The Tape Library - Archive of the Paranormal & the Unexplained - The True Story of The Amityville Horror

Episode Date: November 23, 2022

In this episode we're going to be looking into the terrifying true story that inspired The Amityville Horror. We're going to go over the true crime story of the Defeo murders, looking at the 28 day stay of The Lutz family and the haunting they claim to have experienced. Before moving into the investigations by Ed & Lorraine Warren. Then finally we'll be talking about the many controversies surrounding the case and try to work out what actually happened in the Amityville house. This is the story of one of the most famous haunted houses of all time, a tale of real life paranormal encounters, murder and mystery. 00:00 Intro 01:30 Chapter 1: The Massacre 09:00 Chapter 2: The Haunting 17:11 Chapter 3: The Investigation 22:37 Chapter 4: The Controversy Do you have a supernatural story to share?   You can check out The Tape Library in video form here - www.youtube.com/thetapelibrary Stock footage and additional audio courtesy of Envato Tiktok - https://www.tiktok.com/@thetapelibrary Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/thetapelibrary Archive of the Paranormal, the strange and the unexplained. The Tape Library brings you the creepiest stories, to keep you horror junkies up all night. True scary stories of ghosts, cryptids, UFOs and true crime. Interview with Ed & Lorrain Warren about Amityville - https://youtu.be/QsX9HMzWg_E The Real Amityville Horror Documentary - https://youtu.be/fZAm8yOS0LM That's Incredible - https://youtu.be/6bFmW7tSmmY Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The first shot rang around the house, around 3am on Wednesday, November the 13th, 1974. There were seven people in the house, six of whom were tucked up in their beds, cozy, warm, and safe. For me, the most chilling aspect of the entire story that we're covering tonight is this very moment. A Marlin rifle is fired, and accept. exceptionally loud gun nine times over the next 15 minutes.

No neighbors hear a thing on this quiet, early winter night. But more disturbingly, neither did anyone in this house. Six people were shot. If the official story is to be believed, not one of them got up. They laid in their beds and one by one waited for death to visit them. This bizarre act of brutal violence would lead to one of the most infamous real-life horror stories of all time. Tonight we're going deep into the true story of the Amityville Horror. I know the Amityville story has been done to death, but I just couldn't resist revisiting it.

For myself, and I'm sure many of you out there, Amateurville is the haunted house story. It's the first incident of a haunted house I remember reading about when I was a child. and was likely one of the first supernatural stories I'd really come across. I remember catching parts of one of the awful later films on TV and it terrifying me. I remember how even friends and family members, who had no interest in this kind of thing, knew what you meant when you said Amityville. It's more ingrained in popular culture than almost any example of the paranormal I can think of. We're going to be splitting this story into four parts.

the horrific murder of the Defeo family as they slept in their beds in the resulting trial. In part two, we'll go over the infamous 28-day stay of the house's new owners. Then we'll take a look at the investigations into the reported paranormal encounters before finally talking about the controversies of the entire case and try to pin down what actually happened in its now iconic house. So let's go back to that night in a number. November 1974. We're going to go with the official events of what happened that night, but rest assured we

will be talking about the many different accounts. Ronnie Defeo Jr., or Butch as he was known, was the oldest of five children. To say he was a troubled young man was an understatement, and it speaks volumes that after the story of what happened came out, no one in the community was seemingly surprised. His family lived at 112 Ocean Avenue, Amateurville, a beautiful waterside village on the south shore of Long Island. It appears that at around 3 a.m. in the morning, Ronnie Jr. walked into his parents' bedroom and then shot both his father, Ronnie DeFeyo Sr., age 43, and his mother, Louise DeFeyo, 42, firing at them both twice. before then heading to the bedrooms of his siblings. His brothers John and Mark, aged 9 and 10 respectively.

His younger sister Alison, 13. Before finally heading up to the top of the house and entering his sister Dawn's room, aged 18. All the bodies were found, faced down in their beds, as though they hadn't moved an inch as Ronnie walked around the house. executing his family, one by one. No neighbours reported any kind of disturbance,

although one declaimed to have heard at the Fayo's pet dog barking around the time of the murders. But they did not hear a single gunshot. It's reported that both Alison and Louise appear to have at least woken up before they died. However, the official evidence suggests that none of the bodies were moved post-mortem. despite the appearance that they have been placed in their beds, almost deliberately. 6.30pm that evening, Ronnie Defeo Jr. runs into Henry's bar, just a block away from his family home and starts shouting that his parents have been shot. He gathers a group of guys and they head to the house to discover the grisly scene. It didn't take long for the police to arrive and they moved Ronnie Jr.

away for both his safety and to ask him questions. This is when the stories began, and Ronnie Jr. had a lot of stories. He told the police that the killings had been carried out by a mob hitman. Connections between the mob and the family had long been the talk of rumors in the community. Ronnie Jr. said an old associate of his father's, by the name of Louis Felini, was behind the killings and had threatened to murder his father after a falling out. some years earlier. Ronnie Jr. claimed he hadn't been there for dinner earlier that evening, as he was sick of his mother's poor cooking, a detail that didn't really hold much water. Once it became evident, the family had been killed some 14 hours earlier.

After 12 hours of interrogation, it all came spilling out of Ronnie Jr. He spoke about his hatred for his family, how Ronnie Sr. had abused him for years, how he hated his family. He referred to his younger brothers as pigs. The previous night, while sat in his basement, watching the 1969 film Castle Keep, he decided he had had enough. He went to his parents' bedroom and shot them both in their sleep.

Seemingly, his intention had only been to kill his parents. But after that first act of violence, he couldn't stop himself. In a frenzy he stalked from room to room, executing each and every one of his family members. A fact that Ronnie Jr. has never been able to explain. No one was surprised by this turn of events. Ronnie Jr. had been threatening to murder his parents for years, even leading to a psychologist warning Ronnie's mother that they needed to have him committed before he finally acted. Ronnie Jr. had been the victim of his father.

victim of his father's abuse for years, and that combined with his heavy use of heroin, acid and speed took a severe toll on his mental health until one day he just decided that he couldn't take it anymore. Then the court case began, and as did Ronnie's many, many different versions of events. Ronnie Jr. seemingly decided he would try to persuade the court, he was insane and therefore not responsible for his actions. This could explain the conflicting and downright strange stories that Ronnie came up with. However, these conflicting stories continue to grow and spiral up until his death in 2021. Among his many claims over the years, he said they were sat in the basement watching TV

when he overheard his family plotting to kill him, and he decided to be. to murder them first. He also claimed his sister Dawn had in fact killed his father and that his mother had killed his siblings before he turned the gun on her. He claimed he drugged his family which would explain why they were all found in their beds in such a strange manner. However, there were no drugs found in their systems. He's claimed that his sister and a number of other assailants assisted him in the murders, he's claimed that He's claimed he heard voices that told him to kill them, and even that a female demon in a hood with black hands brought him the rifle to do the deed.

Ronnie's wild stories didn't help, though. A court psychiatrist diagnosed him with antisocial personality disorder, and he was sentenced to spend the rest of his life behind bars. Chapter 2. The Haunting Just two weeks had passed when a new family, arrived at 112 Ocean Avenue, ready to start a new life. George and Kathy Lutz looked up at their new home that they had just paid $88,000 for. They knew the history of the house and had spoken to their family about it, declaring themselves as not a superstitious bunch. The family couldn't turn down such a

beautiful home and at such a still and decided that the unfortunate history was worth it. They entered their home to discover it still full of the Defeo's belongings, all except for the mattresses that were missing from each bed. What followed are 28 days that would become one of the most infamous hauntings of all time. The information in this section is all taken from Jay Anson's best-selling novel about the Lutz's experience, as well as from interviews with George and Kathy. Much like the murders themselves, there are a lot of conflicting stories. what exactly happened here. But we'll get to that later.

A strange activity began almost immediately. In the first hour of being there, the Lutz's dog was chained up to a tree in the garden. For seemingly no reason, the dog suddenly decided to leap over the gate, his chains still attached to the tree, hanging itself over the fence by its neck as the family rushed to save it.

One of George's friends suggested that due to the history of the house, they should ask a Catholic priest to come and bless it. Thinking they had nothing to lose, George agreed. And shortly after they moved in, a priest came to clear the house of any residing spirits. They may be remaining there. The house unsettled the priest from the moment he laid eyes on it. But it was only once he entered the upstairs bedroom, the room where dawn had slept. that he was overcome with a true sense of dread. He asked the Lutz what they were planning to do with this room,

and they stated it was to become a sewing room. The priest declared that should be fine, but in his opinion, no one should ever sleep in this room. The incident with the priest suddenly became more extreme, when he felt what he claimed was a slap across the face before hearing a deep voice, telling him to get out. Later after getting home, it was reported that he was covered in sores and boils all over his hands.

Kathy claimed that early on she felt a presence embracing her from behind. She wasn't sure why, but she instinctively felt that it was a woman, and that the embrace was supposed to be comforting, rather than threatening. She often smelled the woman's perfume around the house. The Lutz's youngest daughter suddenly started talking to an imaginary friend called Jody. She claimed that Jody was a pig with glowing red eyes that would watch over her through her window as she slept. Jody told their daughter that they would always live there. Both George and Kathy claimed to have seen those red eyes peering through windows at night. In December, on a snowy

night. The family once again saw Jody's glowing red eyes, watching through the window as they watched TV. George ran outside to investigate and found hoof prints in the snow. George also discovered a hidden room that was not on any of the floor plans of the house. Hidden in the basement, the room was painted red, and they claimed it had a strong stench of human feces inside. One of the more subtle moments among the grander examples of haunting phenomena is one that I find most chilling. Over the weeks that the family stayed in the house, the children began to sleep on their stomachs, something they hadn't done before. All of this is strange, but it seems George was the focus of whatever was residing in the house. He started to become obsessed with fire, insisting that,

he needed to keep the fire burning in the living room. He would spend hours out back chopping wood, seemingly due to the fact that since he was in the house, he was constantly cold, something the rest of the family were not experiencing. George would hear sounds at night. It would range from footsteps to screams, and even loud music being played from multiple sources,

all at odds with each other. But he could never find the source, of any of these nocturnal noises. One night, he tripped over a lion ornament in the living room. And when he looked down at his leg, he saw what appeared to be bite marks. While Kathy may have felt a kind embrace, and their daughter was making friends, the house was having a dark effect on George. He became increasingly irritable and aggressive with his family.

his personal hygiene became considerably worse, and he began to wake up every night at 3.15 a.m. The same time the Defeo murders were said to have taken place. The activity grew more and more extreme as time went on. Their possessions would be covered in what appeared to be strange black mold. Green slime would ooze from the ceiling, dripping down to the carpet below. swarms of insects, most notably flies, would be in the room Dawn once slept in, but there seemed to be no way to get rid of them. Then the activity became more violent. Covered doors would be slammed. Doors broken off their hinges. The banister rail on the stairs was found ripped off. In one incident, an open window suddenly slammed shut,

trapping one of the children's fingers in it. It came to a half. ahead a little after a month of moving into the home. George woke up in the middle of the night once again, but this time he couldn't move. His bed shaking from side to side, as if it was being lifted over and over by some unseen force. He then saw Kathy levitating across the bed. Her face switch into that of an old woman before his very eyes. What happened after that is unknown. The Lutz family always refused to talk about what happened that final night in the house. A secret that both George and Kathy took to their grave. Since this is one of the most well-documented paranormal cases of all time, it really makes you wonder what happened. It was so bad they could

never bring themselves to talk about it. Whatever happened the family left the next morning. leaving their belongings behind and never returning. Before we jump into the investigation, I noticed something odd. Although I knew the story of the amateur horror, it'd been a long time since I'd read the details. I started writing this video on the 13th of November, just a fun coincidence that I didn't notice when I sat down to create the video. However, to add to it, the same night I started writing this episode, The app I used to track my sleep

claims I was awake Around 3.15 a.m. for 20 minutes I have no memory of this. Chapter 3 The Investigation Two months later The Lott's story was beginning to get a lot of attention A reporter decided to pull together

a team of psychic researchers and spend the night in the home And it just so happened They were able to get Two of the most notable paranormal investigators of all times. Ed and Lorraine Warren, a controversial pair that we have covered on the tape library in the past. George Lutz met with the warrants to give him the keys to the house, but he refused to go any closer than a restaurant four blocks away. Ed tried to ask George more about what happened there.

But George refused to talk, Ed suggesting that he appeared to still be too shaken to want to talk about it, especially what had happened on the final night. The investigators were all shocked by what they saw when they entered the house. It felt like a ghost ship. All of the lots of belongings were still there. Dirty dishes sat in the sink. Their brand new boat sat in the boat house. George hadn't even come back for his custom motorcycles that were kept in the garage.

When entering the house, both of the Warren's claim they were hit with overwhelming sensations. In an interview of the pair, Ed makes it very clear that he is not clairvoyant, nor is he sensitive to the spirit world. However, he said the second he stepped inside the house, it reeked of death. The pair went in separate directions. Ed down to the basement, Lorraine upstairs to the bedrooms, both claimed to be hit with the strange sensation of powerful rushing water, falling on them.

In the basement, Ed encountered what he described as a powerful demonic force. While Lorraine saw in her mind's eye, the image of bodies all lined up on the floor of the sewing room. Supposedly the bodies of the Defeos, before the coroner took them away. The warrants have shared many photos from the investigation. One of them appears to show a number of religious statues in the back garden. Apparently these predate the Lutz is moving in. The statues all come from St Joseph's Shrine in Montreal. Ronnie DeFaio Sr. had travelled to Montreal, just six months before his murder.

But he didn't return alone. He came back with these statues, as well as a priest who was supposedly an exorcist. When asked why Ronnie had brought an exorcist to the house, he simply said, I've got a devil on my back. The Warrens weren't the only paranormal researchers and psychics that were brought to the house that night. All of those that partook and the investigations claimed to have experiences in the house, ranging from feelings of intense terror, heart palpitations, all the way up to communicating with spirits,

and even visions of an Indian chief. The group conducted a seance, during which Lorraine Warren proclaimed that there was an evil, in this house from the bowels of the earth. They claimed that this evil had been there, long before the murders. It's worth checking out interviews with the investigators if you want to hear further about the many experiences they had, but I really wanted to highlight what I think is, regardless of your beliefs, one of the creepiest events to take place during the entire Amityville saga. A number of cameras cameras were set up around the house that were placed on automatic timers. These cameras were sets they would take a photo every five minutes,

with various people walking about, and hours were for photos that seemed to show nothing in particular. Most of the photos were filed away, and not investigated much further. However, some years later, the young secretary was going through the Warren's Library of photos from the Amityville investigation. She was pregnant and said every time she got to one specific photo in the set, her baby would kick.

She looked at the photo. There's the same doorways at the top of the stairs she had already seen a dozen times. That was until she noticed something odd in the bottom corner. There, looking from the doorway, appeared to be a young boy. His eyes glowing, staring directly into the camp. Before we delve into the controversies around this case, and believe me, there are many. I just wanted to thank you for watching all the way through to the final part. If you've enjoyed this video, I have lots more on the way.

In the coming weeks, I'm going to be sharing some of the true paranormal encounters that people have shared with me, visiting a house that would give Amateurville a run for its money, and taking a deep dive into one of the greatest paranormal investigation shows of all time. So if you don't want to miss out, then please click on it. subscribe and turn on notifications so you never miss another entry into the tape library. Chapter 4 The Controversy The Haunting at Amityville has ignited my imagination as it has for many others for decades now. Everything about this story feels like it's ripped straight from a horror movie and as much as I want this whole thing to be true

There are a lot of inconsistencies that need to be addressed. First, let's take a look at the crime itself. In the story of his life, Ronnie Jr. is the very definition of an unreliable narrator. Picking holes in Ronnie's various accounts of the murders would be a video in and of itself, just because of the sheer number of different stories he has told over the years. A number of people have interviewed Ronnie, and a book on the murders was written in the early two years. 2000s that suggests Dawn was an integral part of the murders. In some versions of the story, she convinced Ronnie to do it.

In others, she carried up the murders herself. It's also been suggested that Ronnie committed the murders along with Dawn and two others. There was evidence found on Dawn's body that suggests she may have fired a gun that night. Ronnie claimed that the plan was just to kill their parents, but Dawn had gone crazy and started shooting. shooting the kids. Ronnie tried to get the gun off her, killed her by a mistake. On the night of his arrest, supposedly Ronnie's grandfather was overheard telling his grandson that he didn't want to hear any more about his sister and that he was going to take the blame for this. There have also been numerous rumours over the years that Dawn and Ronnie Jr.

were extremely close, and may have even had an incestuous relationship. To add to the version of events that seems to implicate Dawn Defeo, supposedly the family had been involved in something rather shady, leading up to the murders. A DEA agent had been placed outside their home to stake it out. The night of the murders, the DEA agent supposedly saw Dawn Defeo, walking out of the house carrying a rifle, wearing a hood and black gloves. much like the description of the demon that Ronnie claimed had handed in the gun. One criminologist suggested that it appears the bodies were in fact moved after their deaths,

be placed in the beds. However, this has never been confirmed, and the official ruling by the investigators in court was that the bodies were not moved. It's worth noting that despite these rumours and accusations, no one else has officially been implicated in the murders of the Defeo family. The official story is that Ronnie Defeo Jr. murdered his family as they slept in their beds. Then the hauntings and subsequent events. As I said, this story feels like it's been ripped from a horror film.

And many have suggested that maybe it has been. The Lot's story came out, not long after a little-known novel or movie came out. The Exorcist The Exorcist was a worldwide phenomenon. that brought the idea of the devil back into the public zeitgeist, battle between the good Catholic priests against the demonic entity that could move furniture, levitate people and spray green slime around, all very familiar concepts that are contained in the Lutz story. The priest who claimed he visited the Lutz home later made a statement under an affidavit that he never actually stepped foot into the property. and only spoke to George Lutz over the phone. This is completely at odds with every other account of the incident the priest gave.

The Lutz's neighbour had a large Persian cat that Ronnie DeFaio apparently referred to as piggy due to its size. It was prone to sitting in a tree next to 112 Ocean Avenue, its eyes reflecting light as it watched the inhabitants through the windows. the day they claimed they saw the hoof prints in the snow there was reportedly no snow in Amethfield on that day the new owners of the house after the luts point to the discrepancies in the weather

as evidence that the stories contained in the latter book the Amityville horror are fictional although Ed Warren suggests this might not be that much of a smoking gun now people said well there was no snow call for that night the weather bureau didn't call for snow The Weather Bureau is never wrong, are they? But did you ever see it snow on one side of the town and not on the other side? Yes, positively.

So they picked on little things like this. Little things, they grabbed it. Yes. Speaking of the new owners, they were adamant that there is nothing wrong with the house. A key point of this is that when they moved in, despite the Lutz's claims of doors being blown off the hinges, along with a whole host of other incidents of destruction,

they claimed that when they purchased the house, There was nothing to suggest anything had happened. This is the original banister in the book. It was supposed to have been torn out of its hinges and completely demolished or something. As you can see, it is the original banister. It's been here, like everything else, 50 years, and it's still in perfect condition. Quote, January 2nd. Holding his nose, George forced open the paneling and shown his flashlighter on the red-painted wall.

The stench of human excrement was heavy in the confined space. It formed a choking fog. My name is Patty Comerato. I was friends with Allison Defeo, a girl who was murdered with the rest of her family, here in 1974. This is how I'm going to show you his mysterious red room that's so noted for in the book. This store, which they say was never here, was here, is here, is here, I suppose. This is the red room.

Nothing more than a storage area where, area where Allison and her brothers and I used to keep toys. Just red, you know. There's never any feeling of spirit, presence, or ghosts or any sort of thing like that. It's just a play area. Used to keep toys. Nothing more than that. This is the door of our home. In the book, it became a 250-pound door, which was completely blown out of its frame and off its hinges. As you can see, original door, solid as a rock, immovable, and quite innocent. Once again, Ed Warren takes issues with the new owner's claims. In an interview, he states that visitors to the house since the Lutz left complained of horrific smells, and also that the new owner's parked car burst into flames

outside the house. The window that supposedly would slam shuttle by itself was apparently caused by a creaky floorboard, and a window with an incorrect counterweight. In a bizarre turn of events, Ronnie Defeo Jr's defense attorney, William Weber, became involved with the lotses after they left the house. He brought them the proposal of a book and movie deal for their story. In a long drunken conversation, Weber is said to have revealed elements of the crime they wouldn't have previously known that likely could have influenced their story. Jay Anson wrote the best-selling novel The Amityville Horror, which made him millions.

When asked if the story was true, he was always very reserved to give a definitive answer. However, Anson didn't get to enjoy his riches for long. Dying of complications of heart surgery in 1980. Heart-related conditions are a fate that appears to have befallen a number of people involved in the investigations, into the Amateurville hauntings. And that creepy photo of the boy with the glowing eyes? There are a couple of apparent explanations for this as well. Some suggested that is in fact one of the investigators who was in the house that night.

His glasses reflecting light to give off the impression of glowing eyes. Others had claimed that someone had brought their 10-year-old nephew to the house that night. Although the reporter who arranged the whole thing refutes this. and claimed that there were no children present. So where does that leave us with the Amityfield horror? Did George and Cathy Lutz make up the entire story to make money? It's worth noting that while they did make a decent amount out of the book and movie, it paled in comparison to what Jay Anson made.

George Lutz has said before that he wishes the book had stuck a little closer to the original story. Speaking of the original story, before it became the best-selling tale of demon pigs and blind priests that we all know today, the Lutz's story first appeared in an issue of good housekeeping, but as a substantially more reserved version of events, mostly centred around unexplained sounds and strange feelings in the house. Both George and Kathy took polygraph tests and passed them. While these are obviously not perfect, it does suggest that something did in fact happen to them in that house.

I'm also drawn back to Ed Warren's first description of George Lutz, how he didn't want to talk about what happened in the house, how the family refused to discuss what happened that made them leave the house in such a rush, how they left all of their belongings, rather than staying in that house second longer. Whatever happened to them in those 28 days, both George and Kathy kept to their story until the day they died. I don't believe, as so many others seem to now, that their entire story was made up.

I don't think anyone could have predicted the incredible success of the Amityville horror. And as far as quick-rich schemes go, faking a haunted house as a bit of a wild card. I think the Lutz family did encounter something in that house. What that something was, who will never know. I think they were encouraged by a number of out-house. outside sources, to exaggerate the story, to make it more marketable, to create something that could be scarier than the exorcist.

And with dollar signs in their eyes, they went for it. Maybe what they experienced was a simple trick of the mind, brought on by the fact that they were staying in the house where they knew six people had been brutally murdered just one year previous, maybe sleeping in the beds that one. once belonged to those victims, wasn't the smartest of choices. But maybe, just maybe, there was something, maybe it wasn't demons, maybe it wasn't some sort of all-powerful poltergeist that could rip doors off of hinges and assault priests, but maybe there was some sort of an echo. Maybe if you happened to move into a house where something so unbelievably evil happens, some of that grief

some of that pain some of that horror remains regardless of what you believe the one thing we know for sure is that we don't know what happened during that 12 months span in 112 Ocean Avenue

George and Kathy Lutz are dead and one year ago Ronnie Defeo Jr. passed away he never came clean about what happened in that house on November 13th, 1974. Or if he did, we would never know what parts were truth and what parts were lies. The mystery of the Defeo murders

died with Ronnie. Thank you for watching. When you were lying in bed tonight, if you happen to see two small glowing lights in the darkness of your window, just be comforted by the knowledge that it's just a cat. Or at least, it might just be a cat. Pleasant dreams.