George has attempted to create a false alibi. Police also brought out a witness that claimed to have seen Barry George hastily leaving the area. Finally, the prosecution brought up the fact that a single particle of firearm discharge residue had been found on an item of George's clothing a full year after the murder. This proved that George was knowledgeable of firearms and had access to firearms.

On July 2nd, 2001, at the Old Bailey in London, a jury of his peers convicted buried George guilty of the murder of Jill Dando by ten votes to one before a judge sentenced him to life imprisonment. But the story doesn't end here. Concern regarding George's conviction was widespread, with many arguing that the case against him was purely circumstantial. Evidence from three people placed Barry George's arrival at their disability offices at around noon on the day of the murder, which would have made it impossible for him to have shot Jill Dando outside of her house at 11.30 and then gone home to change before his appointment at the disability office. What's more, two neighbors who almost certainly saw the murderer immediately after the shooting had taken place had failed to properly identify Barry George at

subsequent identity parades. Two appeals were unsuccessful, but after discredited forensics evidence was excluded from the prosecution's case, George's third appeal succeeded in November of 2007. The original conviction was quashed and a second trial lasting eight weeks ended in George's acquittal on the 1st of August 2008. Barry George was officially cleared of Jill Dando's murder. But if such a violent, deranged fantasist didn't kill her, just exactly who did? The police had rolled out theories of a contract killing by the time that they had begun to investigate Barry George. Forensic examination of the shell casing and bullet recovered from

the murder scene suggested that the killer's pistol had been a replica or decommissioned gun, the result of a workshop conversion that had turned a harmless imitation into a real working firearm. It was initially argued that a professional hitman would never use such an unreliable weapon of such poor quality. This led to police focusing on the idea that the murder had been committed by a crazed opportunist who was working alone, which naturally pointed them towards Barry George. But in the years following Barry George's release, additional details on the murder weapon have emerged. For example, it only recently came to the public's attention that the single bullet fired by Dando's murderer

had also been tampered with. Someone had separated the round from its casing, removed a considerable amount of the gunpowder propellant before reassembling the bullet itself. This means that although the lack of propellant would make for a much less lethal round when it was fired, it would be much quieter than a regular bullet. This would enable the murderer to kill Dando on her own doorstep in broad daylight without any potential witnesses hearing the shot. And that is exactly what happened, as mentioned previously when a neighbor of Dando's heard her surprised cry but heard no shots fired. So how exactly, in light of such disturbing, revealing information, are police so sure that it wasn't a hitman? In fact, I'd go so far as to say that such

information would indicate that it was exactly the work of a professional contract killer, one with an expert knowledge of ballistics and tradecraft that would commit such a brazen act without one single credible witness. But who exactly would have the resources and motive to hire or deploy their own assassin? In the mid-90s, the paramilitary rebel group Kosovo Liberation Army began to stage attacks against Serbian security services they claimed were occupying their homeland. This resulted in retaliatory attacks from Serbian armed forces who sought vengeance against the ragtag band of rebels. They targeted KLA sympathizers,

but also used the attacks as an excuse to jail and murder political opponents to serve dominance in the area. By the end of 1998, over 2,000 civilians and KLA fighters had been killed. Europe was aflame with outrage. All of NATO's attempts to find a diplomatic solution to the conflict failed miserably. Eventually, it was deemed that there were no other options besides direct military intervention. The aerial bombardment of Yugoslavia was about to begin. A coalition of 13 nations led by the United States and Great Britain began to bomb bridges, industrial plants, and Serbian military targets in what became known as

Operation Merciful Angel, the aim being to break the back of the Serbian armed forces and reduce their ability to wage war in the region. On the evening of April 6, 1999, an allegiance of 12 British charities, including Oxfam and the Red Cross, launched a televised appeal for the victims of the Serbian aggression. Within an hour of the programs arising, thousands upon thousands of callers jammed telephones, donation hotlines, donating hundreds of thousands of pounds to the cause. The face of that campaign was none other than Jill Dando. In her typically warm, humble manner, Jill appealed to the British public to help stop the biggest humanitarian disaster in Europe since World War II. She tugged on the heartstrings of the nation, describing how just short of a million ethnic Albanians had been forced from their homes by heartless, hateful Serbs. The British public gave generously. Almost three weeks later, on the 24th of April,

Allied warplanes were targeting communications infrastructure in the Serbian capital, Belgrade. The headquarters of the premier Serbian TV network, RTS, was listed as a military target, and 16 of their staff were killed when a single NATO missile struck the building. Many of the victims were trapped under rubble for days, only able to communicate using mobile phones. NATO command attempted to justify the bombing on two levels. Firstly, that it was essentially to destroy and degrade the command and control capabilities of the Serbian armed forces. Secondly, it was argued that the RTS headquarters was making a crucial contribution to the Serbian war effort by pumping out propaganda that fanned the flames of conflict against ethnic minority groups. But the Serbs took

the attack personally. One of the RTS staff members killed in the airstrike was a female presenter who was well known and well liked by the general Serb populace. One could even argue that allied airstrikes killed Serbia's equivalent to Jill Dando, and as you can imagine, that caused a fair amount of outrage. So is it credible that Jill Dando was murdered at the command of Serbian military or political leaders? It can be argued that the origin of such theories stem from a viewer of the televised charity appeal, who wrote into the BBC to complain that the program had been exceptionally biased against the Serbs.

After all, there was absolutely no mention that the violence was instigated by the Kosovan Liberation Army, and not the Serbs themselves, who had the right to defend themselves. The days after Miss Danda was killed, it emerged that Tony Hall, then the BBC's head of news, now the corporation's director general, had been phoned by a man with an East European accent saying, Your Prime Minister Blair butchered innocent young people. We butcher back. Barry George's own defence barrister, Michael Mansfield, was adamant that the Servbian warlord, known as Arkan, had ordered Dando

assassinated in revenge for the bombing of the RTS headquarters. That her involvement in the appeal, the fact she was the public face of the campaign, made her a legitimate target in the eyes of angry Serbs. Shelko Arkan Rashnotovich was something of a cross between a military commander and career criminal. Despite the fact that he commanded the Serb volunteer guard, who he nicknamed the Tigers, he had made his name on Interpol's most wanted list for a number of robberies and murders he had committed throughout Europe. He had robbed banks in Sweden and Holland, had shootouts with police in Germany, and even escaped custody in Belgium as part of a daring prison break. There is no doubt that Arkan was nothing short of a criminal mastermind,

and certainly had an extensive network of fellow crooks in almost every country around mainland Europe. It is not out of the question that he had the contacts and resources to have Jill Dando murdered, but it is not just Arkan who had such a shady past. The entire country of Yugoslavia, of which Serbia was a part of, had engaged in murky dealings. The country's former communist government had a history of targeted assassinations of its political opponents. These killings were generally carried out by hitmen working in pairs, a trigger man and a spotter, and were intricately planned. They had to be since most of these assassinations took place as the target was either entering or leaving their own home. This was when the target was most vulnerable. It also reduced the chances of the target's identity being mistaken and the

wrong person being killed. In fact, a Serbian opposition journalist was murdered outside of his own home just days before Jill Dando's death in an attack that was almost identical to the one she died in. Law enforcement would call such an attack a hard contact execution. Pressing the gun against the target's head before the shot is fired acts almost as a suppressor, not to mention the reduced noise from the tampered bullet. This act of close contact would also prevent the killer's clothing from being splattered with gore. UK Member of Parliament Patrick Mercer, who served with the British Army in Bosnia, would later state that Dando's murder had all the hallmarks of covert forces.

He specifically cited the tailored ammunition used in the killing, explaining that it was Serbian trademark, something he had seen many, many times while he was serving in the region. It would have been possible to arrest and question Arkin to delve deeper into his potential involvement in Dando's murder, if it wasn't for his own assassination that occurred just over six months after she was killed. An off-duty police officer with ties to the Servian mafia executed Arkan in the lobby of the Belgrade Intercontinental Hotel. It appears that although the Servian connection may never be fully explored, there is plenty of credible evidence to suggest their

involvement, yet it is not the only potential explanation for Dando's murder, and the other is arguably even darker and considerably more sinister. When the contract killing theory was dismissed by police in the initial aftermath of Jill Dando's murder, the Servian connection was not the only idea that was cast aside. The other was that a contract killer had been hired by a criminal gang or some similar underworld organization. She was, after all, the feminine face of the show Crime Watch UK for a good chunk of her career, and doubtlessly contributed to putting countless criminals behind bars. Of course, it is possible that she was

targeted for this reason, but it is unlikely. She was not the only host of the program, and she only joined as a presenter after the previous female host departed the Crimewatch team for Pastures New. Silencing Dando would certainly not stop the show from airing, and as I mentioned earlier, Crimewatch even ran a special edition of the show which reconstructed the events of Dando's murder and urged members of the public to come forward with information. If her murder was an attempt to pull Crimewatch off the airwaves, it certainly failed. It also seems like an extremely harsh form of retribution to have a woman killed simply because she facilitated the capture of criminals. Crime Watch gleaned all of the information on its suspects directly from the

police themselves. It's not like Dando had any exclusive information regarding any high-profile crimes, or so it seems. For in 2014, a close friend and former BBC colleague of Dando's went public with some pretty explosive information. Although they insisted on remaining anonymous with their claims, the source told that Dando had been approached with evidence that DJs, celebrities, and other BBC staff were involved in an organized ring trafficking children. Dando apparently took the allegations extremely seriously but was stunned when according to the anonymous source no one wanted to know of the concern she raised about the allegedly high

profile human trafficking ring. She is said to have compiled a file of evidence that she passed on to BBC senior management but nothing came of it. No investigation into the apparent abuse was undertaken. The same anonymous source stated that although she did not want to implicate anyone and risk her own safety, she recalled that there were some shockingly famous names and faces included in the accusations. She also related that information regarding how to join said network was freely available and how Jill had received a number of complaints from female colleagues who also claim to have been assaulted. But nothing was done. Their complaints weren't addressed. There seemed to be an unspoken policy

of turning a blind eye and we may know the reason for such a policy. Jimmy Savile. James Vincent Savile, an English DJ, radio and TV host who headed BBC shows including Top of the Pops and Jim Will Fix It. He was a prolific fundraiser for charitable institutions and raised approximately 40 million pounds for the needy during his lifetime. But he was prolific in other ways too. Upon his death in 2011, hundreds upon hundreds of women came out of the woodwork to accuse Savile of serious abuse. Subsequent investigations led police to conclude that Savile had perhaps been the most active and predatory offender in British history, all under the guise of a kindly, albeit eccentric, philanthropist. But Savile could never have conducted such rampant abuses if not for the

complicity or apathy of the government and charitable institutions he associated himself with. By late October 2012, the scandal had resulted in inquiries or reviews at the BBC, the National Health Service, the Crown Prosecution Service and the Department of Health. All of which tried to work out just how Savile was able to remain undetected or rather how the children he abused came to be marginalized and ignored. But a minor inspection of Savile's credentials showed that he was a very well-connected man indeed. He was made a knight bachelor by the British royal family, granted a papal knighthood by Pope John Paul II, and even gifted a cross of merit by the sovereign military order of Malta.

There is absolutely no doubt that Savile used such influence to cover up the crimes that he and his companions committed. By 2012, when the extent of Savile's abuse had been revealed to the public, Jill's fellow BBC presenter and possible identity of the aforementioned anonymous source, Sally Jones, revealed that Savile had tried to kiss and inappropriately touch her in a chance elevator encounter in the late 80s. When she had related the story to Jill, she was surprised to find that Jill held the opinion that the venerated DJ was nothing more than a dirty old pervert. Where others turned a blind eye or covered up Savile's crimes, it appears that Jill had no qualms calling him out for what he really was.

Sally Jones even related that Jill Dando herself had to fend off plenty of unwelcome advances. DJ Liz Kershaw and former country file presenter Miriam O'Reilly have also both claimed they suffered harassment at the BBC in the 1980s. Could this have been at the hands of Jimmy Savile? Regardless, when Miss Dando joined a campaign to help children spot these type of predators the year before she died She had received death threats, putting the BBC in lockdown With armed guards patrolling television centre in London to protect one of their most valuable assets Could Dando have been silenced by a group of covert abusers led by Savile himself? It would seem to account for the wall of silence that remained until Savile's death in 2011.

One woman's life would be a small price to pay for the continual cover-up of six decades of abuse. Savile himself once said that he believed he would be able to square things away with the big man upon his death, alluding to the idea that the weight of his good deeds would balance the scales. This is commonly believed to be a reference to the predatory behavior he himself knew was evil, but it could allude to other crimes too. Crimes such as the suspicious death of Liz McKeon. Liz McKeon, the former British investigative reporter who exposed Jimmy Savile in the culture of abuse protection at the BBC, was just 52 when she was

found dead. The BBC, who blocked her groundbreaking investigation from airing and spent the next few years attempting to destroy her reputation, reported that she died of complications from a stroke. Liz McKeon was the second high profile BBC journalist to die in suspicious circumstances after attempting to expose the truth about this ring operating in the upper reaches of the establishment. Dando was the first. On May 21st 1999 at Ebden Road Cemetery just five miles from where she was born jill dando was laid to rest next to her late mother who died of leukemia just 13 years earlier friends and colleagues spoke of her selfless nature and warm demeanor laughs were shared tears were shed as a dear friend

a beloved sister was bid farewell b royal correspondent Jeannie bond read from lyrics written by Christina Rossetti in 1848 I shall not see the shadows I shall not feel the rain I shall not hear the nightingale sing on as if in pain and dreaming through the twilight that doth not rise nor set happily I may remember and happily may forget her co-presenter on crime watch UK Nick Ross told the story of how Dando would take off her high heels for the final shot of the show so that each presenter would appear equal in height and thus none more important than the other it was little things such as this that made Dando so lovable. She'd never stop

thinking of others. Nick Ross would go on to propose the founding of an academic institute in Jill's name, raising over a million pounds for the Jill Dando Institute of Crime Science at University College London. The BBC also set up a bursary award in Dando's memory, funding one student each year to study broadcast journalism at University College Falmouth. The impact of Dando's life and legacy are evident. Even 20 years after her death, she is remembered fondly by the public television ground force team in Dando's memory, using plants and colors that were special to her, is located within Grove Park, Weston-Super-Mare. The site is beautiful, a fitting tribute to her memory, but gazing upon such a serene, colorful, sunlit scene,

you realize it stands in stark contrast with the manner in which she died, in an ugly, convoluted, mysterious way, the reasons for which remain firmly in the dark. For those that loved her, those that worked with her, and those with a general interest in unsolved mysteries, one question still remains unanswered, clawing at the minds of the curious. Just who exactly killed Jill Dando? I'm going to go. A wobbler peel, your tread's worn down or you need a new wheel. Wherever you go, you can get it from our tread experts. Toyo's open country family of tires will get you through tough weather in a variety of terrains. Until May 31st, save up to $100 in rebates on select Toyo tires. Find a Toyo tread experts dealer near you at treadexperts.ca slash locations.

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