There seems to be little doubt that one of the most famous American hauntings to ever be documented occurred in the quiet town of Amityville, New York, a peaceful enclave on Long Island’s south shore. There stands no other case from the latter part of the 20th Century that so captured the imagination of the general public... and no other case that filled us with such fear.
he horrific carnage that prefaced the story of the “Amityville Horror” began one dark fall night in 1974. The DeFeos, Ronald Sr. and Louise, their two young sons, Mark and John, and two daughters, Dawn and Allison, were sleeping peacefully in their comfortable, three-story, Dutch Colonial home in Amityville. The silence of the house was shattered when Ronald DeFeo murdered his parents and his siblings with a high-powered rifle. One by one, he killed each of them as they slept, although strangely, the sound of the gunshots never awakened the other family members.
Regardless, the jury ignored DeFeo’s claims and found him guilty of six counts of first-degree murder. State Supreme Court Justice Thomas M. Stark sentenced him to 150 years in prison.
The tragedy in Amityville made grim local news but few outside of New York ever heard about the house until some time later. The horrendous events that followed began on December 18, 1975, when a young couple named George and Kathy Lutz bought the house on Ocean Avenue for $80,000. Just a week before Christmas, they moved into their new “dream home” with Kathy’s three children from a previous marriage. They would later claim that the “dream home” soon became a nightmare!
Almost from the moment that they moved into the house, the Lutz family would insist they noticed an unearthly presence in the place. They began to hear mysterious noises that they could not account for. Locked windows and doors would inexplicably open and close, as if by invisible hands. George Lutz, a sturdy former Marine, claimed to be plagued by the sound of a phantom brass band that would march back and forth through the house. When a Catholic priest entered the house, after agreeing to exorcize it, an eerie, disembodied voice told him to “get out”.
After the aborted exorcism, the events began to intensify. The thumping and scratching sounds grew worse, a devilish creature was seen outside the windows at night, George Lutz was seemingly “possessed” by an evil spirit and green slime even oozed from the walls and ceiling. The family was further terrified by ghostly apparitions of hooded figures, clouds of flies that appeared from nowhere, cold chills, personality changes, sickly odors, objects moving about on their own, the repeated disconnection of their telephone service and communication between the youngest Lutz child and a devilish pig that she called “Jodie”. Kathy Lutz reported that she was often beaten and scratched by unseen hands and that one night, she was literally levitated up off the bed.
The family managed to hold out for 28 days before they gathered up their possessions and fled from the house. According to their story, they left so quickly that they didn’t take their furniture or many of their other possessions with them. The demonic spirits, they said, had driven them from their home!
And then, things started to get really scary....
In February 1976, not long after the Lutz family left the house, local residents were stunned to see New York Channel 5’s news team doing a life news feed from the house on Ocean Avenue. The news crew filmed a seance that was being conducted and a dramatic investigation of the place conducted by Ed and Lorraine Warren, two of America’ most famous “demonologists”. The Amityville house would soon become the center of a three-ring circus!
For those not familiar with the Warrens, Lorraine claims to be a clairvoyant and a trance medium who is said to have the uncanny ability to contact the spirit world. On the other hand, her husband Ed, purports to be an expert on hauntings and exorcism. From the 1950’s through the 1980’s, the Warrens, who are based in Connecticut, were recognized as authorities when it came to ghosts and demons. While they are still active today, their methods have been replaced by more scientific standards of investigation. Regardless, in 1976, their stamp of approval on the events reported at Amityville caught the attention of a nation.
The Warrens went to the house for the first time in February and while supposedly George Lutz refused to accompany them, he did loan them a key. The Warrens stated that they found old newspapers around the house and that the refrigerator was still stocked with food. It was obvious to them, they said, that the Lutz family had left in a hurry. The Warrens brought two other psychics with them to the house to conduct their seance. They later reported that they “sensed” an “unearthly presence” in the house and Ed Warren also claimed to experience heart palpitations that he blamed on the occult forces. The house was haunted, they said, by the angry spirits of Indians who had once inhabited the area and by “inhuman spirits”. The story was that the Shinnecock Indians had used that very parcel of land as a place where sick and insane members of the tribe were isolated until they died. They did not bury the dead there however because they supposedly believed the land was “infested with demons”.
...I copied the proceeding from an Amityville Horror website...A 1979 movie which did not quite follow the true story, fully, was an interesting movie, anyway, and one that everyone should see...But the truth of the matter is that the house, which stands on Ocean Avenue, in Amityville, Long Island, New York, was built in 1928, however, the land which it was built on is what is haunted and not the house, itself...The land was where former indian inhabitants of the area buried their insane and sick and has been haunted since the late 1700`s...Another house once stood on the same ground before the present house did, but it was moved to another location because it, too, was experiencing hauntings and strange occurrances, however, after having been moved to another location the former house experienced no more strange occurrances, and which proves that it is the land which is haunted and not the houses...
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