The Midnight Train Podcast

The Illuminati. (Someone Just Wanted To Fly.)

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The Illuminati

 

So, you're standing amongst the council, being tried by a jury of a higher order. Your crime; Being the most dangerous person across the multiverse. You look shockingly at Mordo, Richards, and the other members of this definitive group of beings as you defend your alleged crimes, for you are facing the… Illuminati!

 

Or some shit like that.

 

We are exploring the super, double extra wannabe cult or the underground rulers of everything evil, depending on your take after today, the "Real Illuminati." At first, we’ll dive into what they SAY IS THE REAL STORY OF THE ILLUMINATI Wink Wink! (Be we all know the truth) and then we’re going to jump right in to what mainstream media (which is controlled by the illuminati) says are “conspiracies”. Strap on your tinfoil hats, Passengers! We’re going for a ride!!

 

The term "Illuminati" refers to several genuine and imagined organizations. However, the term historically refers to the Bavarian Illuminati, a secret society from the Age of Enlightenment that was established on May 1, 1776, in Bavaria, which is now a part of Germany and that has the most delicious cream donuts. The association aimed to combat abuses of governmental authority, superstition, obscurantism (intentionally providing information in a vague or complex way to prevent further investigation and understanding or, simply, spewing a bunch of word vomit to confuse people), and religious influence in public life. In its general laws, they stated that controlling the perpetrators without conquering them was the "rule of the day." 

 

Later, the term "Illuminati" was used to describe many groups that are said to represent a continuation of the original Bavarian Illuminati (even though these links have not been proven). To obtain political power and influence and create a "New World Order," these organizations have frequently been charged with plotting to manipulate events and install operatives inside of governments and companies. The Illuminati are portrayed as lurking in the shadows and manipulating the strings and levers of power. They play a crucial role in some of the most well-known and intricate conspiracy theories. This interpretation of the Illuminati has found its way into popular culture, appearing in various books, movies, T.V. episodes, comic books, video games, and music videos.

 

At the University of Ingolstadt, Adam Weishaupt (1748–1830) started teaching canon law and practical philosophy in 1773. (Canon Law, according to Wikipedia, is "how the Church organizes and governs herself." It is the system of laws and religious legal principles made and enforced by the hierarchical authorities of the Catholic Church to regulate its external organization and government and to order and direct the activities of Catholics toward the mission of the Church.) He taught in a school-sponsored by Jesuits, whose order Pope Clement XIV (14th) had suppressed in 1773, and was the only non-clerical professor there. The university's finances and some authority, which they continued to see as belonging to them, were still in the hands of the Ingolstadt Jesuits. When course content featured anything they deemed liberal or Protestant, they made constant attempts to frustrate and discredit non-clerical employees, especially in those instances. Weishaupt had a strong anti-clerical stance and decided to use a covert organization of like-minded people to propagate the Aufklärung (Enlightenment) beliefs. The word clerical in this sense means "referring to anything to do with the clergy — those ordained for religious work, usually in the Christian faith."

 

He said "screw it" and established his own society, which was to have a ranking or grading system modeled after Freemasonry, but with his own goals because he felt Freemasonry was too costly and not open to his ideas. Bund der Perfektibilisten, or Covenant of Perfectibility (Perfectibilists), was the new order's initial name and a horrible one, to boot. Still, it was later modified since it sounded like some pretentious bullshit. Weishaupt established the Perfectibilists on May 1, 1776, choosing the Owl of Minerva as their emblem. The Owl of Minerva is often called the "owl of Athena." It has been a symbol of knowledge and wisdom throughout the Western world.

The members were to use aliases within the society. Weishaupt became Spartacus. Law students Massenhausen, Bauhof, Merz, and Sutor, became Ajax, Agathon, Tiberius, and Erasmus Roterodamus. Logan would have been dubbed Hasentus Everseenamovieus, whereas I would have been known as Dopus Asfuckasus. Weishaupt later booted Sutor for being a lazy turd. 

 

In April 1778, the order became the Illuminatenorden, or Order of Illuminati, after Weishaupt seriously considered calling it the "Bee order." Massenhausen was the first to step up and be most engaged in advancing society. Significantly, he hired Xavier von Zwack, a former pupil of Weishaupt who was just beginning his distinguished administrative career while studying at Munich not long after the order started. He was the head of the Bavarian National Lottery at the time, where if you won, you got all the donuts. And, of course, that's not true, but it should be. 

Weishaupt quickly viewed Massenhausen's "go get em attitude" as a liability because it frequently led to attempts to hire the wrong people. Later, his unpredictable love life caused him to become careless. As Weishaupt turned over the leadership of the Munich group to Zwack, it was discovered that Massenhausen had stolen subscription money and read Weishaupt and Zwack's communications. After earning his degree in 1778, Massenhausen accepted a position outside Bavaria and lost interest in the order. The order had nominally twelve members at this point.

 

After Massenhausen left, Zwack put all his effort into finding more responsible and significant recruits. This included Hertel, a canon of the Munich Frauenkirche and a childhood friend of Weishaupt, who was considered a hell of a guy. By the end of the summer of 1778, the order had five territories: Munich (Athens), Ingolstadt (Eleusis), Ravensberg (Sparta), Freysingen (Thebes), and Eichstaedt, with a total of 27 members (including Massenhausen).

 

The order had three membership levels at the time—novice, minerval, and illuminated minerval—but only the minerval level required a problematic ceremony. In this, a password and code were supplied to the candidate. Weishaupt was kept informed on the actions and personalities of his members through a system of mutual espionage, with his favorites joining the Areopagus, the ruling council. Some newbies were allowed to join the army and become insinuates. Jews, pagans, women, monks, and members of other secret societies were told to fuck off, but upright Christians were what they wanted. Favored candidates were wealthy, submissive, eager to learn, and between 18 and 30.

 

After unsuccessfully trying to stop some of his followers from becoming Freemasons, Weishaupt decided to join them to gather resources for developing his own ritual. Early in February 1777, he was accepted into lodge "Prudence" of the Rite of Strict Observance. He learned nothing about the more advanced degrees of "blue lodge" masonry as he excelled through its three degrees. Still, the following year, a priest by the name of Abbé Marotti told Zwack that these deeper secrets depended on an understanding of the earlier religion and the primitive Church. Weishaupt was persuaded by Zwack that their own order should establish cordial ties with Freemasonry and acquire permission to develop their own lodge. At this stage (December 1778), adding the first three degrees of Freemasonry was considered a secondary project.

 

Quickly, a warrant was obtained from the Grand Lodge of Prussia called the Royal York for Friendship. The new lodge was named Theodore of the Good Council to flatter Charles Theodore, Elector of Bavaria. It was founded in Munich on March 21, 1779, and quickly packed with Illuminati. However, the first master, Radl, was persuaded to return home to Baden and ran the lodge by July, per Weishaupt's order.

 

The next step involved independence from their Grand Lodge. By establishing masonic relations with the Union lodge in Frankfurt, affiliated to the Premier Grand Lodge of England, lodge Theodore became independently recognized and able to declare its independence. As a new mother lodge, it could now spawn its own lodges. The recruiting drive amongst the Frankfurt masons also obtained the allegiance of Adolph Freiherr Knigge.

 

Knigge was recruited late in 1780 at a convention of the Rite of Strict Observance by Costanzo Marchese di Costanzo, an infantry captain in the Bavarian army and a fellow Freemason. As he was still in his twenties, Knigge had already reached the highest initiatory grades of his order and had arrived with his own grand plans for reform. Disappointed that his plan found no support, Knigge was immediately intrigued when Costanzo informed him that the order he sought to create already existed. Knigge and three of his friends expressed a strong interest in learning more of this order, and Costanzo showed them material relating to the Minerval grade. The teaching material for the stage was "liberal" literature which was banned in Bavaria but common knowledge in the Protestant German states.

 

Knigge's three colleagues lost interest in Costanzo after becoming disillusioned and extremely confused, like the rest of us. Still, he persisted and was rewarded in November 1780 with a letter from Weishaupt. Knigge was a perfect candidate because of his ties inside and outside Freemasonry. For his part, Knigge was charmed by the attention and drawn to the order's proclaimed goals of educating people and shielding them against oppression. Moreover, Weishaupt recognized Knigge's interest in alchemy and the "higher sciences" and promised to promote them. In response to Weishaupt, Knigge laid out his ideas for reforming Freemasonry when the Strict Observance was beginning to doubt its history.

 

Before he could be admitted to the higher ranks of the order, Weishaupt put Knigge in charge of recruitment. Knigge agreed, but with the stipulation that he be given the freedom to select the recruitment locations. Many additional masons joined the Illuminati's Minerval grade after finding Knigge's depiction of the new masonic order appealing. At this point, Knigge seemed to respect the "Most Serene Superiors" Weishaupt said he served. To delay providing any assistance, Weishaupt assigned him an additional duty despite his embarrassing failure to explain anything about the upper degrees of the order. Because he was full of shit.

 

Knigge then created pamphlets documenting the actions of the illegal Jesuits, claiming to show how they continued to thrive and recruit, particularly in Bavaria, using material provided by Weishaupt. Finally, Knigge wrote to Weishaupt that his position was becoming damn near impossible because he couldn't offer his recruits any real answers to their question about the higher grades. Weishaupt finally broke down and admitted in January 1781 that his superiors and the purported antiquity of the order were bullshit and that the higher degrees had not yet been created as he faced the possibility of losing Knigge and his masonic recruits.

 

Knigge was unusually composed in response to Weishaupt's admittance, even though he was looking forward to learning the promised intricate Freemasonry secrets found in the upper degrees of the Illuminati. Weishaupt pledged to give Knigge complete creative control over the development of the higher degrees and to send him his own notes. Knigge, for his part, enjoyed the chance to express himself through the order. He asserted that his new strategy would increase the appeal of the Illuminati to potential members in Germany's Protestant counties. Knigge received a 50 florins advance from the Areopagus in November 1781 to travel to Bavaria, where he met and partied with fellow Illuminati members.

 

The order had now developed extensive internal divisions. In July 1780, the Eichstaedt command had formed an autonomous province, and a rift was growing between Weishaupt and the Areopagus. They found him stubborn, dictatorial, inconsistent, and obviously full of shit. As a result, Knigge was constantly thrown into the role of peacemaker.

 

In discussions with the Areopagus and Weishaupt, Knigge identified two problematic areas. First, Weishaupt's emphasis on recruiting university students meant that young men with little practical experience often had to fill senior positions in the order. Secondly, the anti-Jesuit ethos of the order at its inception had generally become anti-religious. Knigge knew it would be a problem recruiting the senior Freemasons that the order was looking to bring in. Knigge felt the stifling grip of conservative Catholicism in Bavaria and understood the anti-religious feelings that this produced in the liberal Illuminati. Still, he also saw the negative impression these feelings would provide in Protestant states, making the spread of the order in greater Germany much more difficult. The Areopagus and Weishaupt felt powerless to do anything less than give Knigge a free hand. He had the contacts within and outside of Freemasonry that they needed, and he had the skill as a ritualist to build their projected grade structure, where they had ground to a halt at Illuminatus Minor, with only the Minerval grade below and the merest sketches of higher grades. The only restrictions imposed were the need to discuss the inner secrets of the highest degrees and the necessity of submitting his new grades for approval.

 

Meanwhile, the scheme to propagate Illuminatism as a legitimate branch of Freemasonry had farted out. While Lodge Theodore was now in their control, a chapter of "Elect Masters" attached to it only had one member from the order and still had a constitutional superiority to the craft lodge controlled by the Illuminati. The chapter would be difficult to persuade to submit to the Areopagus and formed a real barrier to Lodge Theodore becoming the first mother-lodge of a new Illuminated Freemasonry. A treaty of alliance was signed between the order and the chapter, and by the end of January 1781, four daughter lodges had been created, but independence was not on the chapter's agenda.

 

Costanza wrote to the Royal York, pointing out the discrepancy between the fees dispatched to their new Grand Lodge and the returned service they had received. The Royal York, unwilling to lose the money they were bringing in, offered to confer Freemasonry's "higher" secrets on a representative that their Munich brethren would dispatch to Berlin. Accordingly, Costanza set off for Prussia on April 4, 1780, with instructions to negotiate a reduction in Theodore's fees while he was there. On the way, he argued with a Frenchman about a lady with whom they shared a carriage. The Frenchman sent a message ahead to the king sometime before they reached Berlin, calling Costanza a spy and having him arrested. He was only freed from prison with the help of the Grand Master of Royal York and was kicked out of Prussia, having accomplished fuck all.

 

Knigge's recruitment from German Freemasonry was far from random. He targeted the masters and wardens, the men who ran the lodges and were often able to place the entire club at the disposal of the Illuminati. For example, Baron de Witte, master of Constancy lodge in Aachen, caused every member to join the order. This way, the order expanded rapidly in central and southern Germany and obtained a foothold in Austria. Moving into the Spring of 1782, the handful of students who had started the order had swelled to about 300 members, with only 20 new recruits being students.

In Munich, the first half of 1782 saw considerable changes in the government of Lodge Theodore. In February, Weishaupt had offered to split the lodge, with the Illuminati going their own way and the chapter taking any remaining traditionalists into their continuation of Theodore. At this point, the chapter unexpectedly surrendered, and the Illuminati had complete control of the lodge and chapter. In June, both club and chapter sent letters severing relations with Royal York, citing their faithfulness in paying for their recognition and Royal York's failure to provide any instruction in the higher grades. Their neglect of Costanza, and inability to defend him from negative charges or prevent his expulsion from Prussia, were also brought up. They had made no effort to provide Costanza with the promised secrets, and the Munich masons now suspected that their brethren in Berlin relied on the mystical French higher grades which they sought to avoid. Lodge Theodore was now independent.

 

The Rite of Strict Observance was now in a critical state. Its leader was Prince Carl of Södermanland (later Charles XIII (13th) of Sweden), openly suspected of trying to absorb the rite into the Swedish Rite, which he already controlled. The German lodges looked to Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel for leadership. However, suspicion turned to open contempt when Carl regarded the Stuart heir to the British throne as the true GrandMaster, and the lodges of the Strict Observance all but ignored their Grand Master. This bullshit led to the Convent of Wilhelmsbad.

 

The last Strict Observance convention, postponed since October 15, 1781, eventually began on July 16, 1782, at the spa town of Wilhelmsbad, which is located outside of (and now a part of) Hanau. The 35 participants in a discussion about the future of the order knew that the Strict Observance in its current form was doomed. Also, the Convent of Wilhelmsbad would be a battle over the pieces between the Martinists, led by Jean-Baptiste Willermoz, and the German mystics, led by Duke Ferdinand of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and their host Prince Charles of Hesse-Kassel. Only Franz Dietrich von Ditfurth, and Johann Joachim Christoph Bode, objected to mystical higher grades. Ditfurth actively advocated for a return to the fundamental three degrees of Freemasonry, which was the convention's least likely choice. The mystics had previously developed logical replacement plans for the higher degrees.

 

(Martinism is a type of arcane Christianity and Christian mysticism that is focused on the fall of the first man, his material seclusion from his spiritual source, and the process of his return, known as "Reintegration.")

 

The Illuminati were able to promote themselves as a viable option since there wasn't an effective alternative to the two schools of mysticism. Knigge, who now had complete authority to speak for the order, encouraged and helped Ditfurth, who took on the role of their spokesperson. Weishaupt rejected Knigge's initial proposal to form an alliance between the two orders because he didn't see the benefit of working with a dying order. His new strategy was to enlist the masons opposed to the higher degree of "Templar" Strict Observance.

 

At the convent, Ditfurth prevented Willermoz and Hesse from introducing their own higher grades by demanding that the delegates be informed in full of such degrees. Due to their frustration, the German mystics enrolled Count Kollowrat in the Illuminati as a later affiliate. With no claims to additional masonic revelations, Ditfurth's goal was to replace all higher degrees with a single fourth degree. He left the convent early after finding no support for his proposal and reported to the Areopagus that he had no hopes for the gathering.

 

In an attempt to satisfy everybody, the Convent of Wilhelmsbad didn't achieve shit. They renounced the Templar origins of their ritual while retaining the Templar titles, trappings, and administrative structure. Charles of Hesse and Ferdinand of Brunswick remained at the head of the order, but the lodges were almost independent in practice. The Germans adopted the name of the French order of Willermoz, Les Chevaliers Bienfaisants de la Cité Sainte (Good Knights of the Holy City). Some Martinist mysticism was imported into the first three degrees, now the only essential degrees of Freemasonry. Crucially, individual lodges of the order were now allowed to mingle with clubs of other systems. The new "Scottish Grade" introduced with the Lyon ritual of Willermoz was not mandatory. Each province and prefecture was free to decide what, if anything, happened after the three craft degrees. Finally, the convent regulated etiquette, titles, and a new numbering for the provinces to show that something had been achieved.

 

The Strict Observance was ended by the Convent of Wilhelmsbad. Along with the higher degrees that bound its most significant and influential members, it rejected its founding tale. It eliminated the rigorous regulations that had maintained the order's cohesion and alienated many Germans who did not trust Martinism. Martinism repulsed Bode, who immediately began negotiating with Knigge before joining the Illuminati in January 1783. The following month, Charles of Hesse joined.

 

Knigge's first efforts at an alliance with the intact German Grand Lodges failed, but Weishaupt persisted. He proposed a new federation where all German lodges would practice an agreed, unified system in the essential three degrees of Freemasonry and be left to their own devices as to which, if any, system of higher degrees they wished to pursue. This would be a federation of Grand Lodges, and members would be free to visit any of the "blue" lodges in any jurisdiction. All lodge masters would be elected, and no fees would be paid to any central authority. Groups of lodges would be subject to a "Scottish Directorate" composed of members delegated by lodges to audit finances, settle disputes and authorize new lodges. These, in turn, would elect Provincial Directorates, who would elect inspectors, who would elect the national director. This system would correct the current imbalance in German Freemasonry, where masonic ideals of equality were preserved only in the lower three "symbolic" degrees. The various methods of higher degrees were dominated by the elite who could afford research in alchemy and mysticism. To Weishaupt and Knigge, the proposed federation was also a vehicle to propagate Illuminism throughout German Freemasonry. Their intention was to use their new union, with its emphasis on the fundamental degrees, to remove all allegiance to Strict Observance, allowing the "eclectic" system of the Illuminati to take its place.

 

The newsletter announcing the new federation outlined the faults of German Freemasonry; unsuitable men with money were often admitted based on their wealth, and the corruption of civil society had infected the lodges. Having advocated the deregulation of the higher grades of the German lodges, the Illuminati now announced their own from their "unknown Superiors." Lodge Theodore, newly independent from Royal York, set itself up as a provincial Grand Lodge. In a letter to all the Royal York lodges, Knigge now accused the Grand Lodge of corruption. Their Freemasonry had allegedly been corrupted by the Jesuits. Strict Observance was now attacked as a creation of the Stuarts, devoid of all moral virtue. The Zinnendorf rite of the Grand Landlodge of the Freemasons of Germany was suspect because its author was in league with the Swedes. This direct attack had the opposite effect to that intended by Weishaupt. It offended many of its readers. The Grand Lodge of the Grand Orient of Warsaw, which controlled Freemasonry in Poland and Lithuania, was happy to participate in the federation only as far as the first three degrees. Their insistence on independence had kept them from the Strict Observance and would now keep them from the Illuminati, whose plan to annex Freemasonry rested on their own higher degrees. By the end of January 1783, the Illuminati's masonic party had seven lodges.

 

It wasn't just the clumsy appeal of the Illuminati that left the federation short of members. Lodge Theodore was recently formed and did not command respect like the older lodges. Most of all, the Freemasons most likely to be attracted to the federation, saw the Illuminati as an ally against the mystics and Martinists. Moreover, they valued their freedom too highly to be caught in another restrictive organization. Even Ditfurth, the supposed representative of the Illuminati at Wilhelmsbad, had pursued his own agenda at the convent.

 

The non-mystical Frankfurt lodges created an "Eclectic Alliance," was almost indistinguishable in structure from the Illuminati's federation. Far from seeing this as a threat, the Illuminati lodges joined the new alliance after some discussion. Three Illuminati now sat on the committee that wrote the new masonic statutes. Aside from strengthening relations between their three lodges, the Illuminati seem to have gained no advantage from this maneuver. Ditfurth, having founded a masonic organization that worked towards his ambitions for Freemasonry, took little interest in the Illuminati after he adhered to the Eclectic Alliance. In reality, the Eclectic Alliance's creation undermined the Illuminati's plans to spread their own ideologies through Freemasonry.

 

The final decline of the Illuminati was brought about by the indiscretions of their own Minervals in Bavaria, and especially in Munich. Despite efforts by their superiors to curb loose talk, politically dangerous boasts of power and criticism of monarchy caused the "secret" order's existence to become common knowledge, along with the names of many important members. The presence of the Illuminati in positions of power now led to some public unease. There were Illuminati in many civic and state governing bodies. Despite their small number, there were claims that success in a legal dispute depended on the person's standing with the order. In addition, the Illuminati were blamed for several anti-religious publications appearing in Bavaria. Much of this criticism sprang from vindictiveness and jealousy, but it is clear that many Illuminati court officials gave preferential treatment to their brethren. In Bavaria, the energy of their two members of the Ecclesiastical Council had one of them elected treasurer. Their opposition to Jesuits resulted in the banned order losing key academic and Church positions. In Ingolstadt, the Jesuit heads of departments were replaced by Illuminati.

 

Alarmed, Charles Theodore and his government banned all secret societies, including the Illuminati. A government mandate dated March 2, 1785, "seems to have been a deathblow to the Illuminati in Bavaria." Weishaupt had fled. Documents and internal correspondence, seized in 1786 and 1787, were then published by the government in 1787. In addition, von Zwack's home was searched, and much of the group's literature was disclosed.

 

So, that was exhausting and supposedly all about the "real Illuminati," right? But, according to the www.illuminatiofficial.org website, this may not be the case.

 

"Since the formation of the Illuminati, many citizens have inaccurately portrayed our organization in a negative manner. These misconceptions have been perpetuated for centuries through videos, photos, articles, books, and unofficial online resources claiming to understand our mission and members. In creating this online destination, we strive to alleviate the concerns voiced by the people of this planet and provide insight into our goals and operations."

 

"Their Purpose"

 

"Ensuring the survival of over 7 billion humans is a daunting task. Our duty to this planet has spanned across centuries and survived even the most established government entities. To continue functioning throughout societal and generational changes, The Illuminati's operations often require anonymity for both our members and our work. In 2013, the Illuminati authorized the formation of the Department Of Citizen Outreach. Through various initiatives and campaigns, including this website, the modern Illuminati has committed itself to furthering our relationship with our citizens.You may not find us praised in any history book or document. However, the Illuminati has helped with every major movement on this planet since the first human government was established. Our work is often marked by distinct symbols as a means of tracing our influence through history for those wishing to investigate. With gentle guidance from our organization, the human species is allowed to function in their natural order while playing the part of gears in a machine for the betterment of the world."

 

Also, according to their website, they discuss the symbols of their cult… I mean organization. 

 

"THE PYRAMID

 

In popular culture, a great amount of focus is placed on the Illuminati's belief that money is not evil. Some view our encouragement of work and wealth as a promotion of selfishness – overlooking the true meaning of the Pyramid and its underlying messages that motivate our diligence. In the tenets of the Illuminati, wealth is not simply a means of personal enrichment. Instead, money is a tool that can be used to fulfill each person's duty to the advancement of the human species. The selfish pursuit of money is a hollow goal, but the pursuit of the goodness that money can create is one of humanity's greatest responsibilities. The more money a person owns, the more ability they have to positively change the lives of those who are in need. If you are poor and of good heart, and your friend's house is burned in a fire, you will remain a good person but have no ability to help them with what they need the most. If the same house burns but you are rich, you can give your friend a place to stay and a new home because you have more than enough for yourself and anyone around you who needs it. Money has no feeling, no voice, and no soul – its choice between good or evil is decided by those who use it. Though it is not wrong to be poor, the celebration of poverty is rooted in selfishness. A person who is poor can save a life, but a person who is rich can build a hospital and save ten thousand. The poor can do little to help the poor, but the rich can help as many as they are able. If a person is rich, they have the opportunity to do good, but if they are poor they are unable to help anyone but themselves. Those with little can still do much. Money is merely paper and numbers that are traded for a person's time and effort. Therefore if a person does not have money, they can instead use their time and efforts to further the advancement of humanity – positive actions that are of equal value to any charitable donations. The greater a person's fortune, the greater their responsibility to their fellow humans. Like the Pyramid, those with the greatest power can do the greatest good for the largest number of those below them."

 

"THE EYE

We Are Always Watching Out For You

 

The human species is guarded and preserved by a coalition of its most elite members called the Illuminati. Since our origination, Illuminati members have guided Earth's most dominant creature through periods of interpersonal chaos, environmental outbreaks, and other mass attacks that threaten humanity with extinction. The human has made itself this planet's most dominant and advanced species. Even the weakest human is born master of the strongest of all other species on Earth. Through natural selection, every human generation is made of a genetic structure that is stronger and more advanced than the previous. Living humans evolve at a rapid pace, and can continue to advance in ability through study, practice, and a commitment to self-improvement. As a human absorbs knowledge and wisdom, some will experience their Awakening: a pivotal moment when their minds evolve to a level of understanding that is higher than the majority. They begin to see themselves as strings in a universal tapestry with a duty to uplift their fellow humans, and quickly understand the inner workings of wealth, power, and authority. Those who have experienced their Awakening often describe it as the moment their Eye was opened. The Illuminati is made of individuals who have reached this Awakening. Leaders, innovators, and other influential members of this planet have joined together to shape the face of human society and guide its masses into finding their own individual place in the Universal Design. To create a better world, unique beings with unique objectives and beliefs must forgo their differences and work together for the good of all. Progress requires cooperation. Humans must suppress their natural defensive selfishness and aid others who appear, believe, or act in ways that are different from themselves. Unfortunately, many humans are only concerned with their own wellbeing and thus cannot understand the positive intentions of a higher authority. Many would rather this planet remain in turmoil instead of following the directions that will lead them to happiness. Historically, the greatest enemies of human progression have been humans themselves. For this reason, those who have experienced their Awakening understand the need for it to remain secret – for their own safety and the ultimate good of a humanity that often does not know what is best for it. It is the Illuminati's responsibility to ensure the ongoing survival and advancement of the human species, so that all people, in all places, can live in Abundance."

 

"THE LIGHT

Follow The Light

 

Every human is guided by an inner compass that points toward the Light, revealing truth and direction when facing decisions. Given many names by spiritual leaders and unexplainable by science, the Light is an invisible guide that many believe has led them to joy, success, and lives of Abundance. It communicates directly to every human, urging them to strive for goodness and forgo their natural selfishness. All human religions and spiritual beliefs ultimately seek the Light in ways differing only in form and function. Some religions refer to the Light with a name, such as God or Elohim. The core of every religion is founded on the human species' innate desire to understand this invisible force. Even without a formal religious affiliation, every human is naturally drawn to the Light. Individual members of the Illuminati adhere to every variety of personal spiritual beliefs –– but by recognizing that all of our paths lead to the same destination, we find that the Light brings all people into an ultimate unity. There is no proof that a God exists but there is also no proof that a God does not.

The Illuminati's spiritual foundation is based upon this universal conundrum of faith and doubt. Our organization does not question whether a god does or does not exist but instead focuses on the betterment of the humans living on this planet. Though the human mind in its physical form is not capable of fully understanding the Light, conscious thought and intention reveal many of its inner workings and effects. By studying the wisdom of this planet's greatest minds, humans can discover ways to increase the Light's powerful influence in their lives. The Light, under many names, has been attributed to supernatural changes in the physical realm, including increases in wealth, power, prestige, health, and happiness.

Miracles, attraction, and the belief in unseen powers that can alter the physical world have some basis in truth. Though scientific advancements have explored both this planet's environment and the inner workings of the human mind, there are still countless mysteries that remain unsolved. Thus many occurrences that are attributed to the supernatural are merely the result of the human mind processing a concept it cannot explain naturally. Some humans attempt to form a deeper connection with the Light through rituals that have been passed down for centuries. Though these ceremonies often involve complicated steps and requirements, their true effect is not found in their directions or decorations but rather in the state of mind that results within its participants. Many of the Illuminati's traditions include rituals and oaths designed to explain higher concepts, and use the power of focused repetition to strengthen the ability of the human consciousness. The Illuminati prohibits rituals that include human or animal sacrifice. Learn More. A desire to understand the Light is an integral part of the path to illumination. By rising through the levels of illumination, Illuminati members discover more about their world and the true power that hides within their minds. Whatever you seek, whatever you dream, whatever you hope: all is possible if you follow the Light."

 

"THE ETERNAL CIRCLE

Every human is one part of a larger, eternal design – individual gears in a clock that has no end.

 

Your actions have the power to alter the future of the entire world.

Though you may not fully understand your purpose, your part is just as important as the greatest kings and queens of this planet. Some feel as though their temporary lack of wealth or influence makes them powerless to create change. But does a clockmaker favor the larger gears over the smaller? Does the hour hand become jealous of the minutes because it turns slower? Every part has a role in the functioning of a timepiece. Every part supports those around it in ways it may never see. Your absence would undo the order of our universe, even if you do not realize your importance. The world began before you and will continue after you, but it will be different because of the decisions you made. Every generation inherits the world left by the one before it, just as a king inherits the crown of his father. Your pursuit of wisdom and goodness could lay the foundation for your great-great-grandchild's rise into power – the same descendant who might steer a country from war and save lives by the millions. Did the ancestors of Aristotle or Alexander The Great know who their actions would create? Though you will never understand the full influence of your actions, the results of your dedication to humanity are still yours to claim. As you climb the great Pyramid seeking the Light at its top, you will look down and see that you are an integral part of our universe's most intricate mechanism. Though our human members may perish and fade into the annals of time, the Illuminati will continue to stand into eternity."

 

Why a secret society?

"Freedom is an idol of the human species.

The Illuminati operates in defense of you and all humans, in all places, and of all generations. Our duty to this planet has spanned across centuries and survived even the most established government entities. But the cultivation of trillions of human lives is a daunting responsibility, and while the human would not exist today without our protection, many uninformed masses mistake our guidance for a restriction of liberty.

Every human desires to be free of oppression, free of hardship, free of poverty, free of hunger, free of rules and laws — but as you understand, the nature of your species leaves true freedom impossible. Are you free to murder? Are you free to steal? Are others free to murder and steal from you? Or are there certain freedoms that must be given up for the benefit of all? For happiness, the human desires freedom; for prosperity, the human requires leadership. This is the reason behind our anonymity. To continue functioning throughout societal changes and generational differences, the Illuminati must remain behind the curtain — an outsider, belonging to none and loyal to all. You may never understand how your life can be free while guided by our organization. You may never fully comprehend our purpose and why you are safest and happiest with us. Simply open your mind and release your apprehensions, and you will find the relief of truth. We will never take your hand and pull you down the path like a slave to our whims. You must find and travel the road on your own. But your quality of life is our greatest concern, and the reason our symbols are placed in your society as a map for you to follow if you desire."

 

What about the modern-day "Illuminati" or "New World Order?"

 

According to an article from theweek.co.uk,

In a 2017 interview with the BBC, David Bramwell, "a man who has dedicated himself to documenting the origins of the myth," said the modern-day Illuminati legend was influenced not by Weishaupt but rather by LSD, the 1960s counter-culture, and specifically a text called Principia Discordia.

The book praised an alternative belief system – Discordianism – which preached a form of anarchism and gave birth to the Discordian movement, which ultimately wished to cause civil disobedience through practical jokes and hoaxes.

One of the leading proponents of this new ideology was a writer called Robert Anton Wilson, who wanted to bring chaos back into society by "disseminating misinformation through all portals – through counter-culture, through the mainstream media," claims Bramwell.

He did this by sending fake letters to the men's magazine Playboy, where he worked, attributing cover-ups and conspiracy theories, such as the JFK assassination, to a secret elite organization called the Illuminati.

Wilson turned these theories into a book, The Illuminatus Trilogy, which became a surprise cult success and was even made into a stage play in Liverpool, launching the careers of British actors Bill Nighy and Jim Broadbent.

What is the New World Order?

The idea of a powerful modern Illuminati conspiring to rule the world remained a niche belief a handful of enthusiasts upheld until the 1990s.

 

The internet changed all that, giving conspiracy theorists a global platform to perpetuate their beliefs and present their evidence to a massive audience.

Theories about how the New World Order operates run from relatively straightforward ideas to the outright bizarre.

Conspiracy theorists obsessively analyze public events for "evidence" of Illuminati influence. The symbols most associated with the Illuminati include triangles, pentagrams, goats, the all-seeing eye – such as the one that appears on U.S. banknotes - and the number 666.

This has led to claims some of the American Founding Fathers were members, with Thomas Jefferson accused in the aftermath of the War of Independence.

Another commonly cited Illuminati symbol, which appears on U.S. currency, is the so-called Eye of Providence, which is said to represent the omniscience of God watching over humanity.

According to a 2013 survey by Public Policy Polling, 28% of U.S. voters believe that a secretive power elite with a globalist agenda is conspiring to eventually rule the world through an authoritarian global government. In addition, it found that 34% of Republicans and 35% of independents believe in the New World Order threat compared to just 15% of Democrats.

Who is supposedly a member?

As well as being king and queen of the charts, Beyonce and Jay-Z are frequently depicted as lords of the New World Order. Beyonce's immense fame and popularity have long made her a favorite target for conspiracy theorists.

Illuminati "experts" seized upon her half-time performance at the 2013 Super Bowl as an example of her "devil-worshipping" choreography, even accusing her on-stage alter ego Sasha Fierce of being a "demonic entity."

However, some musicians enjoy deliberately playing with symbols connected to secret societies.

For instance, Rihanna frequently incorporates Illuminati images into her music videos and even joked about the theories in the video for S&M, which featured a fake newspaper with a headline declaring her "Princess of the Illuminati."

Jay Z has also been accused of hiding secret symbols such as goat imagery and devil horns in his music videos. But, most damningly, the logo for his music label, Roc-A-Fella Records, is a pyramid – one of the most well-known Illuminati logos.

Rob Brotherton, a professor at Barnard College and author of Suspicious Minds: Why We Believe in Conspiracy Theories, explains that real-life government conspiracies targeting black people in America, such as FBI infiltration of the Civil Rights movement in the 1950s and 60s, planted the seeds for Illuminati theory's popularity among hip-hop artists and fans.

 

Speaking to Complex, he said: "Hip-hop served as this [soapbox] for people to talk about issues that were relevant to them, things like discrimination, poverty, the criminal justice system, which are often seemingly slanted against African-Americans".

"It's a short leap to go from noticing some kind of injustice to thinking about whether there's something behind it. Hip-hop was just a good candidate to revive this myth," he says.

What do celebrities have to say about the theories?

Katy Perry told Rolling Stone in 2014 that the theory was the preserve of "weird people on the internet" but admitted she was flattered to be named among the supposed members: "I guess you've kind of made it when they think you're in the Illuminati!" However, she added she was tolerant of people who wanted to believe in the theory because: "I believe in aliens."

On the other hand, Madonna might just be a believer – all the more interesting given that she has frequently been accused of being a member herself. Speaking to Rolling Stone, she hinted that she had secret knowledge of the group. The claim is not so shocking given that she released a single titled 'Illuminati.' She said: "People often accuse me of being a member of the Illuminati, but the thing is, I know who the real Illuminati are."

In 2016, Beyonce thrilled her fans by unexpectedly releasing a new single, Formation, in February ­– but conspiracy theorists were excited for another reason. The very first line of the track acknowledged the rumors: "Y'all haters corny with that Illuminati mess."

When Prince died suddenly of an accidental overdose in April of the same year, a small but vocal corner of the internet accused the Illuminati of killing the singer-songwriter, who was famous for fiercely protecting his copyrights and artistic freedom from industry interference.

"The Illuminati talk won't stop coming and what doesn't help is that Prince himself seems to have been genuinely convinced that the organisation existed," reports one gossip website.

In 2009, the singer appeared on T.V. to warn of influential mystery figures controlling the world through "chemtrails" – chemicals pumped into the air via jet planes to manipulate human behavior.

 

Some other conspiracies are

. The Illuminati killed Paul Walker.

After starring in 7 films in the Fast and Furious franchise, Paul Walker fans were shocked by his ironic death in 2013. He was the passenger in a Porsche that careened out of control and crashed into a pole — or so the media said. But if you ask conspiracy theorists, the Illuminati is actually to blame.

According to the YouTuber known as Shane, the Illuminati murdered Walker after he threatened to expose the group. The story goes that Walker was involved in charity work when he came across a bunch of wrongdoings like embezzlement behind the scenes that he wanted to go public with. But, of course, the Illuminati couldn’t let that happen and took him out via drone strike.

 

The Illuminati killed JFK.

History buffs know JFK died after being shot twice by Lee Harvey Oswald, but many people aren’t convinced. According to TIME, 70% of Americans believe the assassination is part of something way bigger… So did the Illuminati have something to do with it? According to The Conspiracy Zone, the answer is ABSO FUCKIN LUTELY.

Their evidence is fascinating: JFK was shot in a triangle. ‘John Kennedy’ has 11 letters in it. The assassination date (11/22/63) includes multiples of 11. His limo was traveling 11 miles an hour… the list goes on. 

Why would the Illuminati want JFK dead? Apparently, JFK planned on bringing U.S. troops home from Vietnam and wanted to end the Federal Reserve to end the national debt, which would take away the Illuminati’s control over the country. He was killed just days after replacing Federal Reserve Notes. Conspiracy theorists have pointed to audio from the day of his assassination that proves there was more than one shooter, as well as a bullet trajectory that doesn’t match that of Oswald’s position.

 

Kesha’s song ‘Die Young’ is an Illuminati anthem.

 

Theorists say Kesha’s music also addresses the secret society, whose symbols abound in her early music videos. Take, for example, the video for ‘Die Young: 

The Illuminati symbolism is so blatant that even Billboard called it out, referencing the numerous triangles, an upside-down cross, and all-seeing one eye. The video even begins with a flashing skull and crossbones. According to conspiracy theorist The Vigilant Citizen, “Illuminati symbols are becoming more prevalent because that was the plan all along: To gradually make them part of popular culture.” Oh boy.

 

Lady Gaga is an “Illuminati puppet.”

Lady Gaga is another pop star rumored to be part of the Illuminati. Again, theorists call out the overt symbolism in her videos and persona, calling it a “tribute to mind control.” They say her stage name ‘Gaga’ refers to being totally absent-minded, which can be achieved through mind control. Furthermore, in her early days, many of her videos were rife with triangles and all-seeing eye symbolism.

However, some say her newest project proves that she’s broken free from the Illuminati. After a little hiatus, she boasts a more subdued, realistic image and more meaningful, artistic music. So, then, why didn't they just kill her?

In an appearance at Harvard, Gaga talked about how unhappy she was in the entertainment industry. She calls herself a ‘Stefanie/Gaga hybrid,’ which Illuminati theorists saw as proof that she became an alternate, demonic personality under Illuminati control. She also says she disliked “being used to make people money,” another potential dig as being an “Illuminati puppet.”

 

Donald Trump is an Illuminati mind controller.

 

If all of these stars are under Illuminati mind control, who’s doing the controlling? Aside from alleged Illuminati king Jay-Z, Donald Trump’s hand signals reveal his status as a top Illuminati member. While using your hands when you talk is normal, conspiracy theorists say Trump’s rather odd gestures are secret messages.

The classic “a-ok” symbol apparently means the devil’s number ‘666.’ However, he also frequently makes the triangle symbol with his hands when he’s at ease — which could be the same Illuminati gesture Jay-Z always makes or a reference to the vagina. 

 

The Kanye West/Kim Kardashian/Taylor Swift feud was fabricated by the Illuminati.

Apparently, when West humiliated Swift on stage at the 2009 VMAs, he welcomed her to the Illuminati.

 

As we know, they’ve managed to keep the feud in the media for years. While most people have begun to agree that anything these people do is just for publicity, according to The Vigilant Citizen, it’s actually an Illuminati “psychological operation” aimed at kids “to precondition them to start believing in fabricated events.”

 

OK, lastly, let’s talk about the lizard Illuminati.

David Icke, the nut job conspiracy theorist, is the leading proponent of this theory. 

This should explain it from an article on Time.com, 

 

They are among us. Blood-drinking, flesh-eating, shape-shifting extraterrestrial reptilian humanoids with only one objective in their cold-blooded little heads: to enslave the human race. They are our leaders, corporate executives, beloved Oscar-winning actors, and Grammy-winning singers. They're responsible for the Holocaust, the Oklahoma City bombings, and the 9/11 attacks ... at least according to former BBC sports reporter David Icke, who became the poster human for the theory in 1998 after publishing his first book, The Biggest Secret, which contained interviews with two Brits who claimed members of the royal family are nothing more than reptiles with crowns. (Picture Dracula meets Swamp Thing). 

The conspiracy theorist and New Age philosopher, who wore only turquoise for a time and insisted on being called Son of God-Head, says these "Annunaki" (the reptiles) have controlled humankind since ancient times; they count among their number Queen Elizabeth, George W. Bush, Henry Kissinger, Bill and Hillary Clinton and Bob Hope. Encroaching other conspiracy theorists' territory, Icke even claims that the lizards are behind secret societies like the Freemasons and the Illuminati. Since earning the dubious title of "paranoid of the decade" in the late 1990s, Icke has written several books on the topic, including his latest work, The David Icke Guide to the Global Conspiracy, while operating his own website — complete with merchandise and advertisements.

The Top Ten Illuminati Movies

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Vigilante Justice - What Goes Around Comes Around. Sort Of.

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Imagine the scene:

A serial murderer is guided by a specific “code” that kills only those who are guilty. He has access to crime scenes as a blood splatter analyst for the Miami police, gathering information and analyzing DNA to confirm a target’s guilt before killing them.

Sound familiar? It should, it’s the premise of the TV show, “Dexter.”

 

Ah, yes, Dexter. I love that show. We figured we would talk about the life of Dexter even though Logan, of course, has never seen it. Jk.

 

Obviously, murder is never acceptable, right? It’s the worst crime we can commit against one another, right? But what if, someone who didn’t believe in the “thou shall not kill” premise decided to murder someone you love? What if someone raped or beat someone you love? What if a child was purposefully abused, raped, or arguably worse, murdered? Does that horrendous situation change the narrative? Would you, COULD YOU, take the life of the person or persons responsible for your now substantial and debilitating loss? I want you to honestly think about that as we go through today’s episode. 

 

Bottom line, do specific human piles of shit DESERVE TO DIE?

 

Pedro Rodrigues Filho, or Killer Petey, is a Brazilian serial murderer. He was convicted and is notorious for hunting out and murdering only criminals as a teenager, between the ages of 14 and 19, particularly an entire gang in retaliation for the killing of his pregnant girlfriend.

 

He served 34 years in prison before being released in 2007, having been formally imprisoned for 71 murders but claimed to have killed over 100 drug traffickers, rapists, and murderers. Filho was initially sentenced to eight more years in jail in 2011 on accusations of inciting violence and deprivation of liberty. However, he was released in 2018 after serving seven years on the condition that he behaved himself. Nevertheless, he murdered 47 inmates inside the prisons where he was held captive, most of whom were rapists.

 

Since his second release from prison in 2018, when he declared himself to be reformed from his self-declared vigilantism as a youth and committed to not committing any more crimes, Filho has gained notoriety as a YouTube personality in Brazil. He runs the channel Pedrinho EX Matador, later renamed 2P Entretenimento, where he comments on current crimes and teaches the general public that committing crimes is not something to be proud of.

 

South of Minas Gerais in Santa Rita do Sapuca, on a farm, Rodrigues was born. His father was abusive and, all in all, a piece of shit and had kicked his mother’s belly during a fight while she was pregnant, leaving the poor unborn child with a bruised skull. 

 

In a quarrel with an older relative at age 13, he shoved the young man into a sugar cane press, nearly killing him, and had pondered leaving him there to die before deciding to save him. He claimed that this was the first time he had felt the urge to kill.

 

When Filho was fourteen years old, his father was accused of stealing food from the high school kitchen where he worked as a security guard, resulting in him losing his job. In vengeance, Filho killed the vice-mayor of Alfenas with Filho’s Grandfather’s shotgun, as he was the one who fired his father. A month later, he killed another guard at the school whom he believed to be the real thief. 

 

On the run, Rodrigues took refuge in Mogi das Cruzes, Greater São Paulo, where he began robbing drug dens and killing drug traffickers, making him a celebrity in the news media as the vigilante “Pedrinho Matador” (Lil’ Petey Killer). Filho killed one of the gang leaders in the area he was ransacking. After killing the gang leader, he took over his role and began running the same gang, almost like a Riddick moment where you keep what you kill.

 

During this time, he met a woman named Maria Aparecida Olympia, nicknamed Botinha. After they found out they were pregnant, Filho proposed! So awesome to see that this man, with what could be perceived as a savage beast-like mentality, actually has a pretty big heart.

 

Unfortunately, a rival gang leader brutally murdered Filho’s fiancee during Olympia’s pregnancy.

 

After finding out about the murder, Filho kind of went full John Wick. He and a few of his friends went to the wedding of the rival gang member. The hit squad brutally massacred all involved in the death of his soon-to-be wife and the mother of his child. He killed 7 at the wedding and injured 16 more. All of this came after Filho went on a torture spree to find out who was involved initially. We don’t know precisely how many were killed or hurt leading up to this point. Dudes an absolute monster and gave zero fucks.

 

Speaking of giving zero fucks, the boyfriend of Filho's favorite cousin knocked her up! Pretty exciting news. Except for the fact that the boyfriend refused to marry her, so… Filho shot and killed him. 

Remember how we mentioned that Filho’s Father was a piece of shit? Well, it gets worse. A few months after the massacre at the wedding, Filho found out that his mother had been killed. By his father. Who had butchered and dismembered her with a machete. After his father was committed to prison, Filho went and paid him a visit! While at the conjugal, Filho stabbed him 22 times! Not only did he kill his father, but he carved his heart out of him and took a rather large bite out of it. Amazing that he still somehow doesn’t have any jail time or was even caught! Brazil, what’s up down there?

 

Well, after a few years of Filho continuing his lifestyle of a gang leader, it’s known that he killed a few more before good old Johnny Law caught up to him in 1973. After he was sentenced to 126 years in prison, he was transported in a police car with another inmate, where he supposedly murdered him in the police car.

 

Filho served only 34 years, however, while in prison. This is because the maximum time a criminal can serve is thirty years when convicted, according to Brazilian law. This was later changed to 40 years in 2019. 

 

While in prison, he didn’t slow down much on the killing. He murdered 47 other criminals serving time in the same prison as him. They were the worst of the worst, though. Murderers, rapists, sex traffickers, etc. That’s valiant, right?

 

But being a killer of killers creates a pretty strong and bad reputation among other criminals. Especially when most of the prison population has that on their rap sheet. So he made some enemies while there.

 

He was ambushed by some of these people. During the ambush, he killed three of his attackers and injured the other two. One bad motherfucker.

 

He was up for release in 2003 but because of the murders within the prison, he was given an extra four years. But he only murdered bad guys. I mean, there was just the one-off murder of his cellmate because he snored too loud, but I mean, come on, who hasn't thought about that? No? Just me? Hmm. Anyways. He did mention that he enjoyed a few of the murders just because they were terrible people, and he wanted to kill them.

 

He was formally let free on April 24, 2007, but on September 15, 2011, he was detained at his home and later found guilty of riot and false imprisonment. He acknowledged that the fact that his girlfriend was not in jail was his primary reason for wanting to be released. However, he was ultimately sentenced to 128 years for these offenses.

 

Filho was released in 2018 due to Brazil’s repeal of the law stating that those with a diagnosis of psychopathy can be imprisoned indefinitely and that the country’s maximum penalty is 30 years. Since then, he has created a YouTube channel where he shares his experiences. In addition, he tries to teach others to not follow in his footsteps.

 

So let’s sum this guy up:

 

Most of the time, Filho hunted down the various types of offenders he wanted to kill by looking up their names and addresses. He then brutally killed them in several methods. However, he admitted that his preferred method was to hack or stab them to death with swords. Usually, when he learned of a crime, that prompted him to take action. When driven by rage rather than thrill, he would occasionally capture criminals (usually professional criminals and drug dealers) and torture them to death. He sometimes modified his approach by following the path taken by his victims when they committed their own crimes, such as when he murdered his father or when he murdered seven people in one day.

 

Now how about we look at some other folks with the same motifs? Now they may not have as extensive of a rap sheet as Filho, but these following people had decided to make it known for taking justice into their own hands when the Justice system didn’t seem to do enough for them.

Marianne Bachmeier

 

She was a struggling single mother who learned with horror that her daughter Anna, age 7, had died. The girl missed school on May 5, 1980, and somehow ended up at the home of Klaus Grabowski, a 35-year-old butcher who lived next door. Later, a cardboard box containing Anna’s remains was discovered on the side of a nearby canal. Grabowski was detained very quickly after his fiancée called the police to report the incident since he already had a criminal record for child abuse. Grabowski argued that he hadn’t sexually molested the little girl before killing her, even after confessing to the crime.

 

Instead, Grabowski made the strange claim that the young girl had attempted to “blackmail” him by saying she would tell her mother he had assaulted her if he didn’t give her money. Grabowski further claimed that the primary motivation for his decision to kill the kid in the first place was this alleged “blackmailing.” 

 

The murder of Marianne Bachmeier’s daughter had already infuriated her. But when the murderer related this tale, she grew even more irate. She was determined to get retribution when the man was put on trial a year later.

 

At Grabowski’s 1981 trial in the Lübeck district court, his defense claimed that since he had been deliberately castrated for his crimes years earlier, he had only committed the offense due to a hormone imbalance.

 

The third day of the trial was Bachmeier’s breaking point. She concealed a .22-caliber Beretta handgun in her handbag, took it out in the courtroom, and fired eight shots at the murderer. Grabowski received six rounds of fire before passing away in a pool of blood on the courthouse floor. Bachmeier reportedly responded, “I wanted to kill him,” according to Judge Guenther Kroeger.

 

Although it was evident from the several witnesses and Bachmeier’s comments that it was indeed her who killed Grabowski, she was shortly placed on trial for the crime. She said, “He killed my daughter... I meant to shoot him in the face but I shot him in the back... I hope he’s dead.”

 

With some celebrating Bachmeier as a hero and others denouncing her conduct, the “Revenge Mother” case swiftly gained notoriety in Germany. Before shooting Grabowski, Bachmeier said that she saw visions of Anna in the trial and could no longer stand for him to misrepresent her daughter. She allegedly sold her story to Stern magazine to pay her defense lawyers for $158,000.

 

In the end, the courts found Bachmeier guilty in 1983 of deliberate manslaughter. For her acts, she received a six-year prison term.

Jason Vukovich

 

Unlike other real-life vigilantes, Jason Vukovich’s search for justice began years before he set out to pursue it. Vukovich, born to a single mother in Anchorage, Alaska, on June 25, 1975, was quickly adopted by his mother’s new husband, Larry Fulton. Fulton seemed devout in public, but in reality, he molested Vukovich during his nightly “prayer sessions.”

 

Vukovich and his brother were often beaten with belts and pieces of wood in addition to sexual torture. And to make matters worse, Fulton got away with all these horrific offenses, which infuriated Vukovich. As a result, Vukovich, who fled terrified at 16, spent years getting by on narcotics and small-time thievery.

 

He returned to Alaska in 2008, but his desire to get revenge on pedophiles like Fulton didn’t go away. It culminated in 2016. Vukovich started by browsing the neighborhood sex offenders list. He then attacked and stole from three of the guys on the list as the last act.

 

In June 2016, Vukovich went after the three guys. Targeting Albee first, he drove to the residences of Andres Barbosa, Charles Albee, and Wesley Demarest. Then, on the morning of June 24, Vukovich broke into the man’s house and smacked the 68-year-old before robbing him and fleeing.

 

Two days later, he approached Barbosa in a very identical manner. However, he arrived at the door at 4 a.m. this time. He assaulted Barbosa with a punch to the face, stole his truck, and fled the scene with two female accomplices and a hammer. Demarest was instructed to get on his knees as Vukovich struck him in the fucking face with a hammer.

 

Vukovich claimed, “I am an angel of vengeance. “I’m going to administer justice to those you injured.”

 

Shortly after, the hammer, stolen items, and a notepad with the names of the persons in it were all discovered by police on Vukovich who was hiding in a nearby car. As a result, 18 charges of assault, robbery, burglary, and theft were brought against him. He decidedly took a plea deal.

 

According to allthatsintersting.com, in 2018, Vukovich was sentenced to 28 years in prison, after which the judge stated that “vigilantism won’t be accepted in our society.”

 

Vukovich has since expressed regret for his actions and urged others in his position not to follow in his footsteps: “I began my life sentence many, many years ago, it was handed down to me by an ignorant, hateful, poor substitute for a father. I now face losing most of the rest of my life due to a decision to lash out at people like him. To all those who have suffered like I have, love yourself and those around you, this is truly the only way forward.”

 

Gary Plauché

 

Now I’m pretty sure we all already know this story, but it fits the agenda of what we share.

 

Jeff Doucet, a 25-year-old karate teacher in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, enjoyed the total confidence of his young pupils and their parents. But on February 19, 1984, when Doucet took Jody Plauché, then 11 years old, for what was intended to be a 15-minute automobile journey, that confidence was horribly betrayed.

 

When their son didn’t come home that day, Gary and June Plauché became quite concerned—and with good reason. Doucet had taken their small boy hostage and was transporting him to the West Coast. Before booking a room at a hotel in Anaheim, California, Doucet shaved his beard and colored Jody’s hair to ward off suspicion.

 

The youngster was repeatedly assaulted there by Doucet until he eventually gave Jody permission to phone his parents. Jody was returned to his family after the police quickly tracked down the call and apprehended Doucet. In the meantime, Gary Plauché, Jody’s father, traveled to the Baton Rouge airport to meet Doucet at arrivals and murder him.

 

Plauché drew a .38 pistol from his boot on March 16, 1984, as soon as he spotted Doucet at the airport. He had been talking to a friend on the other end of a payphone while waiting for Doucet to show up. Even saying, “Look out, he’s coming. A shot is soon to be heard. The subsequent gunshot was recorded on tape since television cameras were filming.

 

Plauché had murdered the abuser of his kid, shooting a hollow-point bullet into Doucet’s head from three feet away. Later, he was put on trial for murder, but the judge sitting on the opposing side of the courtroom was lenient. As a result, Plauché was shortly released after receiving a sentence of seven years with a suspended term, five years of probation, and 300 hours of community service.

 

Jody Plauché, on the other hand, took a while to comprehend all the trauma that had occurred to him at a young age. "I was outraged with what my father did after the incident," Jody said. “I did not want Jeff killed. I felt like he was going to go to jail, and that was enough for me.”

 

He continued, “But my parents, they didn’t force me into recovery. They kind of let me recover at my own pace, and it took a while… but I was able to work through it and eventually accept my dad back in my life.” Jody eventually turned his experience into a book titled Why, Gary, Why?.

Tityana Coppage

Tityana Coppage is a woman from Kansas City, Missouri. She was known as a strong woman who tried to help and lead her family as a young adult.

She was only 21 when she lost her brother – and it wasn’t the first loss her family had to come to terms with.

Her family was extended to several younger brothers with different last names who she cared for equally and passionately.

 

The brother she lost was Jayson Ugwuh Jr. He was a 16-year-old high school student who loved basketball and rap. He was a bright, cheerful kid despite knowing personal tragedies from mere years beforehand.

He was gunned down in public on January 10 while walking with some of his friends.

A car came up, opened fire, and then sped away. What provoked the incident remained a mystery. The only solid fact was that Jayson Jr. was the primary victim.

Tityana and Jayson both endured a shocking loss in 2016 when a drive-by shooting claimed the lives of her young brother Jayden Ugwuh and younger cousin Montell Ross.

 

The boys were just 9 and 8, respectively, at the time of death. Jayson was present for the shooting and held his little brother Jayden as he faded and died from the bullet wounds.

 

The killer was never found. Tityana was only 16 when the incident occurred, leaving her mentally changed.

 

A few days before the killing of Lars, Coppage posted a tribute to her brother on Facebook.

The post read: “I tried to shield y’all from everything I had to witness as a kid. I supported anything and everything you wanted to do in life. I tried to give you the best so you wouldn’t have to look for fake love in the streets,” she wrote in the January 11 post. “I worked hard and long hours to keep a roof over y’all head, nice clothes and shoes on y’all feet refrigerator full of groceries. The streets didn’t rise y’all I did this sh*t 10 toes down. I was at those games as much as I could, I was paying for your studio time for your trips no matter the cost. All I wanted is to see you happy finish school and make it to the top. But some how I still failed you. This wasn’t you Jayson you was so sweet so quite a honorable young man why didn’t you just hear me out I only wanted more time with you that’s all.”

 

The object of Tityana’s vengeance was Keith Lars. Just two days after her brother's death and burial, she gathered as much evidence as possible to affirm the identity of her brother’s murderer.

 

She traced him as the car owner that carried the gunman who killed her brother and armed herself before they met. Lars didn’t go down quietly.

 

They exchanged gunfire, but Tityana came alive and left Lars dead in his car in the parking lot in the city’s northeast section.

Court records state that Lars was found in the back of a Toyota near Virginia Avenue and Admiral Boulevard in Kansas City on January 13, with officers determining that the shooting had occurred close to the 500 block of Benton Boulevard.

At that scene, police found 23 shell casings from two types of bullets. 8

were .45 caliber, and 15 were 9mm.

 

Was Tityana just an ordinary woman pushed beyond the brink to perform such a murderous act?

 

She had already seen injustice win with the still-unsolved deaths of her young siblings, and she didn’t have enough trust in the system to properly avenge her brother’s death.

 

She assumed the guilt of Lars and got in contact with someone called “Auntie” to arm herself with a .45 pistol, saying “I used to many on Bro!” 

 

The fact that multiple gunshots were fired proves she was an amateur with a firearm.

Thanks to witnesses who came forward and surveillance footage in the parking lot where the murder took place, authorities quickly identified Coppage. They arrested her for the murder, booking her into Jackson County Jail on a $200,000 bond.

 

Evidence was quickly collected against Coppage, and she did not deny the charges.

 

She insisted that she got justice for her dead brother, even going as far as to text his cell phone to assure him that she was sending his killer to him.

 

At the time, no formal evidence was collected, or investigations were pending towards Lars as the suspect, though he was armed and did drive the same, or very similar, truck seen at Jayson’s murder scene.

She admitted during questioning that she knew Lars would be in the parking lot when she shot him. However, Tityana initially claimed that the murder was accidental and that she only shot him in self-defense because he fired his weapon at her first.

Coppage was spurred toward Lars by members of her community who seemed to indicate a shared but hushed knowledge of events that led to her brother’s death.

 

The police weren’t able to corroborate as much in their reporting. So all anyone seemed to know was that Lars may as well have been guilty and could have had his own criminal history.

 

Therefore, the extended family of the community assisted Coppage’s vigilante act she grew up around.

Coppage does not deny what she did or why and is charged with second-degree murder, which is murder without premeditation or planning.

 

By her admission, she fired her gun at the vehicle with Lars in it, but she claimed that he fired first and her weapon was meant for protection.

 

She was celebratory over his death, particularly over vengeance, meaning she went there assuming he was guilty and was armed to act.

Coppage contacted Lars before the meeting to tell him she was coming to ask questions.

 

She claimed to call him to try and settle differences between him and her father, knowing that if she didn’t take action, he absolutely would.

 

COPPAGE TEXTED HER DECEASED BROTHER AFTER KILLING LARS AS WELL.

The message sent to Her brother’s phone read: “I owe em that body,” according to an affidavit. This message and the ones sent to “Auntie” led authorities to file murder charges.

 

Rap artists DaBaby and 42 Dugg made public posts on Instagram voicing solidarity and have reached out to pay $20,000 each of her bond as support.

 

She is currently awaiting trial.

 

Jorge Porto-Sierra

 

Ok, so here we have someone that TECHNICALLY didn’t kill anyone, but that wasn’t for lack of trying.

 

When authorities responded to the scene at the Friendly Village Inn & Motel on U.S. Route 192 in Florida in 2018, witnesses recalled seeing Jorge shout, “I’m going to kill you, child molester,” as he drenched the property in gasoline with a cigarette in his hand. 

Porto-Sierra then returned to the parking lot and attacked two individuals sitting in their car. After that, he rammed his Ford Focus into their vehicle and poured gasoline into it through an open window.

Just as Porto-Sierra was preparing to set the car on fire, police arrived on the scene. He was quickly surrounded and told to surrender.

 

The 50-year-old Porto-Sierra admitted that he had planned to “barbecue all the child molesters on fire and kill them.” However, when police asked him why he didn’t, Porto-Sierra claimed that the police had arrived too fast for him to do so.

 

Authorities soon discovered that at least two of the men Porto-Sierra targeted were indeed convicted, sex offenders. One man had been standing outside his room when Porto-Sierra leaped out of his car and launched into a tirade, prompting him to rush inside his room.

 

“They raped kids, they are all child molesters that all live here and deserve to die,” Porto-Sierra later said as he justified his actions to the police.

While the Friendly Village Inn & Motel is indeed a popular place for convicted sex offenders (because it’s far away from schools and playgrounds), and at least two of Porto-Sierra’s targets were known sex offenders, the real-life vigilante still broke the law and thus found himself arrested for his actions.

 

As of 2020, Porto-Sierra is being held on no bond at the Osceola County Jail and charged with 4 counts of attempted murder.

 

André Bamberski

Andre was born to Polish immigrants in France in the 1930s. He was in the thick of the war that affected him growing up. Later, Andre became a chartered accountant and married Danièle Gonnin, having two kids. However, at the time of the incident, Andre and Danièle were divorced, and the latter was married to Dieter Krombach, a doctor, in Lindau, Germany.

Danièle initially told Andre that Dieter believed Kalinka died due to a heat stroke or the effects of a concussion from a few years prior. However, Andre wasn’t so sure. Dieter had stated that on the morning of Kalinka’s death, he had found her in bed, unresponsive; rigor mortis had already set in. However, Dieter tried to revive her by injecting her with a nervous system stimulant and two other stimulants. But that didn’t work, and Kalinka was dead.

The autopsy report read by Andre later showed that Kalinka had blood around her torn vagina. Inside, there was a whitish substance that was never tested. Besides injection marks on her arms, Kalinka had undigested food in her stomach. Experts later believed she died from asphyxiation from regurgitating her own food. All of this left Andre with only one theory: Dieter was responsible for the death.

Andre believed Dieter raped and then killed Kalinka with an injection, possibly to keep her from talking about it. While the German prosecution closed the case, saying Kalinka died of natural causes, Andre didn’t give up, following Dieter across Europe for years to bring him to justice. About a year after Kalinka’s death, Andre went to Lindau, handing out fliers accusing Dieter of murder. He was arrested and then fined and sentenced in absentia.

However, that didn’t stop Andre. He then prodded the French authorities, eventually leading to Kalinka’s body’s exhumation; she was a French citizen. This time, it was revealed that her genitals had been missing since the autopsy, and there was no trace of them. Andre’s work paid off when a French court convicted Dieter in absentia of violence, bringing on death without intention to do so, and sentenced him to 15 years.

But with Germany refusing extradition, Dieter essentially remained a free man for many years. Then, in 1997, Dieter was convicted of raping a 16-year-old in his clinic. He received a two-year suspended sentence in addition to his license being revoked. But a couple of years later, Dieter moved around and worked in several clinics by providing a photocopy of his license as proof.

Andre didn’t give up, even hiring private detectives to find out what Dieter was up to. He said, “All my friends and family, including my father, told me to quit it at this point. They said, ‘You’re not going to achieve anything.’ But I’m a Slav, you see, and the Slavs are very emotional. I cried all the time when I thought about Kalinka. It was a question for me of moral duty. That was the most important thing: to get the truth.”

 

While Dieter received a 26-month prison sentence, he was released early, and Andre learned he was back to work yet again. Andre then resolved to bring Dieter to France in any way possible. He was in Bregenz, Austria, hoping to look for more information about Dieter in Scheidegg, Germany. Andre talked about kidnapping Dieter and eventually heard from Anton Krasniqi, who agreed to help him. In October 2009, Dieter was taken from his house by Anton and two other accomplices and left outside a building in Mulhouse, France, paving the way for Dieter’s trial.

While Dieter’s pattern of drugging and raping women came to light, he was sentenced to 15 years behind bars. As for Andre, he admitted to knowing about the kidnapping plot but insisted he wasn’t involved in the actual act. In June 2014, he was found guilty of ordering the kidnap and received a one-year suspended sentence. In the end, Andre was happy with the result. He believed that he had kept his promise to Kalinka about giving her justice.

Regarding why Dieter would kill Kalinka, Andre said, “Kalinka had asked to move back to Toulouse, and to no longer stay with Krombach. She was about to escape from him: That could have been a motive. But one will never know. One can never know.” Andre quit his full-time job in 1999 to dedicate himself to bringing Dieter to justice. Through it all, he was supported by his partner (also called Danièle) for several years. Now in his 80s, Andre seems to live in Toulouse, France, and enjoying some much-needed time off.

 

This one is a DOOZY! 

 

Drąsius Kedys was born on September 4, 1972, in Garliava, Lithuania. He and his former girlfriend Laimutė Stankūnaitė had a daughter in February 2004. Stankūnaitė was underage when she gave birth to Kedys’ daughter. The couple split in 2006, and the parents got embroiled in a bitter custody battle. His former girlfriend, with the help of Andrius Ūsas, a politician and advisor to the former Speaker of the Seimas Viktoras Muntianas, obtained custody in November 2006. Kedys had visitation rights every other weekend, But later Stankunaite gave up her custody rights, giving them to the father.

On November 29, 2008, Kedys submitted a formal complaint to the police, claiming Ūsas paid Stankūnaitė to sexually molest his daughter. In December 2008, Kedys obtained full custody of his daughter with no visitation rights for Stankūnaitė. The courts repeatedly confirmed that Stankūnaitė had no case to answer, thus dismissing Kedys’ allegations against his former girlfriend as unsubstantiated. Nevertheless, the pre-trial investigation against Ūsas continued. In February 2009, Kedys further pressed accusations against Violeta Naruševičienė, Stankūnaitė’s sister, claiming the former had participated in allowing men to molest her 4-year-old daughter. Finally, in July 2009, Kedys accused Jonas Furmanavičius, a district judge, and an individual known as Aidas of partaking in the molestation. All those people (except for Aidas) professed their innocence and accused Kedys of slander, criminal libel, and death threats.

Kedys was frustrated with the apparent lack of progress in official investigations and convinced that the case was being deliberately stonewalled. So, he sent out 200 DVDs to Lithuanian politicians, media outlets, and law-enforcement agencies, featuring homemade video footage of his daughter’s explicit testimony against three “uncles.” In addition, he promised to send the subtitled version to Members of the European Parliament. However, many sources criticized Kedys, who acted as the cameraman, for asking his daughter leading questions and heavily editing the film (it contained 50 segments filmed across nine occasions).

On October 5, 2009, Furmanavičius and Naruševičienė were shot dead in Kaunas. Kedys became the prime suspect. On the same day, a national search of Kedys was announced, soon followed by an announcement of an international investigation, as he was thought to have left the country shortly after the murders. Kedys' friends Raimundas Ivanauskas and Eglė Barauskaitė were charged with accessory to murder. 

The story caused an uproar in Lithuania, with much of the public siding with Kedys. In the public mind, the case was seen as a father’s futile attempts to pursue justice and protect his daughter and being driven to desperate measures by anger at the injustice. Others questioned whether the killings were actually commissioned by Kedys himself.

On April 17, 2010, at 6:49 a.m., after six months of a police search, a man fishing found Drąsius Kedys' body near Kaunas Reservoir. An autopsy concluded he had died between the evening of April 15 and the morning of the 16th. According to the official report, the cause of death was “choking on vomit” while being heavily intoxicated. However, his relatives were convinced that Kedys was murdered, pointing out wounds on his body. Kedys’ relatives demanded a second opinion from independent experts. Finally, in April 2011, a report was received from the Swedish National Forensic Service confirming Kedys had died from alcohol and drug poisoning and that he choked on the contents of his own stomach. The Swedish report differed from the Lithuanian experts in determining “the injuries on the body appeared before his death” and that the “possibility of drowning is not excluded.”

On April 24, Kedys was buried in Jonučiai cemetery. According to media reports, 6-10,000 people from across the country attended the ceremony.

Ūsas, the main suspect in the pedophilia case, was officially charged with the sexual molestation of a minor. However, he was found drowned in a swamp in June 2010. The death was ruled an accident. Nevertheless, the court case against Ūsas continued, and the court found him innocent in November 2012.

 

Mirriam Rodriguez

 

Miriam’s 20-year-old daughter mysteriously disappeared in 2012. Her daughter had been kidnapped and subsequently murdered, and several men were perpetrators of the crime. Dissatisfied with the Mexican justice system, Miriam decided to take matters into her own hands. To fool authorities and her daughter’s kidnappers, Miriam changed her appearance as best she could and used fake identification to make it more difficult to trace her. 

One of Miriam’s first “victims” was a member of a Mexican cartel who was implicit in the kidnapping and murder of her daughter. She cornered him, held him at gunpoint, and told him, “If you move, I’ll shoot you.”

But she was just getting started. She eventually tracked down her daughter’s killers one by one all across the country. But unfortunately, her vigilantism led to her ultimate downfall when multiple gunmen managed to kill her outside her home. 

Becoming a vigilante against organized criminals is a considerable risk, but it was one that Miriam was willing to take to seek justice for her daughter.

 

Speaking of people standing up against gangs…

 

El Salvador’s Mara Salvatrucha gang is better known as MS-13. Formed in Los Angeles in the 1980s, many members were deported for vicious crimes. However, several of them continued their criminal activity back home. The gang terrorized a nation plagued by a high poverty rate and a virtually helpless police force — until real-life vigilantes stepped up to help.

Spanish for “Black Shadow,” Sombra Negra was first formed around the early 1990s due to El Salvador’s authorities being glaringly overpowered by MS-13. Frustrated by the situation, Sombra Negra started targeting gang members for execution — especially MS-13 members.

Sombra Negra members come dressed in black with bandanas over their faces. They patrol the streets in unlicensed vehicles and with tinted windows. And one of their primary missions is to capture MS-13 members — and make them “disappear.” As Sombra Negra has grown more powerful over the years, so have the legends of their brutal retribution against the gang members.

 

From sexual torture to dismemberment, the paramilitary group of vigilantes became more of a death squad than a traditional band of crimefighters. In El Salvador, it seemed that only extreme measures would stop MS-13.

“Most of the victims were blindfolded, their hands or thumbs tied behind their backs, and they had received tiros de gracia (a coup de grâce), shots to the base of the skull at close range by weapons such as assault rifles and machine guns,” a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services report said. 

From home invasions to sudden killings in the streets, Sombra Negra carries out its mission ruthlessly and describes it as a “social cleansing.” And some authorities are grateful. Even El Salvador’s head of National Assembly Guillermo Gallegos has admitted: “Morally I support this type of expression because people are tired of the way of delinquency.”

In the end, it’s worth noting that many people have mixed feelings about real-life vigilantes. While they may sympathize with their motives in some cases, they may also find some of their choices reckless or unnecessarily dangerous. But there’s no question that these vigilantes have left a massive impression on the world — for better or worse.

 

And there’s another set of gang-fighting vigilantes…

 

Pablo Escobar needs little, if any, introduction. One of the most infamous drug lords in modern history, the Colombian kingpin ran a colossal cocaine empire that saw thousands of people killed. Yet, with corrupt authority figures in his pocket, Escobar’s reign appeared resolute — until it wasn’t.

In the early 1990s, Escobar had two rival cartel members murdered when they visited him in an opulent prison (which he had built for himself). Fidel Castano, the other cartel’s boss, was none too pleased. And so he helped form Los Pepes. Short for “Perseguidos por Pablos Escobar,” the paramilitary group welcomed “People Persecuted by Pablo Escobar.”

Escobar was marked after he walked out of his prison in July 1992. At this point, even the U.S. government and CIA were aiding Los Pepes in their quest to find the kingpin. But unfortunately, Los Pepes also engaged in bloody bombings against Escobar that killed and injured civilians.

 

Some of these nearly killed their target, including a car bomb that injured Escobar’s daughter. For more than a year, Los Pepes ruthlessly attacked anyone in Escobar’s circle — from friends and relatives to public supporters and officials. Finally, it was in 1993 when they closed in on the man himself.

After Los Pepes forced Escobar into hiding, Colombian intelligence intercepted a phone call from Escobar to his son. Now confident of his whereabouts, Colombian police and military forces headed for Escobar’s newfound hiding place in the neighborhood of Los Olivos — ready for retribution after years of brutal violence in the country. 

Whether Los Pepes members played an active role in killing him remains hotly contested, but one thing is sure: Without their vigilant quest to find Escobar, he would likely lead many more to their deaths. Ultimately, he was chased across rooftops and gunned down while on the run.

 

And lastly, what happens when an ENTIRE TOWN decides a lousy guy needs to die?

It didn’t take long for Ken McElroy to become the resident “bully” of Skidmore, Missouri. And considering his crimes, the “bully” label was putting things lightly. For years after he dropped out of school, he was accused of everything from theft and arson to child molestation and statutory rape. But despite being indicted 21 times, he dodged convictions at every turn.

After McElroy raped a 12-year-old girl, he divorced his wife and married the child when she was 14 to avoid a statutory rape charge. When her parents objected, he shot their dog and burned down their house. And after he shot a farmer in 1976, he somehow produced two witnesses who claimed that McElroy was nowhere near the scene of the crime that day.

Ken McElroy was a true terror for Skidmore residents, who wanted him removed immediately. McElroy’s downfall was a long time coming, but it truly fell into motion in 1980 after he shot the town’s elderly grocer in the neck. Though McElroy was charged with attempted murder and eventually convicted, he appealed the case and was released on bond.

 

Soon afterward, it seemed the entire town was present at a gathering on July 10, 1981, to discuss Ken McElroy. Though exactly what they said is unclear, there’s no question that they decided McElroy had to go.

Residents heard that McElroy had gone to the D&G Tavern for a drink. In a prime example of real-life vigilantes in action, the community walked to the bar to confront him. And with no warning, someone began shooting.

Some accounts describe up to 50 vigilantes involved in the onslaught. In the end, McElroy was shot multiple times and struck by at least two firearms. He succumbed to the wounds in his truck. No one called an ambulance — or agreed to testify against another person in court.

To this day, no one has ever been charged with his death.

 

Top 10 Vigilante Films

https://screenrant.com/best-vigilante-films/

Reincarnation or ”Tarnation” If You’re A Cowboy

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When you die and are brought back as a cowboy, call that reintarnation. That's right folks, we are gonna get pun-iful in today's episode as we dive deep into the life and times of Reincarnation. We’ve all heard about the tales, myths, pseudo-science factuals, testimonials, and first hand accounts of reincarnation. Is it real? Is this tabloid conjecture? Are we stuck in an everlasting cycle until we break free and reach enlightenment? Do we need to join the Flatliners in order to find out? Well, let's go over everything we know and maybe, some things you don't know.

 

For those of you who don't know what Reincarnation is, or maybe, just don't understand what it is; the Latin root of the word "reincarnation" literally translates to "entering the flesh again." Reincarnation is the idea that a part of every person—or, in certain cultures, every living thing—continues to exist after death. The transmigration belief varies by culture and is imagined to take the form of a newly born human being, animal, plant, spirit, or as a being in some other non-human realm of existence. This aspect may be the soul, mind, consciousness, or something transcendent that is reborn in an interconnected cycle of existence.

 

So reincarnation is the transfer of the soul, right? What is your soul? I feel that not everyone has a soul, or at the very least deserves one, but what is your soul? Where does it reside? Is it just an idea we give to help us cope with the nothingness that happens after the lights go out? Or is there more to the equation?

 

According to the religion of the ancient Egyptians, a person is composed of both bodily and spiritual components. Ancient Assyrian and Babylonian religion both contained concepts that are similar. The Kuttamuwa stele, a funeral stele for a royal official from Sam'al who died in the eighth century BCE, records Kuttamuwa asking his mourners to celebrate his life and his death with feasts "for my spirit that is in this stele." One of the oldest mentions of the soul existing independently of the body can be found here. The basalt stele, which weighs 800 pounds (360 kg), is 2 feet (0.61 m) wide and 3 feet (0.91 m) tall. It was found during the third season of excavations by the Oriental Institute's Neubauer Expedition in Chicago, Illinois.

 

The Baháʼí Faith affirms that "the soul is a sign of God, a heavenly gem whose reality the most learned of men hath failed to grasp, and whose mystery no mind, however acute, can ever hope to unravel". Bahá'u'lláh stated that the soul not only continues to live after the physical death of the human body, but is, in fact, immortal. Heaven can be seen partly as the soul's state of nearness to God; and hell as a state of remoteness from God. Each state follows as a natural consequence of individual efforts, or the lack thereof, to develop spiritually. Bahá'u'lláh taught that individuals have no existence prior to their life here on earth and the soul's evolution is always towards God and away from the material world.

 

Christian eschatology holds that after death, God will evaluate each person's soul and determine whether they will spend eternity in Heaven or Hell before being raised to life. This viewpoint is shared by the majority of Protestant denominations as well as the oldest branches of Christianity, including the Catholic Church and the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox churches. Some Protestant Christians think the soul is just "life," and they think the dead don't have conscious existence until the resurrection (Christian conditionalism). Some Protestant Christians think that rather than suffering for all eternity, the sinful' souls and bodies will be destroyed in Hell (annihilationism). Either in Heaven or in a Kingdom of God on earth, believers will receive eternal life and experience everlasting communion with God.

 

The present Catechism of the Catholic Church states that the term soul

 

“refers to the innermost aspect of [persons], that which is of greatest value in [them], that by which [they are] most especially in God's image: ‘soul’ signifies the spiritual principle in [humanity]”.

All souls living and dead will be judged by Jesus Christ when he comes back to earth. The Catholic Church teaches that the existence of each individual soul is dependent wholly upon God:

 

"The doctrine of the faith affirms that the spiritual and immortal soul is created immediately by God."

 

Protestants usually hold to the idea that the soul is real and eternal, but there are two main schools of thought regarding what this implies in terms of a hereafter. Some, following Jean Calvin, believe that the soul persists as consciousness after death. Some people, including those who follow Martin Luther, think that the soul passes away with the body and remains asleep (or "sleeps") until the time of the dead.

 

Various new religious movements deriving from Adventism(Adventism is a branch of Protestant Christianity that believes in the imminent Second Coming (or the "Second Advent") of Jesus Christ.) — including Christadelphians, Seventh-day Adventists, and Jehovah's Witnesses — similarly believe that the dead do not possess a soul separate from the body and are unconscious until the resurrection.

 

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that the spirit and body together constitute the Soul of Man (Mankind). "The spirit and the body are the soul of man." Latter-day Saints believe that the soul is the union of a pre-existing, God-made spirit and a temporal body, which is formed by physical conception on earth. After death, the spirit continues to live and progress in the Spirit world until the resurrection, when it is reunited with the body that once housed it. This reuniting of body and spirit results in a perfect soul that is immortal, and eternal, and capable of receiving a fulness of joy. Latter-day Saint cosmology also describes "intelligences" as the essence of consciousness or agency. These are co-eternal with God, and animate the spirits. The union of a newly-created spirit body with an eternally-existing intelligence constitutes a "spirit birth"[citation needed] and justifies God's title "Father of our spirits".

 

Some Confucian traditions draw a distinction between a spiritual soul and a physical soul.

Ātman is a Sanskrit word that means inner self or soul. In Hindu philosophy, especially in the Vedanta school of Hinduism, Ātman is the first principle, the true self of an individual beyond identification with phenomena, the essence of an individual. In order to attain liberation (moksha), a human being must acquire self-knowledge (atma jnana), which is to realize that one's true self (Ātman) is identical with the transcendent self.

 

The Quran, the holy book of Islam, uses two words to refer to the soul: rūḥ (translated as spirit, consciousness, pneuma or "soul") and nafs (translated as self, ego, psyche or "soul"), cognates of the Hebrew nefesh and ruach. The two terms are frequently used interchangeably, though rūḥ is more often used to denote the divine spirit or "the breath of life", while nafs designates one's disposition or characteristics. In Islamic philosophy, the immortal rūḥ "drives" the mortal nafs, which comprises temporal desires and perceptions necessary for living.

 

In Jainism, every living being, from plant or bacterium to human, has a soul and the concept forms the very basis of Jainism. According to Jainism, there is no beginning or end to the existence of the soul. It is eternal in nature and changes its form until it attains liberation.

 

Jiva is the immortal essence or soul of a living organism (human, animal, fish or plant etc.) which survives physical death. The concept of Ajiva in Jainism means "not soul", and represents matter (including body), time, space, non-motion and motion. In Jainism, a Jiva is either samsari (mundane, caught in cycle of rebirths) or mukta (liberated).

 

According to this belief until the time the soul is liberated from the saṃsāra (cycle of repeated birth and death), it gets attached to one of these bodies based on the karma (actions) of the individual soul. Irrespective of which state the soul is in, it has got the same attributes and qualities. The difference between the liberated and non-liberated souls is that the qualities and attributes are manifested completely in case of siddha (liberated soul) as they have overcome all the karmic bondages whereas in case of non-liberated souls they are partially exhibited. Souls who rise victorious over wicked emotions while still remaining within physical bodies are referred to as arihants.

 

Judaism relates the quality of one's soul to one's performance of the commandments (mitzvot) and reaching higher levels of understanding, and thus closeness to God.

 

The Scientology view is that a person does not have a soul, it is a soul. It is the belief of the religion that they do not have the power to force adherents' conclusions. Therefore, a person is immortal, and may be reincarnated if they wish. Scientologists view that one's future happiness and immortality, as guided by their spirituality, is influenced by how they live and act during their time on earth. The Scientology term for the soul is "thetan", derived from the Greek word "theta", symbolizing thought. Scientology counselling (called auditing) addresses the soul to improve abilities, both worldly and spiritual. The ideologies surrounding this understanding align with those of the five major world religions.

 

A popular belief in Shamanism is soul dualism, which is also known as "many souls" or "dualistic pluralism" and is crucial to the fundamental and vital idea of "soul flight" (also called "soul journey", "out-of-body experience", "ecstasy", or "astral projection"). The idea that there are two or more souls in each human being is known as the dualistic theory of the "free soul" and the "body soul." While awake, the former is connected to physiological processes and awareness, but the latter is free to roam when asleep or in trance states. There are numerous soul types with various purposes in some circumstances.

 

Shinto distinguishes between the souls of living persons (tamashii) and those of dead persons (mitama), each of which may have different aspects or sub-souls.

 

Sikhism considers the soul (atma) to be part of God (Waheguru). Various hymns are cited from the holy book Guru Granth Sahib (SGGS) that suggests this belief. "God is in the Soul and the Soul is in the God."

 

According to Chinese traditions, every person has two types of soul called hun and po, which are respectively yang and yin. Taoism believes in ten souls, sanhunqipo "three hun and seven po". A living being that loses any of them is said to have mental illness or unconsciousness, while a dead soul may reincarnate to a disability, lower desire realms, or may even be unable to reincarnate.

 

Damn, we’re getting deep here on the Train! Well, we did say we wanted to do this episode and to do it right, well, this is “da wey”.

 

Now it seems as though the soul is prevalent in just about every religion. Why? Is this just a way of putting a forced answer to a question that we cant solve? Like the creation of our existence or the so-called plan laid before us? Too deep? Anyways, in everything we hear there is usually some truth to what is said. The real strategy is finding out what is true and what is not.

 

While there has been no scientific confirmation of the physical reality of reincarnation, where the subject has been discussed, there are questions of whether and how such beliefs may be justified within the discourse of science and religion. Some champions of academic parapsychology have argued that they have scientific evidence even while their detractors have accused them of practicing a form of pseudoscience. Skeptic Carl Sagan asked the Dalai Lama what he would do if a fundamental tenet of his religion (reincarnation) were definitively disproved by science. The Dalai Lama answered, "If science can disprove reincarnation, Tibetan Buddhism would abandon reincarnation…but it's going to be mighty hard to disprove reincarnation." Sagan considered claims of memories of past lives to be worthy of research, although he considered reincarnation to be an unlikely explanation for these.

 

Over the course of 40 years, University of Virginia psychiatrist Ian Stevenson studied more than 2,500 cases of young children who claimed to remember previous lives. Twelve volumes were written by him, including Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect, Reincarnation and Biology: A Contribution to the Etiology of Birthmarks and Birth Defects, and Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation. He documented the child's statements and the evidence of family members and other witnesses in his instances, frequently coupled with what he thought to be connections to a deceased person who in some ways seemed to match the child's memories. Stevenson also looked at instances in which he believed that birthmarks and birth abnormalities matched the wounds and scars on the deceased. Medical records, such as images from an autopsy, were occasionally included in his documentation. Stevenson anticipated criticism and mistrust of his beliefs since claims of former life memories are always open to accusations of fraudulent recollections and the simplicity with which such claims can be faked. He did look for contradictory information and other reasons for the claims, but as the Washington Post wrote, he frequently came to the conclusion that no regular explanation was enough.

 

Jim B. Tucker, Antonia Mills, Satwant Pasricha, Godwin Samararatne, and Erlendur Haraldsson are a few other academic scholars who have engaged in comparable study, although Stevenson's works continue to be the most well-known. Carl Sagan found Stevenson's work in this area to be so impressive that he used what were apparently Stevenson's investigations as an example of meticulously gathered empirical data in his book The Demon-Haunted World. Though he rejected reincarnation as a reasonable explanation for the stories, he wrote that the phenomenon of purported past-life memories should be further studied. In his book The End of Faith, Sam Harris mentioned Stevenson's writings as a component of a collection of evidence that appears to support the reality of psychic phenomena but only draws on arbitrary human experience.

 

Paul Edwards, a philosopher, called Ian Stevenson's reincarnation tales "purely anecdotal and cherry-picked," refuting Stevenson's assertions. The stories, according to Edwards, are the products of selective thinking, suggestion, and false recollections that arise from the researcher's or the family's belief systems and cannot be taken into account as empirical proof. The philosopher Keith Augustine wrote in critique that the fact that "the vast majority of Stevenson's cases come from countries where a religious belief in reincarnation is strong, and rarely elsewhere, seems to indicate that cultural conditioning (rather than reincarnation) generates claims of spontaneous past-life memories." Further, Ian Wilson pointed out that a large number of Stevenson's cases consisted of poor children remembering wealthy lives or belonging to a higher caste. In these societies, claims of reincarnation are sometimes used as schemes to obtain money from the richer families of alleged former incarnations. Later, Stevenson wrote a book titled European Cases of the Reincarnation Type that collected cases from societies where reincarnation is not widely accepted. Robert Baker said that despite this, all of the past-life experiences examined by Stevenson and other parapsychologists are explicable in terms of well-known psychological characteristics, such as a combination of confabulation and cryptomnesia. Reincarnation conjures assumptions, according to Edwards, that are at odds with contemporary science. Reincarnation is subject to the rule that "extraordinary claims deserve extraordinary evidence" due to the fact that the vast majority of individuals have no memory of former lifetimes and that no mechanism has been empirically proven to allow a personality to escape death and move to another body. Researchers like Stevenson were aware of these restrictions. 

 

Confabulation is a memory error in psychology that is described as the creation of false, distorted, or misconstrued memories about oneself or the outside environment. It is typically linked to a particular subset of dementias or certain types of brain injury, particularly aneurysms in the anterior communicating artery. Confabulation is a behavior that the basal forebrain is thought to be involved with, while research into this topic is currently ongoing. When someone confabulates, their memories are distorted or confused in terms of their temporal framing (such as timing, sequence, or duration), and these distortions can range from small mistakes to outright fabrications. They generally have a high degree of confidence in their memories, even when they are contradicted by other pieces of information.

 

When a forgotten memory resurfaces but is not recognized by the person as such, they think it to be something brand-new and unique. This condition is known as cryptomnesia. A person could mistakenly believe they came up with a joke, a music, a name, or a thought when they didn't mean to copy anything; instead, they were simply experiencing a memory as if it were a fresh source of inspiration. This is a memory bias.

 

Stevenson also asserted that there were a few instances that might have provided proof of xenoglossy, including two in which a subject was said to have engaged in conversation with speakers of the other language rather than just memorizing its terms. Reexamining these cases, University of Michigan linguist and skeptic Sarah Thomason came to the conclusion that "the linguistic evidence is too poor to provide support for the assertions of xenoglossy."

 

The paranormal phenomena of a person being able to speak, write, or understand a foreign language that they could not have learned naturally is called xenoglossy, also known as xenolalia. French parapsychologist Charles Richet coined the term "xenoglossy" in 1905. In addition to modern assertions made by parapsychologists and reincarnation researchers like Ian Stevenson, the New Testament contains claims of xenoglossy. The existence of xenoglossy as a real phenomenon is not supported by science. In xenoglossy, there are two distinct categories. Incomprehensible use of an unlearned language is known as repetitious xenoglossy, while comprehensively using an unlearned language as if it had already been learnt is known as responsive xenoglossy.

 

Some reincarnationists—Stevenson notoriously not included—place great emphasis on purported past-life memories that are regained while hypnotized during past-life regressions. The technique, which was made popular by psychiatrist Brian Weiss, who claims to have taken patients back in time more than 4,000 times since 1980, is sometimes referred to as a form of pseudoscience. These so-called memories have been shown to include historical mistakes derived from historical texts, popular historical myths, or contemporary popular culture. Studies on people who had past-life regressions found that the two most significant influences on the reported details of recollections were the individuals' reincarnation beliefs and the hypnotist's suggestions. The use of hypnosis and provocative inquiries may make a subject more prone to have false or distorted recollections. The source of the recollections is most likely cryptomnesia and confabulations, which mix experiences, knowledge, imagination, and suggestion or instruction from the hypnotist, as opposed to recall of a prior existence. Once they are formed, the memories become identical to memories based on actual life occurrences for the person.

 

Because it offers no proof for its assertions and makes people more susceptible to false recollections, past-life regression has been criticized as immoral. According to Luis Cordón, this can be harmful because it breeds delusions while passing itself off as therapy. Due to the fact that the memories are perceived as being equally vivid and impossible to distinguish from authentic recollections of actual occurrences, any damage may be challenging to repair.

 

The use of past-life regressions as a treatment technique has been contested by APA recognized groups as unethical. Furthermore, the hypnotic technique used to support past-life regression has come under fire for leaving the subject open to the implantation of false memories. Gabriel Andrade contends that past-life regression violates the Hippocratic Oath's first, do no harm (non-maleficence) tenet since the implantation of false memories may be damaging.

 

Now that we have a phenomenal understanding of reincarnation and the simplified version of the soul, we would like to share some examples of first hand accounts where reincarnation shows itself. All we ask of you, the listeners, is to give us your honest opinions and maybe share your own stories or beliefs. 

 

Thank you to Listverse.com for some of the first hand accounts of reincarnation

 

10. Edward Austrian

A four-year-old boy called Edward Austrian had been complaining of a sore throat since his mother can remember. He also can’t stand grey, drizzly days, apparently. Around this time, the little boy began referring to his sore throat as his “shot”. His mother thought nothing of it. After all, kids mix up their words all the time. Doctor after doctor led to an unnecessary tonsil removal, which then led to an unexplained cyst developing in Edward’s throat. His parents were understandably worried. But then something strange happened. Edward started telling his mum detailed stories from WWI – things a four-year-old wouldn’t be able to absorb and remember from a TV show or movie. He spoke of life on the trenches and the day-to-day goings on of the war. And then… one day… he told his mother a graphic story of being shot in the throat and killed. “My name was James. I was 18 years old, in France,” he told his parents. “We were walking along through the mud. It was damp. It was cold. My rifle is heavy. I remember looking out and seeing trees and then there was desolation. I heard a shot come from behind. It went through someone else, hit me square in the back of the neck and I felt my throat fill with blood.” Let’s remember this kid is FOUR YEARS OLD. So that’s not the kind of thing he would learn from the Wiggles, right?

 

9. Bruce Whittier

 

Bruce Whittier had recurring dreams of being a Jewish man hiding in a house with his family. His name had been Stefan Horowitz, a Dutch Jew who was discovered in his hiding place along with his family and taken to Auschwitz, where he died. During and after the dreams, he felt panicked and restless. He began to record his dreams, and one night he dreamed about a clock, which he was able to draw in great detail upon waking.Whittier dreamed about the location of the clock in an antiques shop and went to look. The clock was visible in the shop window and looked exactly like the one in his dreams. Whittier asked the dealer where it had come from. It transpired that the dealer had bought the clock from among the property of a retired German major in The Netherlands. This convinced Whittier that he really had led a past life.

 

8. Peter Hume

 

Peter Hume, a bingo caller from Birmingham, England, started having very specific dreams about life on guard duty at the Scottish border in 1646. He was a foot soldier of Cromwell’s army and his name was John Raphael. When put under hypnosis, Hume remembered more details and locations. He started to visit places he remembered with his brother and even found small items that appeared to have come from the era in which he had lived, such as horse spurs.With the help of a village historian in Culmstock, South England, he even managed to positively identify details about a church that he had known—he was able to tell her that the church used to have a tower with a yew tree growing from it. This was not a published fact, and it startled her that Hume knew it—the church tower had been taken down in 1676. In local registers, John Raphael was discovered to have been married in the church. A civil war historian, Ronald Hutton, investigated the case and asked Hume very era-specific questions while under hypnosis. Hutton was not satisfied that Hume was totally in tune with the era of his past life, as he could not answer all his questions in a satisfactory way.

 

7. Gus Taylor

 

Gus Taylor was 18 months old when he started to say that he was his own grandfather. Young children can be confused about their own identity and those of their family members, but this was different. His grandfather had died a year before Gus was born and the boy totally believed they were the same person. When shown some family photographs, Gus identified “Grandpa Augie” when he was four years old.There was a family secret that nobody had ever spoken about in front of or around Gus—Augie’s sister had been murdered and dumped in the San Francisco Bay. The family were perplexed when the four-year-old child started to talk about his dead sister. According to Gus, God gave him a ticket after he died. With this ticket he was able to travel through a hole, after which he came back to life as Gus.

 

6. Imad Elawar

 

Five-year-old Imad Elawar from Lebanon started talking about his life in a nearby village. The first two words he spoke as a child were the names “Jamileh” and “Mahmoud,” and at the age of two he stopped a stranger outside and told him they had been neighbors. The child and his parents were investigated by Dr Ian Stevenson. Imad made over 55 different claims about his previous life.The family visited the village that the boy had been spoken of, together with Stevenson, and found the house where he claimed he had lived. Imad and his family were able to positively identify thirteen facts and memories that were confirmed as being accurate. Imad recognized his previous uncle, Mahmoud, and his mistress from a former life, Jamileh, from photographs. He was able to remember where he had kept his gun, a fact verified by others, and was able to have a chat with a stranger about their experiences during their army days. In total, 51 out of 57 of the experiences and places mentioned by Imad were verified during the visit.

 

5. James Leininger

 

At a very young age, James Leininger started to remember his life as a navy fighter pilot. Airplanes were the only toys he would play with, and after a time his plane obsession turned into a nightmare. He lost a lot of sleep and kept talking about flying planes, about the weapons, and the scary accident with his plane. James, who only watched kids’ programs on TV, showed his mother what a fighter plane drop tank was, and was able to check a plane over as a pilot would during a preflight check when he was just three years old.The child was able to tell his father that he used to take off from a boat called the Natoma and knew the name of a co-pilot, Jack Larson. The Natoma was indeed a Pacific ship and Larson was still alive. After James told his father that he had been killed in his plane at Iwo Jima, his father discovered a pilot called James M. Huston Jr. who had died there. This was especially strange, as James had started to sign his drawings “ ‘James 3’ ”. James’ family contacted Huston’s sister, and she sent James a bust and a model airplane that had been returned to her by the navy after her brother’s death.

 

4. Ruth Simmons

 

One of the best-known reincarnation stories is that of Ruth Simmons. In 1952, she underwent a series of hypnosis sessions during which her therapist, Morey Bernstein, regressed her back to her birth. She suddenly started to speak with a heavy Irish accent and remembered many specific details from her life as Bridey Murphy, who had lived in Belfast, Ireland in the 19th century. Not many of the things she mentioned could be verified. However, she recalled two people from whom she used to buy her food—a Mr. John Carrigan and a Mr. Farr. The town directory for 1865–66 lists the two individuals as grocers. The story is shown in a film from 1956 called The Search for Bridey Murphy.

 

3. Cameron Macauley

 

Cameron Macauley was born in Glasgow, Scotland. Since the age of two he told his mother he was from an island called Barra, off the west coast of Scotland. He talked about a white house and a beach on which planes landed. He had a black-and-white dog and his dad’s name was Shane Robertson—he was killed by a car. He drew the white house by the beach and complained of missing his other mother. As the child got more and more upset about missing Barra, his mother took him on a visit the the island, which was an hour-long flight away. The plane landed on the beach.The family found a white house owned by the Robertsons, and the black-and-white dog was in one of their family photographs, along with a car that Cameron had remembered. However, nobody recalled Shane. Cameron knew his way around the white house and was able to point out all its peculiarities.As he grew older, Cameron slowly lost his memories, but he is still convinced that death is not the end. Like Gus Taylor, he stated that he ended up in his mother’s tummy after he fell through a hole. The story was picked up by British television, making the Barra case one of the best-documented reincarnation stories.

 

2. Parmod Sharma

 

Parmod Sharma was born in India in 1944. When he reached the age of two, he told his mother that his wife in Moradabad could cook for him, so she did not have to. Morabad was 145 kilometers (90 mi) away from his birthplace, Bisauli. Between the ages of three and four, Parmod described a business venture called “Mohan Brothers,” where he had worked with family members, selling cookies and water. He built miniature shops and served his family mud cookies and water. He had been a well-off tradesman and complained about the financially less rosy situation of his current family. He advised his parents against eating curd, and would not touch it himself. He said that he had become very ill after eating it in his old life. Parmod hated being submerged in a bath and told his parents that he had died in a bathtub. Pramod's parents promised to take him to Moradabad once he had learned to read. It turned out that there was a family by the name of Mehra that had run a soda and cookie shop called “Mohan Brothers.” Manager Parmanand Mehra had died in 1943 after gorging on curd and suffering from a gastrointestinal illness and peritonitis, from which he had eventually died. Parmanand had tried medicinal baths as a cure and had been given a bath very shortly before his death.

 

1. Steve Jobs

A software engineer called Tony Tseung, an employee of Apple, sent an email to a Buddhist group in Thailand, asking if they could tell him what had happened to Apple founder Steve Jobs after he died. The answer was that Jobs is now a celestial philosopher, in a glass palace that hovers over the Apple headquarters in Cupertino, California.In Malaysia, a group of Jobs’ admirers performed a religious ceremony after his funeral. During the ceremony, the group each took a bite from an apple before throwing it into the sea to speed up the process of reincarnation. Phra Chaibul Dhammajayo, one of the abbots at the Dhammakaya Temple, is convinced that Jobs has already been reborn. He is now a divine presence with a specific interest in science and art. Followers have received this information through a special message that was broadcast worldwide. Apparently, more specific details will be communicated when Jobs feels the need to pass on any knowledge or messages.

 

Ok… one last person who claims they were reincarnated!

Born on Dec. 11, 1926, Shanti Devi appeared to be a perfectly normal baby, until around the age of four when she began to ramble on about a past life in a town called Mathura, nearly 75 miles away..

Shortly after she learned to speak, Devi regaled her parents with stories of her past life in a town neither she nor her parents had ever been to.

Simple events would trigger memories of this life, like eating a meal that reminded her of foods she used to enjoy in her old days, or while getting dressed she’d tell her mother about the clothes she used to wear.

Devi eventually informed her parents that her previous name was Lugdi and that she died shortly after bearing a son in October of 1925. She added uncanny details about her labor pains and the surgical procedures she underwent.

Such facts, it seemed, couldn’t have been conjured up by even the most imaginative child.

When she revealed the name of her former husband, Devi’s family was shocked to discover that he was still alive and lived precisely where Devi had said she was from. A historic meeting was arranged between them ⏤ that not even science could quite explain.

Devi recalled in startling detail all the shops and streets in the town. She also began to speak of her husband, a merchant whose name she refused to reveal until she was about nine years old. But she did tell her parents that he was fair, had a wart on his left cheek, and wore reading glasses.

Despite the unusual specificity of her memories, Devi’s parents dismissed her recollections as mere childishness. But when Devi revealed that her husband’s name was Pandit Kedarnath Chaube, sometimes referred to as Kedar Nath, a friend of the family decided to find out if there was any truth to what she’d been saying.

The friend sent a letter to a merchant named Kedar Nath in Mathura to inquire about Devi’s unusual memories. To the friend’s surprise, Nath wrote back confirming all the details. Nath also agreed to send a relative to Devi’s home to gauge the situation.

In an effort to test her knowledge, the relative was brought before Devi first and introduced as her husband. Devi was not fooled and said that no, this was her husband’s cousin.

Shocked, Nath and the child he had with Lugdi, now ten years old, entered the home themselves. Upon seeing them, Devi reportedly burst into tears.

Nath requested to speak with Devi on his own, and by his own admission, claimed that each response she gave to his questions was entirely accurate.

“He found the replies to be quite correct and was moved to tears!” Read an account by an investigator on the case in 1937. “It was as though his dead wife was speaking.”

Shanti spent several days with Kedar Nath and his son before they had to return to Mathura. Saddened by their departure, she pleaded with her parents to let her take a trip to her former home.

She promised she could lead them directly to her old house and, perhaps to persuade them further, explained that she had a box of money buried there.

Devi’s parents relented — though considering the story had captured the attention of Mahatma Gandhi, they hardly had a choice. The famed Indian leader set up a commission to investigate the astonishing case, and in November of 1935, a dozen researchers joined Devi and her parents on the three-hour train ride to Mathura.

As one of the investigators recounted, “Once getting out of the railway station… the girl was put in the front seat and our carriage went ahead of all others. Necessary precautions were taken that no pedestrians should be allowed to lead the way. The driver was instructed to follow the route indicated only by the girl, without caring as to where he went.”

Sure enough, Devi had no problem directing the group to what she claimed was her former home. Along the way, she noted various streets that hadn’t been paved earlier and buildings that weren’t there during her previous life. The driver confirmed these observations were correct.

While exploring the house with Kedar Nath, a member of the commission asked about the buried treasure she mentioned. Shanti Devi promptly ran upstairs and headed straight to a corner of a room, declaring the box was hidden beneath the floorboard. Kedar Nath opened up the flooring and indeed found a small coffer. It was empty.

Shocked, Shanti Devi began looking inside the hole, certain the money was there. Kedar Nath then admitted that he had taken the cash after his wife’s death.

Devi’s reunion tour of Mathura continued to her former parents’ house. “She not only recognized it but was also able to identify her old ‘father’ and ‘mother’ in a crowd of more than 50 persons,” one of the investigators wrote. “The girl embraced her ‘parents’ who wept bitterly at her sight.”

Though she wished to stay in Mathura longer, Devi’s current parents and the investigators were soon headed back to Delhi. In their report, the commission found “no rational explanation” for what they witnessed.

Not only was Devi able to recall her life before, it seemed, but she also had an explanation for the afterlife. In 1936 and 1939, she relayed her experience in death to skeptics and hypnotists alike.

She claimed that at the time of her death, she felt dizzy and enveloped in a “profound darkness” before a flash of light revealed four men in yellow underwear before her.

“All the four seemed to be in their teens and their appearance and dress were very bright,” she once said while under hypnosis. “They put me in a cup and carried me.”

Devi said she saw the Hindu god Krishna showing each person a record of their good and bad activities on earth and telling them what would happen to them next.

Then, Devi said she was taken to a golden staircase from which she could see a river as “clean and pure as milk.” She said she saw souls there and they appeared like flames in lamps.

Years later, a 1958 newspaper interview followed up with her. At the time, Shanti Devi was 32 years old and had never married. She was living a quiet, spiritual life in Delhi.

She also said she’d planned to form an organization “devoted to the idea of living our lives according to the dictates of the inner voice.”

Shanti Devi passed away in 1987 at the age of 61. However, her story lives on courtesy of a book written by Swedish author Sture Lonnerstrand in 1994, which was translated to English in 1998.

Okay so that last one definitely seems a little… off kilter to say the least. One recurring theme with a lot of these stories though, is that the prior life that's experienced was cut short during a traumatic event. Now as we all know, most hauntings seem to be along the same lines. So are hauntings just reincarnation of the life lost with unfinished business? Stuck in Purgatory? I guess after this long ass episode we still don't have any answers. Hopefully, though, we have put you closer on the track to figuring it out for yourselves. Hey! If you figure something out, make sure to drop a line. After all, if we can't figure it out in this life, maybe we will be around to talk about it in  the next.

 

The Best Movies About Reincarnation And Coming Back To Life (ranker.com)

Why isn't The Mummy on this list?!?!?!

The Servant Girl Annihilator (Your Jack the Ripper is Showing)

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We’ve all heard the story of Jack the Ripper, right? Hell, we did a two-parter on the case not too long ago. You know the story. Some crazy person, running around hacking up people, disemboweling them, and nobody knows who it was. You know, that old chestnut. There were other cases similar to the Jack the Ripper case, like the Vallisca ax murders, the Hinterkaifeck Murders, and quite a few more that we’ve covered right here on the Midnight Train. 

 

Well, this story is right in line with those unsolved atrocities and… it happened before Jack the Ripper decided to go all willy nilly and mutilate a bunch of poor women.

 

The Servant Girl Annihilator, also known as the Austin Axe Murderer and the Midnight Assassin (which is my favorite for obvious reasons), was a still, as of yet, unidentified serial killer who preyed upon the city of Austin, Texas, between 1884 and 1885. The murderer’s nickname originated with the writer O. Henry. Apparently he had mentioned the murderer in a letter he had written, coining the dipshit murderers name.

 

The brutal killings in Austin occurred three years before Jack the Ripper terrorized London's East End (and there are some who believe the Servant Girl Annihilator and Jack the Ripper were the same person and we’ll touch on that later). Although these murders happened 75 years before the term serial killer was coined, it still sealed Austin's reputation as the first city in America to have a serial killer — and the peice of crap responsible to be known as the first serial murderer in the country. Not exactly someone sane is running to be the first, but someone has to be the first something, right?

 

First, let’s talk about Austin, Texas and a smidge of its history.

 

As per Wikipedia:

Evidence of habitation of the Balcones Escarpment region of Texas can be traced to at least 11,000 years ago. Two of the oldest Paleolithic archeological sites in Texas, the Levi Rock Shelter and Smith Rock Shelter, are located southwest and southeast of present-day Austin respectively. Several hundred years before the arrival of European settlers, the area was inhabited by a variety of nomadic Native American tribes. These indigenous peoples fished and hunted along the creeks, including present-day Barton Springs, which proved to be a reliable campsite. At the time of the first permanent settlement of the area, the Tonkawa tribe was the most common, with the Comanches and Lipan Apaches also frequenting the area.

The first European settlers in the present-day Austin were a group of Spanish friars who arrived from East Texas in July 1730. They established three temporary missions, La Purísima Concepción, San Francisco de los Neches and San José de los Nazonis, on a site by the Colorado River, near Barton Springs. The friars found conditions undesirable and relocated to the San Antonio River within a year of their arrival. Following Mexico's Independence from Spain, Anglo-American settlers began to populate Texas and reached present-day Central Texas by the 1830s. The first documented permanent settlement in the area dates to 1837 when the village of Waterloo was founded near the confluence of the Colorado River and Shoal Creek.

 

Got all that? Good… maybe you can explain it to me later. Just kidding… kind of.

The victims

 

The first unfortunate victim was Mollie Smith, a 25-year-old cook working for the Walter Hall residence on Sixth Street (then named Pecan Street). She was killed on December 30, 1884, in a grisly killing filled with an extreme amount of blood due to the ax wounds to her head, abdomen, chest, legs, and arms. Her body was found outside and placed in the snow next to the family outhouse. She was attacked with an axe in her sleep, dragged into the backyard, raped and murdered. Walter Spencer, 30 yrs. old, also attacked and wounded.

 

The second poor victim was Eliza Shelly, a young woman who worked as a cook for the family of Dr. Lucian Johnson. Killed a few months after Mollie Smith, Shelly had been brutally murdered on Cypress Street on May 7, 1885, and her head left almost completely split from the blows of an axe. She was the mother of three children.

 

Because of the killer's apparent weapon of choice — an axe — the murders were first known as the Austin Axe Murders until a well-known resident, William Sydney Porter (that writer guy with the pen name, O. Henry) wrote in a letter to a friend: "Town is fearfully dull, except for the frequent raids of the Servant Girl Annihilators, who make things lively during the dead of night." After his letter became public, locals and reporters began referring to the murderer as the Servant Girl Annihilator. 

 

On May 23, 1885, a third hapless woman, also a young servant person, became the next victim. Her name was Irene Cross and she lived on East Linden Street, just across from Scholz Garten. A reporter on the scene after her vicious attack stated that she looked as if she had been scalped. This victim was killed with a knife, as opposed to the aforementioned ax. Was this attack the work of the Annihilator or a different lunatic? 

 

As summer dwindled down, August brought forth the arrival of a horrendous attack on Clara Dick. Later that month, another servant named Rebecca Ramey was wounded and her 11-year-old daughter Mary was killed.

 

At this time, the citizens of Austin were scared as shit and began protecting their homes with extra measures. Other cautions, such as increased patrols in neighborhoods, going home before sunset, and 24-hour saloons closing at midnight, we all also put into place. (It's worth noting that despite the legend, Austin's famous moontowers were not constructed during this time. They came later in the 1890s.)

 

Next victims were 20 year old Gracie Vance and her 25 year old boyfriend Orange Washington. They were sleeping in a shack behind the home of Vance's boss when the couple was brutally attacked with an ax. According to the local paper, Vance's "head was almost beaten into a jelly." Gracie was also dragged into the backyard, raped and murdered.

Lucinda Boddy and Patsy Gibson, both only 17 yrs. old, were also attacked and wounded. 

 

Weird note here, up to this point all the victims were African-American, but they were not all servant girls. And many noted that white residents had not been attacked. At least not yet.

 

The final two murders occurred on Christmas Eve (or possibly December 28th), 1885. First, 41 year old Sue Hancock, the mother of two, described as "one of the most refined ladies in Austin," was found in her backyard (now the Four Seasons Austin) by her husband. She had been dragged there while sleeping and succumbed to her wounds.

 

Hours later, 17 year old Eula Phillips, "one of the prettiest women in Austin," was found dead in her in-laws backyard (where the Austin Central Library is now located) she was also dragged into the back yard, raped and murdered. Her 24 year old husband, Jimmy Phillips Jr, sustained severe wounds in the attack. Ultimately, both spouses of Sue Hancock and Eula Phillips were accused, but found not guilty of the murders.

 

After the Christmas Eve murders in 1885, the killings stopped, but the fear was still palpable. At the time of the murders, Austin had been changing from a small frontier town to a cosmopolitan city, but the reputation it acquired because of the crimes put a halt to the city's growth.

 

The suspects

Although approximately 400 men were eventually rounded up by authorities and questioned in the killings, all suspects were released and the murders remain unsolved. However, there are a few names from history that stand out as possible murder suspects.

 

Nathan Elgin was native of Austin and a young African-American domestic servant who knew the streets of his hometown. 

 

The majority of this next part was taken from the website servantgirlmurders.com

 

Late one night in February 1886 a saloon in Masontown in east Austin was the scene of a violent and disturbing incident. The surrounding neighborhood was in an uproar because a drunken, raging man had dragged a girl from the saloon to a nearby house where he could be heard beating and cursing her while she screamed for help. The entire neighborhood had come out in the streets and the commotion caught the attention of a nearby police officer. Police officer John Bracken arrived on the scene and the saloon keeper, Dick Rogers and a neighbor, Claibe Hawkins, went with Bracken to stop the man from beating the girl to death.

 

Rogers and Hawkins went into the house and pulled the man away from the girl and into the front yard. As Rogers and Hawkins grappled with the man, Officer Bracken got out the handcuffs. The man would not be subdued – he threw off Rogers and Hawkins and knocked Bracken off his feet. The man turned on them and brandished a knife. As Bracken tried to recover a shot rang out. Bracken drew his pistol and fired. The shot brought down the raging man.

The man’s name was Nathan Elgin. There was no explanation for Elgin’s rage at the girl, named Julia.

Bracken’s shot did not kill Elgin instantly but it did leave him paralyzed and mortally wounded; he died the following day.

A subsequent autopsy revealed that Bracken’s bullet had lodged in Elgin’s spine which accounted for the paralysis. The doctors had also noticed another detail – Elgin was missing a toe from his right foot.

During the investigations of the crimes the authorities had carefully noted the footprints which were often bloodstained and had made distinct impressions in the soil as the perpetrator carried the weight of the victim.

Apart from general measurements of size and shape, footprints in most instances are not especially distinctive and they would not have been much use to the authorities had they not possessed some unusual feature. But the footprints left behind at the Servant Girl Murder crime scenes did share a very distinct feature – one of the footprints had only four toes.

The authorities never shared this fact with the press or the general public during the course of 1885. The press frequently complained about the secrecy surrounding the murder inquests and argued that making all the details of the crimes public would facilitate the capture of the responsible parties more quickly. The authorities disagreed and kept certain details of the cases to themselves – details that they hoped would eventually identify the perpetrator and link him to the crime scenes.

After Nathan Elgin’s death the authorities unexpectedly had the direct physical evidence they had been waiting for – a foot that matched the distinctive footprints of the killer. But the foot belonged to a dead man. What were they to do with that information? What could they do with it?

To imagine the state of mind of the authorities at that time one has to understand the heightened state of fear and suspicion that was present in Austin at the beginning of 1886. In the month since the last murders in December 1885, the city’s police force had been tripled in size. A curfew had been enacted and private citizens had organized into patrols to guard the neighborhoods after dark. Strangers were forced to identify themselves or be evicted from the city. Saloons and other raucous downtown establishments, usually open twenty-four hours a day, were forced to close at midnight. A new era of law and order had begun. Would there have been any advantage in revealing that perhaps the midnight assassin was dead? And what if Elgin was not the mysterious murderer of servant girls? It was in the authorities’ best interest to wait and see if the murders continued. Maybe the authorities believed they had gotten lucky – they couldn’t arrest, prosecute of convict Elgin, but perhaps the problem had been solved. But in February 1886 it was still too early to be sure. It is important to remember that at the beginning of 1886, the Christmas Eve murders were not the last murders, simply the latest, and the investigations into the murders continued, notably with detectives still shadowing other suspects.

While the authorities were not able to make use of the evidence against Elgin, the defense attorneys for James Phillips and Moses Hancock certainly were. Eula Phillips, wife of James Phillips, and Susan Hancock, wife of Moses Hancock, had both been murdered on December 24, 1885 and both husbands were subsequently charged with murdering their wives.

In May 1886, during the trial of James Phillips, defense attorneys introduced into evidence floorboards marked with bloody footprints that had been removed from the Phillips house after the murder. They were compared to the footprints of the defendant, who removed his shoes and had his feet inked and printed in an elaborate demonstration in the courtroom. Even though Phillip’s footprints were substantially different in size than the bloody footprints on the floorboards, the jury was unconvinced. The motives of jealousy and drunkenness as argued by the prosecution convinced the jury and they found Phillips guilty of second degree murder.

When the case against Moses Hancock was finally brought to trial, the Hancock received some substantial legal help in the form of pro bono representation by John Hancock (no relation) a former U.S. Congressman, one of the state’s most prominent political figures and one of Austin’s most astute legal practitioners.

Also providing assistance for the defense rather than the prosecution, was Sheriff Malcolm Hornsby, who during his testimony, described making a cast of Elgin’s foot after his death, the significance of the missing toe, the similarities between Elgin’s footprint and the footprints left at the Phillips and Ramey murders, and that fact that there had been no further servant girl murders committed since Elgin’s death. Even so, the jury was not completely persuaded and after two days of deliberation, a hung jury was declared and the case was discharged without a verdict.

The verdicts in the Phillips and Hancock trials illustrated the consensus on the Servant Girl Murders and the motives behind them – that the murders had been committed by different persons with conventional motives.

Was Nathan Elgin the Servant Girl Annihilator? In my opinion, he most likely was based on 1) direct physical evidence linking Elgin to the crimes, 2) testimony of Sheriff Malcolm Hornsby as to Elgin’s ostensible guilt, 3) the fact that there were no further Servant Girl Murders after his death, and 4) Elgin fits the criminal profile of such a killer.

***

Nathan Elgin – A Criminology

The Servant Girl Murders were over 130 years ago and few official records pertaining to them have survived. Likewise, there is little surviving biographical information about Nathan Elgin, however the information that is available strongly correlates to traits associated with a Disorganized/Anger-Retaliatory (D/AR) serial killer profile, and the crime scenes of the Servant Girl Murders correspond exactly to that of anger-retaliatory crime scenes:

• In the anger-retaliatory rape-murder, the rape is planned and the initial murder involves overkill. It is an anger-venting act that expresses symbolic revenge on a female victim. Nettled by poor relationships with women, the aggressor distills his anguish and contempt into explosive revenge on the victim… the aggressive killer will either direct his anger at that woman or redirect his anger to a substitute woman. Because the latter type of scapegoating retaliation does not eliminate the direct source of hate, it is likely that it will be episodically repeated to relieve internal stresses. Dynamically, the rape-homicide is committed in a stylized violent burst attack for purposes of retaliation, getting even, and revenge on women.
• The perpetrator tends to choose victims from familiar areas… and may use weapons of opportunity in percussive assaults with fists, blunt objects or a knife.
• The subject tends to leave a disorganized crime scene, and the improvised murder weapon may be found within 15 feet of the body.

The following traits are common to the D/AR serial killer profile and I would argue that they are present in the historical record specifically in connection to Nathan Elgin:

• childhood abuse or neglect
• early violent episodes
• violent fantasy
• resentment of authority
• escalation
• stressors

Additionally, Nathan Elgin would have possessed the locational expertise critical to successfully enacting the murders and eluding the authorities, culminating in a distinctive signature killing style – the attack on sleeping female victim using blunt force to the head, carrying the body away from the house into the yard where the victim was then raped.

Childhood Abuse Suspicions

• All of the murderers were subjected to serious emotional abuse during their childhoods. And all of them developed into what psychiatrists label as sexually dysfunctional adults. 
• From birth to age six or seven, studies have shown, the most important adult figure in a child’s life is the mother, and it is in this time period that the child learns what love is. Relationships between our subjects and their mothers were uniformly cool, unloving and neglectful. (4)
• The disorganized offender grows up in a household where the father’s work is often unstable, where childhood discipline is harsh, and where the family is subject to serious strain brought on by alcohol, mental illness, and the like. (5)

One of the primary components in the creation of the D/AR serial killer profile is a dysfunctional, abusive relationship within the family and especially between the mother and the subject. The mothers often have psychological disorders or they have been victims of emotional and sexual abuse themselves and are then subsequently abusive with their own children. At best the mothers are emotionally distant and at worst they are physically and psychologically abusive.

Nathan Elgin was born in 1866, the fourth of five children in his family. The Elgin family had moved to Austin from Arkansas after the war, to the freedman’s community that came to be known as Wheatville. Nathan had three older siblings that had already married, started their own families and evidently lived normal lives while Nathan was still a child growing up in Austin. However the older siblings’ mother, Angeline, had been a different woman than Nathan’s mother, Susan. (6)

There is no record of what happened to Angeline, she presumably died or separated from her husband, Richard Elgin, but after she left, a woman named Susan Pearce appeared in her place to raise Nathan – whether she was his biological mother is unknown. I think this substitution in the maternal line is significant and I would speculate that Susan Pearce was an abusive catalyst in Nathan’s emotional development.

The 1880 census listed 14-year-old Nathan Elgin as still living with his parents; it noted his ability to read and write, and his occupation as “servant.” He was likely placed into service by his mother. For Nathan, being a domestic servant at that period in time would have entailed working in an environment with Victorian strictures and discipline, submitting to the authority of women, both black and white, carrying out whatever tasks were ordered without argument.  Habitual abuse or humiliation of young Nathan could have been facilitated by such conditions and it is easy to imagine him having suffered abuse in such a position considering the rage directed at this particular class of women only a few years later.

Any abuse Nathan experienced as a child without having the physical ability to stop it, would in the meantime have fueled an inner world of revenge fantasy and anger waiting to be unleashed. Not until he was a teenager would he finally gain the physical ability to express that anger, except toward whomever was the source. The source or its memory, the humiliation and shame they had used to define him, would retain the ability to make him feel helpless and impotent. The result, once he had gained maturity, would be not just fantasies of rage, but their physical expression, enacted again and again upon victims who were substitute for its source.

Early Violent Episodes – Resentment of Authority – Violent Fantasy

• These adolescents overcompensated for the aggression in their early lives by repeating the abuse in fantasy – but, this time, with themselves as the aggressors.
• He is seen as an explosive personality who is impulsive, quick-tempered, and self-centered.

In the summer of 1881, Nathan Elgin was arrested for carrying a pistol and getting into a confrontation with another young man near the Governor’s mansion, “they cursed each other for some time and aroused the neighborhood.” Such incidents were not particularly remarkable for that time period and the newspaper frequently reported similar skirmishes between young “bloods,” however it does demonstrate that Elgin already had a violent disposition at a young age.  

More remarkable was an incident in 1882, when Elgin sent a threatening letter to a deputy sheriff promising to “whip destroy and kill” the deputy the next time they met. The written expression of violent threats and fantasies, especially toward the police or other authorities, is one of the classic serial killer tells. Nathan’s letter was described “reckless and bloodthirsty” in the newspaper, a description that would later be more fittingly applied to the murders of 1885. 

Locational Expertise

Apart from committing the murders in the middle of the night and using the cover of darkness for concealment, an intimate knowledge of the city would have been key to the killer’s ability to elude the authorities.

Nathan Elgin had locational expertise – he had grown up in Austin as it was being built. As a child in the 1870s he would have seen the wood-framed buildings that lined Congress Avenue and Pecan Street replaced by brick and mortar storefronts. He would have seen the streets graded and the wooded hills cleared for elegant neighborhoods, schools and churches.

By 1885 he would have been intimately familiar with how the city worked and moved. He would have known all the shortcuts, the hiding places, which yards had dogs, which doors were left unlocked. He would have known how to go unnoticed and he would have known what was around every corner.

Escalation

• The disorganized killer has no idea of, or interest in, the personalities of the victims. He does not want to know who they are, and many times takes steps to obliterate their personalities by quickly knocking them unconscious or covering their faces or otherwise disfiguring them. 
• [The victim] will often have horrendous wounds. [The killer] does not move the body or conceal it.
• The offender is usually somewhat younger than his victims. 

In July 1884, there were two instances of women, both African American, being stabbed in the face as they slept. The women survived; the authorities investigated them as separate incidents. In August 1884, an African American woman was struck in the head with a smoothing iron as she slept. These nocturnal attacks, though not fatal, were so idiosyncratic in style that they must have been a fledgling attempt by an anger-retaliatory killer who would later escalate with gruesome results. 

In November 1884, police reports mentioned a non-fatal nocturnal assault on a domestic servant as she slept in her bed. This incident never appeared in the newspaper. 

A little over a month later, an African American woman named Mollie Smith was struck in the head with an axe as she slept; she was dragged into the backyard and raped. Her body was hacked to pieces by the killer and left at the scene. 

Mollie Smith’s murder set the pattern for all that followed.

Locational Expertise and Escalation and Signature in the Vance/Washington and Hancock/Phillips Murders

• The disorganized killer doesn’t choose victims logically, and so often takes a victim at high risk to himself, one not selected because he or she can be easily controlled… 
• …the assault continues until the subject is emotionally satisfied 
• The killer’s personal expression takes the form of his unique signature, an imprint left by him at the scene, an imprint the killer is psychologically compelled to leave to satisfy himself sexually.

After four murders the killer had become very adept and perhaps overly confident and by the time he entered the cabin of Gracie Vance he was confident enough to attack four persons simultaneously.

Gracie Vance was a domestic servant employed by William Dunham and she lived, along with Orange Washington, in a cabin in the rear of his property. When the killer entered Gracie’s cabin, instead of finding a solitary sleeping woman, he found three women and one man. Undeterred he proceeded to incapacitate all four as quickly as possible; however, one of the women was only briefly insensible and she went for help while the crime was still in progress.

Neighbors were awakened by the disturbance and the police were called. Dunham and the neighbors went to investigate and a man was seen fleeing the scene. They fired their pistols at him as he made his escape in the darkness. As with the other victims, Gracie Vance was found in the backyard; her face had been pulverized with a rock. The suspect had fled in the direction of Wheatville, just to the west — the neighborhood Nathan Elgin had grown up in. 

The Christmas Eve murders were in many ways the skeleton key to all the murders in that they demonstrated all the specific facets of the killer’s MO and signature — his locational expertise, his ability to improvise and adjust at the scene as well as his emotional escalation which demonstrated the extent to which he would go to enact a very specific sex murder scenario – an attack in the bedroom upon a sleeping victim, then rape and murder in the backyard – even when the completion of that scenario was problematic. 

Susan Hancock, unlike the other victims, was white, but other than that, the murder was carried out identically to the previous murders. It is unlikely the killer had the specific intent to select a white victim; rather something about the location, the house, and the fact that there was an axe in the backyard attuned to the killer’s preferences.

As with the other victims, Susan Hancock was struck in the head with an axe while she slept and then carried into the backyard. Susan’s husband was asleep in another room but was awakened by the disturbance. He went into the backyard, saw a figure standing over his wife and threw a brick at him. Even though the perpetrator was armed with an axe he didn’t retaliate against Hancock – instead he fled the scene by jumping over a fence into the alley. Hancock then ran to the east side of the house to cut him off but he wasn’t there. 

Instead of fleeing into the darkness, the perpetrator ran west, back toward Congress Avenue, the city’s main thoroughfare. This peculiar evasion demonstrated that the perpetrator was very confident about where he was going — that he expected he could hide in plain sight.

It is interesting to note that had Hancock gone west to cut off the fleeing perpetrator he might have been able to stop him, which could have brought a definitive resolution to the murderous events of that year. However, seeing the perpetrator had escaped he went back to his wife and called for help.

Heading toward Congress Avenue, the perpetrator cut through the yard of the residence of May Tobin where his sudden appearance out of the darkness startled a young woman and her male companion – in his haste he could have literally run into the young woman. A confrontation occurs – the man threatens and insults him in demeaning and racist terms, perhaps the woman does too. The perpetrator has to retreat again and this would have been too much. The urge to kill had not been satisfied and would only have intensified after a humiliating confrontation. He follows the couple’s cab across town to the residence of James Phillips. The cab arrives, the young woman, Eula Phillips, discreetly makes her way into the quiet house. Less than an hour later she is found in the backyard, raped and murdered.

The killer could have dispatched Mr. Hancock and completed the crime at the Hancock residence but he did not. Likewise, he could have attempted to kill Eula and her companion in the relative seclusion of May Tobin’s premises. Instead, the killer’s primary motivation was the realization of a very specific violent sexual murder scenario.

I believe a confrontation must have occurred at May Tobin’s residence between Eula Phillips, her imperious companion, John Dickinson, and a very volatile Nathan Elgin. The confrontation had to have made him angry enough to pursue her across town — even though he had no idea where they were going or what he would find when he got there. I believe he was so angry that he pursued her at his own peril, when other, easier opportunities for a kill were in closer proximity.

The bloody footprints left at the Phillips house would subsequently be affirmatively compared to the footprints of the deceased Elgin. 

Austin Daily Statesman 3 June 1887

Stressors

• …by the very nature of their childhood, serial killers are most likely to lead lives full of stressful events. As children and adolescents they lack self-esteem, are isolated and maladjusted, and are therefore poorly prepared for coping with life as adults. 
• Historically, the retaliatory killer’s marriage will have been ill-fated and he will usually be in some phase of estrangement. …If he has a relationship, there will have generally been a history of long-term spousal abuse, which will not likely have been covered by criminal complaints. 

In the study of serial sexual homicides, a “stressor” is defined as an event, interaction or conflict in which the killer is reminded of past humiliations and abuses. To purge his feelings of shame, inadequacy or powerlessness the killer will endeavor to enact a murderous scene in which he is powerful and in total control.

In the case of Nathan Elgin, there is a remarkable example of a pre-crime stressor in the instance of his wife, Sallie, giving birth to a child the same night two women were being murdered on Christmas Eve. I believe that this was more than a coincidence and whatever stressors Elgin was susceptible to were triggered by this event. While the birth of a child would not normally seem to be cause for a murderous rampage, in the case of a D/AR profile it very well could.

Nathan had married Sallie Wheat in 1882. She was a year older than him. They did not live together. It is not unusual for serial killers to be married, however it is rare in the case of the D/AR killer profile because of their volatile temperament towards women. Sallie could have held the power in the relationship; conversely she could have been subjected to abuse herself. There is an indication that Sallie was aware, at least subsequently, of Nathan’s responsibility for the murders – as a means of disassociation she raised Nathan’s son under the surname Davis rather than Elgin. 

Post Mortem

• We read a great deal of theorizing about the series of murders in Austin, that all the assassinations were the work of a cunning lunatic — a monomaniac on the subject of murder.  From what I can learn, I don’t believe anything of the kind, and it is my deliberate opinion that these murders can not only be unearthed, but when probed to the bottom, it will be found that they were committed by different individuals and that in each case they were prompted by lust, jealousy, or hatred. (27)

A Monomaniac On the Subject of Murder would be an apt title for a 19th century dime novel. The quote above by Waco Marshal Luke Moore was closer to the truth than he realized but the ideas he articulated were not exclusive; Nathan Elgin was indeed a monomaniac on the subject of murder and he was motivated by lust, hatred and revenge.

In contemporary criminal investigations of serial sexual homicides, law enforcement will have decades of criminal profiles at their disposal which have been painstakingly created as a resource to match types of murders to specific types of offenders. In other words, they know who they’re looking for. And the more unusual the murders, the easier it is to focus the investigation toward a specific type of offender.

If the Servant Girl Murders were committed in this day and age and the perpetrator had left behind similar evidence, contemporary forensic resources and methods would create a criminal profile and evidence collected could confirm or eliminate potential suspects. The perpetrator would most likely be apprehended very quickly.

Serial killers who are apprehended and convicted are later questioned extensively by the authorities and they are usually quiet happy to talk about themselves because they frequently have an inherent superiority complex and are eager to expound upon their mastery and superiority even though they are behind bars.

It is interesting to note that the wounded Elgin was not interviewed by reporters, which was unusual – almost everyone involved in a shooting at that period in time had a reporter waiting for them after being attended to by a physician. Nor did the police make any statement regarding Elgin. The inquest of his death was held in secret. Elgin most likely spent his last hours delirious as doctors made a futile attempt at finding and removing the bullet that entered his side and lodged in his spine.

If Elgin’s murder spree had followed the trajectory of most disorganized serial killers, he would have continued to escalate until his confidence overcame his self-restraint and he would have eventually been caught or killed fleeing the scene.

Hypothetically, if he had been arrested for a murder, unless he specifically admitted to it, I doubt the authorities would have connected him to all the murders. Had he been arrested and interrogated I think Elgin would have baffled the police, but they wouldn’t have spent much time contemplating him; he would have undoubtedly been indicted, tried and hung in short order. The newspaper account of him would have been a typically villainous caricature from that time period, and people today would still wonder if he was responsible.

So now, another suspect and a possible connection to Jack The Ripper.

 

The next suspect was Maurice (no last name given), a Malaysian cook who worked at the Pearl House in downtown Austin. The Pearl House had connections to a majority of the victims of the Annihilator, therefore this theory took off like a mother fucker..

 

Allegedly, once Maurice left Austin only 3 weeks after the last murder, bound for New Orleans and ultimately London, the murders ended. And although the killings by Jack the Ripper were arguably more brutal in nature, many believe the Austin and London killers were actually the same person — a murderer that began to escalate his killings. Something that has been studied and noted by psychologists and other people smarter than us. Maurice apparently told acquaintances at the hotel that he was going to work aboard ships as a cook to earn his passage to London for a fresh start. A little known fact: the cook Maurice was actually suspected after the last murder and put under surveillance

 

According to Reddit author Sciencebzzt:

 

So many people who follow the Ripper case seem to want him to be a suave, elegant dude. A surgeon or a royal or a tormented upper class freak of some kind. But the facts don't suggest that. People say whoever killed the girls must have been skilled with a blade, that may be true, but the "brutality" suggests they were cut up like animals, skinned and gutted almost. The way a butcher... or a cook... might.

Anyway, back to Austin in 1886. Most experts on serial killers will tell you it's unlikely that the murders will just stop, unless the murderer is dead, in prison, or has moved elsewhere. In fact, most will say that the serial killers M.O. usually evolves, and changes... while the main motivation doesn't. This would explain the difference in the Ripper murders 3 years later... and also why they seem to have the same extremely brutal motivations. Jack the Ripper didn't use an axe the way the Servant Girl Annihilator did, however, this may have been because an axe was not a common thing to carry around in 1888 London, the largest city in the world at the time. In 1884 Austin, a town of 10,000 at the westernmost terminus of a railroad line, an axe was likely less conspicuous.

The scariest part though... is what happened after 1888. Whoever "he" was, he was obviously a highly driven, aggressive murderer, and he already had success (probably) in leaving Austin and getting away with murder.

Well, consider this: After 1888, similar serial murders of women started happening in port towns along major trade routes, like Nicaragua, Tunis, and Jamaica. If the Servant Girl Annihilator and Jack the Ripper were the same man, given the highly aggressive style, brutality and rapid succession of the murders, one quickly after the other... it's likely he killed far, far more girls than we know about, all over the world.

 

Did Maurice leave to avoid the authorities and escalate his murders or did her simply leave because his reputation was tarnished? 

 

The Jack the ripper murders were allegedly from april 3 1888 to 1891. 

 

The Vallisca ax murders were on June 10th, 1912

 

New orleans ax murders May 1918 to October 1919

 

I spent countless hours looking up ship records from 1886 and there is one record of a “Maurice” that went to England from the US. The funny thing is, his name was Maurice Kelly. The Ripper’s last known and documented victim was Mary Jane Kelly. It’s probably just a coincidence but what if it isn’t?

 

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The Grim Reaper and Death.

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The Grim Reaper

Nothing in life is guaranteed, except for death and taxes, as the old adage goes. We boldly circle April 15th  in red on our calendars so that it stands out like a swollen thumb. Of course, there is also the Internal Revenue Service here in the US, which has taken in over 3 trillion dollars in taxes from over 250 million taxpayers and felt that we aren’t paying enough and hired 87,000 more agents and gave them powers much like a government police force including lethal force. But we don’t need to be on that soap box today. 

 

What about death, though? The other certainty of being human is, for most of us, not quite as certain. Biologists define death as the complete cessation of all life processes, which eventually take place in all living organisms. Sadly, that description doesn't provide a clear picture. It doesn't describe what death feels like. How will you feel then? How will it look? What are our plans? Where are we headed?

 

The embodiment of death in a black robe and scythe in hand, the Grim Reaper, enters. We all know of this deity and its so-called motivations. It approaches everyone while watching for the last sand particle to fall, holding an hourglass in its hand. When that happens, it cuts the soul free with a razor-sharp slice that it has perfected over time. Although it may not be a pretty picture, it is distinct and obvious.

 

Putting a human face on the idea of death is ultimately the Grim Reaper's "job." But why did people feel the need to give the Grim Reaper such a gloomy appearance? Why not turn him into a welcoming and useful tour guide for the underworld? Why must he also be a man, for that matter?

 

We'll examine the Grim Reaper's history, the symbolism attached to his appearance, and how he's portrayed in other cultures. We'll also look at how the Reaper has been depicted in literature, film, and art. When we're done, you'll understand the identity of the Grim Reaper, his methods, and most crucially, the reason for his existence (should you see him prowling around your deathbed).

 

As Lewis Carroll once said, it's best to begin at the beginning. And for the Grim Reaper, the beginning can be found in the creation myths present in all cultures.

 

Death itself must exist before the Grim Reaper, a personification of death, can exist. Humans were initially formed as immortal creatures who descended from their level of perfection in almost all civilizations and religions. The Bible's most famous example is the story of Adam and Eve's fall. The Book of Genesis claims that God made Adam and Eve to care for the world He had made and to help populate it. The Garden of Eden was a paradise where the first man and woman resided. Adam was instructed by God to tend to the garden and gather fruit from all the trees, with the exception of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Unfortunately, Eve was duped into eating the fruit by Satan, who was speaking via a serpent. She then gave Adam the fruit, who consumed it as well despite being aware that it was wrong. Adam and Eve died physically and spiritually as a result of defying God.

 

In other religions, people were formed as mortals who made valiant attempts to become immortal but failed. This tale is told in The Epic of Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh, a character from Mesopotamian literature, was the progeny of a goddess and a human ruler. Gilgamesh, however, was still a mortal being, just like his closest buddy Enkidu. When Enkidu passes away, the great hero is troubled by the idea of dying and embarks on a mission to become immortal. He meets Utnapishtim, a man who has been granted eternal life by the gods, during his travels. Gilgamesh is promised immortality by Utnapishtim if he can last a week without sleeping. Gilgamesh eventually nods off, but Utnapishtim still gives him a plant that can restore its owner's health. Any hopes Gilgamesh had of becoming eternal are dashed when the plant is devoured by a hungry snake on the way home.

 

Gilgamesh returns home in the mythology of Mesopotamia and joyfully accepts his life as a mortal man. But most people aren't that laid back. The thought of our own mortality disturbs us. Everything we accomplish is constantly plagued by the shadow of death. Research supports this. According to a 2022 survey, 20% of Americans over the age of 50 experience anxiety when they consider their afterlife. 53 percent of respondents think ghosts or spirits exist, and 73 percent think there is life after death.

 

Undoubtedly, and as it has been for thousands of years, what happens to us as we die, as well as what occurs after we die, is a huge issue. Humans use a tried-and-true strategy: they give death a form they are familiar with in order to make sense of dying and mortality. As a result, a vague, invisible phenomenon becomes a concrete, observable phenomenon. You can comprehend death if you see a familiar face in it. Better yet, if you can put your anxieties aside and perceive death as a kind, gentle face.

 

It can, of course, also go the other way. Looking at death might reveal a frightful countenance. The terrifying visage of the Grim Reaper arose following a particularly trying period in human history, as we'll discover in the following section.

 

Why not give death a kind face if you're going to give it a human one? The Greeks adopted that strategy and gave death the name Thanatos. Hypnos, the deity of sleep, and his twin brother Thanatos were both shown as attractive, young males. Thanatos is depicted in some images as having wings and a put out flame. He had the responsibility of going to Hades, the Greek underworld, with the deceased. There, Charon, the ferryman on the River Styx, would receive the souls from Thanatos. In this interpretation, death is lovely and beneficial rather than fearful and ugly.

 

There are also feminine variations of death. The Valkyries were depicted as stunning young women in Norse mythology who carried soldiers' souls to their afterlife as well as acting as messengers for Odin. In actuality, the word "Valkyries" refers to "slain's choosers." They would ride on winged horses during battle and pick intrepid soldiers to perish by scouting the battlefield. They would then deliver these spirits to Odin's realm, Valhalla. The valiant spirits were recruited to participate in the terrible struggle known as Ragnarok after they reached the afterlife.

 

The Valkyries are comparable to angels, who serve as a spiritual bridge between God and people. Angels provide messages to mankind or defend them in some myths. In other tales, they converse with the dead and torture the sinners. Many religions and civilizations feature the Angel of Death, a spirit that removes a person's soul from the body at the moment of death. In Judeo-Christian tradition, the archangels Michael and Gabriel have served as death angels. The Islamic Angel of Death known as Azrael can occasionally be seen as a terrifying ghost with eyes and tongues covering every inch of his body. Every soul in the world has a birth and a death recorded in a vast ledger that Azrael keeps updated.

 

By the Middle Ages, the Angel of Death had been conceptually ingrained in both European religion and culture. But in the latter half of the 14th century, an epidemic occurrence changed how the common person perceived and reacted to death. The plague of the Middle Ages, one of the deadliest pandemics in human history, was that occurrence. The initial plague outbreak claimed at least 25 million lives, while subsequent plague outbreaks that recurred for centuries resulted in millions more deaths [source: National Geographic]. Fear swept the entire continent: fear of death, fear of an unknown epidemic, fear of the agony of the disease's late stages, when the skin on a victim's extremities grew black and gangrenous. All activities were characterized by a morbid atmosphere, which also had an impact on the period's writers and painters.

 

Unsurprisingly, skeletons started to represent death in artwork at this time. In reality, the skeletal form of death was frequently depicted in a similar manner by painters. He was frequently pictured with a crossbow, dart, or other weapon. These tools would eventually give way to the scythe, a mowing instrument with a long, curved blade attached at an angle to a long handle. Many artworks depicted the hereafter chopping down souls like grain by swinging its scythe through a throng of humanity. A young woman would occasionally stand at the grave to serve as a reminder of the connection between life and death. The idea that death might communicate with the living and lure them into the hereafter was another prevalent one. Due of this, skeletons are depicted dancing and having fun with people from all walks of life in the Dance of Death, also known as Danse Macabre.

 

These post-plague images of death led to the creation of the Grim Reaper. We'll look at the significance of his form and physique on the following page.

 

The Grim Reaper is an incredibly symbolic figure. When he eventually arrives, the items he is carrying and even the clothes he is wearing will reveal something about his character and his objectives. Let's examine some of the symbolism one symbol at a time.

 

Skeletons and skulls. It was common to observe piles of decaying bodies as the disease spread through Europe and Asia. One in five Londoners perished during the Great Plague of London, which struck the city between 1665 and 1666 [source: National Geographic]. Given how common death and dying are, it is reasonable that artists and illustrators started to represent death in the form of a corpse or skeleton. The skeleton figure serves as a metaphor for the decomposition of human flesh—what remains after worms and maggots have done their dirty work. It also feeds into one of the biggest concerns that people have: the dread of annihilation.

 

Black cloak. Black has long been connected to loss and gloom. Funeral attendees dress in black, and black hearses are used to transport the deceased. Black, however, is frequently associated with bad energies. The Reaper exudes mystery and danger thanks to his dark cloak. The Reaper hides beneath the shadows of his cloak, playing off our fears of the unknown because the things we can't see worry us just as much as the things we can see.

 

Scythe. The Reaper is seen clutching arrows, darts, spears, or crossbows in early depictions. These are the tools he use to kill his victim. A scythe eventually took the place of these other tools of killing. A scythe was an implement used for cutting grass or reaping grain. It made sense for this symbol to be put to death in an agricultural community where harvesting in the fall signified the end of a year. Death harvests souls for their passage into the hereafter in a similar manner to how we harvest our crops.

 

Hourglass. Sand pours from the upper to bottom glass bulb of the traditional hourglass over the course of an hour. It has endured into the digital age as a reminder to be patient as our computer loads a Web page or executes a command because it is such a potent representation of time and how it passes. Additionally, the Grim Reaper holds an hourglass, reminding us that time is running out. Our time is up when the sand is gone. We can only pray that we have more time to live than an hour.

 

It was so common to see this representation of the Grim Reaper in religious writings. The Book of Revelation in the Bible provides the best illustration. Four horsemen appear in Revelation 6:1–8 to bring about tragedies signifying the end of the world. Pestilence, war, famine, and death are the four horsemen. Only Death is expressly mentioned out of the four. He is seated on a pale horse, which is frequently mistaken for pale green, the hue of illness and decay. Most often, Death is portrayed as the Reaper himself, with a grimacing skull and scythe in hand, ready for the gory labor that lies ahead.

 

The Grim Reaper is still a popular subject for writers today. We'll examine at a few instances of the Reaper in popular culture in the section that follows.

 

Without a doubt, the Grim Reaper makes a fantastic character, which explains why he has long been a part of myths and legends. One typical tale, known as the "cheating death" tale, describes a person who tries to deceive the Grim Reaper in order to avoid dying. A well-known illustration is "The Legend of Rabbi Ben Levi" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Death for the holy man in Longfellow's poem arrives with the somber proclamation, "Lo! the time approaches near/When thou must die." Can I hold the sword of death? the rabbi enquiries. The rabbi receives the weapon from Death, who hurriedly flees and hides until God can step in to save him. Ben Levi is not killed when God appears, but the rabbi is instructed to give the sword back to its rightful owner.

 

Other influential works, such the Danse Macabre, or Dance of Death, a sort of drama that appeared after the Black Death, have established our contemporary understanding of the Reaper. These plays were intended to help churchgoers accept the certainty of death. A victim's encounter with death, symbolized as a skeleton, was portrayed in the performance, which typically took place in a cemetery or churchyard. The victim makes various justifications for why his life should be saved, but these are rejected, and death eventually follows him away with an entourage of other skeletal creatures. Several German engravers, like Bernt Notke and Hans Holbein, found that the scenes from this play made for interesting themes. These artists' prints depicted dancing skeletons amid people from all social classes as a message that nobody, not even royalty, could avoid death.

 

Ingmar Bergman's "The Seventh Seal" has had a similar impact on current culture. The 1957 movie is about Antonius Block, a knight who returns from the Crusades to discover that the disease has killed many of his countrymen. Max von Sydow plays Antonius Block in the role. Block is also awaited by Death, who is portrayed by Bengt Ekerot. Having reached a standstill, the knight challenges Death to a game of chess, which Block ultimately loses. The image of Ekerot's Death, a menacing white visage disguised beneath a black cloak, endures so vividly despite the story's unsettling nature.

 

The Grim Reaper also plays a key role in the following works:

 

• "(Don't Fear) The Reaper," a song released by Blue Öyster Cult in 1976 and now regarded as a rock classic
• "Because I could not stop for Death," a poem by Emily Dickinson, in which the narrator shares a carriage ride with Death
• "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens, in which the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come, cloaked and skeletal, appears to show Scrooge how he will die
• The Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett, which feature Death as an ally of mankind
• The Sandman by Neil Gaiman, a groundbreaking series of comic books in which Death appears as a girl
• "Death Takes a Holiday," a 1934 film about Death's decision to take a break from his normal business to see what it's like being mortal; a 1998 remake, "Meet Joe Black," starred Brad Pitt in the role of Death.
• "Scream," a 1996 homage to slasher flicks in which a murderous teen stalks his victims in a Reaper-like costume
• "Dead Like Me," a Showtime series that explores the lives (or afterlives) of a group of grim reapers who walk among the living

 

Whether he is funny or terrifying, a man or a woman, the Grim Reaper will probably always be a part of our pop culture diet. The Reaper will calmly wait in the shadows and come for each of us in the end, even if storytellers grow weary of dealing with death and dying.

 

Lastly, we thought since we are talking about the personification of death, we should also include some theories as to what happens after we die. Let’s see how many you, the listeners, agree with; and how many we think are stupid and illogical. Let's begin!

 

10. Excretion 

The idea that the universe is actually one enormous brain of a higher species has been around for many years. In certain containers, it might be one or more brains. This hypothesis states that the solar system is merely a brain cell. Humans are insignificant components of this cell as well. For that enormous brain, our thousands of millions of years of history occurred in a fraction of a second. Let's examine what it says on life after death. How are our own dead cells handled? They are discarded after being sloughed off. Similar things will happen to us if we are a small piece of a vast mind. That is, the universe will leave our consciousness where it dumps its waste when we pass away. Oh, how disgusting. I am aware that this notion is a little unusual and a little challenging to understand, but that is only because we do not fully understand it.

 

Just like that, my life became meaningless.

 

9. You enter the cosmic consciousness

 

Life: What is it? Knowing the answer to this question is crucial. We are conscious of our existence and are fully in charge of our own thinking. Only 20 watts of power are required for this by our brain. Most light bulbs use more electricity than that because this power is so low. Biologists are still unable to properly explain how our brain makes every decision so precisely. Our area of expertise is consciousness, but we do not understand its origin. And where does it go after we pass away? In accordance with Sir Roger Penrose and Stuart Hameroff's orchestrated objective reduction theory of the mind, coherent quantum processes in clusters of microtubules within brain neurons are biologically "orchestrated" to produce consciousness. You can imagine this universe as a sea of consciousness, according to this notion. Human mind originates from this place and travels back there once we die. Consciousness connects all things in the cosmos. You can think of it like this: If you think of the universe as a sea, then our consciousness would be a wave. It remains on the ground for some time before going back. The conclusion is that after we die, our consciousness returns to the universe, where it may remain eternally or it may temporarily inhabit another body.

 

Our consciousness is therefore deeply ingrained in the cosmos and is inherently perplexing.

 

8. Being Human Is just One Level

 

Reincarnation theory holds that after we die, our souls transfer into new bodies, giving rise to a subsequent birth. Dr. Ian Stevenson has studied incarnation and looked into countless instances of young people claiming to have lived before. He established the Division of Perceptual Studies at the University of Virginia and was an academic psychiatrist. He describes incarnation as the "survival of personality after death" at times. Along with genes and environment, he thinks it can provide a plausible justification for a variety of personality traits, including phobias. However, no one's allegations have been shown to be true. When this notion first emerged, little was understood about the universe's complexity and mysticism. Because of this, they only thought that our spirit may reincarnate in a different body on earth. What if your soul has a different physical body somewhere else in the universe? What if your spirit adopts a shape that we are unaware of rather than moving into a new body? This idea holds that our Souls or conscious entities can travel anyplace in the cosmos. This implies that you could once more be a person, a cool alien, a pointless insect, or something else else. In reality, we have no idea who or what we will be after we no longer exist as humans.

 

7. The Universe Ends

 

Can you demonstrate the reality of this world and the cosmos? The likelihood is that you will affirm and provide the objects and people in your environment with proof. However, according to the solipsistic hypothesis, there is nothing outside of your mind and brain. For you, what you see and hear is accurate, but you can never establish the veracity of the people in your immediate vicinity. Let's use GTA 5 as an example. When you are at a specific location in this game, everything around you is functional. There are other close residents there, so nothing strange is happening to you. What about the locations where you are not? Actually, those places didn't exist back then. According to this hypothesis, there is no other life in the cosmos besides you. Therefore, the universe stops existing after you pass away. That implies that every person you know and love likewise vanishes. Simply said, everything and everyone is a projection of your subconscious mind.

 

Therefore, take another look at the world and stop griping about pointless things. After all, you are the one who made it all.

 

6. Life Starts over again

 

I'm sure you've experienced this at least once in your life. that a location or person appears familiar to you, despite the fact that you've never been there or interacted with them before. This is known as déjà-vu. What if everything feels familiar? That implies that your life keeps repeating itself? Therefore, it appears that you may be familiar with that location or that individual. Two things could lead to this. First of all, your life is like a movie that never ends. Second: Although your life is repeated, you always have more influence over it. This reminds me a lot of the film Groundhog Day. Obviously, there are some significant differences; in this case, life restarts after death rather than after a day, and you have significantly less influence than in the film. Therefore, have luckier next time, bro. God knows how many times we are experiencing a life (which stinks) without even realizing it is a déjà-vu.

 

You have successfully entered a loop.

 

5. The Dreamer Wakes Up

 

It's entirely possible that our existence is nothing more than a creature's dream, despite the fact that this may sound like some made-up stories from the 1980s. You must have all had dreams. Only until we wake up do we know that dreams were just illusions. We become unable to distinguish between reality and dreams. Since dreams come from our own subconscious minds, their reality may or may not be in question. Vital Signs: The Nature and Nurture of Passion author Gregg Levoy concurs. And some of the most well-known concepts in the modern world, including Google, the Theory of Relativity, the first periodic table, etc., had their origins in dreams. Thus, it is possible for dreams to be quite real. So it's possible that we wake up in the "actual" world after we pass away. very similar to Inception The subject of what occurs when a dreaming creature passes away now arises. For the time being, there is no clear response to this query. We have no idea if the person who is waking up from sleep is a soul, a human, or something else entirely.

 

4. You Get Re-programmed

 

This hypothesis proposes that our world is a computer simulation. The most prevalent option on this list is this. It's likely that you have heard of this before. Nick Bostrom, an Oxford philosopher, made the initial suggestion in 2003. It contends that either all intelligent species perish before being able to produce an ancestor simulation or choose not to do so for some reason. Or perhaps we are merely acting out a simulation. In the event that we are simulations of our ancestors, our Consciousness is programmed. We play a very small part in the simulation. So, after erasing your memories, our programmer can transport us to a different space and time in the simulation when we pass away. They only need to make a few tweaks as they already have our base code. It is really difficult to foresee what those programmers will perform. They have a wide range of options at their disposal. What a blast?

 

3. Our Consciousness Is Unreal

 

The simulation hypothesis is also related to this notion. Avoid saying, "There are two theories on the same hypothesis." Theo Musk believes that the odds of us actually living in the "true" world are one billion to one. It is completely believable. This side, though, is substantially darker. As your "Consciousness" is merely programming, we lack our own free will. We appear to be operating according to a code. They are free to run or remove your code whenever they wish. They might have entered your code the last time you closed your eyes. While you slept last night, all of your memories were implanted in you. Even though it has only been a few hours, you suddenly believe you have been this person for years. They can also alter or remove your code the next time you go to bed. Depending on what they need, they could simply "remove" you from the simulation or completely change who you are. This reminds me a lot of Westworld. In this case, a fictitious universe is made, and characters are formed with certain duties allocated to them. We all contribute to some larger narratives. By simply adding new memories of a different location and possibly even time to the code, they can change the role of any person according to their needs. Everything you believe yourself to be is merely an illusion. Therefore, all that we are is a collection of 0s and 1s. And we carry out our pre-programmed actions.

 

We can at least be glad that our life, despite appearing to have no purpose, has helped our creators in some way. Or why did they even decide to make us?

 

2. Death Is An Illusion

 

Humans are the only animals on Earth with understanding of time, in contrast to other animals. We are aware that Time can only advance in units of days, months, or years. But is it really this time of day? The concept of time that we have today was developed by humans. Anything we believe about time could be incorrect. We think that time always flows like a river's stream. It is not required for the Universe to function in the same manner that we perceive time to function. Along with the present, the past and the future also exist in the cosmos, but we are not able to view them. Imagine that consciousness is the projecting light that causes us to see the film and that reality is a film strip. We are unable to notice the light unless a frame is placed in front of it. Its presence, however, cannot be disputed. The same principles govern Time and Reality. The past and future are not visible to us, but they coexist with the present. Three-dimensional space-time surrounds us and binds us. So how does this relate to death? You don't actually die. Death is just a fantasy. Because you are unable to exist in frames where you are dead, you must always exist in frames where you are living. Just that other people think you are dead because this does not hinder ‘their’ existence.

 

1. Anything is Possible

 

About what happens after death, we cannot be certain. The many-worlds interpretation hypothesis postulates that there are an almost unlimited number of realities. There are countless parallel universes, each containing every conceivable concept. There is a universe where you are a billionaire, Hillary won the election, and I am reading this essay you wrote. Therefore, in some universes, anything is conceivable after death. Reincarnation occurs in some universes, or heaven and hell exist in some as well. In some universes, after we pass away, we become zombies, whereas in others, we simply pass away. In some alternate universe, all of the aforementioned theories are plausible. We simply don't know what universe we reside in, or perhaps it hasn't been determined yet. You might pass away in the cosmos or theory you hold dear. According to the solipsism theory, your universe will come to an end when you pass away. Anything is possible, after all. 

The Most Dangerous Gangs; Part One of...

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So thank you to a beautiful and wonderful listener, we decided to do an addendum to our top police stings and follow it up with the top most dangerous mobs/gangs of all time. 

La Cosa Nostra

One of the biggest threats to American civilization from organized crime is the Cosa Nostra, sometimes referred to as the "Mob" or the "Mafia," which sprang from the Sicilian Mafia. The term "La Cosa Nostra," used by the US government, and "Cosa Nostra" by its members literally translates to "this thing of ours" or "our thing." This international organization of criminals, made up of many "families," is committed to combating crime and defending its members. These organized and major racketeering activities are being carried out by these crime families or groups, which are connected by kinship or by conspiracy. A wide range of illicit activities, including as murder, extortion, drug trafficking, government corruption, gambling, infiltrating lawful enterprises, labor racketeering, loan sharking, prostitution, pornography, tax fraud schemes, and stock manipulation are also engaged in by them. The Cosa Nostra is most prevalent in the urban areas of New York City, New England, and portions of New Jersey, Philadelphia, Detroit, and Chicago. The Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese families are among the prominent ones in the New York City region. Sometimes, members and associates of one La Cosa Nostra family collaborate with members of other La Cosa Nostra families to carry out joint criminal activities.

 

Within these families, members collaborate on "crews" that are commanded by a "capo" or "captain," who is in charge of overseeing his crew's illicit actions and offering them assistance and safety. The crews are made up of trusted outsiders known as "associates" and "made" members known as "soldiers." An associate must be of Italian heritage, have proven their capacity to make money for the Family, and have shown a willingness to use violence in order to become a "made member" of the Family. The three highest-ranking members who manage the Family are the Boss or Acting Boss, the Underboss, and the Consigliere, or advisor. Cosa Nostra has its origins in Italian organized crime, although it has existed as a distinct organization for a long time. It still collaborates with many criminal organizations with Italian headquarters today in a variety of illicit operations. 

 

Labor racketeering, in which it attempts to dominate, manage, and control a labor movement in order to have an impact on associated businesses and industries, is one of its main sources of income, power, and influence. Organized criminal organizations may profit greatly from labor unions, particularly their pension, welfare, and health funds. The mafia tries to regulate these schemes by giving businesses "sweetheart" contracts, cordial worker relations, and weak work regulations, or by manipulating union elections. Large cities like New York, Buffalo, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, and Philadelphia that have robust industrial bases and labor unions tend to be the epicenters of labor law infractions. Additionally, there are several organized criminal characters in these cities. Labor racketeering costs the American public millions of dollars annually through increased labor expenses that are ultimately passed on to consumers, according to many FBI investigations.

 

In order to investigate potential violations of labor law, the FBI collaborates closely with other governmental organizations and uses methods such as electronic surveillance, covert operations, use of secret sources, and victim interviews. The passing of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) in 1970 was the one event that helped more than anything else to deter organized crime. The agencies were able to work more effectively as a result of this action because they could target the entire corrupt organization rather than incarcerating individuals who might simply be replaced by other members or affiliates of organized crime.

 

The first known Sicilian Mafia member to immigrate to the United States was Giuseppe Esposito. After assassinating 11 rich landowners, the chancellor and vice chancellor of a Sicilian province, and six other Sicilians, he escaped to New York. In 1881, he was detained in New Orleans, Louisiana, and then sent back to Italy. 

 

The nation's first significant Mafia event occurred in New Orleans. Police Superintendent David Hennessey of New Orleans was executed on October 15, 1890. Numerous Sicilians were detained, and 19 were ultimately charged with the crime. An acquittal spread allegations of widespread corruption and scared witnesses away. On March 14, 1891, a group of angry New Orleans residents formed a lynch mob and murdered 11 out of the 19 defendants. Eight managed to flee, nine were shot, and two were hanged.

 

As different gangs gained and lost power throughout the years, the American Mafia changed. The Black Hand gangs in the early 1900s, the Five Points Gang in New York City in the 1910s and 1920s, and Al Capone's Syndicate in Chicago in the 1920s were a few of the earliest.

 

The Italian Mafia factions started fighting during Prohibition for exclusive control of lucrative bootlegging networks. They struggled for dominance of bootlegging alongside Jewish and Irish ethnic gangs. By the conclusion of the decade, two Italian organizations were competing for dominance of the nation's criminal underworld. Joe Masseria, the head of the Genovese criminal family, oversaw one gang, while Salvatore Maranzano, who oversaw the Bonanno crime family, oversaw the other. The deadly Castellammarese War, which raged from February 1930 to April 15, 1931, was the result of the rivalry's escalation. When Charles "Lucky" Luciano, Masseria's senior soldier, and Salvatore Maranzano planned to have Masseria assassinated, the battle came to an end.

 

Maranzano eventually rose to prominence as the nation's most powerful Mafia leader, referring to himself as "Boss of Bosses." Maranzano designed the organization's code of conduct, set the conflict resolution processes, and split New York City into five families. Charles "Lucky" Luciano was designated as the leader of the Genovese family, as it eventually came to be known.

 

Maranzano's leadership position would, however, be transitory. Maranzano preferred to exclusively associate with Sicilians and upheld the traditions of the purported "Old World Mafia '' by refusing to cooperate with non-Italians. Younger Italian organized crime figures like Luciano believed that limiting their business dealings to Italians would restrict both the development of their individual careers and the possible expansion of their criminal empires. As long as there was money to be made, these men—known as the "Young Turks''—wanted to deal with Irish and Jewish gangsters.

 

Marazano quickly saw Luciano as a threat and gave the order to kill him. On September 10, 1931, Marazano was murdered by a group of mobsters at his office in the New York Central Building when Luciano learned about the scheme.

 

In order to prevent future Mafia battles, Lucky Luciano formed "The Commission," a coalition of five Mafia families of similar magnitude, with the aid of his lifelong buddy, Meyer Lansky. Vincent Mangano, Tommy Gagliano, Joseph Bonanno, and Joseph Profaci served as the commission's other leaders. After then, this panel made decisions about all organized criminal activity throughout the 1930s. The leaders of the Chicago Outfit and the Five Families of New York City reportedly still make up the Commission.

 

The organized crime groups quickly diversified into new businesses after Prohibition ended in 1933 because they were unable to maintain the high profits they had made throughout the 1920s. These new businesses included labor racketeering through the control of labor unions, construction, loan sharking, extortion, protection rackets, sanitation, transportation, prostitution, and drug trafficking.

 

In Las Vegas, Nevada's legal casinos by the 1950s, numerous Mafia leaders had made legitimate investments and were skimming money before it was recorded. It is assumed that the sum was in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

 

For years, the Mafia operated in secrecy with little opposition from the law because local law enforcement authorities lacked the tools or expertise necessary to successfully confront organized crime perpetrated by a covert organization they were unaware even existed.

 

It wasn't until 1951 that a U.S. Senate investigation concluded that this country was home to a "sinister criminal organization," subsequently known as La Cosa Nostra. Six years later, in the little upstate New York hamlet of Apalachin, The New York State Police discovered a gathering of important La Cosa Nostra officials from all across the nation. Numerous guests were taken into custody. The incident served as the impetus for altering how organized crime is combated by law enforcement.

 

Joe Valachi, the first Mafia member to turn state's evidence in 1963, divulged extensive details about the organization's inner workings and trade secrets. After then, the National Crime Syndicate of the Mafia was aggressively attacked by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Although the Mafia came under additional pressure as a result, its illegal operations were not significantly reduced.

 

However, the Nevada State Legislature's passage of a measure in 1969 that made it simpler for companies to run casinos caused the Mafia's power in the Las Vegas economy to start to decline. A year later, the RICO Act was approved by the US Congress, giving law enforcement extra power to go after the mafia for its criminal operations. By the start of the 1980s, the FBI had achieved success when it was able to free Las Vegas casinos from Mafia rule and made a concerted effort to weaken the Mafia's grip on labor unions.

 

23 mafia bosses from all throughout the country were found guilty of violating the RICO statute between 1981 and 1992. By 1990, almost 1000 members of criminal families had been found guilty. While many Mafia organizations around the nation were severely damaged, the most powerful families continued to control crime in their regions.

 

The Mafia has persisted in engaging in a wide range of illicit operations into the twenty-first century, including extortion, government corruption, gambling, infiltration into lawful firms, labor racketeering, loan sharking, and more. Today, Chicago and the Northeast still account for the majority of its operations.

 

La Cosa Nostra's organizational structure has not altered since the 1930s, and Cosa Nostra has operated for more than a century in a variety of guises.

 

Camorra Mafia

 

Now We talked about the American Mob, and we hear about them a lot, so let's talk about the True Italian Mafia, The Camorra.

 

Due to that gang's effect on American organized crime, the term "Mafia" has come to symbolize all forms of organized crime in popular culture. However, that phrase is really the name of the organized criminal gang rooted in Sicily, according to Mafia historian Umberto Santino's study of Mafia and Mafia-type groups in Italy. The 'Ndrangheta, from Calabria, the Sacra Corona Unita, from Apulia, and the Camorra, from Campania, the area that includes the city of Naples, are further "Mafia-type" groups.

 

The history of the Camorra is "particularly discontinuous," according to Santino. Despite having origins that may go as far back as 15th-century Spain, sources like Britannica claim that the organization first rose to prominence in the 19th century. Santino, however, claims that the organization's current form dates back to the late 1950s, when local criminal organizations in Campania started using the term "camorra." In the 1960s, these organizations expanded and became increasingly effective at smuggling cigarettes.

 

In this decade, they also forged advantageous relationships with a number of Neapolitan Mafia factions, which in the 1970s led to the development of profitable black market drug trafficking. However, there is one key distinction between the Cosa Nostra, sometimes known as the Mafia, and the Camorra. While the Mafia has a top-down, pyramidal structure of authority, the Camorra has a more dispersed system of small organizations, or "clans," that hold power. The Camorra has found success with its organizational structure, and as a result, is currently more powerful than the Sicilian Mafia.

 

According to Santino, the Camorra has 7,000 members spread throughout its 145 clans. The Camorra is the most prosperous and feared criminal gang in Italy thanks to its domination over the trafficking in narcotics including cocaine and heroin. The Independent published a story in 2006 about an Italian author named Roberto Saviano who wrote a book that revealed a few more details about the Camorra than the gang would have wanted. He had excellent reason to worry for his life. "This sprawling network of criminal gangs, according to [Saviano]," wrote reporter Peter Popham, "now dwarfs both the original Mafia of Sicily, the 'Ndrangheta and southern Italy's other organized gangs, in numbers, in economic power and in ruthless violence."

 

The New York Times reported that Saviano's book Gomorra was a "literary sensation" that sold more than 500,000 copies, but it also resulted in death threats and compelled him to go into hiding because it depicted gang violence, drug trafficking, child soldiers, and other aspects of the Camorra's business that the gang would prefer to keep hidden from the outside world. Aspects like the rampant government corruption, which causes trash to pile up in the streets car-high, or the fact that the Camorra has killed much more people recently than the Sicilian Mafia and made Campania one of the most deadly regions in Europe.

 

Sicily is where the Mafia that we know and admire today originated. They first appeared at some time in the late 19th century, and over the next 150 years or so, they expanded all over the world and became involved in just about everything. It has long been a mystery how this highly ordered system came to be, but new study from the University of Nottingham suggests that it all began with lemons.

 

Sicily discovered they had the ideal mixture to develop a lucrative crop in the late 1800s. Despite having the greatest concentration of lemon trees in all of Italy, they also faced a particular set of issues. Lemon farmers eventually turned to hiring their own private protection firms to protect their investment and themselves because of factors such as a wealthy upper class that exploited the peasant class to the fullest, a glaring lack of public law enforcement, and a government that really wasn't keeping the peace. Add a few more elements now: Sicily's location on a key Mediterranean trade route, the rapidly expanding citrus industry, and the demand for private security forces to safeguard interests make it the ideal location for the Mafia to establish itself.

 

Don Calo Vizzini was at the head of the Villalba Mafia during World War II, and he may have said it best. He was quoted by the University of Nottingham paper as saying, "In every society there has to be a category of people who straighten things out when situations get complicated. Usually they're functionaries of the state. Where the state is not present, or where it does not have sufficient force, this is done by private individuals."

 

The roots of the Camorra have speculated that it originated from a secret 12th century organization of assassins.

 

The Beati Paoli were a Sicilian group that originated in the 12th century; no one knows why they were given that name, although it's presumably religious in nature. The tale claims that they formed in response to the persecution of the aristocratic class, and the majority of what we know comes from Francesco Maria Emanuele, Marquis of Villabianca. They not only attracted each and everyone to their cause, but they also created a hierarchy akin to a royal court. From there, they set up security services, employed themselves as paid killers, and... well, secrets prevent us from knowing what else. Since they obviously had an underground hideout, we do know that it was accessible through the crypt of a Palermo church.

 

There are even reports that the Camorra had a lot to do with helping the allies sabotage Mussollini in World War 2. Much information was originally written up as German control and sabotage during this time but many years after, with arrests of many members, documents were found that showed that the Camorra and other factions helped screw over Ol’ Mussollini.

 

Crips

 

The Crips were only a social group, as one Original Gangster (OG) put it, and by most accounts, he is right (Kontos 99, 2003). While there are numerous uneven areas throughout the turbulent history of the Crips, there are also recurring themes. However, unlike the violent, frequently fatal incidents connected with the Crips, which are frequently portrayed with dramatic exaggeration, the genuine components of the narrative do not make for riveting television. Many OGs and gang members have voiced their shock and disappointment at how the Crips have been portrayed, while still admitting the group's flaws and its final transition from activism to gangsterism. Debra Addie Smith, a close friend of the founder of the Crips, once expressed that she “was wondering when someone was gonna finally tell the real story about the Crips”.

 

The Black Panther movement was being dismantled by the police, who were making "mass arrests, incarcerations, and deaths of black teenagers by the police," which led to the formation of the Crips, a grassroots group mostly made up of African-Americans. The CRIPS (Community Resources for Independent People) emerged in South Central Los Angeles, California, in 1969 with a message of resistance and justice during a period of despair and pessimism within the black community, following the ultimate dissolution of the Black Panther movement. Raymond Washington, a "fearless and strong 5-foot-8 fireplug who liked to fight and detested guns," is credited with founding the gang. He finally distanced himself and was killed as the Crips started using guns and formed a feud with the Bloods.

 

Stanley Tookie Williams met Raymond Lee Washington in 1969, and the two decided to unite their local gang members from the west and east sides of South Central Los Angeles in order to battle neighboring street gangs. Most of the members were 17 years old. Williams however appears to discount the sometimes-cited founding date of 1969 in his memoir, Blue Rage, Black Redemption. In his memoir, Williams also refuted claims that the group was a spin-off of the Black Panther Party or formed for a community agenda, writing that it "depicted a fighting alliance against street gangs—nothing more, nothing less." Washington, who attended Fremont High School, was the leader of the East Side Crips, and Williams, who attended Washington High School, led the West Side Crips.

 

Williams recalled that a blue bandana was first worn by Crips founding member Buddha, as a part of his color-coordinated clothing of blue Levis, a blue shirt, and dark blue suspenders. A blue bandana was worn in tribute to Buddha after he was shot and killed on February 23, 1973. The color then became associated with Crips.

 

By 1978, there were 45 Crip gangs, called sets, in Los Angeles. They were heavily involved in the production of PCP, marijuana and amphetamines. On March 11, 1979, Williams, a member of the Westside Crips, was arrested for four murders and on August 9, 1979, Washington was gunned down. Washington had been against Crip infighting and after his death several Crip sets started fighting against each other. The Crips' leadership was dismantled, prompting a deadly gang war between the Rollin' 60 Neighborhood Crips and Eight Tray Gangster Crips that led nearby Crip sets to choose sides and align themselves with either the Neighborhood Crips or the Gangster Crips, waging large-scale war in South Central and other cities. The East Coast Crips (from East Los Angeles) and the Hoover Crips directly severed their alliance after Washington's death. By 1980, the Crips were in turmoil, warring with the Bloods and against each other. The gang's growth and influence increased significantly in the early 1980s when crack cocaine hit the streets and Crip sets began distributing the drug. Large profits induced many Crips to establish new markets in other cities and states. As a result, Crips membership grew steadily and the street gang was one of the nation's largest by the late 1980s. In 1999, there were at least 600 Crip sets with more than 30,000 members transporting drugs in the United States.

 

Funny side note: As of 2015, the Crips gang consists of between approximately 30,000 and 35,000 members and 800 sets, active in 221 cities and 41 U.S. states. The states with the highest estimated number of Crip sets are California, Texas, Oklahoma, and Missouri. Members typically consist of young African American men, but can be white, Hispanic, Asian, and Pacific Islander. The gang also began to establish a presence in Canada in the early 1990s; Crip sets are active in the Canadian cities of Montreal and Toronto.

 

Bloods

 

The Bloods gang was first established in Los Angeles as a defense against the Crips. The Pirus street gang, which was initially a group of the Crips, split out during an internal gang battle, united with other minor gangs to create the gang that would later become known as the Bloods, which is where the Bloods' origins and their rivalry with the Crips begin. At the time, there were three more Crips sets than Bloods sets. Despite this disparity in numbers, Bloods sets became more aggressive, especially towards rival Crips members, in an effort to demonstrate their dominance. Therefore, it is believed that the Pirus were the original Bloods founders. The gang's concentration changed to drug manufacture during the emergence of crack. The United Blood Nation, a gang that started out on Rikers Island, is frequently associated with blood sets on the East Coast.

 

The George Motchan Detention Center (GMDC), often known as C 73, is located on Rikers Island and is home to the United Blood Nation, also known as the Bloods. Problem offenders were separated from the rest of the jail facilities using GMDC. The Latin Kings were the most prominent and well-organized gang in the NYC jail system before this time. The majority-Hispanic Latin Kings were violently abusing White and occasionally African American prisoners. These African American prisoners created a defense organization they named the United Blood Nation after being organized by some of the most aggressive and charismatic prisoners. This prison group, United Blood Nation, was copying the Bloods street gangs in Los Angeles. Eight initial Blood sets were formed by many of the leaders of this freshly formed prison gang to recruit in their local communities around New York City.

 

By 1996, the Blood street gang had grown to include thousands of members and was becoming one of the most powerful gangs in existence. It also kept up a regular recruiting push. The Bloods were at this point less organized and more vicious than other gangs. Numerous slashings (attacks with a razor blade or knife) that were recorded during robberies were later determined to be Bloods initiations. The Bloods' signature ceremony was the Blood ritual. Bloods found recruits all throughout the East Coast.

 

In addition to members of other races and ethnicities, African Americans make up the majority of the Bloods. Early adolescence to mid-twenties is the average age of members, however some continue to retain leadership roles well into their late twenties and, on occasion, their thirties. Although there is no one person who can be identified as the Bloods' national leader, each individual Bloods set has a hierarchical leadership structure with distinct degrees of membership. Status within a gang is indicated by these membership levels. Each set is managed by a leader, who is often an older person with a longer criminal history. A fixed leader is not chosen; instead, he or she exerts themselves through creating and overseeing the gang's illicit businesses, using their reputation for brutality and violence as well as their own charisma to do so. The majority of the cast members are "soldiers," and they range in age from 16 to 22. Because of their readiness to use violence to win the respect of gang members and to deal with anybody who "disrespects" the set, soldiers have a strong feeling of dedication to their set and are very dangerous. Although they are not full members, "associates" participate in a variety of illegal acts and identify with the gang. If any women are involved in the gang, they are often associate members and are frequently employed by their male counterparts to carry guns, store narcotics, or engage in self-prostitution in order to support their group.

 

The surroundings of a recruit frequently affects recruitment. Bloods actively seek for school-age African Americans in particularly impoverished regions. Youth might find security and a sense of belonging by joining a gang. Economically deprived children who observe the trappings of gang life—gold jewelry, cash, pricey sportswear—can likewise experience instant satisfaction.

 

Based on how long a person has been a part of a certain set, blood sets have an informal hierarchy of levels.

 

The ranks are only a symbol of respect for individuals who have been a part of the set the longest and have survived the longest; they do not indicate leadership or domination over the set. Bloods of lesser ranks are not subject to those in positions of authority. Bloods of lesser status frequently refer to Bloods of higher rank as "Big Homies." They also call one another "relatives." Once a person joins a Blood set, they cannot quit the set or flip (move to another set) for the rest of their lives.

 

Members of the Bloods frequently refer to themselves as dawgs or ballers, HKs (an initialism for Hoover-Killer), CKs (an initialism for Crip-Killer), and MOBs (an initialism for Member of Bloods) (meaning drug dealers). Contrary to popular belief, Bloods & Crips are typically friendly amongst sets. Although it is against the law, bloods sometimes engage in civil war with one another. For example, the deuce 2x Crips and tray 3x Crips are at war, and they frequently work with Crip sets to eliminate their fellow blood competitors.

 

The many gang indicators used by Bloods members to distinguish themselves from other gangs include colors, attire, emblems, tattoos, jewelry, graffiti, language, and hand signals. Red is the gang's primary color. They like donning athletic attire, such as team coats that display their gang's colors. San Francisco 49ers, Miami Heat, Atlanta Hawks, Houston Rockets, Boston Red Sox, St. Louis Cardinals, Cincinnati Reds, Portland Trailblazers, Cleveland Indians, Philadelphia Phillies, Los Angeles Clippers, New Jersey Devils, Philadelphia 76ers, and Chicago Bulls are a few of their favorite clubs.

 

The most commonly used Bloods symbols include the number “5,” the five pointed star, and the five pointed crown. Despite common misconception Bloods are not a people nation (with the exception of a few) but they will however tie flags with the people for defense or mutually such as how the Crips & BGDs consider themselves cousins. These symbols may be seen in the tattoos, jewelry, and clothing that gang members wear as well as in gang graffiti, which is used by the Bloods to mark their territory. Such graffiti can include gang names, nicknames, declaration of loyalty, threats against rival gangs, or a description of criminal acts in which the gang has been involved. Bloods graffiti might also include the word “Piru” which refers to the fact that the first known Bloods gang was formed by individuals from Piru Street in Compton, California.

Yakuza

 

During the Tokugawa Shogunate (1603–1868), two distinct groups of outcasts gave rise to the yakuza. The tekiya were the first of such groups; they were nomadic peddlers who moved from village to village selling cheap things at fairs and markets. Many tekiya belonged to the burakumin social class, which was essentially underneath the four-tiered Japanese feudal social order and consisted of misfits or "non-humans."

 

The tekiya started forming close-knit gangs in the early 1700s under the direction of bosses and underbosses. The tekiya began to engage in customary organized crime operations including turf battles and protection rackets after being strengthened by fugitives from the upper classes. In keeping with a long-standing custom, tekiya frequently provided security for Shinto festivals and, in exchange for payment for protection, assigned stalls at the associated fairs.

 

Between 1735 and 1749, the shogun's government appointed oyabun, or officially recognized leaders, in an effort to quell gang conflicts among various tekiya factions and lessen the amount of fraud they engaged in. The oyabun was given the privilege of using a surname and carrying a sword, which was previously reserved for samurai. The term "oyabun," which refers to the bosses' roles as the leaders of their tekiya families, literally means "foster parent."

 

The bakuto, or gamblers, were the second social group that gave rise to the yakuza. During the Tokugawa era, gambling was outright prohibited and is still outlawed in Japan today. The bakuto hit the highways and preyed on gullible prey using hanafuda card games or dice games. They frequently adorned their bodies with vibrant tattoos, which gave rise to the practice of full-body tattooing among modern yakuza. The bakuto naturally expanded from their primary line of work as gamblers into lending shady business and other illicit pursuits.

 

Depending on how they make the majority of their money, certain yakuza groups may still refer to themselves as tekiya or bakuto. They still use the rites that were a component of the initiation ceremonies of the older organizations.

 

Yakuza gangs have seen a rise in prominence since the end of World War II following a decline during the conflict. More than 102,000 yakuza members in 2,500 different families were reported to be employed in Japan and overseas by the Japanese government in 2007. Despite the burakumin being officially exempt from discrimination since 1861, many gang members today are descended from that marginalized group. Others are ethnic Koreans, who are also subjected to a great deal of prejudice in Japanese society.

 

The distinctive characteristics of modern yakuza culture bear traces of the gangs' antecedents. For instance, a large number of yakuza have full-body tattoos that were applied with conventional bamboo or steel needles as opposed to sophisticated tattooing guns. Even the genitalia may be tattooed, which is a very unpleasant ritual. Although they typically wear long sleeves in public, the yakuza members frequently take their shirts off while playing cards with one other and show off their body art as a reference to the bakuto customs.

 

The practice of yubitsume, or cutting off the little finger's joint, is another aspect of yakuza culture. When a yakuza member disobeys or otherwise offends his boss, he will perform a yubitsume as an apology. The offender provides the boss with the top joint of his left pinkie finger, which he has amputated. Subsequent offenses result in the loss of other finger joints.

 

This practice dates back to the Tokugawa era; the gangster's sword grip is weakened by the loss of finger joints, theoretically making him more reliant on the group as a whole for defense. To blend in, many yakuza members wear prosthetic fingertips today.

 

The three biggest yakuza organizations currently in existence are the Sumiyoshi-kai, which started in Osaka and has about 20,000 members, the Yamaguchi-gumi, centered in Kobe, with 15,000 members, and the Inagawa-kai, located in Tokyo and Yokohama, with 20,000 members. The gangs engage in illegal activities such the trafficking of people and goods, the exportation of weapons, and the smuggling of illegal drugs. They do, however, also own a sizable amount of stock in well-established companies, and some of them are well-connected to the Japanese financial, banking, and real estate industries.

 

It's interesting to note that the Yamaguchi-gumi were the first to assist victims in the gang's hometown after the tragic Kobe earthquake of January 17, 1995. Similar to this, many yakuza organizations delivered truckloads of goods to the afflicted area following the earthquake and tsunami of 2011. The yakuza also has the strange benefit of suppressing small-time criminals. Because small-fry thieves don't intrude on yakuza turf, Kobe and Osaka, with their strong yakuza syndicates, are among the safest cities in an overall safe country.

 

The Japanese government has clamped down on the gangs in recent decades despite these unexpected social benefits of the yakuza. A strong new anti-racketeering law known as the Act for Prevention of Unlawful Activities by Criminal Gang Members was passed in March 1995. All of the listed businesses with ties to the yakuza were removed from the Osaka Securities Exchange in 2008. Yakuza bosses have been detained by authorities since 2009, and businesses that support the gangs have been closed down.

 

Even though the police are currently working very hard to quell yakuza activities in Japan, it appears improbable that the syndicates would completely vanish. After all, they have endured for more than 300 years and are intricately linked to many facets of Japanese society and culture.

 

Mara Salvatrucha(MS-13)

 

La Mara Salvatrucha, also referred to as MS-13, is a ruthless, inhumane street gang. As many as 40 states in the United States are now home to MS-13 members who commit murder, rape, maiming, and terror. Legendary tales exist of their heinous crimes.

 

No one contests the veracity of these statements. MS-13, like many street gangs, actually takes pride in its well-deserved image. The U.S. Department of Justice claims that the group's motto is "kill, rape, control."

 

If you believe President Donald Trump and others, America's broken immigration system is to blame for MS-13. The belief is that the United States will be a lot safer if it can stop MS-13 gang members from committing all of their mayhem, deport them, and stop them from crossing the border.

 

Unfortunately, things don't work that way.

 

"Attention to gangs is valid. About 13 percent of the homicides in this country are gang related. That's far more homicides than from mass shootings or terrorism," David Pyrooz, a sociologist at the University of Colorado who specializes in gangs and criminal networks, says. "But let's remember this. The maximum number of homicides associated with MS-13 in a given year — gang-related homicides — is about 2 percent of the total ... gang-related homicides in the United States. That is, I hate to use this language, but that is in many ways a drop in the bucket when it comes to gang activity."

 

"MS-13 is sort of the perfect boogeyman," Pyrooz says. "They are the moral panic; the connection to immigration, the connection to Latinos, and then the heinous violence, makes it so they can function as this evil boogeyman."

 

It's frequently forgotten in discussions of MS-13 that the organization didn't start out in Latin America and then storm the border to wreak havoc on the American way of life.

 

The gang was founded in the United States in the 1970s. El Salvadoran immigrants went to Los Angeles in an effort to escape a devastating civil conflict. There, they lived in areas of the city that were already under the influence of other gangs, used marijuana, and listened to heavy metal music. La Mara Salvatrucha was created when the newcomers came together to socialize and to defend themselves from other groups.

 

A brief explanation of the group name is as follows: In El Salvador, the word for "gang" is "mara." Here is an explanation of "Salvatrucha" and the subsequent 13 (again, from the DOJ):

 

Salvatrucha is a slang term for "alert," "watch out," or "cunning," and it combines the terms "Salva," which stands for "Salvadoran," and "trucha." The "13" stands for the 13th letter of the alphabet, or "M," signifying the group's ties to the Mexican Mafia, an organization that operates inside prisons.

 

Police started to crack down as the new gang confronted more established organizations in Los Angeles and linked up with other gangs (including the Mexican Mafia), deporting some members to El Salvador, where civil instability remained rife.

 

However, some of those MS-13 members returned to the United States in the 1980s, and others from El Salvador joined them. However, it seems unlikely that there was a premeditated influx of gang members from Latin America into the country.

 

"Criminal migration is real," according to "MS13 in the Americas: How the World's Most Notorious Gang Defies Logic, Resists Destruction," a report by The Center for Latin American & Latino Studies at American University in Washington D.C., and Insight Crime, a foundation that studies organized crime in Latin America and the Caribbean. "But this does not appear to be part of a master plan, nor is it coordinated from some central headquarters. Gang members appear to move in the same patterns as the rest of the population, and many of them move to escape the gang and the violence associated with it."

 

Currently, MS-13 claims to have 10,000 members in the United States and 30,000 members worldwide. Thus, it ranks among the largest gangs in the entire world. The group is the first and only street gang to be listed as a global criminal organization by the American government.

 

Despite its size, MS-13 does not have a particularly significant criminal presence in the United States when compared to the total number of gang members in the nation. The National Gang Intelligence Center estimates that there are 1.4 million gang members nationally, and MS-13 is just one of the 33,000 gangs that the FBI has identified.

 

"What's interesting about them, what makes them different from other groups — partly in response to what the president has been tweeting and talking about them" Pyrooz says, "we can't think of an example in recent history of a single group that has attracted such attention on a national level."

 

According to news reports and those who have investigated the MS-13 gang, its members engage in money laundering, prostitution, drug trafficking, racketeering, and other illicit activities. They are extremely brutal in how they do their street business. The group has been implicated in numerous violent assaults, kidnappings, rapes, and most infamously, some horrifying murders.

 

"Gang violence is far more lethal than what it was four or five decades ago," Pyrooz says.

 

From "MS-13 in the Americas":

"Violence is a major part of the glue that binds the MS-13. It is part of every stage of an MS-13 member's life: Potential members commit violent acts to be considered for membership and ultimately to gain entry; they are then beaten into the gang in a ritual that has left more than one permanently scarred; they move up the gang ladder by 'putting in the work' and showing 'commitment,' euphemisms for committing violent acts in the name of the gang."

 

According to the Washington Post, up to 10 MS-13 members lured a guy into a park in Maryland in 2017 before stabbing him more than 100 times, beheading him, and chopping out his heart. In vengeance for her boyfriend's murder, an 18-year-old Virginia lady admitted to taking part in the killing of a 15-year-old girl. The 18-year-old killed the younger girl by stabbing her 13 times and recorded it to show MS-13 leaders.

 

"It's hard to say that the attention is not undue or not deserved," Pyrooz says. "But it's hard to be able to focus specifically on them without paying more attention to what the problem of gang activity is in the United States as a whole."

The 25 Best Gang Movies of All Time - IMDb

Suicide Pilots

Listener Discretion Is Advised. 

A pilot who intentionally crashes or attempts to crash an aircraft in an attempt to commit suicide, often with the intention of killing other people on board or on the ground, is said to have committed suicide. This is occasionally referred to as a murder-suicide. It is known to have caused some commercial aviation crashes and is likely to have contributed to others. In general, it is challenging for crash investigators to pin down the pilots' intentions since they occasionally take deliberate actions to obstruct recordings or other inquiries. Pilot suicide is therefore sometimes impossible to establish with absolute certainty.

 

Unless there is strong evidence that the pilot was actually committing suicide, investigators do not classify aircraft events as suicide. This proof could come in the form of suicide notes, prior suicide attempts, suicide threats, or a history of mental illness. Eight deaths were determined to be suicides in a study of pilot suicides from 2002 to 2013, and five other cases of unclear causes may have been suicides. To ascertain if the suicide was a terrorist act, investigators may also consult with terrorism experts and look for connections to extremist groups.

 

The majority of pilot suicides occur in small, general aviation aircraft. The lone occupant of the airplane in the majority of these situations is the pilot. A flying prohibition would have ordinarily resulted from the pilot using drugs, most frequently alcohol or antidepressants, in around half of the cases. Many of these pilots have a history of mental illness that they have tried to hide from authorities.

 

As most people know, the strategy of war where pilots will dive bomb their aircrafts into land or sea based vessels has been around since World War 2 so we arent really going to talk too much about incidents such as those. However, the first person credited with doing so was Russian aviator Nikolai Gastello. He was credited with the first takedown of a land based vehicle with his aircraft, although his aircraft had been shot down and was in a rapid partially controllable descent which this is later to be disputed. Other notable incidents are the kamikazes of the Empire of Japan during the Pacific Campaign of World War 2.

 

Now lets talk about cases where pilots had suicidal thoughts or temptations of murder while piloting an aircraft.

 

Hosted by Jonathan Sayre and Logan Sayre

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If you or someone you know is having thoughts of hurting themselves, someone else or they just need some mental assistance, contact the National Institute of Mental Health https://www.nimh.nih.gov or your local mental health facility. 

”Hell’s Belle” Gunness, aka Lady Bluebeard, aka ”The La Porte Ghoul”

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Belle Sorenson Gunness was initially born as Brynhild Paulsdatter Størseth; November 11, 1859, Selbu, Norway – April 28, 1908?, Lwas a Norwegian-Americ

Standing six feet tall (183 cm) and weighing over 200 pounds (91 kg), she was a massive, physically strong woman.

 

Early years

 

Gunness' origins are a matter of some debate. Most of her biographers state that she was born on November 11, 1859, near the lake of Selbu, Sør-Trøndelag, Norway, and christened Brynhild Paulsdatter Størset. Her parents were Paul Pedersen Størset (a stonemason) and Berit Olsdatter. She was the youngest of their eight children. They lived at Størsetgjerdet, a very small cotter's farm in Innbygda, 60 km southeast of Trondheim, the largest city in central Norway (Trøndelag).

 

An Irish TV documentary by Anne Berit Vestby aired on September 4, 2006, tells a common, but the unverified story about Gunness' early life. The story holds that, in 1877, Gunness attended a country dance while pregnant. There she was attacked by a man who kicked her in the abdomen, causing her to miscarry the child. The man, who came from a wealthy family, was never prosecuted by the Norwegian authorities. According to people who knew her, her personality changed substantially. The man who attacked her died shortly afterward. His cause of death was said to be stomach cancer. Growing up in poverty, Gunness took to milking and herding cattle the following year on a large, wealthy farm and served there for three years to pay for a trip across the Atlantic.

 

Following the example of a sister, Nellie Larson, who had emigrated to America earlier, Gunness moved to the United States in 1881 and assumed a more American-style name. Initially, In Chicago, while living with her sister and brother-in-law, she worked as a domestic servant, then got a job at a butcher's shop cutting up animal carcasses until her first marriage in 1884.

 

First Victim

 

In 1884, Gunness married Mads Ditlev Anton Sorenson in Chicago, Illinois, where, two years later, they opened a candy store. The business was unsuccessful, and the shop mysteriously burned down within a year. They collected the insurance, which paid for another home.

 

Some researchers tend to believe that the marriage to Sorenson produced no offspring. However, Neighbors gossiped about the babies since Belle never appeared to be pregnant. Other investigators report that the couple had four children: Caroline, Axel, Myrtle, and Lucy. Caroline and Axel died in infancy, allegedly of acute colitis. The symptoms of acute colitis — nausea, fever, diarrhea, and lower abdominal pain and cramping — are also symptoms of many forms of poisoning. Caroline's and Axel's lives were reportedly insured, and the insurance company paid.

 

A May 7, 1908 article in The New York Times states that two children belonging to Gunness and her husband Mads Sorensen were interred in her plot in Forest Home cemetery.

 

On June 13, 1900, Gunness and her family were counted on the United States Census in Chicago. The census recorded her as the mother of four children; only two were living: Myrtle A., 3, and Lucy B., 1. An adopted 10-year-old girl, possibly identified as Morgan Couch but later known as Jennie Olsen, was also counted in the household.

 

Sorenson died on July 30, 1900, reportedly the only day on which two life insurance policies on him overlapped. Both policies were active simultaneously, as one would expire that day, and the other would begin. The first doctor to see him thought he was suffering from strychnine poisoning. However, the Sorensons' family doctor had been treating him for an enlarged heart, and he concluded that heart failure caused death. An autopsy was considered unnecessary because the death was not thought suspicious. Sorenson died of cerebral hemorrhage that day. Gunness explained he had come home with a headache, and she provided him with quinine powder for the pain; she later checked on him, and he was dead.

 

She applied for the insurance money the day after her husband's funeral. Sorenson's relatives claimed Gunness had poisoned her husband to collect on the insurance. Surviving records suggest that an inquest was ordered. It is unclear, however, whether that investigation actually occurred or Sorenson's body was ever exhumed to check for arsenic, as his relatives demanded. The insurance companies awarded her $8,500 (about $299,838.51 in today’s dollars), with which she bought a pig farm on the outskirts of La Porte, Indiana.

 

Suspicion of murder

 

In 1901, Gunness purchased a house on McClung Road. It’s been reported that both the boat and carriage houses burned to the ground shortly after she acquired the property.

 

As she was preparing to move from Chicago to LaPorte, she became re-acquainted with a recent widower, Peter Gunness, also Norwegian-born. They were married in LaPorte on April 1, 1902; just one week after the ceremony, Peter's infant daughter died (of uncertain causes) while alone in the house with Belle. In December 1902, Peter himself met with a "tragic accident.” According to Belle, he reached for his slippers next to the kitchen stove when he was scalded with brine. She later declared that part of a sausage-grinding machine fell from a high shelf, causing a fatal head injury. A year later, Peter's brother, Gust, took Peter's older daughter, Swanhilde, to Wisconsin. She is the only child to have survived living with Belle.

 

Her husband's death netted Gunness another $3,000 (some sources say $4,000). Local people refused to believe that her husband could be so clumsy; he had run a hog farm on the property and was known to be an experienced butcher; the district coroner reviewed the case and unequivocally announced that he had been murdered. He convened a coroner's jury to look into the matter. Meanwhile, Jennie Olsen, then 14, was overheard confessing to a classmate: "My mama killed my papa. She hit him with a meat cleaver and he died. Don't tell a soul."

 

Jennie was brought before the coroner's jury but denied having said anything. Gunness, meanwhile, convinced the coroner that she was innocent of any wrongdoing. She did not mention that she was pregnant, which would have inspired sympathy, but in May 1903, a baby boy, Phillip, joined the family. In late 1906 Belle told neighbors that her foster daughter, Jennie Olsen, had gone away to a Lutheran College in Los Angeles (some neighbors were informed that it was a finishing school for young ladies). Jennie's body would later be recovered, buried on her adoptive mother's property.

 

Between 1903 and 1906, Belle continued to run her farm. In 1907 Gunness employed a single farm hand, Ray Lamphere, to help with chores.

 

The Suitors

 

Around the same time, Gunness inserted the following advertisement in the matrimonial columns of all the Chicago daily newspapers and those of other large midwestern cities:

 

“Personal — comely widow who owns a large farm in one of the finest districts in La Porte County, Indiana, desires to make the acquaintance of a gentleman equally well provided, with view of joining fortunes. No replies by letter considered unless sender is willing to follow answer with personal visit. Triflers need not apply.”

 

Several middle-aged men of means responded to Gunness' ads. One of her ads was answered by a Wisconsin farmhand, Henry Gurholt. After traveling to La Porte, Gurholt wrote his family, saying that he liked the farm, was in good health, and requested that they send him seed potatoes. When they failed to hear from him, the family contacted Gunness. She told them Gurholt had gone off with horse traders to Chicago. She kept his trunk and fur overcoat.

 

Another one was John Moe, who arrived from Elbow Lake, Minnesota. He had brought more than $1,000 with him to pay off her mortgage, or so he told neighbors, whom Gunness introduced him to as her cousin. He disappeared from her farm within a week of his arrival. 

Although no one ever saw Moe again, a carpenter who did occasional work for Gunness observed that Moe's trunk remained in her house, along with more than a dozen others.

 

Next came George Anderson from Tarkio, Missouri, who, like Peter Gunness and John Moe, was an immigrant from Norway.

 

During dinner with Anderson, she raised the issue of her mortgage. Anderson agreed that he would pay the debt off if they decided to get hitched. Late that night, Anderson awoke to see her standing over him, holding a burning, almost spent candle in her hand and with a strange, sinister expression on her face. Without uttering a word, she ran from the room. Anderson fled from the house, soon taking a train to Missouri.

 

The suitors kept coming, but none of them, except for Anderson, ever left the Gunness farm. By this time, she had begun ordering massive trunks to be delivered to her home. Hack driver Clyde Sturgis delivered many of these trunks to her from La Porte. He later remarked how the heavyset woman would lift these enormous trunks "like boxes of marshmallows,” tossing them onto her broad shoulders and carrying them into the house. She kept the shutters of her house closed day and night; farmers traveling past the dwelling at night saw her digging in the hog pen.

 

Ole B. Budsberg, an elderly widower from Iola, Wisconsin, showed up next. He was last seen alive at the La Porte Savings Bank on April 6, 1907, when he mortgaged his Wisconsin land, signing a deed and obtaining several thousand dollars in cash. Ole B. Budsberg's sons, Oscar and Mathew Budsberg, had no idea that their father had gone off to visit Gunness. When they finally discovered his destination, they wrote to her; she promptly responded, saying she had never seen their father.

 

Several other middle-aged men appeared and disappeared in brief visits to the Gunness farm throughout 1907. Then, in December 1907, Andrew Helgelien, a bachelor farmer from Aberdeen, South Dakota, wrote to her and Belle was all about it. The pair exchanged many letters until a letter came that overwhelmed Helgelien, written in Gunness' careful handwriting and dated January 13, 1908. This letter was later found at the Helgelien farm. It read:

 

“To the Dearest Friend in the World: No woman in the world is happier than I am. I know that you are now to come to me and be my own. I can tell from your letters that you are the man I want. It does not take one long to tell when to like a person, and you I like better than anyone in the world, I know. Think how we will enjoy each other's company. You, the sweetest man in the whole world. We will be all alone with each other. Can you conceive of anything nicer? I think of you constantly. When I hear your name mentioned, and this is when one of the dear children speaks of you, or I hear myself humming it with the words of an old love song, it is beautiful music to my ears. My heart beats in wild rapture for you, My Andrew, I love you. Come prepared to stay forever.”

 

Yikes….

 

In response to her letter, Helgelien flew to her side in January 1908. He arrived with a check for $2,900, the entire savings he had drawn from his local bank. A few days after Helgelien arrived, he and Gunness appeared at the Savings Bank in La Porte and deposited the check. Helgelien vanished a few days later, but Gunness appeared at the Savings Bank to make a $500 deposit and another deposit of $700 in the State Bank. At this time, she started to have problems with her farmhand, Ray Lamphere.

 

In March 1908, Gunness sent several letters to a farmer and horse dealer in Topeka, Kansas named Lon Townsend, inviting him to visit her; he decided to put off the visit until spring and thus did not see her before a fire at her farm. Gunness was also in correspondence with a man from Arkansas and sent him a letter dated May 4, 1908. He would have visited her, but didn’t because of the fire at her farm. Gunness allegedly promised marriage to a suitor Bert Albert, which did not go through because of his lack of wealth.

 

Turning Point

 

The hired hand Ray Lamphere was deeply in love with Gunness; he performed any chore for her, no matter how gruesome. He became jealous of the many men who arrived to court his employer and began making scenes. She fired him on February 3, 1908. Shortly after dispensing with Lamphere, she presented herself at the La Porte courthouse. She declared that her former employee was not in his right mind and was a menace to the public. She somehow convinced local authorities to hold a sanity hearing. Lamphere was pronounced sane and released. Gunness was back a few days later to complain to the sheriff that Lamphere had visited her farm and argued with her. She contended that he threatened her family and had Lamphere arrested for trespassing.

 

Lamphere returned again and again to see her, but she told him to kick rocks each time. Lamphere made thinly disguised threats. Like on one occasion, he confided to farmer William Slater, "Helgelien won't bother me no more. We fixed him for keeps." Helgelien had long since disappeared from the area, or so it was believed. However, his brother, Asle Helgelien, was disturbed when Andrew failed to return home and he wrote to Belle in Indiana, asking her about his sibling's whereabouts. Gunness wrote back, telling Asle Helgelien that his brother was not at her farm and probably went to Norway to visit relatives. Asle Helgelien said he did not believe his brother would do that. He believed his brother was still in the La Porte area, the last place he was seen or heard from. Gunness, being the ballsy bitch she was, told him that if he wanted to come and look for his brother, she would help conduct a search, but she cautioned him that searching for missing persons was an expensive proposition. If she were to be involved in such a manhunt, she stated, Asle Helgelien should be prepared to pay her for her efforts. Asle Helgelien did come to La Porte, but not until May.

 

Ray Lamphere represented an unresolved danger to Belle, and now Asle Helgelien was making inquiries that could very well send her to the gallows. She told a lawyer in La Porte, M.E. Leliter, that she feared for her life and her children’s. Ray Lamphere, she said, had threatened to kill her and burn her house down. She wanted to make out a will just in case Lamphere followed through with his threats. Leliter, the attorney, complied and drew up her will. She left her entire estate to her children and left Leliter's office. She went to one of the La Porte banks holding the mortgage for her property and, not suspiciously at all, paid it off. However, she did not go to the police to tell them about Lamphere's allegedly life-threatening conduct. The reason for this, most historical, true crime nerds agree, was that there hadn’t been any threats; she was merely setting the stage for her own arson.

Joe Maxson, who had been hired to replace Ray Lamphere in February 1908, awoke in the early hours of April 28, 1908, smelling smoke in his room on the second floor of the Gunness house. He opened the hall door to a shit load of flames. Maxson screamed Gunness' name and those of her children but got no response. He slammed the door and then, in his tighty whiteys, leaped from the second-story window of his room, barely surviving the fire that was closing in around him. He raced to town to get help, but by the time the old-fashioned hook and ladder firetruck arrived at the farm at early dawn, the farmhouse was a big ol’ pile of smoking ruins. Four bodies were found inside the house. One of the bodies was that of a woman who could not immediately be identified as Gunness, since she had been decapitated. The head was never found. The bodies of her children were found still in their beds. County Sheriff Smutzer had somehow heard about Lamphere’s alleged threats, so he took one look at the carnage and quickly went after the former handyman. Attorney Leliter came forward to recount his tale about Gunness' will and how she feared Lamphere would kill her and her family and, coincidentally, burn her house down.

 

Lamphere reeeeeally didn’t help his own cause. The moment Sheriff Smutzer confronted him and before the lawman uttered a word, Lamphere exclaimed, "Did Widow Gunness and the kids get out all right?" He was then told about the fire, but he denied having anything to do with it, claiming that he was not near the farm when the blaze occurred. A young lil dude, John Solyem, was brought forward. He said he was watching the Gunness place and saw Lamphere running down the road from the Gunness house just before the structure erupted in flames. Lamphere snorted to the boy: "You wouldn't look me in the eye and say that!"

 

"Yes, I will,” replied Solyem. "You found me hiding behind the bushes and you told me you'd kill me if I didn't get out of there." Lamphere was arrested and charged with murder and arson. Then scores of investigators, sheriff's deputies, coroner's men, and many volunteers began to search the ruins for evidence.

 

The headless woman’s body was a massive concern to La Porte residents. C. Christofferson, a neighboring farmer, looked at the charred remains of this body and said that it was not the remains of Belle Gunness. As did another farmer, L. Nicholson, and so did Mrs. Austin Cutler, an old friend of Gunness. More of Gunness' old friends, Mrs. May Olander and Mr. Sigward Olsen, arrived from Chicago. They examined the remains of the headless woman and said it was’t Belle Gunness.

 

Doctors then measured the remains and, making allowances for the body’s missing neck and head, stated the corpse was that of a woman who stood five feet three inches tall and weighed no more than 150 pounds. Friends and neighbors, as well as the La Porte dressmakers who made her dresses and other garments, swore that Gunness was taller than 5'8" and weighed between 180 and 200 pounds. Remember, she was a large woman who could toss around clothing trunks like they were frisbees. Detailed measurements of the body were compared with those on file with several La Porte stores where she purchased her apparel.

 

When the two sets of measurements were compared, the authorities concluded that the headless woman could not possibly have been Belle Gunness, even when the ravages of the fire on the body were considered. (The flesh was severely burned but intact). Moreover, Dr. J. Meyers examined the internal organs of the dead woman. He sent the stomach contents of the victims to a pathologist in Chicago, who reported months later that the organs contained lethal doses of (dun dun dunnnn)...strychnine.

Gunness' dentist, Dr. Ira P. Norton, said that if the teeth/dental work of the headless corpse had been located, he could definitely ascertain if it was, for sure, Belle Gunness. Enter Louis "Klondike" Schultz, a former miner, who was hired to build a sluice and begin sifting the debris (as more bodies were unearthed, the sluice was used to isolate human remains on a larger scale). What the flying FUCK is a sluice you may be asking your obviously intelligent self. Well, it’s a sliding gate or other devices for controlling the flow of water, especially one in a locked gate. On May 19, 1908, a piece of bridgework was found consisting of two human, canine teeth, their roots still attached, porcelain teeth and gold crown work in between. Norton, her dentists, identified them as work done for Gunness. As a result, Coroner Charles Mack officially concluded that the adult female body discovered in the burned debris was Belle Gunness. Even though NOTHING ELSE LINES UP.

 

Asle Helgelien arrived in La Porte and told Sheriff Smutzer that he believed his brother had met with foul play at Gunness' hands. Then, the new farmhand, Joe Maxson came forward with information that could not be ignored: He told the Sheriff that Gunness had ordered him to bring loads of dirt by wheelbarrow to a large area surrounded by a high wire fence where the hogs were fed. Maxson said that there were many deep depressions in the ground that had been covered by dirt. These filled-in holes, Gunness had told Maxson, were nothing but garbage. She wanted the ground made level, so he filled in the depressions.

 

Sheriff Smutzer took a dozen men back to the farm and began to dig. On May 3, 1908, the diggers unearthed the body of Belle’s stepdaughter, Jennie Olson (who vanished in December 1906). Then they found the small bodies of two unidentified children. Subsequently, the body of Andrew Helgelien was unearthed (his overcoat was found to be worn by Ray Lamphere). As days progressed and the gruesome work continued, one body after another was discovered in Gunness' hog pen: 

 

So, let’s run through these poor, unfortunate souls.

 

Ole B. Budsberg of Iola, Wisconsin, (vanished May 1907);

 

Thomas Lindboe, who had left Chicago and had gone to work as a hired man for Gunness three years earlier;

 

Henry Gurholdt of Scandinavia, Wisconsin, who had gone to wed her a year earlier, taking $1,500 to her; a watch corresponding to one belonging to Gurholdt was found with a body;

 

Olaf Svenherud, from Chicago;

 

John Moe of Elbow Lake, Minnesota; his watch was found in Lamphere's possession;

 

Olaf Lindbloom, age 35 from Wisconsin.

 

Reports of other possible victims began to come in:

 

William Mingay, a coachman of New York City, who had left that city on April 1, 1904;

 

Herman Konitzer of Chicago who disappeared in January 1906;

 

Charles Edman of New Carlisle, Indiana;

 

George Berry of Tuscola, Illinois;

 

Christie Hilkven of Dovre, Barron County, Wisconsin, who sold his farm and came to La Porte in 1906;

 

Chares Neiburg, a 28-year-old Scandinavian immigrant who lived in Philadelphia, told friends that he was going to visit Gunness in June 1906 and never came back — he had been working for a saloon keeper and took $500 with him;

 

John H. McJunkin of Coraopolis (near Pittsburgh) left his wife in December 1906 after corresponding with a La Porte woman;

 

Olaf Jensen, a Norwegian immigrant of Carroll, Indiana, wrote his relatives in 1906 he was going to marry a wealthy widow at La Porte;

 

Henry Bizge of La Porte who disappeared June 1906 and his hired man named Edward Canary of Pink Lake Ill who also vanished 1906;

 

Bert Chase of Mishawaka, Indiana sold his butcher shop and told friends of a wealthy widow and that he was going to look her up; his brother received a telegram supposedly from Aberdeen, South Dakota claiming Bert had been killed in a train wreck; his brother investigated and found the telegram was fictitious;

 

Tonnes Peterson Lien of Rushford, Minnesota, is alleged to have disappeared April 2, 1907;

 

A gold ring marked "S.B. May 28, 1907" was found in the ruins;

 

A hired man named George Bradley of Tuscola, Illinois is alleged to have gone to La Porte to meet a widow and three children in October 1907;

 

T.J. Tiefland of Minneapolis is alleged to have come to see Gunness in 1907;

 

Frank Riedinger a farmer of Waukesha, Wisconsin, came to Indiana in 1907 to marry and never returned;

 

Emil Tell, a Swede from Kansas City, Missouri, is alleged to have gone in 1907 to La Porte;

 

Lee Porter of Bartonville, Oklahoma separated from his wife and told his brother he was going to marry a wealthy widow at La Porte;

 

John E. Hunter left Duquesne, Pennsylvania, on November 25, 1907 after telling his daughters he was going to marry a wealthy widow in Northern Indiana.

 

Two other Pennsylvanians — George Williams of Wapawallopen and Ludwig Stoll of Mount Yeager — also left their homes to marry in the West.

 

Abraham Phillips, a railway man of Burlington, West Virginia, left in the winter of 1907 to go to Northern Indiana and marry a rich widow — a railway watch was found in the debris of the house.

 

Benjamin Carling of Chicago, Illinois, was last seen by his wife in 1907 after telling her that he was going to La Porte to secure an investment with a wealthy widow; he brought $1,000 from an insurance company and borrowed money from several investors as well; in June 1908 his widow was able to identify his remains from La Porte's Pauper's cemetery by the contour of his skull and three missing teeth; $1000 at that time is approximately $31,522.45 today.

 

Aug. Gunderson of Green Lake, Wisconsin;

 

Ole Oleson of Battle Creek, Michigan;

 

Lindner Nikkelsen of Huron, South Dakota;

 

Andrew Anderson of Lawrence, Kansas;

 

Johann Sorensen of St. Joseph, Missouri;

 

A possible victim was a man named Hinkley;

 

Reported unnamed victims were:

 

a daughter of Mrs. H. Whitzer of Toledo, Ohio, who had attended Indiana University near La Porte in 1902;

 

an unknown man and woman are alleged to have disappeared in September 1906, the same night Jennie Olson went missing. Gunness claimed they were a Los Angeles "professor" and his wife who had taken Jennie to California;

 

a brother of Miss Jennie Graham of Waukesha, Wisconsin, who had left her to marry a rich widow in La Porte but vanished;

 

a hired man from Ohio age 50 name unknown is alleged to have disappeared and Gunness became the "heir" to his horse and buggy;

 

an unnamed man from Montana told people at a resort he was going to sell Gunness his horse and buggy, which were found with several other horses and buggies at the farm.

 

Most of the remains found on the property could not be identified. Because of the crude recovery methods, the number of individuals unearthed on the Gunness farm is unknown but is believed to be approximately twelve. On May 19, 1908, the remains of approximately seven unknown victims were buried in two coffins in unmarked graves in the pauper's section of LaPorte's Pine Lake Cemetery. Andrew Helgelien and Jennie Olson are buried in La Porte's Patton Cemetery, near Peter Gunness.

 

So, here’s the even MORE fucked up part… if it’s possible.

 

Ray Lamphere was arrested on May 22, 1908, and tried for murder and arson. He denied the charges of arson and murder that were filed against him. His defense hinged on the assertion that the body was not that of that big ol’ girl, Belle Gunness.

 

Lamphere's lawyer, Wirt Worden, developed evidence that contradicted Norton's identification of the teeth and bridgework. A local jeweler testified that though the gold in the bridgework had emerged from the fire almost undamaged, the fierce heat of the fire had melted the gold plating on several watches and items of gold jewelry. Local doctors replicated the fire conditions by attaching a similar dental bridgework to a human jawbone and placing it in a blacksmith’s forge. The natural teeth crumbled and disintegrated; the porcelain teeth came out pocked and pitted, and the gold parts melted (both the artificial elements were damaged to a greater degree than those in the bridgework offered as evidence of Gunness' identity). The hired hand Joe Maxson and another man also testified that they’d seen "Klondike" Schultz take the bridgework out of his pocket and plant it just before it was "discovered.” Lamphere was found guilty of arson but acquitted of murder. On November 26, 1908, he was sentenced to 20 years in State Prison (in Michigan City). He died of tuberculosis the next year on December 30, 1909.

 

On January 14, 1910, the Rev. E. A. Schell came forward with a confession that Lamphere was said to have made to him while the clergyman was comforting the dying man. In it, Lamphere revealed Gunness' crimes and swore that she was still alive. Lamphere had stated to the Reverend Schell and a fellow convict, Harry Meyers, shortly before his death that he had not murdered anyone but had helped Gunness bury many of her victims. When a victim arrived, she made him comfortable, charming him and cooking a large meal. She then drugged his coffee, and when the man was all fucked up, she split his head with a meat chopper. Sometimes she would simply wait for the suitor to go to bed and then enter the bedroom by candlelight and chloroform the hapless sap. A powerful woman, Gunness would then carry the body to the basement, place it on a table, and dissect it. She then bundled the remains and buried these in the hog pen and on the grounds around the house. Thanks to her second husband’s instruction, Peter Gunness, the butcher, Belle had become an expert at dissection. To save time, she sometimes poisoned her victims' coffee with strychnine. (Um… the first husband) She also varied her disposal methods, sometimes dumping the corpse into the hog-scalding vat and covering the remains with quicklime. Lamphere even stated that if Belle was overly tired after murdering one of her victims, she merely chopped up the remains and, in the middle of the night, stepped into her hog pen and fed the remains to the hogs.

 

Lamphere also cleared up the mysterious question of the headless female corpse found in Gunness’s home’s smoking remains. Gunness had lured this woman from Chicago on the pretense of hiring her as a housekeeper only days before she decided to make her permanent escape from La Porte. Gunness, according to Lamphere, had drugged the woman, then bashed in her head and decapitated the body, taking the head, which had weights tied to it, to a swamp where she threw it into deep water. Then, she chloroformed her children, smothered them to death, and dragged their small bodies, along with the headless corpse, to the basement.

 

She dressed the female corpse in her old clothing, and removed her false teeth, placing these beside the headless corpse to assure it being identified as Belle Gunness. She then torched the house and fled. Lamphere had helped her, he admitted, but she didn’t take off by the road where he waited for her after the fire had been set. She had betrayed her one-time partner in crime in the end by cutting across open fields and then disappearing into the woods. Some accounts suggest that Lamphere admitted that he took her to Stillwell (a town about nine miles from La Porte) and saw her off on a train to Chicago.

 

Lamphere said that Gunness was a rich woman, that she had murdered 42 men by his count, and maybe more, and had taken amounts from them ranging from $1,000 to $32,000. She had allegedly accumulated more than $250,000 through her murder schemes over the years—a considerable fortune for those days (about 10 million dollars, today). She had a small amount remaining in one of her savings accounts, but local banks later admitted that she had withdrawn most of her money shortly before the fire. Gunness withdrawing most of her money suggested that she was planning to evade the law.

Gunness was, for several decades, allegedly seen or sighted in cities and towns throughout the United States. Friends, acquaintances, and amateur detectives apparently spotted her on the streets of Chicago, San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles. As late as 1931, Gunness was reported alive and living in a Mississippi town, where she supposedly owned a great deal of property and lived the life of a respected woman. Sheriff Smutzer, for more than 20 years, received an average of two reports a month. She became part of American criminal folklore, a female Sasquatch, if you will.

 

Gunness’s three children’s bodies were found in the home's wreckage, but the headless adult female corpse found with them was never positively identified. Gunness' true fate is unknown; La Porte residents were divided between believing that Lamphere killed her and that she had faked her own death. In 1931, a woman known as "Esther Carlson" was arrested in Los Angeles for poisoning August Lindstrom for money. Two people who had known Gunness claimed to recognize her from photographs, but the identification was never proved. Carlson died while awaiting trial.

 

So, what the fuck happened to “Hell’s Belle”??

 

The body believed to be that of Belle Gunness was buried next to her first husband at Forest Home Cemetery in Forest Park, Illinois.

 

On November 5, 2007, with the permission of descendants of Belle's sister, the headless body was exhumed from Gunness' grave in Forest Home Cemetery by a team of forensic anthropologists and graduate students from the University of Indianapolis to learn her true identity. It was initially hoped that a sealed envelope flap on a letter found at the victim's farm would contain enough DNA to be compared to that of the body. Unfortunately, there was not enough DNA, so efforts continue to find a reliable source for comparison purposes, including the disinterment of other bodies and contact with known living relatives.

 

As far as we know… Belle Gunness, the wicked Norwegian bitch… got away with So. Many. Murders… including her own.

 

Movies

 

https://deluxevideoonline.org/our-tens-list-faked-deaths-in-movies/

Crazy Sting Operations

www.patreon.com/accidentaldads for bonus content and to support the show AND The Save The Music Foundation!

 

Top police stings

 

A sting operation is a deceitful operation used by law enforcement to apprehend criminals in the act of trying to commit a crime. In order to obtain proof of a suspect's misconduct, a typical sting involves an undercover law enforcement officer, investigator, or cooperative member of the public acting as a criminal partner or prospective victim and cooperating with a suspect's activities. Journalists for the mass media occasionally use sting operations to film and disseminate footage of illegal conduct.

 

Sting procedures are prevalent in many nations, including the United States, but are prohibited in others, like Sweden and France. Certain sting operations are prohibited, such as those carried out in the Philippines where it is against the law for police enforcement to act as drug traffickers in order to catch purchasers of illegal substances.\

 

Examples

 

• Offering free sports or airline tickets to lure fugitives out of hiding.
• Deploying a bait car (also called a honey trap) to catch a car thief
• Setting up a seemingly vulnerable honeypot computer to lure and gain information about hackers
• Arranging for someone under the legal drinking age to ask an adult to buy an alcoholic beverage or tobacco products for them
• Passing off weapons or explosives (whether fake or real), to a would-be terrorist
• Posing as:
• someone who is seeking illegal drugs, contraband, or child pornography, to catch a supplier (or as a supplier to catch a customer)
• a child in a chat room to identify a potential online child predator
• a potential customer of illegal prostitution, or as a prostitute to catch a would-be customer
• a hitman to catch customers and solicitors of murder-for-hire; or as a customer to catch a hitman
• a spectator of an illegal dogfighting ring
• a documentary film crew to lure a pirate to the country where a crime was committed.

 

Whether sting operations constitute entrapment raises ethical questions. Law enforcement might have to be careful not to incite someone who wouldn't have otherwise committed a crime to do so. Additionally, while conducting such operations, the police frequently commit the same crimes, like purchasing or selling narcotics, enticing prostitutes, etc. The defendant may raise the entrapment defense in common law jurisdictions.

 

Contrary to common belief, however, laws against entrapment do not forbid undercover police personnel from pretending to be criminals or deny that they are police officers. Entrapment is normally only a defense when suspects are coerced into confessing to a crime they probably would not have otherwise committed. However, the legal meaning of this coercion differs widely from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. Entrapment might be used as a defense, for instance, if undercover agents forced a possible suspect to manufacture illicit narcotics in order to sell them. Entrapment has often not taken place if a suspect is already producing narcotics and authorities pretend as purchasers to apprehend them.

 

Operation Entebbe

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) commandos successfully carried out Operation Entebbe or Operation Thunderbolt, a counterterrorism hostage-rescue mission, at Entebbe Airport in Uganda on July 4, 1976.

A week earlier, on June 27, two members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - External Operations (PFLP-EO) (who had previously split from the PFLP of George Habash) and two members of the German Revolutionary Cells hijacked an Air France Airbus A300 jet airliner carrying 248 passengers. The declared goal of the hijackers was to trade the hostages for the release of 13 detainees in four other countries and the release of 40 Palestinian terrorists and related prisoners who were detained in Israel. The flight, which had left Tel Aviv for Paris, was rerouted after a stopover in Athens through Benghazi to Entebbe, the country of Uganda's principal airport. The ruler Idi Amin, who had been made aware of the hijacking from the start[10], encouraged the hijackers and personally greeted them. The hijackers confined all Israelis and a few non-Israeli Jews into a separate room after transferring all captives from the plane to a deserted airport facility.  148 captives who were not Israelis were freed and taken to Paris over the course of the next two days. Ninety-four passengers—mostly Israelis—and the 12-person Air France crew were held captive and threatened with execution. 

Based on information from the Israeli intelligence service Mossad, the IDF took action. If the demands for the release of the prisoners were not granted, the hijackers threatened to murder the hostages. The preparation of the rescue effort was prompted by this threat. These strategies included getting ready for armed opposition from the Uganda Army.

It was a nighttime operation. For the rescue mission, Israeli transport planes flew 100 commandos to Uganda over a distance of 4,000 kilometers (2,500 miles). The operation took 90 minutes to complete after a week of planning. Out of the 106 captives still held, 102 were freed, and three were murdered. In a hospital, the second captive was later slain. Lt. Col. Yonatan Netanyahu, the unit leader, was one of the five injured Israeli commandos. Netanyahu was Benjamin Netanyahu's elder sibling and the future Israeli prime minister. Eleven Soviet-built MiG-17s and MiG-21s of the Ugandan air force were destroyed, and all five hijackers and forty-five Ugandan troops were killed. Idi Amin gave the command to attack and kill Kenyans living in Uganda after the operation because Kenyan sources supported Israel. 245 Kenyans in Uganda were killed as a consequence, and 3,000 left the nation.

In honor of Yonatan Netanyahu, the commander of the force, Operation Entebbe, which had the military codename Operation Thunderbolt, is occasionally referred to retroactively as Operation Jonathan.

 

Operation Valkyrie

Senior Nazi military officers and Adolf Hitler convened in the Wolf's Lair in Rastenburg, Eastern Prussia, on July 20, 1944. Hitler's body was discovered scattered across the table as the Nazi military chiefs sat down to plan troop deployments on the Eastern Front when an explosion burst through the steamy meeting room. With the Führer's death, the Nazi threat to Europe could have been lifted. or so it seems at first.

 

Claus von Stauffenberg and his accomplices believed they had turned the course of World War II and maybe saved thousands of extra lives for a brief period of time in history. The July Plot, also known as Operation Valkyrie, was the most famous attempt to have Hitler killed, although it was ultimately unsuccessful for a variety of reasons, some of which are still unknown to this day.

The July Plot Is Hatched

Many Germans, including some of the country's top military figures, had begun to lose faith in Germany's ability to win the war by the summer of 1944. Hitler was widely held responsible for ruining Germany. The Wolfsschanze was one of Hitler's military headquarters. A number of prominent politicians and senior military figures devised a plan to murder the Führer by detonating a bomb at a conference there in order to spark political unification and a coup. Operation Valkyrie was the name of the strategy. The plan was that after Hitler's death, the military would assert that the murder was the result of a Nazi Party coup attempt, and the Reserve Army would take significant buildings in Berlin and detain senior Nazi figures. Carl Friedrich Goerdeler would become Germany's new chancellor, and Ludwig Beck would become its first president. The new administration wanted to negotiate a peaceful conclusion to the war, ideally with benefits for Germany.

The main conspirators' motives varied, according to Philipp Freiherr Von Boeselager, one of the last remaining participants in the July Plot. Many of them only saw it as a means of avoiding military defeat, while others hoped to at least partially restore some of the nation's morals. They chose Claus von Stauffenberg, a young colonel in the German army, to carry out the assassination. Despite not being a member of the Nazi party in the traditional sense, Stauffenberg was a devoted German patriot. In the end, he came to think that if Germany was to be saved, it was his patriotic duty to expel Adolf Hitler.

Hitler, though, had experienced assassination attempts before. Assassination attempts against Hitler had been more frequent since his spectacular ascent to the top of Germany's political scene in the late 1930s. Hitler, who was becoming more and more paranoid, frequently altered his plans without warning and at the last minute.

What Went Wrong

Stauffenberg entered the bunker at Wolfsschanze on July 20, 1944. The conference was planned to take place in a concrete, windowless subterranean bunker that was closed off by a large steel door. By making sure it happened within one of these facilities, the detonation would be confined and anyone nearby the explosive device would die quickly from the shrapnel.

The conference was moved to an above-ground wooden bunker with better air circulation on July 20 due to the oppressively hot weather, according to Pierre Galante's Operation Valkyrie: The German Generals' Plot Against Hitler. Numerous windows, a wooden table, and other beautiful furniture were all present in the area, which meant that the potential explosion would be much diminished since the energy of the blast would be absorbed and diffused.

Stauffenberg was aware that this was the case, but he nonetheless proceeded, assuming that two explosives would be sufficient to destroy the room and kill everyone within.

Stauffenberg excused himself when he arrived, saying that he needed to change his clothing, and went to a private room. The two explosives needed to be armed and primed. However, he only had time to arm one of the two devices due to an unexpected phone call and a quick knock at his door. Thus, the possibility of a greater blast was cut in half.

Stauffenberg realized that in order to cause any kind of harm, the explosive device needed to be placed as near to Hitler as possible. He was able to get a seat as near to Hitler as possible with only one other person between them by claiming that his hearing was impaired due to his wounds. Placing the bag as near to Hitler as possible, Stauffenberg then left the room pretending to take a personal call.

The briefcase was accidentally shifted to the opposite side of a large wooden leg that was supporting the meeting room table as another official was taking a seat.

The Aftermath

Panic broke out after the device exploded at precisely 12:42 pm. Twenty individuals were hurt, including three cops who subsequently died from their injuries, and a stenographer was instantaneously murdered.

Stauffenberg and his assistant Werner von Haeften leapt into a staff car and bluffed their way past three different military checkpoints to flee the mayhem at the Wolfsschanze complex because they believed that Hitler was indeed dead.

Hitler, however, along with everyone else who was protected by the large wooden table leg, only suffered a few minor cuts and an eardrum perforation. He had fully torn-up pants, and the Nazi leadership would subsequently utilize pictures of them in a propaganda effort.

Ian Kershaw, a historian, claims that during the explosion, contradictory news concerning Hitler's fate came. In spite of the disarray, the Reserve Army started detaining senior Nazi officials in Berlin. The entire scheme, however, was eventually thwarted by delays, unclear communication, and the announcement that Hitler was still alive.

The conspirators were all given the death penalty in a hastily called court martial the same evening by General Friedrich Fromm. In the courtyard of the Bendlerblock, a makeshift firing squad murdered Stauffenberg, von Haeften, Olbricht, and another officer, Albrecht Mertz von Quirnheim, while Ludwig Beck committed himself. At Berlin's Plötzensee jail, Berthold Stauffenberg was gently strangled while the incident was being recorded for Hitler to see.

Hitler's life was ultimately saved that day by a number of interrelated reasons, but the conspirators were right that Germany was headed for disaster. Less than a year later, the Nazi leader and his closest advisers committed suicide.

Operation Iceman

Ever wonder what its like working undercover with an alleged murderer? Well, let's just say it's not hard to get a stuffy nose around this case…

In fact, serial killer Richard Kuklinski's preferred method of murder involved using a nasal spray bottle to spritz cyanide into the faces of his victims. As a result, undercover agent Dominick Polifrone was never more on guard than during the 18 months he spent building a case against the so-called Iceman.

“No matter where I went with him, I wore this leather jacket with a pocket sewn inside containing a small-caliber weapon,” recalls Polifrone, who gained his target’s confidence and taped dozens of their conversations. “I knew that I was somewhere on his hit list. If he’d pulled out that nasal spray, I’d have to protect myself.”

The streetwise New Jersey officer acquired enough proof before Kuklinski had suspicions, preventing that situation from occurring. Finally, the enormous 6-foot-4 gangland killer was apprehended thanks to his evidence.

“I’ve met hundreds of bad guys, but Kuklinski was a totally different type of individual,” he tells The Post. “He was coldhearted — ice-cold like the devil. He had no remorse about anything.” 

Kuklinski was captured by Polifrone in a combined operation between the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms and the office of the New Jersey attorney general. The criminal, who was a leading suspect in the murder of a mobster whose body was found two years after his disappearance, was posing as a respectable businessman residing in suburban Dumont, New Jersey.

The reason the medical examiners discovered ice in the muscle tissue was because Kuklinski, who earned his notoriety for frequently freezing the bodies of his victims and then defrosting them, erred that time.

Police made an indirect connection between the deceased man and Kuklinski, who was charged with a number of previous homicides. 

“We had to get something nobody knew,” recalls Polifrone.

The sting only appears briefly on screen in the film. In order to gain Kuklinski's trust, Polifrone, a resident of Hackensack, New Jersey, pretended to be a "bad person" for a whole year and a half.

They met in parks and rest areas along highways and discussed the horrific killings Kuklinski had carried out, including a Mafia hit in Detroit for which he was paid $65,000.

Additionally, there were "statement killings." To put a dead canary in the mouth of a victim as a warning to other victims, one mafia leader paid him extra.

Another occasion, Kuklinski made light of the fact that he saw a gang member consume an entire cheeseburger laced with cyanide before passing away while joking with Polifrone.

Recalls the cop: “He told me that cyanide normally works real quick and easy, but that ‘this guy has the constitution of a God damn ox, and is just eating and eating. 

“He said he almost ate the whole burger and then, bam, he’s down!”

Polifrone knew exactly how to play his role. “I laughed, of course,” he shrugs. “That’s what bad guys do.” 

Paradoxically, Kuklinski was a committed family man. He led a Jekyll-and-Hyde existence. 

“He never socialized, gambled or messed around with other women,” adds Polifrone. “He lived for his wife and kids.”

One minute he’d be repairing his daughters’ toys, the next, dismembering a body with a chain saw and stuffing it into an oil drum.

“He would come home and completely shut off this murderous component and seek security and love from his family,” says “Iceman” director Vromen. “He fulfilled the need to provide for them by killing.”

Polifrone finally nailed Kuklinski after tricking him into buying what he thought was pure cyanide. A team of feds and ATF officers arrested him in December 1986.

Twenty-eight years later, he reflects on the man who died, apparently of natural causes, in Trenton Prison in 2006 at age 70. Eyebrows were raised because he was due to appear as a witness at the trial of a Gambino family underboss.

“I hope he died a slow death because of what he did to families and individuals,” concludes Polifrone. “He had no mercy. And if it was foul play, that’s OK with me.”

So let’s talk about some controversial sting operations you may or may not have heard of.

 

ACORN Sting

 

Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now is known as ACORN. ACORN was a group of neighborhood-based organizations in the US that supported low- and middle-income families. They also offered details on affordable housing and voter registration. James O'Keefe and Hannah Giles, two young conservative activists, published recordings that had been edited with care in 2009. The two pretended to be a pimp and a prostitute before using a hidden camera to get unflattering answers from ACORN workers that seemed to give them advice on how to hide their prostitution business and avoid paying taxes.The plea for assistance in obtaining funding for a brothel didn't appear to deter the ACORN employees either. This sparked a national debate and led to a reduction in financing from public and private sources. ACORN declared on March 22, 2010, that it was disbanding and shutting all of its connected state chapters as a result of declining funding. Interesting fact: On January 25, 2010, James O'Keefe and three other people were detained on felony charges for allegedly tampering with the phones at Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu's office in New Orleans. O'Keefe stated that he was looking into claims that Landrieu's staff had dismissed constituent phone calls over the health care issue. O'Keefe recorded the action as they pretended to be telephone repairmen.In the end, they were accused with breaking into a government building under false pretenses, a misdemeanor. Following his admission of guilt, O'Keefe received a three-year probationary period, 100 hours of community service, and a $1,500 fine.

 

Operation West End

The largest undercover news story in Indian journalism has been described like this. In order to expose the alleged culture of bribery inside the Indian Ministry of Defense, a well-known newspaper from India by the name of Tehelka—which translates as "sensation" in Hindi—started its first significant undercover operation, "Operation West End" in 2001. Two reporters from the publication pretended to be London-based armaments dealers from a fake firm. In the undercover film, numerous politicians and defense officials are shown discussing and accepting bribes in exchange for assisting them in obtaining government contracts, including Bangaru Laxman, secretary of the ruling BJP party. Laxman and Military Minister George Fernandes (shown above) resigned following the release of the tapes, and a number of other defense ministry employees were placed on administrative leave.

 

Interesting Fact: Instead of initially acting on the evidence from the sting operation, the Indian government accused the newspaper of fabricating the allegations. The main financial backers of Tehelka were made targets of investigations, and the newspaper company was almost ruined. In 2003, Tehelka was re-launched as a weekly newspaper, and was funded by faithful subscribers and other well-wishers. In 2007, Tehelka shifted to a regular magazine format.

 

Senator Larry Craig

On June 11, 2007, an undercover police officer conducting a sting operation targeting males cruising for sex at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport detained Idaho Senator Larry Craig. Sgt. Dave Karsnia, the arresting officer, claimed that just after noon, the suspect entered a restroom and shut the door. Craig then moved into the stall next to him and propped his suitcase up against the stall door's front. By obscuring the front view, this is frequently done in an effort to hide sexual activity. Several minutes later, the officer claimed to have noticed Craig looking into his stall through a gap, tapping his right foot repeatedly, then moving it till it brushed Karsnia's. Craig then passed his hand under the stall divider into Karsnia’s stall with his palm up and guided it along the divider toward the front of the stall three times. Karsnia then waved his badge back, to which the senator responded, “No!” The senator pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct and paid a fine, but changed his mind after word of his arrest later became public. Craig claimed he just had a “wide stance”, and he only pleaded guilty to avoid a spectacle.An appeals court rejected his request to change his mind about entering a guilty plea. Craig completed his time in the Senate but was unable to have his case dismissed by the Senate Ethics Committee. Craig departed office on January 3, 2009, having not to run for reelection in 2008. Fascinating Fact: Soon after Craig was arrested, the men's room started to resemble a tourist destination, with people coming to seek directions and take photographs. Even restroom tissue may be purchased on eBay. Listen to the conversation between Senator Craig and Sgt. Karsnia immediately following the arrest here.

 

7

Sarah Ferguson was victimized by Mazher Mahmood, a reporter for the tabloid daily "News of the World," in May 2010. In order to set up a meeting with Ferguson, Mahmood pretended to be a wealthy international businessman. The Duchess, who was discreetly recorded throughout the encounter, offered to connect the "tycoon" with Prince Andrew's influential inner circle. "500,000 pounds when you can, to me, open doors," Sarah Ferguson is heard saying on the video. She may also be seen removing a briefcase that is holding $40,000 in cash. After the event was reported, Ferguson's spokesman claimed she was both "devastated" and "regretful." She said that she had been drinking before asking for the money and was "in the gutter at that point" in an interview with Oprah Winfrey. Mazher Mahmood, the guy who pretended to be the tycoon, is referred to as the "Fake Sheikh" and has conned several famous people. No one is certain if that is his true name or what his real history is since he likes to make things as mysterious as possible. The journalist denies ever allowing his face to appear in any of his pieces and claims to have received several death threats. He also avoids public appearances.

 

Bait Cars

The Minneapolis Police Department employed the first bait cars in the 1990s. The largest bait car fleet in North America is now situated in Surrey, British Columbia, which is widely regarded as the continent's "auto theft capital." The cars are carefully modified, equipped with GPS tracking equipment, audio/video surveillance, and an engine-disabling remote control. It has helped to lower car theft by 47% when it was introduced in Surrey, British Columbia, in 2004. In one of the more contentious bait vehicle stings, a lady was murdered nearly instantaneously after a robber driving a bait car drove into her in Dallas, Texas, in 2008. To resolve the litigation, $245,000 was given to the victim's family. Fact: The key to determining whether police are utilizing a bait car improperly and would result in entrapment is if they left it in a way that would tempt someone who would not ordinarily commit a crime. Here, you can view one of the more eye-catching (to put it mildly) bait vehicle stings. Many others will undoubtedly have the same thoughts as I had. “Where the heck was the kill switch?”

 

Marion Barry

A well-known politician and former mayor of Washington, D.C., Marion Barry. Police were going to conduct an undercover narcotics transaction with former Virgin Islands official Charles Lewis on December 22, 1988, but they were turned back when they discovered Mayor Marion Barry was in Lewis's hotel room. This prompted a grand jury inquiry into potential mayor meddling in the narcotics probe. Barry testified for three hours in front of the grand jury before telling reporters he had done nothing wrong. Then, on January 18, 1990, Barry was arrested in a Washington, D.C. hotel after using crack cocaine in a room with his former girlfriend, who had turned informant for the FBI. This was the result of a sting operation put up by the FBI and D.C. Police. Barry said the now-famous phrase, "Bitch set me up," which has come to be linked with him. Following his arrest and subsequent trial, Barry made the decision not to run for mayor again. He was charged with 14 charges by a grand jury, including suspected grand jury perjury. The mayor could have spent 26 years in prison if found guilty on all 14 counts. Barry was only given a six-month prison term after the jury found him guilty of using cocaine. Barry campaigned for municipal council after being let out of prison. He garnered 70% of the vote due to his widespread popularity and the perception held by many that Marion Barry was the target of a political witch hunt by the government. Then, in 1995, Barry won a fourth term as mayor of Washington, D.C. Barry is currently back in his position on the D.C. city council. Regardless of your opinion on Marion Barry, you have to respect his perseverance and drive to help the people of Washington, D.C. The aforementioned occurrence is only a small portion of his remarkable life. A documentary titled "The Nine Lives of Marion Barry" was produced by HBO. 

 

Joran Van der Sloot

Dutch national Joran Van der Sloot is a key suspect in the case of Natalee Holloway, who vanished on May 30, 2005, while traveling to Aruba to celebrate her high school graduation. On March 29, 2010, Van der Sloot got in touch with Beth Twitty Holloway's mother's attorney John Q. Kelly, reviving the case. Van der Sloot promised to provide details about Holloway's demise and the whereabouts of her remains in exchange for a total of $250,000 with a $25,000 down payment. After Kelly and Twitty made contact with Alabama law enforcement, the FBI launched a sting operation. On May 10, Van der Sloot accepted a wire transfer of $15,000 to his Dutch bank account along with an additional cash payment of $10,000. He drove Kelly to the location of Holloway's remains in exchange for the cash. He indicated a home, saying that his father had assisted in burying the body in the foundation. The home had not yet been constructed when Holloway vanished, therefore this turned out to be untrue. Later, Van der Sloot informed Kelly through email that the entire incident was a fraud. At this point, police might have detained Van der Sloot for wire fraud and extortion, but they chose to wait while they worked to establish a case of murder against him. Van der Sloot was not only let free, he was also given permission to depart Aruba and travel to Bogotá, Colombia, and then Lima, Peru, with the money he had made from the operation. He met Stephany Flores Ramirez, a 21-year-old University of Lima business student, in a casino hotel in the city. Ramirez and Van der Sloot are seen entering a hotel room together on security footage, but only Van der Sloot is seen exiting. On June 2, Ramirez was discovered dead in the hotel room that Van der Sloot had booked, her neck broken and she had been battered to death. On May 30, 2010, precisely five years after Natalee Holloway vanished, Ramirez passed away. A person arrested Van der Sloot He admitted to the murder on June 3 and June 7. Fascinating fact: Van der Sloot is presently detained at Peru's Miguel Castro jail, where murder charges have been brought. He apparently now claims that if he is permitted to move to a jail in Aruba, he would tell the whereabouts of Natalee Holloway's remains.

 

Perverted Justice Stings

Perverted-Justice is a group that uses volunteers to masquerade as juveniles online, often between the ages of 10-15, and wait for an adult to message or email the decoy back. If the topic becomes sexual, they won't actively reject it or support it. Then, in order to set up a meeting, they will attempt to identify the males by acquiring their phone numbers and other information. The group then provides law enforcement with the information. Additionally, Perverted-Justice has worked with the American reality show "To Catch a Predator." In Murphy, Texas, one of the more contentious instances took place in 2006. Louis Conradt (seen above), a district attorney in Texas, pretended to be a 19-year-old college student and had sexually explicit internet conversations with a person he thought was a 13-year-old kid. They hired an actress to portray the youngster on the phone when Conradt demanded images of the boy's genitalia. Conradt stopped returning phone calls and instant messages, so police and the reality program decided to conduct a search warrant operation at his residence. A gunshot was heard as the police entered the scene to make an arrest. Conradt was inside with a self-inflicted wound when they arrived, and he eventually passed away at a hospital. 23 people were taken into custody for online solicitation of minors as a consequence of the sting operation in Murphy, Texas. Due to inadequate evidence, none of the 23 instances were prosecuted as of June 2007. Conradt's family launched a $105 million lawsuit against Dateline's To Catch a Predator series. The dispute was ultimately resolved outside of court. All next episodes' development was halted by the network in 2008.

Rachel Hoffman

On February 22, 2007, a traffic stop in Tallahassee, Florida, resulted in Rachel Hoffman being found in possession of 25 grams of marijuana. Then, on April 17, 2008, police searched her flat and found 4 ecstasy tablets and 151.7 grams of marijuana. Police allegedly threatened to put her in jail unless she worked as an undercover informant for them, according to her account. She was then dispatched untrained to an undercover gathering to purchase a weapon and a significant quantity of narcotics from two alleged drug traffickers. The suspects relocated the drug purchase while she was there. When she departed the buy place in the car with the two suspects, the police officers who were keeping an eye on the sting lost sight of her. The identical gun she was intended to purchase was used to kill her by the two suspects while they were in motion. Two days later, her corpse was discovered close to Perry, Florida. One of the murder suspects was convicted of first-degree murder and given a life sentence without the possibility of parole on December 17, 2009, which would have been Rachel Hoffman's 25th birthday. Trial for the second murder suspect is set for October 2010. Interesting Fact: On May 7, 2009, a law called “Rachel’s Law” was passed by the Florida State Senate. Rachel’s Law requires law enforcement agencies to (a) provide special training for officers who recruit confidential informants, (b) instruct informants that reduced sentences may not be provided in exchange for their work, and (c) permit informants to request a lawyer if they want one. 

 

Mr. Big

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police created Mr. Big, sometimes known as "the Canadian method," in the early 1990s in response to unsolved killings. It is employed in Canada and Australia, but many other nations, like the United States and England, view it as entrapment. The technique works something like this: An undercover police unit poses as members of a fictitious gang, into which the suspect is inducted. The suspect is invited to participate in a series of criminal activities (all faked by the police). In addition, the “gang members” build a personal relationship with the suspect, by drinking together and other social activities. After some time, the gang boss, Mr. Big, is presented to him. The police have a fresh interest in the first crime, and the suspect is instructed to provide the gang with further information. They clarify that Mr. Big might be able to affect the course of the police investigation, but only if he confesses to the full extent of the crime. He is also warned that if he conceals any other previous offenses, the gang could decide against working with him in the future since he would be a burden. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police are shown in the picture above carrying the hats of the four officers who were killed in Edmonton, Canada, in 2005 at a memorial service. Two of the men serving prison sentences for the murders made confessions to Mr. Big operatives.Interesting Fact: In British Columbia, the technique has been used over 180 times, and, in 80% of the cases, it resulted in either a confession or the elimination of the suspect from suspicion. However, cases of false confessions and wrongful convictions have recently come to the public’s attention, and many are starting to question the controversial technique. In 2007, a documentary was made, called Mr. Big, that was very critical of the procedure.

 

You can’t talk about undercover operations without talking about the mob. Here are five badasses who infiltrated the mob.

 

In law enforcement, working as an undercover officer carries the high risk of discovery by criminal suspects, leading to violence, torture and death. But the rewards can be huge, with wire recordings and eyewitness testimony that can result in arrests and convictions. A trained officer knows how to strategize, win the confidence of their targets and get them to reveal what’s needed to build a case to take to trial. It requires an unusual kind of person, able to work under stress, stay focused, pull off the character he or she is playing and be prepared to tell many lies.

What follows here is a list of five remarkable individuals whose undercover operations, despite real dangers, resulted in the convictions of leaders and associates of organized crime, over almost a century. This list leaves out many other famous undercover officers, whom we would like to recognize in the future. Perhaps because of the gravity of the investigations, and the financial resources required, all of these undercover officers worked for agencies of the U.S. government.

MICHAEL MALONE

Mike Malone worked undercover for the Treasury Department’s Intelligence Unit. In the late 1920s, he infiltrated Al Capone’s Chicago Outfit and helped convict the crime boss of tax evasion.

Michael Malone had all the makings of an undercover agent who would successfully infiltrate Al Capone’s Chicago gang for nearly two years. Malone, whose parents came over from Ireland, grew up in New Jersey and meshed well with its European immigrants, eventually learning to speak Gaelic, Italian, Yiddish and Greek. With his “black Irish” dark hair and skin, he resembled someone from southern Europe. After finessing his way into Capone’s inner circle in 1929, Malone proved invaluable to his superiors in the Treasury Department pursuing a tax evasion case against the Chicago crime boss. Despite the danger, Malone kept an iron will. Blowing his cover would have proved fatal. But given his skills, it didn’t happen.

While Malone kept up the charade, he delivered information that proved incriminating not only for Capone, but for his top enforcer, Frank Nitti (aka Nitto). Malone remained disguised within Capone’s bootlegging band even for a time after the feds filed tax charges against Capone, Nitti and Capone’s brother, Ralph, in 1931.

When Capone’s jury trial commenced, and the Treasury Department removed Malone from his undercover job, the agent gained a bit of respect from the embarrassed gang chief himself. In the Chicago courthouse, Malone happened to enter an elevator where Capone stood with his defense lawyers.

“The only thing that fooled me was your looks,” Capone is said as to have remarked to Malone. “You look like a Wop. You took your chances, and I took mine. I lost.”

From 1929 to 1931, Malone fed intelligence about Capone that would culminate in the historic conviction of the nation’s most notorious Mob boss. His fascinating story began after his service in World War I. With law enforcement his career goal, Malone joined the Treasury Department’s Intelligence Unit later known as the “T-Men.” Early on, in the 1920s, Malone appreciated how donning disguises brought him closer to the suspects. He posed in everyman roles such as garbage man and shoe shiner.

Elmer Irey, chief of the Intelligence Unit, had worked with undercover agent Malone on Prohibition cases. Once, Irey enlisted Malone to smash a West Coast version of “Rum Row,” rumrunners selling contraband Canadian liquor from ships off the coast of San Francisco. Malone posed as gangster from Chicago in hiding, with money to invest in illegal booze. He devised a nighttime sting operation. Agents posing as bootleggers drove speedboats out to the booze-laden mother ship and, after money changed hands, Malone fired off a flare, signaling the U.S. Coast Guard, which boarded the mother ship and arrested the astonished bootleggers.

President Herbert Hoover entered office in March 1929, a few weeks following the infamous St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in Chicago, where seven men associated with Capone’s bitter rival in bootlegging, George “Bugs” Moran, died in gunfire. Hoover conferred with Irey and urged him to compile a team of special agents to “get Capone” on tax charges. Meanwhile, another team of Prohibition Unit agents in Chicago, headed by Eliot Ness, would attack Capone on violations of federal liquor laws under the Volstead Act.

Irey appointed Special Agent Frank Wilson, Malone and several others to the get Capone team. Meanwhile, a group of wealthy business executives in Chicago, called the Secret Six, donated large sums of money for expenses to assist the feds in getting Capone. Malone used their largess to purchase some expensive clothing to look the part of a well-heeled hoodlum that Capone would envy.

Malone set about infiltrating Capone’s underworld at its core – the Lexington Hotel, where the boss and his men lived. Wearing a fancy suit, purple shirt and white hat, Malone sat in the lobby, reading newspapers for days on end. He spoke in an Italian accent, introduced himself as “Mike Lepito,” met Capone men playing craps and played the part of a mobster. He mailed letters to friends in Philadelphia, who wrote back. Capone’s guys broke into his room, noted his pricey checkered suits and silk underwear. They opened his mail from Philadelphia, read the letters written, impressively, in underworld lingo they understood. They informed Capone.

Finally, Capone sent a cohort down to the lobby to ask “Lepito” about his business in town. “Keeping quiet,” Malone replied in his Italian inflection. In the coming days, over drinks, Malone told the guy he was on the lam for burglary in Philadelphia. That got Malone invitations to play poker and trade gossip with the gang, then dinner at their hangout, the New Florence, and then to attend the birthday party Capone planned for Frank Nitti at the Lexington. Malone met Capone at Nitti’s party. The secret agent’s new acquaintances included big-shot hoods Nitti, “Machine Gun” Jack McGurn, Jake “Greasy Thumb” Guzik, Paul “The Waiter” Ricca, Murray “The Camel” Humphreys and Sam “Golf Bag” Hunt. Malone was in.

He discreetly phoned Wilson about what he’d overheard within the gang. Wilson and his aides traced signatures on bank checks while pursuing tax evasion cases against Nitti and Guzik. A federal court in Chicago convicted Guzik, who got a five-year sentence. But Nitti skipped town. Malone, assigned to find him, followed Nitti’s wife to an apartment building in Berwyn, Illinois. There, the cops nabbed Nitti, later sentenced to 18 months in prison for tax evasion.

Then the police pinched Al himself following his 1931 indictment on tax charges. “Mike Lepito” was there at the Lexington when Al Capone arrived back, triumphant about his release on $50,000 bail. Malone listened and reported to Wilson about Capone’s scheme to bribe and fix the jury in his favor. The feds moved quickly and a judge created a new list of jurors. Malone then reported Capone’s plot to hire five gunman from New York to kill four federal officials in Chicago – including Wilson. With safety measures in place, Capone ordered the gunmen to leave town.

Capone’s trial, after a judge refused to plea bargain with the Mob boss, started in October 1931. Four days afterward, Malone finally gave up the act. The news spread fast to Capone and his men. Malone had heard that Phil D’Andrea, Capone’s bodyguard, planned to bring a concealed gun into the courthouse. Malone and another agent frisked and disarmed D’Andrea, and had him arrested. A jury Capone could not fix found the boss guilty on 22 criminal counts. The judge gave him 11 years in the federal pen and a $50,000 fine, plus court costs.

Months later, in early 1932, the Intelligence Unit had Malone, Irey, Wilson and Special Agent A. P. Madden probe the kidnapping of aviator Charles Lindbergh’s son. The team’s persistence paid off within two years, with the capture (and conviction) of suspect Bruno Hauptman, who still had some of the marked currency the agents convinced Lindbergh to use as ransom money.

Malone had other notable cases. In 1933, Irey assigned him to find fugitive New York gangster Waxey Gordon, wanted for tax evasion. Malone located Gordon in a remote cottage in the Catskill Mountains. Special Prosecutor Thomas Dewey took the case, and the court put Waxey away for 10 years. A year later, Malone infiltrated Louisiana Governor Huey “Kingfish” Long’s crooked crew. After Long’s assassination, the IRS won a tax fraud conviction against Malone’s target, Long’s close aide, Seymour Weiss.

In his last undercover operation before his death, the Intelligence Unit gave Malone a large amount of cash and a Cadillac to use in Miami Beach, disguised as a rich syndicate man. He found and reported what the agency wanted – details of a coast-to-coast illegal abortion ring.

After Malone’s death in 1960, Wilson described him to a news reporter as “the best undercover agent we ever had.”

JOSEPH PISTONE

Joe Pistone is one of the FBI’s most celebrated undercover agents. Using the name Donnie Brasco, he infiltrated the New York Mafia and helped produce 200 indictments. Courtesy of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

In New York City during the mid-1970s, the FBI investigated a rash of truck hijackings happening each day. The agency assigned agent Joseph “Joe” Pistone to go undercover for six months to find out where the Mob-connected thieves took the stolen cargo. His adopted name was “Donnie Brasco.” He was so effective as a wiseguy that the FBI let him keep it up. No one knew how far the investigation would lead, or what it would mean for Pistone, who started as an agent in 1969.

His experience would eventually prompt the mobsters in New York to put out a $500,000 contract for his murder, but it never happened. In the end, the evidence and trial testimony he provided in the 1980s produced 200 indictments of Mob associates and more than 100 convictions. His work decimated the Bonannos, one of New York’s five major crime families.

Pistone’s journey while undercover, impersonating a mobbed-up jewel thief, would last an incredible five years, from 1976 to 1981, during which he penetrated the upper levels of the Bonnano organization. No FBI agent had made it inside the Mob like that. The agency beforehand had to rely on informants.

Pistone took a class to learn about jewelry to make his affectation believable. In Brooklyn and Manhattan, he roamed bars and restaurants frequented by Mob types. He communicated using the street smarts he absorbed growing up as a working-class Italian-American kid in Paterson, New Jersey, where he went to Italian social clubs and encountered local hoods. Years in, he had the Bonanno circle so convinced that it moved to have him a “made” man shortly before the FBI ended his assignment.

At first he befriended low-level mobsters. He wore a wire to record conversations, and committed to memory names and license plates since taking notes would obviously raise red flags. By 1976, he’d won the trust of important Bonnano members, notably family soldier Benjamin “Lefty Guns” Ruggiero, said to have killed 26 people, and capo Dominick “Sonny Black” Napolitano. Ruggerio recommended him so that he could join the clan. Pistone’s Mob activities centered in New York and Florida, taking him away from his wife and young daughters for extended times. Pistone even had to vacation with his demanding cohorts. He moved his family members out of state for their protection.

As “Donnie Brasco,” Pistone helped Ruggerio transfer stolen goods and sell guns. He engaged in loansharking, extortion and illegal gambling. Once, while pretending to be an expert in burglar alarms, angry Mob associates intent on committing burglaries demanded he reveal the name of a mobster who would vouch for him. The FBI used an informant to quell their suspicions.

In the 1997 film Donnie Brasco, undercover agent Joe Pistone is played by Johnny Depp, left. Al Pacino, right, plays Benjamin “Lefty” Ruggiero.

In 1981, the situation intensified again when the crime family commanded him to kill an adversary. The FBI pulled him out of the sting. It was time to start making cases, and for him to testify in open court as himself. Starting in 1982, Pistone’s testimony over the next several years in racketeering cases sent more than 100 mobsters to long prison terms. Prosecutors considered him crucial to convicting 21 defendants in the “Pizza Connection” case of pizzerias used to traffic in heroin and launder money for the Sicilian Mafia.

Pistone went into hiding and later retired from the FBI, unscathed, in 1986. In the 1990s, Salvatore “Sammy the Bull” Gravano, former underboss for the Gambino family who turned FBI informant, said the embarrassment from the “Brasco” case drove bosses in New York’s crime families to suspend the Bonanno group from its board of directors.

But Pistone couldn’t stay retired. In 1992, at age 53, he requested reinstatement with the FBI, which agreed only if he would enter the agency’s strict training class, lasting 16 weeks at its base in Quantico, Virginia. Pistone endured the rigorous course alongside recruits in their 20s. He passed and the FBI rehired him, at least until the mandatory retirement age of 57.

Pistone’s 1988 book on his undercover experiences, Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia, was a bestseller. Based on the book, actor Johnny Depp portrayed Pistone in the 1997 feature film Donnie Brasco, with Al Pacino as Ruggerio.

JACK GARCIA

Jack Garcia was an FBI undercover agent of Cuban descent who convinced members of the Italian-American Mafia that he was Italian. He took part in more than 100 undercover investigations over a 26-year career.

Before he succeeded in infiltrating New York’s Gambino crime family, FBI agent Joaquin “Jack” Garcia had to go school. That is, the FBI’s “mob school,” where he received an education in how to hit the ground running with veteran mobsters. His teacher was special agent Nat Parisi. First off, Parisi said, do not carry a wallet – wiseguys carry wads of currency, often bound by the kind of rubber band grocery stores use to keep broccoli together. Also, correctly pronouncing Italian food matters – as Tony Soprano might say, those long pasta shells are not “manicotti,” but “manicote.” Another valuable lesson he learned is that his Mob brethren loved compliments – his favorite one: “Where did you get those nice threads? You look like a million dollars.”

In his 26-year career as an FBI agent, Garcia took part in more than 100 undercover investigations, from Miami to New York, Atlantic City and Los Angeles, targeting mobsters, drug traffickers and corrupt politicians and cops. He participated in the highest number of undercover cases in FBI history. In many of his capers, he impersonated a mobster, using the name “Jack Falcone” (in honor of the Italian judge Giovanni Falcone, killed by the Sicilian Mafia in the 1990s). As a backstory, he told his Mob marks about having a Sicilian pedigree (actually he’s a native of Havana and grew up in the Bronx) with an expertise in stealing and fencing stolen goods, with jewelry as his specialty. Sometimes, he had to run several undercover roles at once. He took advantage of his fluency in Spanish and Italian, being careful not to mix things up when the phone rang.

In the early 2000s, the FBI chose Garcia for what would be the most fruitful infiltration of an organized crime family since Joe Pistone’s in the 1970s. While undercover as “Jack Falcone” with the Gambino’s family’s chapter in Westchester County, New York, for two years, he flashed cash, Rolex watches, diamond rings, flat-screen TVs and other supposed stolen property (items seized in other FBI cases). Much of the cash he held went to pay for expensive dinners – mobsters, he said, are notoriously cheap when the check comes. He gained 80 pounds over the two years.

One mobster in particular who liked his money and goods, and would become his almost daily companion, was Gambino capo Gregory DePalma. An “old school” hood who in 2003 finished serving 70 months for racketeering, DePalma right away threatened violence and extorted owners of Westchester-area construction firms, strip joints, restaurants and other businesses. Garcia said he witnessed DePalma commit a crime almost every day.

The FBI had Garcia pose as a wiseguy seeking to invest in a topless bar in the Bronx. Garcia’s inquiries led him to meet DePalma in 2003. By providing stolen property for DePalma to sell for cash, Garcia convinced him that “Jack Falcone” was an experienced jewelry thief and fencer from Miami. When Garcia hung out with DePalma over the two-year period, he wore a body wire, and the FBI planted bugging devices at DePalma’s hangouts. Garcia gave DePalma a cell phone that the talkative mob capo used prodigiously, not knowing the FBI had bugged it.

The operation yielded 5,000 hours of recorded conversations used to implicate DePalma and other Gambino men in racketeering. In 2005, DePalma planned to honor “Falcone” by rendering him “made” within the Gambino family. In a recorded conversation, Garcia as “Falcone” replied to DePalma, “I’m honored for that,” he said, in the tape later used in court. “I will never let you down either.”

But it wasn’t to be. After Garcia witnessed a Gambino soldier beat another member with a crystal candlestick, the FBI shut down the undercover operation. (Garcia and Pistone are the only law enforcement officers ever nominated to be “made.”)

Garcia’s efforts inside the Gambino crew paid off big time. The evidence he delivered for the FBI resulted in the arrest of 32 Gambino members and associates, including DePalma, Gambino boss Arnold “Zeke” Squitieri and underboss Anthony “The Genius” Megale. DePalma went to trial in 2006. Garcia, who retired from the FBI two months before the trial started, agreed to testify in federal court in Manhattan. The jury found DePalma guilty on 27 counts, and the judge gave the 74-year-old a 12-year prison term.

Like Pistone, Garcia’s undercover career is chronicled in a memoir, Making Jack Falcone: An Undercover FBI Agent Takes Down a Mafia Family.

KIKI CAMARENA

Kiki Camarena was an undercover agent for the Drug Enforcement Administration in Mexico. After contributing information that led to major drug busts, he was tortured and murdered by drug cartel bosses in 1985.

Enrique “Kiki” Camarena, the late Drug Enforcement Administration agent assigned to investigate drug trafficking in Guadalajara, Mexico, in the 1980s, is famous as one of the most heroic DEA agents ever. But he is more well-known in death than in life. His torture-murder in Mexico in 1985 took place at the hands of drug cartel bosses with the complicity of high-level Mexican government officials, law enforcement and, allegedly, the CIA.

At the time, the Reagan administration was secretly training and supplying Central American guerilla fighters, known as the “Contras,” against the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua. The U.S. government allegedly granted the cartel bosses free rein to traffic drugs – to the point of using CIA-recruited American pilots to fly cocaine into the United States to sell for cash so the cartel could make donations to buy more weaponry for the Contras.

Camarena, born in Mexicali, Mexico, in 1947, moved with his impoverished family to Calexico, California. He served as a firefighter in Calexico, and with a strong desire for police work, joined the Imperial County Sheriff’s Department, moving up to its narcotics task force. The experience led to his career in the DEA starting in 1975. Assigned to the DEA office in the “narco paradise” of Guadalajara in 1980, Camarena was a convincing undercover officer with his appearance and ability to speak Spanish and barrio “street” language to fit in with the drug underworld. His target was the powerful Guadalajara drug cartel (which later evolved into the Sinaloa cartel).

In the early 1980s, in what he called “Operation Padrino,” Camarena arranged for U.S. agents to seize international bank accounts held by wealthy cartel drug lords. He developed evidence of major marijuana plantations in the Mexican state of Zacatecas, based on informants and overflights in a plane flown by his DEA pilot, Alfredo Zavala Avelar. In November 1984, from his background work, Mexican federal police and the DEA raided enormous pot-growing operations on a ranch in Zacatecas that employed thousands of field hands. The task force confiscated 20 tons of marijuana, burned the crop and made 177 arrests.

The bust cost cartel figure Rafael Caro Quintero about $50 million. Caro Quintero believed his operation had the protection of the Mexican army, and the CIA, since he owned a farm used to train the U.S.-backed Contras. He vowed revenge against Camarena. Meanwhile, a DEA force organized by Camarena seized a large cache of cocaine shipped by cartel boss Miguel Felix Gallardo’s operation to New Mexico and Texas. Gallardo also believed he had CIA and Mexican official protection.

During the fall of 1984, Quintero held meetings with top cartel traffickers Gallardo, Ernesto “Don Neto” Fonseco Carrillo and Ruben Zuno Arce. Also present, thanks to rampant corruption bought by the Guadalajara cartel, were Mexico’s minister of domestic affairs and DFA chief Manuel Bartlett Diaz, plus Mexico’s defense minister, the head of Mexico’s Interpol office and the governor of the state of Jalisco. The agenda was to kidnap Camarena and get him to reveal his informants and other information. Zuno Arce gave the order. Fonseca only intended to scare and release him, but Quintero wanted to kill the DEA man.

On February 7, 1985, Quintero and Gallardo directed their henchmen to kidnap Camarena off a street in Guadalajara. As the agent walked from the U.S. consulate to meet his wife for lunch, they forced him at gunpoint into a car and drove him to a residence used for cartel rendezvous. They bound and blindfolded him, turned on a tape recorder and questioned him, during which he was severely beaten and tortured. The lead interrogator was the crooked head of the secret police in Guadalajara, Sergio Espino Verdin. The cartel men wanted to know what Camarena knew about them, their dealings with Mexican officials and the CIA’s involvement in drug trafficking. The gangsters also brought in and beat up Zavala, Camarena’s pilot. Both men died about two days later, angering Fonseco, who told Quintero not to kill Camarena.

Camarena’s wife reported him missing and Washington launched what would be the largest manhunt in the history of the DEA. The cartel had the two men’s bodies buried, then dug up and relocated to a farm in another state, where Mexican police found them in early March. During his funeral a week later, Camarena’s family interred his ashes in Calexico.

His slaying triggered an international incident. U.S. officials ordered all cars from Mexico at the border searched, effectively closing it. The investigation revealed the CIA connection, leading to bitter clashes between CIA and DEA agents. A federal court in Los Angeles charged 22 defendants in the murders of Camarena and Zavala. Under pressure, Mexican authorities acted, arresting 13 men. Mexican courts convicted Fonseco, Quintero and Espino, and sentenced each to 40 years, although Quintero won early release on a technicality in 2013. U.S. officials are still seeking Quintero to face federal charges. Mexican police arrested Gallardo in 1989, and he received 40 years. A court in Los Angeles found Zuno Arce guilty in the murders in 1990, sentenced him to two life terms in prison, where he died in 2012.

In Camarena’s honor, in 1985 the National Family Partnership started the National Red Ribbon Campaign, a volunteer anti-drug use and education effort that urges youths to recite a pledge to refrain from drugs, and celebrates “Red Ribbon Week” on drug awareness each October.

Camarena’s is featured as a character, played by actor Michael Pena, in a chapter of the Netflix series Narcos: Mexico, about on his actions with the DEA.

JAY DOBYNS

Jay Dobyns went undercover with the Hells Angels outlaw motorcycle gang for 20 months in Arizona on behalf of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. His work led to 16 arrests.

For Jay Dobyns, fitting in with the infamous biker gang the Hells Angels for almost two years meant adhering to his undercover alter ego, Jay “Bird” Davis, to the point of obsession. To maintain his cover, he had to divert his mind away from his wife and kids. And it all would be worth it – at least that’s what he thought at the time.

Dobyns had hit on his best clandestine ruse yet while in Arizona in 2001, after 15 years of service as an undercover special agent with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. While working undercover cases in the late 1980s for the ATF, he’d been injured twice – from a gunshot wound to the back from a suspect in Tucson and when gunrunners hit him with a car during an attempted getaway in Chicago. He took part in investigations of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Other undercover roles of his ended in the arrests of a Mexican drug boss and members of the Aryan Brotherhood gang. Altogether, he served in more than 500 undercover operations disguised as a hitman and Mob debt collector. He infiltrated organized crime groups and gangs engaged in drug and arms smuggling.

In 2001, to gather intelligence as “Davis” for the ATF in northern Arizona, Dobyns worked in the Bullhead City area, posing as a gun seller and an enforcer for a nonexistent collections agency. But his operation was interrupted in 2002 with the now-famous riot and shootout among members of the Angels and a competing biker gang, the Mongols, at the Harrah’s casino in nearby Laughlin, Nevada, during the annual River Run motorcycle rally. Two Angels and one Mongol died and dozens of people were injured.

The ATF brass soon redirected him to penetrate the dangerous Hells Angels club. Dobyns certainly had the physical part down with his beard and six-foot, one-inch frame he used as an all-conference football player for the University of Arizona. Later, an Angels member would apply tattoos covering his upper arms.

Dobyns teamed with another ATF agent, two other undercover officers and a pair of paid informants. The idea was to create a fake biker gang with the aid of one of the informants who once served in a motorcycle gang based in Tijuana, Mexico. The gangster informant and Dobyns would run the gang, called the Solo Angeles, promote it as a pro-Hells Angels crew and request to join the Angels as a “nomad” chapter. The ATF named the setup “Operation Black Biscuit.” As a convincer, Dobyns and his fellow agent feigned an execution of a Mongol member, tying up an agent, placing cow’s brains and bloody Mongol clothing on him and taking a photo. Based on the picture, the Angels took the bait and let them hang out and ride with them. They trusted him so much they offered to make him a member of the Angels’ Skull Valley Chapter. He was the first law enforcement officer to infiltrate the Angels. His undercover penetration of the Angels lasted more than 20 months, one of the longest ever for the ATF.

His work ended with 16 arrests from the Angels gang. But the criminal case, amid problems between the ATF and Justice Department lawyers, fell through in federal court. Federal prosecutors blamed the ATF, saying the agency did not reveal evidence from informants. In 2006, the feds dropped racketeering enterprise charges – the most serious — against all but four of 42 Angels charged in the Laughlin riot.

Dobyns’ battle with his own employer, the ATF, soon began. He filed suit in federal court against the agency alleging it did not protect him while he was on duty. He won a $373,000 settlement in 2007. The next year, Dobyns’s wife and two kids barely escaped after someone firebombed the family home in Tucson. The ATF investigated Dobyns himself as a suspect in the arson. Investigators cleared him. In 2014, the year he retired after 27 years with the ATF, he filed another suit, for $17.2 million, saying the ATF failed to safeguard his family amid death threats. A judge awarded him $173,000. During an appeal, the judge voided the monetary judgment, but recommended discipline for ATF personnel and barred seven Justice Department attorneys from the case. He ordered a special master to investigate government actions in the case, and possible misconduct by the feds in the arson investigation. But the judge died of cancer. The special master in a report said that the first case was fair enough and required no further probe into the federal government. A new judge accepted the recommendation.

Dobyns has authored two books, one on his undercover experiences, another on his travails with the ATF. These days, he delivers lectures on his life to audiences at universities and law enforcement associations nationwide.

And now some of our infamous quick hitters:

 

1. Donald Duck decoy

 

Police in Fort Lee, New Jersey used a Donald Duck costume as a decoy to catch drivers who failed to yield to pedestrians. Drivers who didn’t stop for the cartoon duck were ticketed. One woman, Karen Haigh, fought her $230 ticket.

 

"They told me that I was getting a ticket for not stopping for a duck," she told Eyewitness News. "But it scared me. I'm a woman. This huge duck scared me." 

2. Coco the Clown

 

These old clips from the show COPS show a strange undercover police sting, and proves the adage that clowns are usually scary or just creepy. One cop dressed up as Coco the Clown, an outfit that kind of resembles John Wayne Gacy, to catch women working as sex workers. Spoiler: he pretty much sprays all of them with silly string and the whole thing is sad to watch.

3. Amish woman

 

At least one cop from the Pulaski Township Police Department in Pennsylvania dressed up as an Amish woman in an attempt to catch a sexual predator. Sgt. Chad Adams of the Pulaski Township Police Department wandered the streets for two months in 2014 after police were tipped off that a predator was masturbating in front of children, according to the Associated Press. He posted on the department’s Facebook page, “Hey friends, sometimes being a police officer means going undercover and doing what you have to do to catch the bad guy. Now that our investigation is complete I'll share with you this photo! Back in January we had an individual preying on Amish children walking home from school. The male individual was pulling up to the children and getting out of his car and masturbating in front of them. Although we did not apprehend the individual we believe he was caught in another county. I wanted to share with you that we will use all means available to try and protect our children. That includes dressing up as an Amish woman to attempt to apprehend a pervert! Thanks goes out to the Neshannock police and New Wilmington police in assistance with the investigation! Sincerely, Sergeant Chad Adams.”

 

Sadly, the sting didn’t work, but police believe it is because the culprit moved into another county.

 

4. DVD Prize sting

 

Police in Phoenix, Arizona set up a sting to catch people with outstanding warrants, mostly DUIs, in 2002. The people were told they won a DVD player. People thought they were showing up to pick up their prize. Instead, they walked right into their own arrest. Watch as these suspects went from excited to shocked to sad.

5. Panhandling trick

 

In 2015, undercover cops in California posed as panhandlers to ticket distracted drivers. They stood on the side of the road, posed as panhandlers and holding signs that identified them as police officers. The pieces of cardboard they were holding also stated that they were looking for seatbelt and cellphone violations. For those drivers who weren’t paying attention, they didn’t read that and they ended up paying the price.

 

6. Horse sex

 

Police in Arizona responded to an online ad posted by suspect Michael Crawford in 2015. He was soliciting a willing horse owner who would let him have sex with his horse.  Investigators in the Animal Crimes Investigations Unit chatted with Crawford via e-mail and the phone, posing as willing horse owners, according to USA Today. The exchanges “graphically detailed” exactly what Crawford allegedly wanted to do to the horse.

 

The sheriff overseeing it all? The controversial Joe Arpaio, who has announced his run for the U.S. Senate in Arizona in 2018, according to the New York Times. He’s known for his severe correctional tactics and his hardline stance on immigration.

Movies! Best undercover movies

https://screenrant.com/best-movies-about-undercover-agents-ranked-rotten-tomatoes/amp/

Creepy Uganda

Creepy Uganda

 

So Logan and I saw that we were rising through the ranks of Uganda's listeners for the show and thought: “Hey!  We should show our love and support to these wonderful people”. So, in order to do it right,  we are going on a trip! To Creepy Uganda. 

 

Aside from rituals, ancient vengeful deities, and some rather haunted locations found throughout the wonderful country, there's actually quite a few beautiful areas that, as a tourist, would be something to see! Beautiful Lakes, Mountains and rich cultures are just some of the many things that are strewn about Uganda. So without further adieu, Let’s Get Creepy.

 

The East African nation of Uganda, formally the Republic of Uganda, is a landlocked nation. Kenya borders the nation on the east, South Sudan on the north, the Democratic Republic of the Congo on the west, Rwanda on the south-west, and Tanzania on the south. A sizable piece of Lake Victoria, which Tanzania, Kenya, and the rest of the country share, is located in the southern region of the nation. The African Great Lakes area includes Uganda. The climate in Uganda, which is also part of the Nile basin, is variable but usually modified equatorial(Characteristics of Modified Equatorial Climate have a range of 4 to 27 degrees celsius). There are about 42 million people living there, 8.5 million of them reside in Kampala, the country's capital and largest metropolis.

 

Uganda was given its name after the kingdom of Buganda, which ruled over a sizable area of the country's southern region, including the capital city of Kampala, and whose language, Luganda, is extensively spoken today.

 

The United Kingdom began to govern the region as a protectorate in 1894, establishing administrative law throughout the realm. (A Protectorate is state that is governed and guarded by another independent state is known as a protectorate. It is a dependent region with local autonomy over the majority of internal matters that yet recognizes the authority (much like our relationship between the US and Puerto Rico) of a more powerful sovereign state without being that state's actual possession.) On October 9, 1962, Uganda declared its independence from the UK. Since then, there have been other bloody wars, including an eight-year military dictatorship under Idi Amin.

 

Their Constitution stipulates that "any other language may be used as a medium of instruction in schools or other educational institutions or for legislative, administrative, or judicial functions as may be authorized by law," despite the fact that English and Swahili are the official languages. Many more languages, including Ateso, Lango, Acholi, Runyoro, Runyankole, Rukiga, Luo, Rutooro, Samia, Jopadhola, and Lusoga, are also spoken in the Central and South Eastern portions of the nation.

 

Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, the president of Uganda at the moment, came to power in January 1986 following a lengthy six-year guerrilla conflict. He was able to run and win the presidency of Uganda in the general elections of 2011, 2016, and 2021 as a result of constitutional revisions that eliminated the president's term restrictions.

 

Uganda’s varied terrain includes volcanic hills, mountains, and lakes. The average elevation of the nation is 900 meters above sea level. Mountains line Uganda's eastern and western borders. The Ruwenzori mountain range is home to Alexandra, the highest peak in Uganda, which rises to a height of 5,094 meters.

 

One of the largest lakes in the world, Lake Victoria, which has several islands, has a significant effect on most of the country's southern region. The most significant cities, including Kampala, the capital, and Entebbe, a neighboring city, are found in the south, close to this lake. The country's largest lake, Lake Kyoga, located in the middle of a vast marshy landscape. Uganda is a landlocked country, although it has a lot of big lakes. Lake Albert, Lake Edward, and the smaller Lake George are additional lakes to Lakes Victoria and Kyoga. The Nile basin encompasses practically the whole country of Uganda. On the border with Congo, the Victoria Nile flows from Lake Victoria via Lake Kyoga and into Lake Albert. South Sudan is reached by continuing northward. The Suam River, which is a component of Lake Turkana's internal drainage basin, drains a region in eastern Uganda. The Lotikipi Basin, which is mostly in Kenya, receives water from the far north-eastern region of Uganda.

 

There are 60 protected areas in Uganda, including ten national parks. Bwindi Impenetrable National Park and Rwenzori Mountains National Park are both UNESCO World Heritage Sites. What in the hell is UNESCO? It stands for Unidentified Neural Electron Sexual Conspiracy Organization and of course that’s incorrect and stupid. It ACTUALLY stands for The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. A specialised agency of the United Nations aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture.The Bwindi Impenetrable National Park is home to a group of mountain gorillas, the Mgahinga Gorilla National Park is home to gorillas and golden monkeys, and the Murchison Falls National Park is home to those evil fucking hippos.

 

The military in Uganda is known as the Uganda People's Defense Force. There are about 45,000 soldiers on active service in Uganda's military. Only the United States Armed Forces are deployed to more nations, according to analysts, than the Ugandan army, which is actively engaged in a number of combat and peacekeeping missions in the area. Uganda has troops stationed in the Central African Republic, Somalia, South Sudan, and the northern and eastern regions of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

 

The landscape and wildlife of Uganda are the main attractions for tourists. In 2012–13, it contributed 4.9 trillion Ugandan shillings (US$1.88 billion or €1.4 billion as of August 2013) to Uganda's GDP, making it a significant source of employment, investment, and foreign money. Photo safaris across the National parks and wildlife reserves are the primary draws. Other highlights are the mountain gorillas, which may be found in Uganda's aforementioned Bwindi Impenetrable National Park (BINP) and Mgahinga Gorilla National Park (MGNP), which are two of the continent of Africa’s oldest cultural kingdoms. With more than 1073 species of birds reported, Uganda is an ornithologist’s paradise, ranking fourth among bird species in Africa and sixteenth worldwide. The Great Rift Valley and the white-capped Rwenzori mountains are only two of Uganda's many landscapes.

 

Unfortunately like everywhere else, Uganda has a plethora of things that have happened there that aren’t exactly what some may consider “pleasant”. For lack of a better term and because we’re adults, let’s just say some Pretty fucked up shit had happened, actually. Genocide being a fairly big thing. But we want to dive into the lesser known side of Uganda.

 

Like maybe some cryptozoology? Hmmmmmm?

 

A large cryptid bird named Bagge's Black Bird was once sighted in Uganda's Lake Bujuku, which is located south of Mount Speke in the Ruwenozori Mountains. They were purportedly observed in large numbers in 1898 at a height of 9,000 feet, according to Stephen Salisbury Bagge, a guide for the government. Bagge described them as black birds the size of sheep with an alarm call resembling that of a bull. Not much else to go on here since this was the only sighting allegedly of the creature. But who knows! Maybe it was a pterodactyl, or better yet, a rather large black bird that was living rather well and just so happened to be bigger than the rest.

 

Denman's bird was another cryptid bird that Canadian mountaineer Earl Denman purportedly claimed to have seen diving "swiftly and nearly vertically in the high mountain air" in Uganda's Ruwenzori Mountains. Ben S. Roesch speculated that they could have been Verreaux's eagles, which are common in the region and frequently observed diving to grab hyraces (rock rabbits) and hares (the thing that doesn’t grow on my head) when hunting in pairs.

 

The irizima, also known as "the thing that may not be spoken of," was a cryptid that was seen in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo near Lake Edward. One of the least well-supported of the African neodinosaurs, it has been compared to both the mokele-mbembe and the emela-ntouka.

 

Neodinosaurian cryptids like the mokele-mbembe or li'kela-bembe have been seen mostly in the Republic of the Congo and Cameroon, where it is thought to live in marshy or swampy wetlands, lakes, and rivers. Several other bodies of water have also reported seeing it, but the Likouala region and Lake Tele are particularly linked to it. Many cryptozoologists have long assumed that the mokele-mbembe is a big amphibious animal with a bulky body, a long neck and tail, and a small head. However, a wide range of different reptilian and mammalian identities have also been proposed.

 

A neodinosaurian cryptid known from the rainforest swamps and rivers of the Republic of the Congo and the southwest Central African Republic, the emela-ntouka (Bomitaba or Lingala: "killer of elephants" or "eater of the tops of trees") is described as a horned animal and has been likened to rhinoceroses and ceratopsian dinosaurs. It is often used as a synonym for the older but now less well-known chipekwe water rhinoceros from Zambia, as well as the ngoubous from Cameroon, the ntambue ya mai from the southern Democratic Republic of the Congo, and certain accounts of forest rhinoceroses. The morphology of the emela-ntouka has been described as well-defined but puzzling. It is described as an amphibian with an elephantine, rhinoceros-like appearance, a big horn on its nose, and a bulky tail resembling a crocodile. The emela-identity ntouka's has historically been the subject of two extremely divergent conflicting theories: either it was a big semi-aquatic rhinoceros or, primarily due to its bulky tail, a living ceratopsian dinosaur. Many cryptozoologists no longer subscribe to the latter notion, as the emela-ntouka is now thought of as a mammal. One ethnic group, the Aka, refers to the emela-ntouka as mokele-mbembe, a practice that has generated considerable misunderstanding.

 

Now that we understand those two similar cryptids we go back to the irizima. It was initially brought up by Captain William Hichens, who said that there were two conflicting accounts of the creature, including a "gigantic hippopotamus with the horns of a rhinoceros" and an animal with hippo-like legs, an elephant-like trunk, a lizard's head, and an aardvark's tail. Hichens said that such a creature had been spotted by an unknown big game hunter, who then told Herbert Francis Fenn about it, inspiring him to look for neodinosaurs in the Congo. A Brontosaurus, described by Hichens as "a massive marsh animal, ten times as big as the biggest elephant," was discovered in a Congo swamp by a "madcap man" who had been searching for the monster, according to Hichens. Hichens, according to Bernard Heuvelmans, mistook information about the Great Brontosaurus Hoax and Captain Leicester Stevens' excursion for information about Lake Edward. Also, it sounds like they found the funny mushrooms.

 

The brontosaurus hoax was pretty interesting as well. Allegedly, the news paper in the area of the Democratic Republic of the Congo wanted Captain Stevens to find this cryptid found in the marshes of Lake Edward. The twist is that the original reports were of a ceratopsian dinosaur not a brontosaurus that was written in the news.

 

Hunter Roger Courtney later made reference to the Lake Edward monster, describing it as a huge, black beast that spews tremendous waves and spouts. When the hunter persuaded his companions to aid him onto the water, the monster had already dove, according to Courtney, who claimed that a Dutch hunter had spotted the animal from the shore of Lake Edward. In addition, Courtney had heard rumors about "dinosaurs" from the adjacent Ituri Forest, which he took to be true.

 

According to E. A. Temple-Perkins, who studied the irizima in Lake Edward, the monster—especially as it was described by Courtney—may have originated as a local legend intended to explain why waterspouts naturally occur. Given the lack of reliable material from Lake Edward, Bernard Heuvelmans believed that Captain Hichens had accidentally introduced the Lepage-Gapelle fake monster there, leaving Roger Courtney's brief report as the only description of the Lake Edward monster. Karl Shuker, however, asserts that these two contradictory descriptions demonstrate that the term "irizima" is likely used to describe both of the two primary African neodinosaur types found in Lake Edward, the long-necked mokele-mbembe type and the horned emela-ntouka type. Shuker hypothesizes that the irizima, which Hichens described as having numerous horns, may be the same animal as the emela-ntouka and the ngoubou, which resemble Arsinoitherium (a large two horned mammal that went extinct and resemble rhino but the horns being on its brow instead of its snout).

 

A group of semiaquatic cryptids known as water lions, water leopards, or jungle walruses have been found in rivers and occasionally wetlands throughout tropical Africa, particularly in the Central African Republic. The majority of the time referred to as huge cats , they can be identified by their protruding fangs or tusks and their penchant for hippopotamus slaughter, so they’re not all bad. A number of competing theories exist, and some water lions have also been identified or confused with neodinosaurs, water rhinoceroses, and pseudodeinotheria. Ingo Krumbiegel and Bernard Heuvelmans theorized that water lions represent a surviving species of sabre-toothed cat adapted to an amphibious lifestyle and that sounds terrifying. The majority of water lion sighting reports were gathered in the 20th century, however reports of the n'gooli or “water panther”, continue to come from Cameroon.

 

The Nandi bear, also known as the chemosit (Kalenjin: "devil"), is a cryptid that has been seen in western Kenyan highlands as well as Uganda. It is described as a deadly creature with a matted mane that resembles a bear. Cryptozoologists have determined that the Nandi bear is a fusion of several different cryptids, including maybe two real unknown animals: a huge hyena and a giant baboon, however identities of a living chalicothere (the weird horse/gorilla looking thing) and an unknown bear have also been proposed. Since the 20th century, there have been few or no sightings, and it has been hypothesized that the Nandi bear, if it ever existed, is now extinct. Maybe another version of the sasquatch? 

 

Hope the Cryptids were a little more easy going because now we dive into some… shit.

 

Sir Edward Frederick William David Walugembe Mutebi Luwangula Mutesa, often known as Kabaka Mutesa II, led a fascinating life. He ruled as Buganda's 36th kabaka (king) from 1939 until his passing on November 21, 1969. In addition, he served as Uganda's first president from 1963 until 1966, when he was ousted and taken into exile by Prime Minister Milton Obote.

 

Following the passing of his father, King Daudi Cwa II, he succeeded to the throne of Buganda in 1939. He was overthrown twice: once by the colonial governor-general Sir Andrew Cohen in 1953 so that he could be replaced by his half-brother, whom Cohen believed he could better control; and once more in 1966 when Prime Minister Obote forced him to leave for Britain, where he died in exile. Following his first exile of two years, Mutesa II was permitted to reclaim the throne as part of a negotiated agreement that established him as a constitutional monarch and granted the Baganda the opportunity to choose delegates for the kingdom's parliament, the Lukiiko. He had thirteen wives and eleven children by marriage and six through other means.

 

Initially joining forces to demand self-rule, Sir Edward Mutesa II, KBE and Prime Minister Milton Obote went on to win the 1962 election. Mutesa II was named non-executive president, primarily serving in a ceremonial capacity, but after independence, their relationship started to sour. Obote allegedly instructed Idi Amin-led soldiers to raid his stronghold in 1966. Mutesa II had to escape to the UK once more. Obote declared himself president and assumed total control while he was overseas.

 

The largest of Uganda's several ethnic groups, the Baganda, were led by Mutesa II as monarch. Despite taking advantage of it, Obote used his position of power to get rid of both the traditional kingships and the independence of the province administrations because Buganda had only agreed to join the state if it had a high degree of autonomy. In 1993, Mutesa's son was elected as the 37th kabaka under a revised constitution. Within Uganda, Buganda is currently a constitutional monarchy. In Uganda, Mutesa II attended King's College, Budo. As a student at Magdalene College in Cambridge, England, he enlisted in an officer training corps and received a captain's commission in the Grenadier Guards. Buganda was then a part of Uganda's British rule. Many of the traditional leaders or kings served as the British's representatives in Uganda. The late fourteenth century is when the Buganda kingly line began. Oddly enough, Obote was deposed in a coup in 1971 by none other than Amin, the head of his own army and closest supporter.

 

At the age of 45, Mutesa II passed away from alcohol poisoning at his London apartment in 1969. The British authorities determined that he committed suicide, despite his followers' claims that Obote regime assassins were responsible. In 2009, four decades after Mutesa II's passing, a family friend and fellow Ugandan exile living in London told the BBC, "We got warning, people used to write and say somebody has been sent, be aware, take care."

 

According to JM Kavuma-Kaggwa, an elder from Kyaggwe, Mukono District: “There were rumours that Obote was spending Shs 250,000 per week (a lot of money then) to track down the Kabaka. Their mission had completely failed until luck struck when the late Oscar Kambona of Tanzania who fell out with President Nyerere and fled into exile in London, organised a birthday party in November 1969 in Sir Edward Mutesa’s honour.”

 

“Also in attendance was a beautiful Muganda girl who had reportedly been recruited by the GSU to go to London, befriend Sir Edward, be close to him and poison him. She came close to the Kabaka during the party. It was reported that the Kabaka invited the girl to this birthday party and that was the time she managed to poison him because she was the one in charge of the Kabaka’s drinks that evening.”

 

After Obote was overthrown in 1971, Mutesa II's remains were brought back to Uganda and given a formal funeral by the new president, Idi Amin, who had led the attack on Mutesa's palace in 1966 as the army commander.

Definitely an interesting story to say the least. This next event is a little more… unsettling.

 

On the last night of her life, Rose Nakimuli shut down her little hair salon in rural Uganda at around nine o'clock. The 27-year-old made her way back down to the neighborhood bar for a late-night beverage after walking home to change and turning on her porch light for the evening. Later, while she was strolling along a country road next to a two-lane highway on her way home, a friend leaned out of his small bar to greet her. The following morning, a neighbor discovered her dead; slouched behind banana trees in front of her house. Nakimuli was stripped and forced to kneel on her knees. Her vagina had been penetrated with a cassava stick. Her spouse recognized her by the maroon sweater that was hanging from a tree close by. Considering the porch light was still on suggests that she never actually made it home.

 

Nakimuli is one of 23 women who have died mysteriously and horribly on the outskirts of Kampala, the expanding metropolis of quickly urbanizing Uganda, from May to November of 2017. The murders have caused fear in the neighborhood, sparked doubts about the nation's dedication to protecting women, and increased scrutiny of the police force, a potent institution criticized for acting with impunity and serving as an extension of the government's ruling political party, the National Resistance Movement.

 

All of the victims were female, ranging in age from 19 to 38. Four of the individuals have been recognized as sex workers, along with a number of traders and a high school student. Many of the victims had no nearby family and lived alone. Three of the women, at least, are yet unidentified. Many of the murders, according to the police, were committed by witchcraft practitioners who sought financial gain through human sacrifice. Others, according to them, are the result of spousal abuse, drug use among unemployed youth, land disputes, and lone women who fail to take the necessary safeguards. 

 

Twelve or more suspects have been taken into custody. Some have apparently been tortured into confessing. However, not much evidence connecting the suspects to the crimes has been made public.

 

Locals and activist organizations charge the police with being overburdened and conflicted over the murders of over twenty women.

 

“What makes me to feel that there is an element of injustice is that it took Rose to die in order for somebody to move,” said Nakimuli’s husband, Anatoli Ndyabagyera.

 

Community watch groups have been established, a curfew has been implemented to prevent women from travelling alone at night, and the local informal economy has collapsed in the interim. Some of the safety measures have not been applied since Idi Amin's regime and the civil conflict that ensued after his overthrow in 1979.

 

Interior Minister Jeje Odongo blamed a couple of businesspeople at the head of a vast criminal network connected to "the Illuminati" in September 2017 for most of the killings. According to Odongo, the guys, Ivan Katongole and Phillip Tumuhimbise, performed rituals using the victims' blood and body parts in order to increase their wealth.

 

In Uganda, magic and mysticism still have great power. The rituals that these beliefs usually take the form of can occasionally become more evil. In the past, killings for ceremonial purposes have often involved children in particular.

 

Jordan Anderson, a researcher who has studied magic in East and Central Africa, claims that the latest killings of women, however, have little in common with conventional ritual homicides. One reason is that it's unusual to preserve a sacrificial body.

 

“You are killing the person because, in the first sense, you want to use that body part in the ‘medicine’ or the potion that you are going to put together,” he said. “It’s the particular part of the person you want, not the death per se."

 

Black magic can also be useful cover for a murderer trying to hide their tracks or an easy scapegoat for incompetent security forces.

 

“If you have this motif in the media, people can pick it up and copycat it,” Anderson said. “If there’s insecurity in this area, if there are murders taking place, this is a great excuse for the politicians, the police and, above all, the people doing the murders.”

 

In an interview at one of the clubs where she was last seen alive, her husband noted that Nakimuli was regarded as being "extremely sweet." She was unable to stand by as a child sobbed. He couldn't bring himself to clean up her house for two months following her passing.

 

In small communities like the one where Nakimuli passed away, rumors are easily disseminated, and Ndyabagyera is still dubious of the police's version of what happened to his wife. He thinks Nakimuli's cousin may have set her up as part of a long-standing vendetta.

 

The small village of Katabi, where Nakimuli and 11 other women were murdered, is located along the main road from Kampala to Entebbe, which is home to the president of Uganda's palace and the country's primary airport on Lake Victoria. Museveni frequently travels this route on his way from his residence to the capital. He didn't go to the town, however, to pay his respects to the deceased until late September.

 

Museveni interviewed the victims' friends and neighbors during the unexpected visit while keeping a clipboard in his hand and taking careful notes.

 

The majority of the twelve slain women in the Katabi area were brutalized in ways akin to Nakimuli. Many had been assaulted with cassava sticks, stripped naked, and strangled.

 

On the opposite side of Kampala, 20 miles north, the bodies of an additional 11 women were found during the same time frame. There, victims were allegedly sexually assaulted and strangled, yet there were no sticks in their genitalia.

 

An individual named Ibrahim Kaweesa, a chicken dealer who had previously served ten years in prison for robbery, has been connected to those killings. Which seems like a huge escalation. The interior minister claimed that Tumuhimbise, a teenage shopkeeper, employed Kaweesa to murder a dozen women "for ritual performance to protect or improve his wealth."

 

As part of a loose network supporting law enforcement, 40-year-old Charles Waswa assisted in the arrest of Kaweesa and claimed, "They removed the blood."

 

Kaweesa resided two-thirds of the way down a short row of apartments, surrounded by women cooking outside and shrieking children. He was labeled by his neighbors as an arrogant and dangerous womanizer.

 

Kaweesa's neighbor Annette Namkose, 29, stepped in to prevent them from dating. She alleged through a translator that in response, he threatened to kill her, saying, "I'll kill you like I did the ones in Entebbe."

 

She declared, "He's not a neighbor you want to be with.

 

Police said that after being detained, Kaweesa swiftly confessed to the crimes. He allegedly led detectives around a number of the crime scenes without being asked.

 

“I don’t believe we have arrested each and every person who knew about this matter,” said Kasingye, the police spokesman.

 

“I cannot say 100% there isn’t going to be any (more) crime because it has never happened anywhere in the world. But at least it (the arrests) shows us we can stop criminals. We can arrest them, we can prosecute them and we can do this throughout the whole country.”

 

Unfortunately cases like these happen too much in many places around the world. Uganda seems to be trying to get ahead of the curve with the installment of the Anti-Human Sacrifice and Trafficking Task Force following the Anti-Trafficking Act in 2009. 

 

Although reports have shown that the task force has been severely underfunded for a while, we do hope that things start to turn around.

 

Speaking of human sacrifices, this is a report from only a few weeks ago:

 

Human sacrifices continue unabated in the remote and rural areas of the landlocked East African country of Uganda despite authorities enacting tough laws and threatening death sentences.

 

According to officials, 132 incidents of human sacrifices have been recorded in the last three years. The numbers have spiked from 22 sacrifices in 2019, 45 in 2020 and 65 in 2021.

 

Most victims of such “ritual sacrifices” are children, apparently because they are easier to abduct and seen as “pure” and so of "higher ritual value".

 

Anadolu Agency quoted authorities as saying on Sunday that the sacrifices are being carried out by witch doctors or local traditional healers, dotting rural areas.

 

Admitting that human sacrifice is a big problem, Lucas Oweyesigire, the police spokesman for the Kampala region, said most such practices take place in rural areas.

 

The so-called leader of traditional healing and witch doctors, Mama Fina, has also condemned human sacrifice and described those recommending the sacrifice of human beings as “fake”.

 

Taking advice from witch doctors

 

Police spokesman Fred Enanga said only last month they "arrested a man identified as Musilimu Mbwire on suspicion of killing his two sons in human sacrifice.”

 

According to preliminary investigations, a rich man had paid Mbwire money and convinced him to sacrifice his two sons at the instructions of a witch doctor.

 

Superstitions lead people in rural areas to seek help from witch doctors, who in turn offer weird prescriptions, including human sacrifices to turn around their luck.

 

A more worrisome part of the superstition is to undertake human sacrifice to put the body at the foundation of a building to bring good luck.

 

Timothy Mukasa, a local leader in Kampala’s suburb of Kireka, said many multi-storey buildings in the town have been built on a human body.

 

“The witch doctors tell owners to put a human body at the foundation of the construction of the buildings,” he said.

 

In 2014, authorities apprehended and later sentenced a tycoon Kato Kajubi for sacrificing a child and then putting his body in the foundation of a building that he was about to construct.

 

David Musenze, a journalist who studied psychology, said there are not many qualified counsellors to attend to psychological and mental issues of people, which makes them take advice from witch doctors.

 

"People go to witch doctors to help them get jobs, be promoted at jobs, or kill their enemies, along with many other problems," he said.

 

So, what about hauntings, you might be thinking to yourself. Well, we found a story from someone living in Uganda from the “your ghost stories” website.

I had always thought this sort of nightmare was happening to me alone until I have come across this site. I always took my suffering silently especially the unexplained sickness which always followed devil attacks.

 

It all started on 28th November 2004 one hour to midnight. Whilst walking home after branching off from the main road. I heard footsteps of someone walking behind me and whoever it was seemed to have been in a hurry, I glanced back and stepped aside to see who it was and let him/her pass as I was in a narrow path.

 

I saw a hazy form I can't clearly explain here, my hair stood on my head like when you encounter something fearful. A cold shiver enveloped me and a gust of chilly wind wrapped my entire body, like I was putting on a cloak. I let out a silent incoherent scream and ran towards home which was just nearby. That occurrence signalled the beginning of my suffering to date.

 

Since then, whenever I sleep I am woken up by something touching my foot or a feeling of a being lying beside me, in the morning I find scratches on my body and at first I thought it was me scratching myself during asleep so I used to trim my nails, but the scratches continued.

 

During the attacks, I fall in a sort of hypotonizing stance. I neither can move nor make any sound except my feet which I use to struggle and try to shrug of the being.

 

In the past two years the demon has turned sexual, it would turn in a woman form, hugging me in bed trying to initiate sexual intimacy, when I wake up my reproductive organ feels so cold and shrunk. There's pain also in the pelvic area for most of the day.

 

I have tried all sorts of remedies e.g. Blessed water, salt, prayers etc. But none seems to work, Any suggestions on how to get rid of this demon is welcome.

 

And lastly, the Haunted Palace of Kabaka

Kabak’s Palace, also known as Idi Amin’s Torture Chambers or Haunted Mansion or Lubiri Palace is located in Lubiri area of Kampala on Mengo Hill Road. It was the home of the Bugandan kings but these days it largely remains unoccupied due to the horrific events that took place under the rule of Idi Amin and President Milton Obote. President Idi Amin built his torture chamber here where hundreds of people were reportedly tortured to death. Their spirits are believed to have haunted the palace which is closed to the public these days for repair and clearing it from the so-called spirits.

 

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