Where True Crime Meets the Paranormal: Amityville & The Devil Made Me Do It

SPEAKER_00 0:00

On this week's episode of Whispers from the Mist, Conversations from the Spiritual Byway, we are going to take a deeper look at two of the Warren's most talked-about cases, Amnityville and The Devil Made Me Do It. These are stories where true crime and the paranormal become deeply intertwined, and separating what we know from what we believe isn't always easy. We'll look at the crimes, the paranormal claims, and the Warren's involvement, and the questions that still remain. Because when two very different worlds collide, discernment becomes even more important. And with that, we'll continue this conversation along the spiritual byway. Hello, everyone, and welcome to Whispers from the Mist, Conversations from the Spiritual Byway. I am Michelle and I am here with the wonderful Stacy. How are you? I'm good. How are you? The wonderful Stacy. I like that. I'm well, I'm feeling much better after taking a moment of pause after recording our last episode, because again, I think it's just so important. I need everyone to know we were not criticizing anything. We were just looking at the other side of the coin, putting that information out there because it's important to be discerning.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

It is such an important piece of everything that we look at. You know, it's it's if we are not discerning, if we just accept one side of the coin, I think we miss a lot of, I don't want to say pertinent information, but you miss so much more that could actually be there, right? Like even if it goes against what you initially believed or thought, it's it's still a piece of it.

SPEAKER_00 1:39

Right. And we can look no further than the history books that we were given in school. We can look no further than he said, she said, and what actually happened, because there's always two sides of the story. There's always more information out there to be found. So that's why we did it. And I think we needed to. Even if it makes us or made me uncomfortable, because we've got to push our own envelopes too. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 2:06

But I'm I'm kind of excited because I think we've got two episodes where we're gonna focus on some of the specific warren cases. And I think Michelle is kind of taking the helm this week, where she did a ton of research on two of their most well-known cases. And I'll be taking the helm a little bit next week. So, what are we talking about today, Michelle?

SPEAKER_00 2:30

Okay, well, before I share the stories that I picked, I just want to say we're doing a lot on the Warrens right now, and I realize that. So I hope you're all finding it as fascinating as Stacy and I are, and we're building up to an experience I'm going to have. So we have this week's episode and next week's episode, which Stacy said we're diving into some of the cases they're associated with. And then there's an episode Bonnie and I recorded about the new owners of the Warren Home, not the artifacts, but the home. And then while you're listening to that episode, we will be in the Warren House, and that'll give us a little time to come out and then let you know about our experiences. I'm very excited. I'm so excited. I I really cannot wait or cannot. That's gonna be great. Now I'm preparing myself right now, so I'm very excited. Um the next two cases that I'm going to share, because I picked two, I want to share with the listeners why I chose them. So I'm a person who's always been fascinated by true crime, and I've always been fascinated by the paranormal. And in my mind, those two worlds have always been a natural place where they can meet, they can coexist. We're each asking questions, we're investigating, and we're trying to understand what happened or what is happening. But a couple months back, I did go to CrimeCon in Las Vegas. And while I was there, it made me realize that those worlds don't approach questions in the same way. And I really didn't feel the disconnect until I was at Crime Con. I felt the difference between what a true crime investigation is and what a paranormal investigation is, much more than I ever had before. In both evidence matters, how we investigate the matters, and being willing to question our own interpretation matters. But I felt a little bit like a joke. So I guess I just really felt it was important to share that. I always in my mind had just thought they could coexist, but they don't coexist as well as I thought. But they do overlap. They do. They definitely overlap. And I do find it interesting, and maybe we'll talk about it at the end of this episode, that some people do get really offended that are doing the true crime work every single day, where there's actual victims, actual perpetrators, and then the paranormal comes in and they're like, Well, we're going to communicate now with the victims of this crime and see if we can get them to come through. You know, people have a real problem with that. One of the cases cited was the McKenzie Sherilla case and trying to contact those victims. It is really interesting to share that.

SPEAKER_01 5:15

I know we talked about the podcast that we listened to, but they do talk about that overlap and how it seems like there's this juncture now where true crime and paranormal are really getting muddled together. I personally think that they are two very different things. And with that said, if you're doing a paranormal investigation in a space where something horrific happened, you're still possibly going to have paranormal activity. And as long as you are respectful and you honor, you know, essentially the history of the true crime or the story that happened, I think that overlap can be okay. I think it depends on the approach.

SPEAKER_00 6:03

I agree. And I think in that podcast we were listening to with Jason Haas, they did say that one of the things they had trouble with was bringing true crime artifacts into like a paranormal museum, like the Zack Begins Museum. They didn't cite Zach Begins in the interview, but I got what they meant because I've been to the Begins Museum and I understood while it was there, but that's how my mind works. I can let them coexist, but I can see where other people don't. Yeah, I I I agree with you. Yeah. I felt that was important to share because I've come across two situations with true crime. I wasn't looking for it. It wasn't because my mind just went there. They actually presented themselves. And so I know there's validity there. I know my story. I know I didn't make it up, but they don't coexist as naturally as I had originally assumed. I can see that. But still, I had to choose these two cases because they do involve both a true crime story and a paranormal experience.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

What a great lead into I tried.

SPEAKER_00 7:10

I stumbled there, but I tried to get my point across. So we're gonna talk about Amnityville first. And this is one of those stories that has been with me for I don't know, as long as I can remember. And it's been with me because it scared me. Now, as I said a moment ago, it's both a true crime story and a paranormal story. And I believe what scared me initially was the paranormal part. Because as a kid, you know, I'm pretty protected in my own home from the gruesome scenes of a crime or having my parents talk to me about horrific things. Right. But while I was protected from that aspect, I wasn't protected from Hollywood. And in 1979, I believe it was 1979, Amnityville horror came out. I knew the Hollywood version. I knew what the house looked like. I recognized its silhouette, and I knew that something terrible had happened there. But what stayed with me was the idea that there was something terribly wrong with the house and the energy itself. That was what I held on to as a young child before even knowing that I was holding on to it. So today for the story, I want to start with the part that we know to be true, which is a true crime part. On November 13th, 1974, Ronald DeFeo Jr., known as Butch, murdered six family members inside their home at 112 Ocean Avenue in Amnyville, New York. The victims were his parents, Ronald and Louise, and his four-year siblings. They were all shot and they were killed. Now, this is a part of the story that we know to be fact, and that is a true crime at the center of Amnotyville. DeFeo initially gave police a different version of what happened, but then he eventually confessed to killing his family and was sentenced appropriately. About a year later, the house was sold to George and Kathy Lutz. They moved in with Kathy's three children from a previous marriage in December of 1975. And just in case anyone's wondering, which maybe you are, Stacy, they did know the history of the house when they purchased it. Okay. Yes, they were. That's a very important fact. And of course, the price was probably lower because it had sat on the market and there was a story like this behind it. So this is where the paranormal side of the Amnityville story begins. Before the LUTs had really settled in, the family asked a Catholic priest to come in and bless the house. And according to the account that has since become famous, while blessing one of the upstairs rooms, the priest heard a voice tell him, get out. Oh. Probably not that dramatically, but still unsettling. There were also later reports that he did become ill and he experienced some other strange physical symptoms, although those details about his experience have been told very differently over the years. Again, accounts change. Yes. For the Lutz family, though, the strange activity reportedly continued. Ultimately, they would only stay in the house for about 28 days. George reportedly began waking up around 3.15 in the morning, which is significant because it was believed to be close to the time that DeFeo actually committed the murders. There were also reports of cold spots, strange smells, unexplained noises, doors and windows behaving oddly, and for some reason, George became almost obsessed with keeping the fireplace going. Interesting. Yeah. So I'm just going to ask real quick, have you ever seen this movie? I have not. I have not either because it terrified me. But it doesn't mean I didn't know of it and know of the scary parts.

SPEAKER_01 11:00

Well, I mean, that's what they show the most of. So I guess that makes sense. I um I've heard of it. I'm not a big horror fan myself.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

So that would be talked about that before. So I didn't think that you probably had seen it, but I wanted to ask, and that seemed like a great place to ask that question. Absolutely. Okay. And while all of that is unsettling enough, the experiences reportedly became more disturbing. Kathy said that she felt unseen contact. So something touching her. There were also claims that she appeared to age suddenly. Her daughter began talking about a friend named Jody who was described as having the appearance of a pig with red eyes. That's creepy. Very creepy. There were also reports of flies appearing in the house during the dead of winter, furniture moving on its own, and even family members levitating from their beds. And I think it's a really good time to point something out. So many of these details have become a part of the Amnity Bell legend that it is now difficult to separate what the family reported from what was later emphasized, expanded on, or changed through the books and movies. So we have the experience, we have the in-between, and then the product that came out in the books and the movies. So you gotta take everything with, again, a little bit of discernment.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Well, I will say one of the hardest things for me to believe in everything that you've just shared is that, you know, people are levitating above their beds because even when there are experiences with spirits that can move things, it takes a lot of energy and time. So out of all of them, that's the one I'm going, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

Have you ever seen anything levitate? I've seen things move on their own, where like I'm sitting there and then like a penny gets pushed off a countertop and there's no one there. I've seen that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:59

But not lifted up in front of my no.

unknown 13:03

No.

SPEAKER_00 13:04

Okay. Well, with whatever was going on there, the Lutzes only lasted 28 days, and they left their house and they left many of their belongings behind. They didn't even want them back. It was after the Lutz family had left the house at Ed and Lorraine, Warren became involved. The Warrens were invited to investigate the house along with other investigators and members of the media. Lorraine would later describe Amnityville as one of the most disturbing places she had ever entered, and she believed there was an extremely negative presence in the house. Ed also believed the activity was demonic in nature, which doesn't surprise me. They're looking at it through a Catholic perspective. Right. And during that investigation, one of the most famous images connected to Amnestyville was taken. Now, this is a photograph that appears to be a young boy looking out from a doorway or a hallway. Now, for the people who believe in this photo or believe the house is haunted, the photograph has often been pointed to as evidence. But where you have people believing, you have the skeptics, and many have offered a much simpler explanation, such as that was a figure of somebody who may have already been inside the house, and we just didn't know they were there. And I think that photograph, again, is almost a perfect example of Amnityville itself. Two people can look at exactly the same thing and walk away with completely different interpretations. Now, while the Warren's investigation became an important part of the Amnadyville story, something else happened that would make the house famous even far beyond the paranormal community. The Lutz family decided to turn their experience, as I said, into a book. Author Jay Anson was brought in to tell the story using hours of recorded recollections from George and Kathy about what happened during those 28 days. In 1977, the Amnotyville Horror was published, and again, huge success. And then in 1979, it became a movie. And at that point, Amnotyville wasn't simply the story of a family who had said they experienced something frightening inside the house. It became a part of pop culture. So much so that later owners reportedly took steps to make the house less recognizable and discourage people from coming to see it. The address was changed from 112 Ocean Avenue, and those distinctive quarter round mirrors, the ones that gave the house almost a feeling like eyes were watching, they were eventually removed. The house is still there. It just doesn't look exactly like the Amnettyville house many of us remember. And this is where the story gets a little bit complicated. Again, as I'm saying layers, over the years, questions were raised about how much of the Letz's family account actually happened the way it was described. Some people connected to the case challenge portions of their story. George Lutz continued to maintain that the family really did experience something inside the house. And interestingly enough, later owners did not report any kind of paranormal activity like the Lutz's did. Interesting.

unknown 16:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:16

So maybe it's because it happened so soon after the murders, or maybe it was fabricated. Right. I know it was supersized like a value meter. So we're left with several different layers of Amnityville. We have the crime, which we know happened, and then we have the Lutz family account of what they believed happened during those 28 days. And then we have the Warren's interpretations of what they encountered, and then we have a book, and we have Hollywood, and it turned Amnityville into something much bigger. And I think that's where I come back to the house I remember as a kid. I knew that house was supposed to be terrifying long before I understood that six real live people had lost their lives there. And now, looking at it as an adult, I think that's part of what makes Amityville so interesting and probably why the story has endured for so long. Somewhere along the line, the true crime, the paranormal claims, and the legend all became intertwined. And separating them, that's not an easy thing to do. So maybe the question isn't simply whether the Amityville house was haunted. Maybe it is or should be. What happened? What did the people genuinely experience or believe they experienced? And what happened to the story once the rest of the world got a hold of it.

SPEAKER_01 17:36

Yeah. There you have it.

SPEAKER_00 17:38

There you have it. That is the story that freaked me out so bad as a kid, and I never even watched the movie.

SPEAKER_01 17:46

Well, I think again, we talk about Hollywood. We talk about what Hollywood does to these stories and how they shift the the reality so much. You know, one of my biggest fears was seeing a ghost for so, so, so long. And now I'm kind of like, if it happens, cool. It it's not what Hollywood portrays it to be. And I think, too, one of the points that you made that I am kind of clinging to is this story that was sensationalized with this family moving in after such a horrific thing happened. How much of it was real and how much of it did they create in their own experience? Because we can make things happen by manifestation very easily. And we can misrepresent things because, you know, we we are human and we're already scared. You know, there's a very real possibility that when they went ahead and purchased the house, even though they knew the history, even though they knew, you know, what had happened there, that they didn't put much thought into it until they started living there. And then you're reliving this horrific happening over and over and over again until you start making things happen. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_00 19:03

It makes sense. And while I'm listening to you, I'm thinking of the actual crime imprinting itself on the house, the terror of that night. Right. And then I'm also thinking about living there, laying in bed at night when everything is dark and everything is still and you can hear your own thoughts and there's not a lot of chaos. I would go to that story and I would think like, what happened? What room did he go into first? Although I think they they do know. But like I would be trying to figure out the path. Like what happened. Yeah, no, I it would, I could never have purchased that house, even if the price was right. I I don't think I could live there. I I think the true criminess of it all, the fact that six people lost their lives. And honestly, at that point, I would be wondering if it was haunted and what that would mean. I mean, I wouldn't be thinking I'd be seeing a pig with red eyes or anything, or people levitating off beds, but there'd be some activity. And I mean, kids can be mischievous, especially if they, you know, are mad about what happened and that everything was cut so short.

SPEAKER_01 20:15

So well, the the pig with the red eyes, I have a hard time. Again, that's another piece of that that I'm kind of going, what did you actually see? Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 20:25

And again, you know, people coming in to investigate back in the day. I don't think they had a lot of controls there to be like, oh, we're gonna put this in place to see if we can find a reason why this is happening. Did something happen? Probably. Like just because it might not be as sensational as what was in the book or what was in the movie doesn't mean something didn't happen. Again, for the sake of the story.

SPEAKER_01 20:51

Yeah. I and honestly, I I don't disbelieve that things happened in that space. I would be curious to talk to the current owners. I know that they changed the address and they remodeled the home so that it didn't stand out like it did. I would genuinely be curious, even if it wasn't like huge things happening, if they had any sort of things.

SPEAKER_00 21:14

Right. And all I want to say is even 12 years after a crime like that, 24 years, I could not buy that house.

SPEAKER_01 21:23

No, I'm with you on that one.

SPEAKER_00 21:25

Same page. Yeah. So, you know, we've been talking about the paranormal part of it, but again, we have to remember the six victims. The victims are getting lost in the paranormal part of it. There were six people who lost their lives. So I'm just gonna take a moment to send love and gratitude to the victims. But that is the Amnityville story. I always refer to it as the Amnityville horror because that is the name of the book. And you know, I think my first introduction to this house actually came in book form, and I do believe. I was at my grandparents' house and one of them was reading the book and I saw the cover of it and it was terrifying. So I just wanted to throw that out because that memory just bubbled to the surface. Well, we are going to move away from Amnotyville and we're going to move to Connecticut and a story that is titled The Devil Made Me Do It. Now, unlike Amnityville, this isn't a story that I've carried with me since childhood. The Devil Made Me Do It is a case I came across more recently while researching Ed and Lorraine Warren. So this is another story where the paranormal and the true crime aspect intertwine and they become so intertwined that you can't really separate them. So I want to take a moment to acknowledge the people who were a part of this story. We have 11-year-old David Glatzel, his sister Debbie, her boyfriend Arnie Cheyenne Johnson, and Alan Bono. And Alan Bono is the man who ultimately lost his life in this case. So as I said a moment ago, the story was in Connecticut. It happened in 1980. And according to the Glatzel family, David, who you'll remember is 11 years old, began experiencing some very frightening things. He reportedly described seeing an old man or creature in the home that terrified him. His behavior suddenly changed, and there were reports of him having nightmares, of hearing growling, having convulsions, hearing strange voices, and then physical marks appearing on his body. So a little bit of an escalation going from personality to physical experiences, kind of scary. That is kind of scary, and all based on his own reports, too, correct? And his family's reports of this is what began happening to this 11-year-old child. Whatever was happening to him, the family knew something was terribly wrong. So they sought the help of the Catholic Church, and then eventually Ed and Lorraine Warren became involved in this case. The Warrens believe that David wasn't simply experiencing a haunting in their interpretation of everything. He was suffering from what? Paranoid schizophrenia. Oh demonic possession, huh? Yeah, demonic possession.

SPEAKER_01 24:19

Me, I go to psychology. That's my brain.

SPEAKER_00 24:22

So with that, this is where some of this discernment that we've already talked about with the Warrens becomes really important. They viewed all these experiences through a very specific religious framework, which we've talked about, and the language that they chose to use reflected that. Priests became involved along with prayers and rites that were intended to help David. The Warrens themselves could not perform a formal Catholic exorcism, but they remained involved with the family. And that is where Arnie Johnson came in. Arnie Cheyenne Johnson. Arnie was Debbie's boyfriend, and he was reportedly present for some of what was happening with David. According to the account, that later becomes very central to the story. During one of David's episodes, Arnie became very frustrated watching David suffer, and he challenged whatever he believed was tormenting him, saying something like, Leave the boy alone. Take me instead. Okay. We all know not to do that, right? Yeah. Any of our listeners now, no, please don't challenge anything. Yeah, bad, bad idea.

SPEAKER_01 25:39

Just just don't. Just don't.

SPEAKER_00 25:41

Just don't. But I choose to believe he was doing it out of a place of compassion, not essentially knowing what was going to happen. But that moment does become very important. According to the Warrens and some members of the family, David eventually began to improve. But where David was improving, Arnie began behaving differently. There were reports of strange states or trances, there were changes to his behavior, and there were episodes he couldn't remember. So the Warrens really believed that whatever was tormenting David was now tormenting Arnie. Then on February 16th, 1981, something really bad happened. It's a huge tragedy. Arnie was with Debbie and several other people in Brookfield, Connecticut. They had been spending time with Alan Bono, who was Debbie's boss and also their landlord. It had been a long day, alcohol was involved, and then an argument began. And some of the details surrounding that argument have changed over time, but we know there was an argument and it escalated. Arnie, he pulled out a knife, and Alan Bono was stabbed and killed. Arnie was just 19 years old. And suddenly what had been a family's alleged experience with possession became a murder case. Arnie's attorney, Martin Manella, wanted to argue that Arnie was not guilty because he had been demonically possessed when he killed Bono. And this is where the case gets its name. The devil made me do it. But the judge, Robert Callahan, wouldn't allow demonic possession to be used as a legal defense because it could not be objectively proven in a courtroom. So the defense changed direction and argued self-defense instead. The jury did not accept this argument, and in November 1981, Arnie was found guilty of first degree manslaughter. He was sentenced to 10 to 20 years in prison and ultimately served about five years before being released. And if the story ended there, it would already be extraordinary. But for me, one of the most interesting parts comes later, because years afterwards, members of the Glatzel family began telling very different stories about what had happened. Some continued to stand behind the possession account of the Warrens, but David's brother, Carl, became one of its strongest critics. Carl said David had never been possessed. He believed that his brother had been dealing with mental health issues and accused the Warrens of helping turn his family's experience into something much more sensationalized. So again, as we've been talking about, the Warrens are criticized for a little bit of exploitation based on what the family's saying. Right. Lorraine Warren strongly disagreed and maintained that what happened to David was real. And this is where I think discernment matters because two things can exist at the same time. So I don't think we have to choose between saying everything happened exactly as the Warren's described or none of it happened at all. There's a lot of space in between those two things. But what we do know is that Alan Bono was killed. We do know that Arnie Johnson killed him. And we know his attorneys attempted to bring demonic possession into his defense and the court rejected it. We also know members of the Glatzel family later strongly disagreed with what happened before the killing and about the warrants' role in telling their story. What we can't establish in the same way is whether David was possessed, whether anything transferred to Arnie, or whether something paranormal played any role in the murder. And that's what makes this case so complicated. Because when paranormal investigation crosses into true crime, I think the responsibility changes. We're no longer talking about a strange noise in the house or whether somebody saw a shadow. We are talking about a real victim, a real family, and consequences that can't be undone. So when I look at the devil made me do it, I want to hear what the Warrens believed happened. I want to hear what the family experienced, but I also want to hear from the people who later changed or challenged the story because discernment isn't automatically believing the paranormal explanation, and it isn't automatically dismissing it either. It's being willing to sit with the pieces that don't fit neatly together and ask, what happened, what was interpreted, what may have been added later, and who benefited from the version of the story that survived. And I don't know that this case gives us a clear answer. And maybe that's exactly why more than 40 years later we're still talking about it. Or because it's a Hollywood movie, but it is fascinating. Whatever it is, it's fascinating.

SPEAKER_01 30:30

I think it's definitely a combo there. I think that, you know, we sensationalized it. So because we sensationalized it, we're going to continue talking about it. And you've got kiddos growing up watching these horror movies now today, too, right? Like who's to say what actually took place now? You know, we don't even have the warrants to go back and say, hey, can you retell this story and tell us exactly, you know, what your experience was? And, you know, we we just we don't have access to that. All we have access to, even with all of the technology and technological advances that we have, we still don't have the exact occurrences of what happened at that point in time. And, you know, this is something that I've I guess I've been thinking about since I listened to that amazing podcast, too, is we can go back and pull the magazine, the writings, and stuff like that, but we're only getting a snippet of a perspective. We're getting a snippet of what the truth may have been, but we don't know. We have no way because we don't have video cameras that are showing us exactly the breakdown. We don't have the technology at that point in time to show us all of it. Does that does that make sense?

SPEAKER_00 31:47

It does make sense. And what came to mind while you were talking about that, like one of the criticisms of that Jason Hawes interview was the fact that there was no one from the Warren side there to share their side or share what they know about the case, that it felt very one-sided. And I mean, stories, they exist and they're many different perspectives. How we view even doing this podcast right now, talking for the last hour, you might be thinking, My God, the lady rambled on, where I'm thinking, oh, I told that story really well. I mean, we could have two totally different perspectives, and the truth is somewhere in the middle. Both of them happen. They can coexist. Absolutely. So I just I thought that was a fascinating story. Again, you know, it hits on one of the criticisms that maybe, you know, by saying it was a demonic possession, it caused more harm because maybe it was a mental disorder or something medical going on. And, you know, we we just don't know. We we will never know. That's and that's the truth, is we we'll never know. It's all fascinating. And again, there was a real life victim. So take a moment for him. I mean, the the focus quickly moves away from the victims in stories where the paranormal gets mentioned. Amplified. Amplified. Yeah. Do you have questions? Well, yeah, if you don't have any questions about Amnityville or The Devil Made Me Do It? I don't think so. Okay, well I'll share my listener questions then. Okay, question number one. When true crime and paranormal claims overlap, do you think the paranormal part helps us understand the story, or can it sometimes distract from the real people and the events involved? The second question is do you believe a family can sincerely experience something they interpret as paranormal, even if parts of the story later become exaggerated or change? And question number three, when a case becomes a book or a movie and part of pop culture, how do you separate what actually happened from the version of the story that stayed with you? And those are your questions. And I think we talked about all of them in this episode. Yeah. Or at least those are amazing questions.

SPEAKER_01 33:58

I want to close out this episode. Stay curious, everyone. That's what you know. And we need you along by the way.

SPEAKER_00 35:03

We're here for you, and we're all in this together.