Category: Murders And Crime

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4 Strange and Thought-Provoking FBI Investigations

Did you know that the FBI wasn’t the first major law enforcement arm of the federal government, nor was it always the most important? In fact, the Postal Inspection Service is the oldest American federal law enforcement agency; it can trace its roots back to 1772.

The FBI didn’t bust onto the scene until 1908 (back then it was just the “Bureau of Investigation”), and it didn’t really come into it’s own until the 48-year tenure of its infamous director J. Edgar Hoover, which ran from 1924 until 1972.

Unlike most law enforcement, the FBI has extremely broad jurisdiction, which allows it to be effective across state lines and in investigating complex financial and delicate political crimes. Of course most of us know this because the FBI is very much in the news these days, and has been ever since the 2016 election.

But let’s talk about some less well known FBI investigations, shall we?

1. The FBI tormented Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Photo Credit: Public Domain

After Martin Luther King Jr. gave his “I have a dream” speech, the FBI considered him the most dangerous and effective leader of the civil rights movement. The FBI, and J. Edgar Hoover in particular, made it their mission to ‘deal’ with King, so they tapped his phones, and painted him as a Communist and a sexual deviant. Hoover hated King so much that he tried to convince King to commit suicide.

Photo Credit: lettersofnote.com

In 1964, one year after King’s famous speech, he received an anonymous threatening letter in the mail (it came from the FBI) along with a cassette tape of allegedly incriminating recordings of Dr. King in hotel rooms with various women. The cassette was the fruit of nearly a year of surveillance, and the note intimated, in terms that a 1976 congressional investigation found to be not uncertain, that King should commit suicide.

Here is a selection:

King, there is only one thing left for you to do. You know what it is…You are done. There is but one way out for you. You better take it before your filthy, abnormal fraudulent self is bared to the nation.

2. The FBI investigated a fictional anti-goth cult for 2 years.

The cult was called “The Church of the Hammer”, supposedly founded by a former member of the Westboro Baptist Church. The FBI started its investigation into the organization in 2005.

The investigation didn’t have much to go off of at the beginning – the whole thing was based off of an interaction a goth person had online with the groups Yahoo Group, “GodHatesGoths”. The goth was arguing with the group, trying to convince them that the goth subculture was unfairly maligned, and did not actually necessarily worship Satan.

Photo Credit: Muckrock.com

But the group was apparently unpersuaded, and in the postings they had made some pretty significant threats:

Photo Credit: Muckrock.com

The FBI was worried, and so they started to contact law enforcement and witnesses from the various incidents the group had allegedly been involved in, according to their postings – but investigators couldn’t find anything.

Finally, over two years later, they went to the actual website, godhatesgoths.com. There, they found…

Photo Credit: Muckrock.com

And the investigation was closed.

3. The FBI nailed its most-wanted cybercriminal because the guy’s password was his cat’s name + 123.

Jeremy Hammond was perched atop the FBI’s list.

He was an excellent black hat hacker, and, as he said,

“From the start, I always wanted to target government websites, but also police and corporations that profit off government contracts…I hacked lots of dot-govs.”

He worked as a hacktivist with Anonymous, and he successfully hacked a number of different corporations and government websites. Then, one day, his luck ran out.

In 2012 he was arrested, and 2014 he copped to a plea deal for 10 years in jail.

When his house was raided, Hammond’s first thought was to close his computer, so it would be password protected. But the government cracked it. Again, in Hammond’s own words,

“My password was really weak…[my cat’s name] Chewy. Chewy 123.”

4. The FBI does not always get their man…or find the missing airplane.

In 2003, only 2 years after 9/11, a 727 airplane took off from the capital of Angola, Luanda.

Only two men are known to have been on the plane (a 727 usually takes 3 people to fly), and while one was a trained pilot, he was licensed only for much smaller private craft.

The type of aircraft stolen
Photo Credit: RuthAS, CC BY 3.0

Ben Charles Padilla and his recently hired helper, John Mikel Mutantu, did not communicate with the tower while taxiing jerkily onto a runway, and taking off.

Though there was a frantic search for the plane, involving the FBI and investigative agencies both American and from around the world, it was never seen again, nor were its occupants.

The FBI quietly closed its investigation two years later, in 2005, and there has been no significant public comment on the case since then.

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5 Fast Facts About Billy the Kid

Americans have a fascination with Billy the Kid, who walked the thin line between villain and hero with so much success that he remains venerated despite serious character flaws.

Outlaws like Jesse James and John Dillinger also fall into this category; they were violent men who used aggression and force to get what they wanted, yet there was something about them that makes the public want to see them more as Robin Hoods than dangers to society.

In the spirit of going with the flow, here are some facts about Billy the Kid that everyone who hates to love him and his ilk will find super interesting.

#5. His legend may be a bit exaggerated.

It’s said that Billy the Kid killed 21 people – one for each year of his short life – but evidence suggests the actual number is only 4, with 2 of them being prison guards, though he may have been a participant in the deaths of 5 more people.

#4. His real name is a topic of debate.

Henry McCarty. William Bonney. Henry Antrim. All of these names have been attributed to Billy the Kid over the years.

We know he was born Henry McCarty, but some say his father’s name was William Bonney. He started using his father’s name sometime in 1877, but often used his stepfather’s last name, Antrim, as well.

Another mystery for a mysterious man.

#3. He probably wasn’t left-handed.

There’s a famous image of the Kid wearing a gun belt with the holster on the left side, which led many lefties to claim him as their own. Sadly (for them), it’s been discovered that the image was flipped during reproduction, so the gun was actually on his right hip all along.

#2. He worked at a cheese factory.

Charlie Bowdre, a man who was part of Billy the Kid’s inner circle and previous part owner of said cheese factory, claims this is where the two of them first met.

#1. Plenty of people think he faked his own death.

The official story is that Billy the Kid died in Fort Sumner, New Mexico, on July 14, 1881. But many claim that Sheriff Pat Garrett helped the Kid fake his death and ride off into the sunset, though no substantiation for this claim has ever surfaced.

Ollie “Brushy Bill” Roberts and a man named John Miller both claimed to be Billy the Kid long after the date of his death. But Roberts’ cluelessness regarding gunfights and photo comparison evidence have shown him as an unlikely Kid, while Miller’s claims were put to rest in 2005 after DNA samples were not a match.

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15 People Who Survived Murder Attempts Share Their Stories

The details of these 15 murder attempts are crazy and true – and, since they have happy endings, they also make for interesting reading.

Take a look at these stories.

#15. Got bad vibes.

Mines not extreme by any chance but a couple of years ago my brother and I went to walk the dog at like 11pm. We left through the side gate (live on a corner) and right as we exit I see this weird looking dude at the corner of the footpath walking weirdly towards us. Got bad vibes and told my brother to get the dog and get back inside. This dude is walking kind of side on and hiding something in his hand behind his back, as I’m getting my brother through the gate the dude says something like “oi mate can I come in, I need a blanket I’m freezing” I just ignored him and went inside and locked the door. We then get a call from the people who live two doors up, the same dude knocked on their door and their 10yo son opened it to see the dude holding a fucking hatchet. Anyway I’m glad I went with my gut on that one

#14. Thank god for nosy neighbors.

Thank God for my nosey neighbors. I always used to hate how nosey they were. Until this happened. When I was about 10 I was riding my bike outside. My parents always let me ride my bike outside during the summer, but only up and down the street we were on. One day, a man in a fan was parked across the street. He called to me, asking me if I had seen his dog and could help him find it. Me, being a dumb child, offered to help him find it, and I started walking towards his van. My neighbor, and older white lady, came BOLTING out of her house hooting and yelling, telling the guy to back off. The dude got back in his car in a hurry and took off, and it wasn’t until many years later that I realized how bad that situation could have been.

#13. I went furious.

I (18F back then, now 25) was on my way home at night after meeting a friend.

My home was just 10 minutes away from the trainstation. After a few minutes I felt someone following me. No big deal I tought, just someone else walking home. But I started walking faster. I realized the person behind me was catching up…weird. In my head I started to make up scenarios of how to defend myself if the person would attack me. Never would I think of this to actually happen.

Well, until I felt something on the back of my head, hitting me hard. I went furious. I turned around and attacked the guy. My mind was just full of anger towards this stranger who, what I thought, hit me.

We were wrestling until I fell on the ground. He was sitting on top of me, strangling me. I tried to crawl my nails into his eyes as deep as I could, but I started to black out. Suddenly there was this tought in my head “wake up, or you will die”…well, adrenaline kicked in again and I opened my eyes and screamed of the top of my lungs, attacking him again.

That helped. He stood up and began to run. I layed there for a few seconds, then I started to run home, still screaming.

My mom was already at our door and opened for me because my screams woke her up (or her mother senses, who knows?) She immeadiately called the cops and they could arrest him on the same night.

It turned out that he actually shot me in my head from behind. They assume that the gun didn’t work properly, the bullet didnt penetrate my skull and stuck in there, but as far as I know they never found out why the gun misfired. I’m glad though. He told the cops that he already followed me a few times in the past, but never had the guts to “do it”. He wanted to kill me and rape my dead body.

I know that’s a wild story, I have some swiss news paper articles as a source if someone cares though.

#12. They never found them.

I was 14 and outside in my garage petting my cat. It was November so it was already dark by 5pm. Someone opened the door behind me without me hearing, grabbed me by my Ponytail and starting dragging me outside. They hit me on my head with a brick and knocked me out. Pulled me halfway around my house when (I’m guessing this is when) they stabbed me on the left side of my stomach. This must have brought me out of my daze, because my mom said she heard me scream from inside where she and my brother And sister were in the kitchen. They came out the front door and saw me bleeding out on the side walk, called 911. had 12 stitches (double layer) a severe Concussion, and whiplash. didn’t eat and hardly slept for a week. They never found them.

Edit: somehow believed for nearly 14 years I was 15 when this happened, turns out I was 14. Edited to correct.

2nd edit: thank you so much for my first gold! ☺

#11. This was also a mistake.

I was riding in a train across Eastern Europe. I was running low on money and even though I had been warned that a woman should not travel alone in second class seating I did not spring for first class. I was sitting alone in one of the compartments that seats six. This was also a mistake and a very stupid one to sit alone. Eventually the train stopped and a man got on – he was very drunk. He came into my compartment and I guess thought I looked like his ex-wife.

He attacked me. If it were not for the fact that this particular station was the border between two countries I would be dead. Instead border patrol from both countries were on the train and while I was unable to scream, the door was open and at least a half a dozen uniformed men jumped him and saved me. I was in the hospital for a little while but recovered. At one point during the trial, one of the cops asked me if I wanted him and his buddies to hold the guy down while I hit him. I thought he was joking. So I said no, go ahead you do it. I was also joking. But it turns out they took it seriously and were about to! I did put a stop to that at least. But they were so offended that someone from their country would attack a young female American tourist. They were furious with him. So many people there depended upon tourism

#10. Don’t think he saw me at all.

Was a bouncer at a club in LA for a minute in the 90’s. Stopped some dudes clearly affiliated (in a gang) at the door after they refused security checks. After a few minutes of their threats & Manson lamps they left spewing all sort of warnings.

A little later it starts to wind down and because it’s a little slow & we’re overstaffed so I start to drink. I get a bit drunk (not wasted, but sleepy-buzzed) so I tell my buddy I’m going to go lay down in the back of his car for a while.

A few minutes after lying down I realize I have to piss. I get out and stumble a few into a spot between a guard gate (for a parking lot) and a building for a little privacy (there’s a few dozen people milling around in front of the club). I’m about 25 feet away from the club’s entrance and just off an alleyway.

While I’m relieving myself, a dude runs right past in front of me, around the guard booth to my rear, and unloads a 9mm (recovered rounds from back seat/trunk/roof/bumper) into the back seat of the car I’d just crawled out of.

“bam bam bam bam…” Unloading into the car.

He then turns, runs right back past me, and down the alley into the night. Don’t think he saw me at all.

Nothing really came of it. Except my partner was convinced I was a “marked man” and refused to be near me for a year or so.

Edit: holy crap, I kind of expected this to get buried. This was Los Angeles. I was about 25 (almost 50 now) so some specifics are long gone – but I remember this: my buddy was genuinely terrified by this, I don’t think he knew anything about it (in fact he seemed to interpret the event as a larger conspiracy to have me snuffed – not some random pissed off dude making a point/getting jumped in) and because he ditched the car/wouldn’t take my calls it got left at that. For those concerned with the car – it was, like, a 1980’s rusted out sedan…maybe a $500 car. Details about the slugs/number of rounds fired were relayed to me later by third parties (my friend and I were known in the neighborhood, people were talking about it). Thank you for the well wishes. Honestly though, this wasn’t even the first time I was shot at (it’s been a long strange trip).

Edit 2: Also, I tried to argue later that it’s just as likely the guy was shooting at someone else across the street and that the car just got in the way. But there were holes all through that thing. Back seat had 4/5, another 2/3 went into the back window and ended up in the backs of the front seats, another 2/3 rounds went right into the trunk. I honestly don’t know if he was a terrible shot, or if he hit right what he was aiming for.

Apologies if I’m doing this wrong, I suck at Reddit.

#9. He was stabbed 7 times.

I have a friend who had a party at his parents house when he was in high school that a ton of random people went to. He got super drunk during the party and went upstairs to go to sleep, knowing that his friends would watch the party for him. My friend woke up from his nap to a guy from his school sitting on top of him stabbing him death. He was stabbed seven times before it stopped and he laid there on the bed dying.

The only reason he is still alive is because his best friend came upstairs to ask him if it was alright if he made a frozen pizza and found him. The assailant was put in jail and recently was released and it scares me to know that a guy who “wanted to know what it would feel like to kill someone” (said during the trial), is still out there free.

#8. I was very confused.

My supposed best friend decided that my wife and I were too perfect. Therefore it must all be an act and I was obviously abusing her.

He was at our house after I made an awesome dinner and we were having fun drinking and singing karaoke.

I went to the kitchen to put some glasses away, came back and leaned on the couch with him slightly behind me to the left of me.

Then I heard a thunk and felt an amazing amount of pain on the top of my head. He had picked up the whiskey bottle on the table and smashed it into my skull.

I was very confused as to wtf was happening. Then the blood started pouring. I didn’t want to get blood everywhere so I went to the kitchen.

Dude is pacing back and forth saying weird shit. I thought about my gun (which was close by) but I wasn’t thinking quite straight. He left.

I had a huge concussion and still suffer side effects from it.

My number 2 goal in life is to live longer then that asshat just so I can shit on his grave.

#7. I was too late.

I was exiting a bar once after last call and was with a friend who was a medic. We saw a girl laying in a snow bank near a telephone pole who had just been hit by a car. We ran over and tried to help her, some others were already on the phone with 911 and I, not having any medical training didn’t have anything to contribute but didn’t want to just leave, the whole situation was concerning.

I turn around for a second and start to hear people screaming… I turn around a a minivan was heading for us, the few people around this woman. They already started to run, but I was too late…​

He hit me as I was trying to flee… put the car in reverse, ran over me again, and then went forward and run over me a third time.

Turns out the guy was high and drunk and got into a fight with the women’s bf, whom I bared a strong resemblance too. He thought I was him. Not to throw a pity party for myself but 9 years later I have a ton of medical issues, and my life pretty much started on a downward spiral since then… but sure, I guess I “survived”.

Edit: For everyone wondering about the guy, An off duty cop watched the whole thing go down, and copied his license plate number. He was apprehended 20 minutes later & charged with attempted murder, along with many other things.

He plea’d out to just 3 years in jail. He had actually killed someone else a few years before drunk driving. How they thought that was appropriate is beyond me.

#6. Next thing I know.

This all happened many years ago.

I was a lead man at a factory. A girl starts working there, and I take an interest. After a few months, I find out she is in a terrible drug-fueled abusive relationship. Every night, I tell her to call me, I’ll come get her. Finally after months, she calls me, I come get her and take her to my house.

The guy she was in the relationship with didn’t take too kindly to me taking her away. He spends the next 2 years harassing and threatening us.

A few months after she and I got married we went out for a few drinks. Her ex just happened to be at the bar we went to. He apologized to us for the threats and harassment. We were sitting outside talking with a few other people.

Next thing I know, I’m on my back on the ground with someone choking me. I try all I can to get them off of me, but being blindsided and them being on top of me, it wasn’t easy. As I struggle to get free, everything goes black, then I see “the light at the end of the tunnel”. In that moment I was certain that this was the end of me. I somehow manage to get a better hold of this person’s head, and I yank them off of me. We run to the car and get away.

A week or so later, my wife had been talking to everyone she thinks might know what happened. Turns out, her ex had paid 2 people $50 to kill me that night.

#5. Drive away, sweetheart.

I was abducted at a gas station during undergrad. The locks on my car were broken, and as soon as I got back in, a strange man came in and forced me to drive him to an ATM. I am paralyzed with fear so any sense or reason I had went out the window. He claimed he worked at Wendy’s and for my generosity he would give me all the Wendy’s I ever wanted. On the way to the ATM he showed me pictures of his daughters (on his clearly stolen cell phone). Then a Whitney Houston song came on the radio and he starts BAWLING his eyes out and screaming “Why do all the good people have to die, only bad things should happen to bad people.” I go to the ATM, take out cash, give it to him thinking it’s over. He then makes me get back in the car and drive him somewhere else. We pass by some train tracks and I’m thinking this is it, this is where I will be murdered. He asks me what I’m studying in school, and I tell him Biochemistry. “I believe in jet propulsion and all that shit. WE ARE NOT ALONE ALIENS ARE AMONG US.” He then makes me pull over at a gas station and he tells me “drive away sweetheart”. I call the cops, had to do a line-up, apparently this dude had done this to a ton of other women, and some were less unscathed than I was….

#4. He was perfectly civil.

Throwaway because it got some media. I’m a criminal defense attorney. I was representing this guy that had embezzled almost $500k from his business partner. He was looking down the barrel at several years in prison, a bunch of his assets had been seized by the government, was being sued by multiple creditors for north of $2 million, and was in the midst of an ugly divorce and wasn’t allowed to see his kids. I was one of 3 lawyers he had – criminal, civil and divorce. He was drinking a lot and using coke — I used to get this incoherent phone calls in the middle of the night that ranged from threats to crying.

He came to my office one day and asked for me but I was in court. My secretary said he was perfectly civil. He then went to his divorce lawyer’s office and shot him to death. Got stopped by the police a short distance away and was wounded in a shootout. He would later tell the cops that he had come to my office to shoot me that day and also planned to shoot his civil attorney.

#3. I was supposed to sleep there.

Sophomore year of college went with a friend to go hang out at his old college. We were supposed to crash with a few friends of his but we met a few ladies and ended up at a pool party. Next day went home and my friend started getting calls from one of his buddies moms asking if he’d seen him.

Turns out in the middle of the night a few guys broke into the house kidnapped my friends buddy and roomate. Took there car and drove them out to the middle if nowhere and executed them. I guess it was part of some gang initiation.

I was supposed to sleep there with my friend. I still somtimes think about it and get the shivers.

EDIT: spelling.

This happened in 1999 in stubenville ohio. Someone posted a link to the wiki page in the comments.

Thank you to all the people who commented. I posted this before work and then my phone went crazy for the next few hrs.

#2. My mom got mad at me.

Well. My mom got mad at me when I was 20 and I didn’t give her money for her birthday, which I’m assuming was to pay off drug dealers of hers, so she stabbed me between the ribs. Ended up getting stuck in the bone and had to get it taken out in surgery.

#1. I was that close.

I was doing volunteer work in Central America, working in a really bad area of the capitol city–it was a slum built on top of the city’s garbage dump. The whole place reeked of trash, and there were large metal cylinders coming up out of the ground throughout the area to vent the gas from decomposing garbage underground.

As a fellow volunteer and I walked down a dirt path, two men approached us. I’d never seen them before. They were acting strangely, but I just thought they were drunk or high–a lot of people in the area drank rubbing alcohol to get drunk, since it was cheaper than beer or liquor. Over time, drinking the rubbing alcohol would really mess with their brains.

As the men got closer, they began acting really friendly–too friendly. One of them came close to me, trying to put his arm around my shoulders. At first, it seemed like the behavior of a guy who gets happy and friendly when he’s drunk. However, an alarm went off in my head, and I gently–but firmly–pushed him away. I tried to make it seem lighthearted and playful, like, “Hey, man! How’s it going?” (Affectionate shove.) I didn’t want to make a scene, since I was a gringo; I didn’t want to seem like an ugly American.

This went on over and over down the whole path–he’d get close, I’d shove him off, he’d come close again. Finally, my friend and I came to a fork in the path, and we went one way while they went another.

After we got to the house of some people we knew, we told them about the two guys. (I was so focused on protecting myself, I didn’t even notice much of what was happening with the other guy.) They said, “Oh, everyone around here knows him. That’s his routine–he comes up to people, pretends to be friendly, puts him arm around them, then pulls out his knife and stabs them in the stomach.”

I was that close to getting stabbed to death.

Yikes! Dumb luck is really the best thing to hope for sometimes.

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15 People Who Have Killed or Injured Someone in Self Defense Reveal What Happened

I suppose you have to do what you have to do if your life is in danger…so these stories are pretty gripping and terrifying.

Because that’s exactly what these people from AskReddit did.

Here are their stories.

1. Rural justice

“My great grandmother was widowed in rural greece after WW2. Her sister was in an abusive relationship, and my great grandmother told her husband “if you hit her one more time I will kill you”.

He obviously hits her, so my great grandmother goes to his poker game with all the elite men in the village and shoots him square between the eyes. No one questions the rural justice imposed and she lives out the rest of her life a dominating figure in the village.”

2. Florida

“My great uncle lived in a trailer in a rural area of Florida. A kid (17) broke in one night and held him at knifepoint. He had no money, and told the kid that. He also told the kid to leave or he will grab the shotgun next to him.

Kid charged and slashed him, then he shot him dead. They ended up charging his friend (driving get away car) with the murder. Turns out they robbed several trailers that night. Chose the wrong one.”

3. Wedding reception

“My parents story: during their wedding reception, two men with masks entered and announced they’d be robbing them. Everyone thought it was a prank, laughed it off, and went on with the party. They pulled out guns and said it was no joke.

Everyone was on the ground on all fours, and they went around collecting wallets and jewelry from the guests. They came up to my grandpa (I’ve never met him) and saw what looked like a wallet in his breast pocket (it was a date book) and asked him to hand over his wallet. He said he didn’t have one (cause he didn’t) and was punched in the stomach. My uncle looked up at the guy and had a gun put to his forehead and was told “I’m going to blow your fucking brains out.”

My uncle grabbed the gun and turned around, pulling the guy’s face into his shoulder. My grandpa and others tackles him down and held him down. The second guy went running off, and my dad (ran track on college) chased after him and tackles him. Him and others pin him down.

Police come and everyone is excited that the ordeal is over. The cops say something like “this is going to take a bit longer though, there was a death.” Freaking out, my family asks who and find out the first guy was suffocated from being held down. (Later it was confirmed he was on cocaine and died from something related to his heart).”

4. Russia

“This happened to my dad in Russia, back in the 90s, which were wild there.

My dad is a big fat guy who can’t fight for shit. He’d recently gotten an 8 month old puppy, and he took the puppy for a walk. He was and still is a smoker of MORÉ cigarettes – I think they only exist in Europe.

Two young guys walk up to him and ask for a cigarette. He says he doesn’t have any. Now that brand of cigarettes that he smokes – they are really long – and the pack is sticking out of his pocket. The young guys get pretty pissed and one of them shoves dad. When my dad falls down, the guys take out a telescopic truncheon.

Dad knows it’s a losing battle but he unclips the dog’s leash so he could swing the metal clip at least.

Now, there is one important fact that I left out about this puppy. He was a Caucasian Sheepdog. At 8 months, he was about 75 lbs. And he went fucking ballistic. Both guys end up in ICU, one loses an eye.

The cops want the dog killed, and dad has to pay a lot of bribes to keep that from happening. The dog ends up living a nice happy 13 years.”

5. Knocked out

“Not me, but my dad had to knock someone out with a pipe wrench.

My dad was in his mid-twenties and had just started up his HVAC company. It was late at night, one of his customers called about his tenant’s complaining the air was out. At 3am. My dad, as a recent business start-up all on his own, got dressed and went out on the call.

He got there and fixed the AC and when he was leaving (it was a bit of a run down, poverty stricken area), a man who was clearly drunk thought he was with his girlfriend who was living in the house my dad just worked on. My dad, obviously, was like no, I’m the HVAC repair guy. Dude pulls out a knife and charges my dad and my dad simply swings at him with what was in his hand, which was a wrench. Knocked the guy in the temple and he was out cold.

Dad kinda panicked and jumped into his van and sped off. Nothing ever came of it so I assume the guy was ok, aside from a massive headache.”

6. You’re free to go

“Obligatory “Not me, but my Grandpa”, but here goes. Grandpa was something else. Arrested several times during prohibition for running stills in the hills of Appalachia and other colorful sorts of stuff. Anyway, many years after that, he was in a bar somewhere in town.

Some young asshole got in his face, as young assholes do. Words were exchanged, the young guy pulled out a gun, and he stuck it in my Grandpa’s face.

Grandpa didn’t have time to determine the extent of the young man’s commitment to his actions, so he decided to pull out his gun and kill him right there. Cops were called, witnesses were interviewed, and Grandpa was free to go.”

7. Whoa

“I’m a medic and firefighter. We got called to a rollover accident new years morning. Obviously a drunk driver. It was 3am. We were first on scene, walked up to the car, and found a gun pointed at my face.

I grabbed his arm, smashed it into the A post repeatedly. My partner didn’t even know what was going on.

The guy dropped the gun, I told me partner to get it, and I ripped the guy from the car. He’s screaming I broke his arm.

The police get there, I tell them he had a gun and pulled it on me. They grab him and throw him in their car.

He was arrested, taken to the hospital so his arm could be splinted. Was charged with driving impaired and assault. Please guilty and went to jail for a couple of years.”

8. Drugs are bad

“A TINY girl I went to school with was at home with her mother in law. A man came and knocked on the door with some bullshit excuse like his car was broken down or something. He eventually left. Her husband took his truck into the shop that day and came home later. That night, the same man broke into their house thinking it was only the two women home, as no other cars had returned.

Her husband began struggling with the intruder and broke a wooden baseball bat over the guys head. He kept attacking. Mother in law jumps in. Tiny woman ran to the kitchen and got a knife and stabbed the man to death stabbing multiple times. The man was high on PCP or something.”

9. Bad times in Panama

“Granddad was in the Navy stationed in Panama after WWII. One day, he and one of his shipmates were out patrolling or on guard duty or some such when a local kid runs up and says there’s an American in a bar nearby and he’s about to get killed. So my granddad and his comrade follow the kid to the bar and walk in to see an American sailor all cut up, backed into a corner holding a chair over his head, surrounded by a a couple of locals with knives.

Granddad scans the room and sees a pair of Panamanian cops in uniform sitting at a nearby table just watching and laughing. He tells the guys with the knives to back off and one of them turns and lunges at him, so he shoots him in the belly.

Immediately, the cops jump up reaching for their sidearms, but Granddad’s buddy shoots them both right around the same time Granddad shoots the second knife-wielding attacker. So maybe thirty seconds after they walked into the bar, four guys are dead.

They got court-martialed but somehow came out without so much as a discharge. Not sure how or why. I need to get around to seeing if I can find any records on it.

Also, my granddad never met a story he couldn’t embellish, but I have a feeling this one is true. He’d talk about horrific violence he experienced at Iwo Jima till the cows came home, but he did NOT want to talk about Panama.”

10. My God…

“Not me, but my father. Back in the 60s, he was at a small town bar with a friend. The friend was playing pool and won a bunch of money off some guy he’d just met. So the guy goes out to the car, gets a gun and kills my dad’s friend.

Everyone in the bar kind of jumped on the gunman, and my dad kicked/stomped his head with his steel toed work boots. The guy died in the hospital, but my dad was never arrested or charged with anything.

He doesn’t talk about it much. The only reason he told me was because I made a stupid joke about shooting someone and he wanted to teach me why it wasn’t funny.”

11. A scary situation

“Was at party with my best friend (a guy) in a house full of college students that all either lived together/hung out together aged between 22-28, in all about 20 of us. His roommate who’d never really had alcohol in excess got shit faced.

This guy kept hitting on me and not taking social cues of me being not interested. Things turned violent eventually. He said he’d kill my best friend for cock blocking. I pretty much put him in a hold and calmed him down and went to another side of the house. A few minutes later, he comes to find us, but he’s gotten a baseball bat.

My best friend lived there, the guy lived there and I was a house guest. My best friend wound up getting whoever was left at the party in one room and the guy was chasing him around with a baseball bat. The way it turned was when the guy got a hold of my friend, and my friend did his best to restrain him, but this guy was unrelenting. It’s all confusing really, the guy just snapped.

My friend literally had to beat him unconscious because he kept trying to strangle my friend. We were all really scared. By the time the cops got there, the guy’s face was REALLY fucked up and my friend had some broken bones. Self defense is a crazy thing, we were concerned my best friend would go to jail, but he didn’t.

Turned out the roommate was there on an expired visa, and he had two or three priors for aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

Last we heard he’s still in jail, his face is completely rearranged and banned from entering The United States for ten years. That was 4 years ago.”

12. A story from Queens

“I was living in Queens while attending Fordham U in the Bronx. Came off the train one night, there was a young busker at the end of the platform rapping about how if everyone just gave a little money God would give a little back. I looked straight ahead, ignored him, tried to power walk past him.

I’m a small female, he was a much bigger man. He grabbed me by the arm and started trying to charm me for money. I was pulling away, trying to make him let go, he wouldn’t. I started screaming and then I just started stabbing him with my keys. I always carried my keys with the tips stuck out between my fingers because it was a not so nice neighborhood and I always got home late. It didn’t kill him but it hurt enough that he let me go.

This little immigrant woman had been coming up the platform and heard me screaming so she came running and started hitting him with umbrella. So now he’s on the ground bleeding and being sacked about his personage by a seventy-five year old Ukrainian woman who introduced herself to me as Olga. Police came, arrested him, gave me and my new friend a pat on the back and a ride home.

Fortunately it was the only time I was ever assaulted when I lived in Queens. When I lived near campus in the Bronx it was a lot worse. My roommate was insane.”

13. Bar fight

“When I was 22 I was at a show at a bar, watching my friends band play. After they finished their set I moved to the back to be near the doors to help them with moving their equipment out. It’s very dark and everyone else is still up closer to the stage.

Suddenly, someone I don’t know grabs me from behind, in a big bear hug, and starts to drag me back towards the doors leading out. I, without thinking at all, drop my weight, manage to slip out of his arms, whirl around, grab his hair and SLAM his face down into my rising knee. I can still to this day feel his nose shatter as I hit him. He stumbles backwards, blinded and covered in blood.

He’s rather quickly grabbed by my friends who had seen him attack me and the cops are called. He’s arrested and taken to the hospital, where it turns out I broke not only his nose, but also fractured his cheek bone.

For context I’m a girl, and around 110 lbs. I’ve never been in a fight or have any real idea how to defend myself. I’m certain the only reason this worked is that he hadn’t expected me to defend myself in any way, it was entirely the surprise of it. I don’t think it would have worked at all had he been prepared.”

14. Don’t mess with Texas

“My civics teacher who lived in a smaller Texas town told me a crazy story from his childhood. When he was a kid, a robber broke into his house and was stealing shit from his family. He woke up and looked around the house due the noise. He found the robber standing in his foyer, about to exit, and the next thing he knew, the robber’s head exploded.

His father who was upstairs got a his revolver, shot the robber’s head, who met the hammer of justice if the form of a .44 magnum.

That was that. Robber gone, and no legal consequences faced the family, due to Texas laws concerning protecting your property (this occurred way long ago so laws may be different). He used this story to explain the kinds of laws the U.S and Texas had. Pretty insane story. Moral of the story: If you rob someone, and they have a gun and they know how to use it, prepare to say goodbye to your way of life, or your mortal coil. Especially in Texas.”

15. Nightmares

“3 of them have been car/motorcycle jackings. The one that sticks with me the most is the guy who tried to steal my bike at knife point. I reached into my riding jacket and fired the gun through the holster(and jacket). It’s not like the movies where the bad guys just fall over.

In the time it took emergency services to arrive, I had to watch a grown man writhe in pain, scream, cry, beg for his mom, and ultimately expire.

It is one of the most heartwrenching things I’ve ever seen. I still have nightmares.”

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10 Ghost Tours That Will Seriously Give You the Creeps

I really, really love all things creepy. I’m talking about scary movies, scary books, scary everything.

If you like to dabble in scary tourism, this is just the list for you.

Today we take a look at 10 real-life, creepy tours recommended by the Buzzfeed community that are guaranteed to give you a good scare.

1. The Stanley Hotel – Estes Park, Colorado

“The Stanley Hotel (where The Shining was filmed) offers guided tours, and you can even spend the night in specific rooms that are reported to have ‘higher than usual activity.’ The guide said many people died building the hotel, and their ghosts will often come out to ensure guests are enjoying it.

While on the tour, one of the guides encouraged me to take a picture in this one dark hallway. When I had the film developed, there were two orbs, one on each side of me, clear as could be. So spooky.”

2. The Jennie Wade House – Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

“After taking pictures on the Jennie Wade House tour, a bunch of my friends and I had photos turn out really strangely— there were giant clouds and shadows in weird spots.

At one point, we also heard footsteps upstairs and thought it was the other tour group, but then we found out they were in the basement.

A chain that was blocking off a section began to swing in circles with nobody touching it — scary!”

3. Zak Bagans’ Haunted Museum – Las Vegas, Nevada

“Zak Bagans’ Haunted Museum is located in a mansion that the state of Nevada deemed haunted after they found a pentagram, human flesh, and streaks of blood in it in the ’70s.

It contains 30 rooms of artifacts from Zak’s personal collection, including an allegedly demonic chair that was used during the Ed and Lorraine Warren exorcisms!”

4. Jack the Ripper Tour – London, England

“Last Halloween, a few friends and I went on the Jack the Ripper guided tour in London. Our host was amazing — she took us on a walk to all the spots where the murders had happened and the victims were found. She had photos and went into a LOT of detail about the killings.

The night itself was freezing cold, which literally added to the chill of everything!”

5. The Waverly Hills Sanatorium – Louisville, Kentucky

“I did an overnight paranormal investigation at the Waverly Hills Sanatorium just for fun, not believing I’d experience anything paranormal. It was life-changing!

I saw and heard things that night that I never thought could happen. It was both terrifying and fascinating.

I’d do it again any day.”

6. Manly Quarantine Station – Sydney, Australia

“Q Station is by far the scariest tour ever!! There’s so much amazing history to the place, which has pitch black buildings, cold spots, and decontamination showers.

Oh, and a couple of jump scares thrown in for good measure!”

7. French Quarter Ghost & Legends Tour – New Orleans, Louisiana

“This tour in the French Quarter of New Orleans is such a fun and interesting tour of all of the crazy happenings down there. It is especially terrifying to go see the Lalaurie Mansion, home of serial killer Madame Lalaurie.

Nic Cage used to own the home but he would never spend the night because of what had happened in it!”

8. The Crescent Hotel – Eureka Springs, Arkansas

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Its National Paranormal Day! ? So let's throw it back to 2012 when me and my uncle were into Ghost Hunting and he took us on a road trip from Missouri to the infamous Crescent Hotel located in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. Honestly, a really beautiful place with a chilling history. The Crescent Hotel is known to be one of the most haunted hotels in America. It was first a resort for the rich that became a hospital for cancer patients. Unfortunately, the "doctor" Norman Baker was running scams and likely performing dangerous experiments on the patients leading to their death. He was found to not have any medical training and was eventually arrested. When we went, we only caught a few orbs (seen in a few of the pics) on the haunted tour and my mom's arm got yanked while she was sleeping. Yes, we stayed overnight! What's crazy is that recently there has been an unearthing of jars filled with body parts. This discovery happened after the recent Ghost Adventures visit in February! Creepy! • • • #nationalparanormalday #Horrorjunkie #GhostHunting #GhostAdventures #EurekaSprings #Arkansas #TheCrescentHotel #MostHaunted #Haunts #Ghosts #Mansion #Roadtrip #Scary #Hotel #Missouri #Travel #GhostTown #Supernatural #Paranormal #Creepy

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“On the Crescent Hotel tour, they talk about many different ghosts that stay in certain rooms and areas.

Plus, they even have a cat ghost!!!”

9. The Sorrel-Weed House Tour – Savannah, Georgia

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#noghostswereseen

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“The Sorrel-Weed House Tour is all fun and games until you descend into the basement.

It’s hands down the creepiest place I’ve ever set foot in. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I was being watched.”

10. The Joshua Ward House Tour – Salem, Massachusetts

“When I went on a tour of the Joshua Ward House — which was once the home of a High Sheriff in the Salem Witch Trials — I was suddenly overwhelmed by a chilling feeling when I was standing by the basement.

The next day, a bruise in the shape of a bite mark from HUMAN TEETH showed up on my ankle!”

Are your bags packed yet?

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Ex-Convicts Share the 15 Most F***ed Up Aspects of Prison Life

Prison is hell, and we should all be incredibly thankful that most of us will likely never experience it.

Thank heavens for that, because this AskReddit thread had ex-cons shed some light on the most f*cked up things about prison that the general public doesn’t know about, and it’s messed up.

1. Smokes

“A cigarette in prison consists of the following:

Take a regular cigarette out of the pack

Cut the tobacco portion of that cigarette into 4 equal parts

Remove the tobacco from each of those separated portions and reroll it using Bible pages into 4 mini-cigarettes called a “clip”

Sell each clip for $2-$4

A cigarette out of that pack can be sold whole for between $10-$20 each.

Edit: Here is the currency conversion for the prison where I was incarcerated:

1 ramen noodle soup = $1

1 mackerel fish pouch = $1.50

bag of coffee = $8

new bar of Ivory soap = $2

1 pack of duplex cookies = $2

bed made = $1

laundered t shirt = $1

tattoo = $20 – $50 (depends on how many hours spent)

fellatio in far stall = $5

All part of the cigarette/clips/tobacco trade

It was very common for someone to walk around the yard picking up fully Smoked Cigarettes to shake out the last few crumbs of tobacco for rolling into a clip.

Most people were fine just buying a clip or two that would last them for the entire evening. If someone saw you smoking a Cadillac you are either going to have to share that Cadillac or fight. (Again a Cadillac is a full Factory rolled standard cigarette.)”

2. NOISE

“With the acoustics of concrete, steel and glass, its not only not quiet noises all the time… it’s LOUD noises all the time. Barely can think in some cell blocks.”

3. GOT is everywhere

“On a slightly lighter side, a sort of family friend recently got out of prison after ~18 years for holding up a gas station for drug money.

My uncle was his friend and when the guy got out my uncle said “Man, there’s this show you’re gonna love called Game of Thrones.”. The guy laughed and said he was current on it. The in-prison black market was his source for a tiny ~2 inch battery powered screen and microSD cards with the episodes on it.

Every now and then it would be confiscated as contraband and he’d have to save up for a month to buy another.

He also had a prison-cat that knew to leave his cell before morning activities and to come back after lights out, he’d feed it little chunks of meat he smuggled out of the mess hall. One big thing for him was making sure to train the cat who to go to next because there’s definitely some people that would have killed it just for the unique experience.”

4. Sounds terrible

“You never wake up feeling safe, ever. There is so much hanging over your head that you may not be in control of that the stress level is through the roof.”

5. Lifers

“The lifers are usually the nicest people you will meet while you are there. This is their home, this is their whole world. Most of them try to make it as pleasant for themselves as possible.”

6. A business

“The fact that literally every single aspect of the infrastructure is setup to be for-profit, to exploit your family. From arrest quotas, to plea deal quotas, to the corporate run phone system, the prison labor gimmick slave labor used to make PRODUCTS FOR COMPANY PROFIT, not to better the community or help society.

Prison is a business, a corrupt, criminal, awful business run by politicians and special interests that are more evil than the inmates.”

7. Interesting…

“The most unlikely people are chess masters.”

8. The simplicity

“When you get out you miss the simplicity of choices.

When you are in all you think about is getting out and what you will do when that happens. Everything focuses around this.

When you are out, at first, the input is enormous and a small part of you miss the simplicity. ? “

9. The rules

“Former prison librarian here.

Dental care – Dentists won’t fill your teeth, they will just pull them. No caps, no implants.

Race – Prisons are still self-segregating in a lot of ways. When I worked in a prison in WV, one dorm had a black TV (controlled only by black inmates) and a white tv (controlled by only white inmates).

Honor culture – If you call someone a name or steal from them, the other person must retaliate to save honor. As a result, you will see a lot of black eyes in prison.

Postage stamps are a form of currency.

Many prisons censor what books come into the institution. At one prison I worked in, The Art of War by Sun Tzu was banned simply because of the title. I assure you that no one in admin had ever read the book.”

10. Guilt

“My dad was in prison, in his situation, and in many others, you feel immense guilt after getting to know your fellow inmates. Because you’re gonna get out, and they’re not, ever.”

11. Broken spirit

“A neighbor of mine was locked up for murder and released some time before I was born. It’s one of those things where everyone knew about it but no one talked about it.

I remember him telling me the story of why he was in there and what it was like (very rarely did), and the most surprising thing in his experience was that the smaller/quieter/weaker/more vulnerable in general were typically left alone. It’s only if you acted like a big shot did people want to fight you.

Also, picking fights with said smaller/quieter/weaker/more vulnerable ones will instantly get you a nonstop flogging by other inmates until your spirit broke.”

12. Ugh

“Shit-bombing.

I had a friend go to prison for a drug related crime. He had his own cell and stuck to himself for the most part. Another inmate shit into a water bottle and filled it to the brim with water and mixed it up into a slush.

Said inmate then took the water bottle to the my friends cell, placed at the slit at the bottom of his cell door, and fucking stomped on it! Shit water sprayed absolutely everywhere… while my friend was in the cell too.”

13. Barefoot

“When you get out, the feeling of soft carpet on your bare feet is borderline orgasmic and you’ll never take it for granted again.”

14. Sickness

“Don’t get sick! You’ll probably die a horrible death.”

15. Withholding

“Guards can and will withhold medical treatment. When I was in county jail, there was an older woman, vomiting profusely. She couldn’t keep water down, her skin was tenting and she was hallucinating.

I explained all this to the guards and that she needed medical treatment immediately. For two days she was like that until I transferred out. I have no idea what happened to that woman and I still think about her. This was in Georgia, USA.”

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This Woman Went on a Tinder Dream Date, and Ended Up Getting Scammed out of $200,000

A lot of us have had bad dates, be it on Tinder or elsewhere, but few of those terrible dates probably compare to the experience Cecilie Fjellhoy had recently. The 29-year-old London resident went on a date with a guy who seemed absolutely dreamy… until he swindled $200,000 from her and vanished.

It all started when Cecilie matched with Simon Leviev. Simon told Cecilie that he was an Israeli millionaire and diamond dealer; he claimed that his nickname was the “Prince of Diamonds.”

Sure, that might sound like a scam immediately. But Simon took Cecilie on a private plane ride to Bulgaria as part of their first date, so his story kind of held water. He swept Cecilie off of her feet.

Photo Credit: iStock

“This was the first time where I felt like, ‘Oh my god I really like him. And it seems that he really likes me back as well,’” Cecilie told ABC News . “He’s texting and he’s calling and he seems to really want to get to know me, and I think I fell a bit for that.”

Eventually, Simon started claiming that he was in danger because of his line of work. He asked Cecilie to extend her line of credit to him so that nothing would be in his name and there wouldn’t be a paper trail. He even went so far as to send Cecilie videos of him and his “bodyguard” in the hospital after an “attack.”

Unfortunately, it was all a ruse.

Simon turned out to be Shimon Hyuat, a 28-year-old convicted Israeli con-man. He has a long history of defrauding women to fund his lifestyle, including the private plane that he used to woo Cecilie.

In the end, he took Cecilie’s money and disappeared. She was so heartbroken that she had to get psychiatric help. Meanwhile, Shimon is living it up in Panama, where he is denying allegations of defrauding Cecilie.

Photo Credit: Pixabay

So, is Cecilie still on Tinder? It’s unclear, but she is continuing to meet new people — with a lot more skepticism.

“[I’m] much, much less naive,” she said.

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8 Great Facts That’ll Put a Smile on Your Face

Some facts will bum you out, like finding out that honey bees are seriously endangered.

These facts, however, are the opposite of that. They will make you smile, maybe even laugh. So let’s get to it!

1. Resting place

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2. It’s easy!

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3. Look at ’em go!

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4. Perfect!

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5. It really does

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6. You better believe it

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7. Love, South Korean style

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8. Think about that

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I saw that frown go upside down…

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5 of the Most Infamous Murders in Mob History

There’s something about high-profile mob hits that’s almost thrilling to the general public. On March 13, 2019, Francesco “Franky Boy” Cali, the 53-year-old leader of the Gambino crime family was shot and killed in Staten Island, New York, in front of his home.

It was a stark reminder that although the heydays of mob hits may be behind us, these kinds of “hits” can (and do) still happen.

In light of recent events, we thought we’d bring you a list of 5 of the most famous mob murders in history.

1. Carmine Galante – 1979

Photo Credit: Public Domain

Galante was known to have a psychopathic personality and led the Bonnano crime organization, one of the Five Families. The heads of New York’s other families were not happy with the way Galante conducted business and they finally decided he had to go.

On July 12, 1979, Galante was gunned down as he ate lunch on the patio of an Italian restaurant in Brooklyn. A photo of the gruesome crime scene showed Galante dead on the ground with his ever-present cigar dangling from his mouth.

2. Paul Castellano – 1985

Photo Credit: Public Domain

70-year-old Castellano was the head of the Gambino crime family and his 1985 assassination outside a steak house in Manhattan signaled the rise of John Gotti, who organized the hit.

Many in the family were unhappy with the way Castellano ran the organization, so it was determined that he had to be taken out.

3. Albert Anastasia – 1957

Photo Credit: Public Domain

Anastasia was one of the founding fathers of the American Mafia, and he also was the head of Murder, Inc., a ruthless gang of hired killers. He was the head of what became the Gambino crime family.

On the day of his death, Anastasia sat in his barber’s chair in Manhattan for a shave and a haircut and was shot down by two masked gunmen.

4. Bugsy Siegel – 1947

Photo Credit: Public Domain

Siegel learned his trade on the mean streets of New York but later headed West to handle mob business in Las Vegas and California. Siegel was one of the original financiers of the casinos in Las Vegas.

Siegel promised his mob boss associates that their investments in Las Vegas would pay off, but the opening of the Flamingo Hotel was a flop and the writing was on the wall for Bugsy.

On June 20, 1947, Siegel was shot and killed through a window of his girlfriend’s house in Beverly Hills, California as he sat on her couch. The identity of the shooter or shooters has never been confirmed.

5. The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre – 1929

Photo Credit: Public Domain

This was probably the most famous mob hit of all time – on February 14, 1929, seven members of Bugs Moran’s North Side gang were gunned down in a garage in Chicago.

The man behind the deadly affair: none other than the legendary Al Capone, whose gangs had fought against Moran and other enemies for years to control of the Windy City’s booze trade.

The men who carried out the vicious hit were dressed as police officers, which allowed them to line the seven victims up against a wall, where they blindsided them with machine gun fire.

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15 Baffling Unsolved Mysteries That Simply Defy Explanation

I’m the type of person who NEEDS answers to things. I absolutely hate leaving questions unanswered. I actually have to keep myself away from mystery documentaries, because I will start yelling at the TV. I just love a good mystery (possibly too much).

These AskReddit users feel the same way I do and they shared mysteries that are so confounding that they have no possible explanation.

What are some of your favorite true unsolved mysteries? Share them in the comments.

#1. A strange situation

“When I was 7 or 8, we had this neighbor who was a super nice old lady that would give us snacks and talk to us through her window. She was agoraphobic and never, ever, ever left the house. Her kids would come by every other day or so to check up on her and everyone in the neighborhood knew them. One day me and my friends were outside playing like always, when her son comes to bring her groceries like always.

He comes out and asks if we’ve talked to his mom and we say we havent seen her in a day or 2. That sweet little old lady vanished from her house. Apparently no trace of her. Family was around alot after that was obviously was freaking out. I moved away a few years later but they never found out what happened. It wasn’t till I was an adult that I realized how f*cked that whole situation was.”

#2. The stranger

“Kind of personal, and I’m a bit late, but here goes:

While visiting Rome a few years back, the group I was with decided to tour the Vatican. One of our friends had a friend who was a brother studying to be a Priest. He was going to get us past the tourist barriers for a closer look at everything while we participated in a small mass at one of the numerous altars.

When we met up with this fellow, he immediately struck me as someone that I had met before. Almost someone that I had a good friendship with, but couldn’t explain where or why I had known him. I didn’t mention anything, as I was too busy hiding the pocket knife that I’d accidentally left in by bag before trying to get into the basilica.

The tour was interesting and the mass was a unique experience, but the whole time this feeling like I knew the man was haunting me. He invited us out to a coffee shop afterwards, and I took the time to retrieve the pocketknife I hid under a trash can.

When I returned, there was a seat for me right in front of the brother. I sat down, apologized, and started to listen to the conversations. Yet as soon as this guy has the chance to talk to me directly, he says, “Have I met you before? I have this strange feeling that we know each other but I can’t place it.”

I was blown away. We both were. This was the first conversation we had, and we both believed we had know each other personally. But when he explained his life over back in America, I couldn’t think of any reasonable explanation as to where we met. And even if we did, the feeling was that of close friends, not of a “I shook hands with you once.”

#3. Utterly confused

“I have a personal mystery. When I got home from uni and before I found a job I had a period of time where I stayed at my family home. Due to being home alone often during this time I tended to be the one who collected the mail and did odd home jobs. One day we had a particularly large amount of letters and parcel (for my brother’s birthday) and because two trips are for weak people I struggled and carried them all into the house. I managed to throw the letters onto the table but about half slipped onto the floor (this is important).

Thinking screw it, I carry the box upstairs to the office and come back down to pick the letters up. Yet, when I come back into the kitchen there are no letters anywhere. Confused, I check every downstairs table and eventually the mail box. Nothing at all. Finally I go back into the kitchen and notice one of the kitchen chairs is slightly pulled out from under the table. I pull it all the way out and under the cushion on the seat is a neat pile of the letters. There was no one but me at home for a few hours before this. Utterly confused till this day.”

#4. Wizardry

“I once did a magic trick in front of 20 people as a teenager. We had orchestrated it, so there were 2 of us.

So the trick is, I ask someone from the audience to pick a card, hold it above their head in front of the crowd, but card back facing me, so the entire crowd sees the card. Now someone on the other side of the window behind the crowd also sees the card, and with the crowd facing forwards, they don’t see him. So he plasters the card from another deck, on the window, and when he’s done doing that, I throw the entire deck at the window, and lo and behold, their card is now stuck on the other side of the window.

What happened surprised not only the crowd, but myself and my co-magician as well.

I throw the deck and the EXACT card is not only plastered on the other side of the window, it is also stuck on OUR side of the window, right next to it. My mind was blown and I still can’t explain it to this day. We played it as a part of the trick, so nobody in that crowd knows what sort of black wizardry went down that day.”

#5. A personal mystery

“Personal mystery: 20+ years ago I had a very brief job selling gas services door to door (side note, I’m not good at selling things, especially those I don’t truly believe in). Anyway, as dusk just started to arrive, near 5 pm, I knocked on a door and an old woman answers. I gave her my standard “ we can save you $$ by switching to xxx gas, my we look over your latest bills and our offerings to compare?” She tells me “I’m sorry, honey, I don’t live here, this is my son’s house, let me get him for you” and I politely accept.

After maybe 5-7 10 of waiting, I think maybe they’d forgotten me or were trying to blow me off so I have one last knock and this time a younger man, mid-40’s I’d guess, answers and asks if he can help me. I give him the same sales speech and he stops me midway and says “now is not a good time, we just buried my mother today”. I’m apologized and quickly backed away. I tell myself it was a nice way to mess with the door to door guy but I really don’t know to this day.”

#6. That is strange

“Two days before the space shuttle Challenger blew up I dreamt I was at the launch. The shuttle took off and caught the gantry. It started to veer off and I could hear the occupants screaming. Two days later I was having s home haircut and my daughter came in to tell me the news on the tv. It sent shivers down my spine. Of course it was coincidence but very creepy.

The strangest thing was that I wouldn’t have attended the launch – I live in UK and such a visit was unthinkable.”

#7. No idea how that happened…

“When I was in high school, my aunt gave me a t-shirt for my birthday. It was kind of sparkly and not something I ever would buy for myself, but I sometimes wore it. One day I realized I had two of this shirt in my closet. No idea how that happened. I could never think of a good explanation, although there must be one… Still seems strange.”

#8. A true mystery

“I was late for an appointment one day and was speeding up a hill with a big curve to the right, the direction I was going. Almost as soon as I got around the curve I saw there was an accident in front of me, blocking both lanes on my side. (Since there were only one or two other cars stuck behind it it must’ve just happened, because there were no emergency vehicles there yet.)

To the right of me was a sidewalk where people were standing gawking, and to my left was oncoming traffic in the other two lanes, so I couldn’t go around it, and I was going too fast to be able to stop in time. I knew if I relaxed I was less likely to be as severely injured, so I quickly shut my eyes and relaxed as much as I could.

And absolutely nothing happened.

When I opened my eyes, I could see the crash behind me in my rear view mirror and I was continuing along an empty (on my side) road.

This happened about 35 years ago, and to this day I have no idea how that happened.”

#9. Never figured it out

“When I still lived at home and came back from a night out my mother would often be up reading & if I wasn’t too tired I’d sit with her a bit and chat before going to bed. This was regular occurrence for years.

A couple years after I moved out I get a text from my mom one Sunday morning asking where I’d gone.

Was a little surprised as I was just in my apartment.

She tells me that last night I came home late and we chatted for a bit and she was surprised that I had left the house so early in the morning.

Now occasionally, I would still stop by my parents place to crash for the night depending on where I was in the city but I’d always let them know first.

Figured my mom has just dreamt this. So I call her and explain that I wasn’t there & ask what we talked about.

She summarizes the conversation and gives me details about things she shouldn’t have known about my night out eg. What was going on in the lives of the friends I had seen that night.

Never figured it out but now my mom teases and says she knows what I’m up to all the time.”

#10. They never turned up

“We lived in a bi-level house with a chest freezer in the basement and the kitchen on the second floor.

When I was younger I was a teenager I was asked to bring tatertots upstairs so my mom could make a casserole. I went and grabbed them and came upstairs.

When I got upstairs the tater-tots were no longer in my hands, and my mom asked where they were, I thought I had just spaced out and forgot them. So I went back downstairs and they weren’t in the freezer anymore. Searched literally every square inch/nook and cranny between the chest freezer and the kitchen and they were not anywhere.

They never ever turned up. To this day my mom thinks I was playing a dumb prank on her. My most plausible explanation is that we live in a computer simulation and they got accidentally glitched out of it.”

#11. The watch

“I bought my husband a watch for his 30th birthday engraved with his name. Not long after he lost it somewhere in the house. We searched everywhere for it but it couldn’t be found. Fast forward 13 years and my husband has a heart attack and dies instantly.

Two weeks later our 2 yo son walks out of the bathroom holding his watch. There are no cupboards in there- just a shower and bath. He’s very excited to have it and to this day, I have no idea where he got it from.”

#12. The ring

“Lost my class ring when I was 20. About 8-10 months later I move 1000 miles away. Only brought a few clothes and my car. Someone hit me and totaled my car while there…twice, be careful driving in Florida. Bought a new car (twice). Lived there for a year. Then moved about 200 miles away. A month after moving to the new town I receive a call from a church. They received a donation of clothes. While sorting them out they found a class ring with my name etched inside the band. My new home number came up when they searched my name. The church was about two miles from where we just moved.

My wife didn’t get rid or donate any clothes. I thought it must be a mistake, but decided to go take a look. Sure enough, it was mine. I looked through the clothes they found it in and they weren’t mine or my wife’s. Still no idea how it could have ended up 1,100 miles from where I lost it.”

#13. No glass…anywhere

“A little late but this story still makes me sleep with the lights on whenever I think of it. My sister and I were upstairs at my grandparents house where we lived. We were playing some Disney princess game on our TV. All of a sudden we hear a loud piece off glass shatter. It seriously sounded like someone dropped a chandelier.

My uncle who was visiting at the time came sprinting up the stairs because he thought we were being assaulted. He checked in the next room that the sound came from and nothing had fallen. There were no glass shards anywhere. Kinda creeped him out as well.”

#14. That is creepy

“Personal story and a something that still bothers me till this day.
I’m a soccer/football coach of kids (great way to earn money when you’re a student) and each year we have a couple of ‘open’ practices where parents bring their kids to see if they like soccer etc. After one of these practices a kid walks up to me and says ‘I’m sorry that you lost your grandma’. I was a bit confused and I said ‘Ooh no, you must think of someone else’ and I just shrugged it of.

The next day I woke up for school and my parents told me my grandma died in her sleep and that her nurse found her in bed that morning.

The kid might have mistaken me for someone else but it still bugs me. Also; he never showed up at practice again.”

#15. We thought so

“I was in NYC near Grand Central Station, and a pair of Hasidic Jews came up to my wife and me and pointedly asked me whether my last name was “Igor”. I said uh, yeah? They said “we thought so.” and walked away. I still have no idea what the context was nor how they knew my last name among a busy commuting crowd.”

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