Episode Recap: The Poltergeist/Watch in the Wilderness

Subject Names:  Susan Lewis, her daughter Jamie, Matt and his daughter Marie
Subject Location:  California
Paranormal Experience: A pernicious poltergeist

Susan Lewis loved her house. Susan's daughter Jamie considered it her sanctuary. Even Susan's boyfriend Matt and his daughter Marie loved the house. Until the peanut butter spilled.

The evidence literally stacked up. Susan found things placed in odd ways all through the house. Shampoo bottles one atop the other in the bathroom, canned food in the microwave instead of the pantry; nothing dangerous, just very strange. Susan still believed it was the girls playing a prank.

One day, Jamie and Marie were in Jamie's room to tackle homework. Jamie put her coffee down on the nightstand and turned around to get the dog. Before she could turn back to the coffee, it had been splattered all over her bed. Marie claimed innocence. Angry, Jamie stripped the bed and began cleaning the room. She brought in bleach and sat it on the dresser. She reached for something, and when she turned back the bleach was upended and spilling all over the floor. Jamie immediately called Susan. While the trio went over what happened, toys from Jamie's shelves began to fly off toward them.  Panicked, they ran. Jamie realized they had a poltergeist.

In the following months, the poltergeist tortured them. Doors banged all night long. Things were twisted, pulled out, or dashed to the floor. Food was all over the walls. Lights ceased to work at night. Then one evening, Susan noticed that there were arrows in the chaos, all pointing to the vents in the walls. Was it trying to communicate?

Reluctantly, Matt followed the vents into the attic. When he couldn't see where he was putting his feet, Susan pulled the plug on any possible danger. 
Susan believed they could communicate with the poltergeist. She made a place on the mantle, found a small cat figurine, and offered it as a gift to the spirit as reinforcement that they could coexist. Annoyed, Matt grabbed the peace offering, throwing it out into the backyard. When he returned, the figurine was back on the mantle. In frustration, he grabbed it and smashed it on the floor.

They knew trouble was coming. 

That night, the word "cat" appeared scrawled all over the house. Susan described the chaos as a "rampage". While they were cleaning up, Jamie and Susan saw strange footprints. What was in their house? The poltergeist then proceeded to attack the two litters of kittens born to Susan's pet cats. One by one, the kittens grew ill and died.

The poltergeist's attacks continued when Marie was home alone and the furniture began moving on its own. Marie called Susan in a panic. Jamie returned home, only to have the door lock as soon as she unlocked it. Frightened, Marie grabbed her camera and began taking photos.

Those photos showed a light energy swooping through the frame. If it could move heavy furniture, what else could it do?  Worried for his daughter's safety, Matt kept calling until he reached a pastor who would visit the house. The pastor confirmed "spiritual warfare" was going on and prayed with the family, but he couldn't help them. They were on their own.

Jamie sat alone in her room as the poltergeist began banging on the door. It  was like a battering ram, lasting for three hours. When it stopped, Jamie opened the door to find it held a giant hole. The doorknob had even been bent. The nearby bathroom light began flickering. That door had no lock, or even doorknob.  Jamie quickly put some kite string through the hole where the knob should have been and began holding the door closed. What resulted was a supernatural tug of war, until the spirit simply cut the string.

The door slowly creaked open, but there was nothing there. Jamie tried to leave through her bedroom door, but the spirit closed and locked the door. The smell of smoke came into the room.  She managed to open the door, only to find a burning pan on the floor outside.  She stepped around the pan into the house, and found toilet paper and paper towels draped all around anything flammable.  It was trying to burn the house down with her in it. Extinguishing the pan fire, she then grabbed everything the spirit had strewn through the house.

Susan and Jamie finally moved out.  Matt and Susan separated.  Jamie and Marie have a bond for life, and the four of them have never had another paranormal encounter.  Their house never sold, and four neighboring houses that were put on the market shortly thereafter remain unsold.

Watched In The Wilderness
 

Subject Name:  Jeff Boiler
Subject Location: Oregon
Paranormal Experience:  A mysterious creature in the woods

Jeff Boiler was a deputy sheriff in the Cascade Mountains. After getting off his shift early one day, he decided to take a hike. When he stopped to map out a new route, what he saw through his compass stopped him in his tracks. It was a person, but it was not a human being, and it was watching him.

Before Jeff could reach around to get his weapon, the creature disappeared. It moved too fast to have been a human. Curious, Jeff followed it.

When he reached the open area where he'd seen the creature, Jeff was unable to locate any tracks to follow. Unfortunately, Jeff was in a position where if he didn't turn back then, he wouldn't make it back to his car before dark. So, he turned back, taking a route that he hoped would put more space between him and the creature.

That was when he heard the enormous snapping sound like gunfire. Nothing short of a breaking tree could have made such a massive sound. Jeff began to run, and heard another loud snap within moments. Jeff, a former Marine and a long-time police officer, was scared to death.

As darkness encroached, the snaps began to get closer. The creature could see him, but Jeff couldn't see it.

Jeff's run halted in a clearing when he encountered a deer. She didn't seem to be afraid of humans.  While he stood there, she sniffed the air, then took off as fast as he had ever seen a deer run.  Jeff knew he was being watched. He was convinced he was being hunted.

He took off running for his car. The snapping trees followed, growing closer.  They finally stopped when he reached the car.  Jeff fumbled with the keys to the car, knowing that the creature could attack at any moment. Finally, he got the door open and began fighting with the ignition to get the car started. After a few heart-stopping attempts to start the car, the engine finally turned over, allowing him to escape.

When he got back to the sheriff's office, he needed to talk to someone, so he confided to the sheriff about what he had encountered. The sheriff informed him that there had been reports of big hairy creatures all over the area. He told Jeff not to write up a report, and not to talk about it, which Jeff did not do.

All Jeff knew was that he was never going back there.