Ed & Lorraine Warren the Strangest Cases
In the field of the paranormal Ed and Lorraine Warren have been nothing short of controversial. They have achieved fame and fortune for their careers investigating the unknown, but the veracity of their claims have been called into question numerous times. Nonetheless they have been at the center of a few famed cases of the supernatural and have even been made stars of a successful film franchise (though they had nothing to do with the Enfield Poltergeist). And the Warren Occult Museum still serves a number of curiosity seekers who want to their own experience with the unexplained. In honor of this couple's contributions good or ill to the paranormal here are a couple of their strangest cases.
Amityville Horror: The case which made the Warrens a household name. George and Kathy Lutz moved into their dream home (why do so many tales of the paranormal begin with people finding their dream house?) and discovered there were unexplained forces at work. George's mind started to crack as the spirits which caused the previous owner to go on a murder spree were beginning to take hold of him. As the story rose in fame, the Warren's accompanied by a TV crew and reporters investigated the strange happenings in the house. The couple claimed that the property was once owned by a practitioner of the occult who was responsible for the dark spirits present in the home. During their investigation Ed and Lorraine captured the now famed photo of what they claim is a demonic entity which had taken the form of a boy with glowing eyes.
Annabelle: Donna was a nursing student who received a Raggedy Ann doll from her mother for her birthday. This seemingly innocent doll would become the center of one of the most famed paranormal happenings of the twentieth century. When coming home at night Donna and her friends would notice the doll would move on its own. Not knowing what else to do they called a medium who informed them that the spirit of a young girl named Annabelle, who had once lived in their apartment complex, had taken up residence in the doll. It was not long before Donna's friend Lou, who was a frequent guest guest began to be seemingly tormented by the doll. When the Warren's entered into the picture they came to the conclusion that the doll was in fact being manipulated by a demonic entity. They called in their friend Father Cooke to perform and exorcism on the doll but it did not seem to work. The Warren's decided to best thing to do was to place Annabelle in a protective case to bind the evil spirit. Those wanting to see Annabelle can now see her as an exhibit at the Warren Occult Museum.
The Southend Werewolf: As stated in the introduction, contrary to film the Warren's had nothing to do with the Enfield Poltergeist case. But they were involved in another one of the United Kingdom's biggest cases of the paranormal the Southend Werewolf. Bill Ramsey was a simple carpenter in Southend, Essex As a boy he had a fascination with wolves, his parents even recalled a moment of his youth when he was growling while digging in their garden and chewing on barbed wire with an animalistic ferocity. As an adult the cold feeling he felt that day came back after a night returning from the pub. Ramsey claimed he felt a chill overtake him and when he looked in the rearview mirror he saw a wolf staring back at him, this triggered him into attacking the others in the car with him. Around Christmas later that year he was caught and tranquilized prowling the halls of a hospital, howling and acting aggressive to others. Years later in 1987 Ramsey fell into another one of his wolf-like spells where he attacked a group of police officers, forcing a dozen officers to have to work to finally put him down. Medical science had no answer for what was happening to Bill Ramsey and Warrens came in to offer a more supernatural explanation. As with many of the Warren's investigations it was determined that a demon was responsible for his werewolf-esque behavior. The demonologists arranged for the troubled man to be taken to the United States so that a priest they trusted could perform an exorcism.
The Perron Haunting: In the pleasant Rhode Island town of Harrisville, Carolyn Perron began to wake in the early morning to the vision of a woman in grey ominously warning her to take her family and leave their home. The Perron family were tormented by levitating beds; objects moving on their own; and disembodied voices. The Warren's were called in to investigate and discovered that in the 1840's an alleged black magic practitioner named, Bathsheba Thayer had allegedly impaled her own child their as a sacrifice to Satan. Though the townspeople tried to punish her for this crime no damning evidence was found to convict, so she was released and allowed to live as a social outcast until her suicide years later. This haunting was the inspiration for the film, the Conjuring, but unlike the film, the Warren's were never truly able to help the Perron's. The demonologist couple and their colleagues performed multiple cleansings but nothing seemed to drive out the evil forces. Eventually the Perron clan had to leave their home and move to Georgia in hopes of getting far away from their haunted house.
