“The True Story Behind ‘THE ENTITY’: The Doris Bithers Case” and More True Horrors! #WeirdDarkness

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Listen to ““The True Story Behind ‘THE ENTITY’: The Doris Bithers Case” and More True Horrors! #WeirdDarkness” on Spreaker.

IN THIS EPISODE: The investigation on August 22, 1974, in Culver City California was to be like any other one Dr. Barry Taff had done. Believing that this would be an open and shut case they showed up at Doris Bither’s house. Not expecting much. Little did they know this would be one of the biggest cases in the annals of paranormal history. (“The Entity Haunting: The True Story of Doris Bither”) *** One of the most mysterious disappearances of the American twentieth century took place when a man named Bruce Nelson Campbell stumbled out of his Jacksonville motel room one night, dressed only in a pair of green pajamas, and was never seen again. (“The Man In The Green Pajamas”) *** A woman moves into a flat by herself and immediately begins to feel an uncomfortable presence around her. (“Tiny Apartment, Big Presence”) *** On a cold January morning, John Hoskins slaughtered three members of his family. (“A Day That Began with Death: The Hoskins Family Murders of 1919”)

SOURCES AND REFERENCES FROM THE EPISODE…
“The Man In The Green Pajamas” written by Troy Taylor & Lisa Taylor Horton: https://tinyurl.com/y4a68c3p
“Tiny Apartment, Big Presence” written by KatsWhiskers: https://tinyurl.com/yxmb9d67
“A Day That Began with Death: The Hoskins Family Murders of 1919”, written by John Brassard Jr.: https://tinyurl.com/weq3ytl
“The Entity Haunting: The True Story of Doris Bither” written by Xavier Ortega: https://tinyurl.com/y8fv25w
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OTHER PODCASTS I HOST…
Paranormality Magazine: (COMING SEPT. 30, 2023) https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/paranormalitymag
Micro Terrors: Scary Stories for Kids: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/microterrors
Retro Radio – Old Time Radio In The Dark: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/retroradio
Church of the Undead: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/churchoftheundead

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(Over time links seen above may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)

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“I have come into the world as a light, so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness.” — John 12:46

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TRANSCRIPT:

DISCLAIMER: Stories and content in Weird Darkness can be disturbing for some listeners and intended for mature audiences only. Parental discretion is strongly advised.

INTRODUCTION=====
Doris Bither claimed that spirits would physically attack her. The reports ranged from Doris walking around her home and bumping into the ghosts, to actual spectral rape. Of course, Taff and Gaynor were skeptical of all this. Ghost apparitions are a hard thing to prove and collect evidence for (from a scientific perspective). “Ghostly rape” is even harder to believe. It was not until they saw the bruises in her inner thighs and all over her body, as well as people outside the family corroborating by testifying that they had also seen apparitions that both investigators started to take heed as to what Doris was saying. Doris Bither reported that two of the beings were the smallest ones and would hold her down while the biggest or tallest one of them would rape her. Dori’s eldest son would admit to seeing her mother being tossed around the room. In one instance he tried to intervene and was thrown across the room by the unseen force.
I’m Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness.

SHOW OPEN=====
Welcome, Weirdos – I’m Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. Here you’ll find stories of the paranormal, supernatural, legends, lore, the strange and bizarre, crime, conspiracy, mysterious, macabre, unsolved and unexplained.

Coming up in this episode…

The investigation on August 22, 1974, in Culver City California was to be like any other one Dr. Barry Taff had done. Believing that this would be an open and shut case they showed up at Doris Bither’s house. Not expecting much. Little did they know this would be one of the biggest cases in the annals of paranormal history. (“The Entity Haunting: The True Story of Doris Bither”)

One of the most mysterious disappearances of the American twentieth century took place when a man named Bruce Nelson Campbell stumbled out of his Jacksonville motel room one night, dressed only in a pair of green pajamas, and was never seen again. (“The Man In The Green Pajamas”)

A woman moves into a flat by herself and immediately begins to feel an uncomfortable presence around her. (“Tiny Apartment, Big Presence”)

On a cold January morning, John Hoskins slaughtered three members of his family. (“A Day That Began with Death: The Hoskins Family Murders of 1919”)

If you’re new here, welcome to the show! While you’re listening, be sure to check out WeirdDarkness.com for merchandise, my newsletter, enter contests, to connect with me on social media, plus, you can visit the Hope in the Darkness page if you’re struggling with depression or dark thoughts. You can find all of that and more at WeirdDarkness.com.

Now.. bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and come with me into the Weird Darkness!

STORY: HOSKINS FAMILY MURDER=====
For Allen Taylor, January 15, 1919 was just another day on his farm near Prescott, Iowa. That is, until his 15-year-old neighbor Irene Hoskins came stumbling down the lane with a gash in the side of her head.
Young Irene told Allen that her father, John Hoskins, had murdered her stepmother, Hulda, and her two stepsiblings, Roy and Gladys.
Allen raced to the telephone and called for help. Chester Wood, another close neighbor, arrived soon thereafter. Together they rode to the Hoskins farm. The men had known John for some time, and wouldn’t have thought him capable of something like this.
John Hoskins was a widower with two children, Merlin and Irene. In 1915, he had married Hulda Campbell, a widow from nearby Nevinville, Iowa, with two children—Roy, 12, and Gladys, 18. John and Hulda had appeared happy together, and the family was well liked in the area.
When Wood and Taylor arrived at the Hoskins farm, they could see Hulda’s bloodied body on the back porch. John stood nearby, grasping a straight razor. He told them not to come any closer, or he would attack.
Frightened, the two men fled.
By the time law enforcement arrived, John had slit his own throat, as well as one of his wrists. He lay in a pool of blood, just inside the back door of the house. One of the responders, a doctor, inspected the wounded man, declaring him beyond saving.
But then, John began to twitch. They lifted him up and carried him inside the house to treat his wounds.
A horrific sight awaited the responders once they entered the back door into the kitchen. On the floor were the bodies of Roy and Gladys. Blood covered the room in a grisly red mosaic. Merlin was nowhere to be found.
The doctor kneeled down to more closely examine John. It became clear that his wounds were superficial; the damage to his wrist was minor, and his throat had been cut too high to cause any fatal injury. The sheriff ordered Hoskins to be treated and then transported to the county jail in Corning, Iowa.
With John Hoskins in custody, the investigation commenced. At the coroner’s inquest, several of those who had been present that day were called to testify. A grim timeline emerged, based largely on the testimony of Irene and Merlin—who, it turned out, had witnessed some of the bloodshed before fleeing to his uncle’s house.
Irene said that she and Gladys had slept in until nearly 6:30 that morning, which was much later than John had wanted. The family planned to go see John’s parents that morning.
The delay apparently put John in a foul mood; he soon began arguing with Hulda. According to the children, this was far from an isolated event. Indeed, earlier that same year, an enraged John had grabbed Roy by the throat and began strangling him. When Hulda and Irene tried to break it up, John attacked them, too.
The quarrel subsided without further injury then. Nevertheless, it told of violence to come.
As John argued with his wife, the children sat down at the kitchen table and began eating breakfast. Soon John joined them while Hulda went outside to the separating house to get some lard.
In the middle of the meal, John stood up and walked to the back door. He reached outside and grabbed a piece of wooden buggy axle that he used for mixing hog feed.
Without a word, John then walked over and clubbed Gladys in the head. She crumpled to the ground. John swung again, this time striking Roy. Irene and Merlin both ran, afraid for their lives.
John ran after Irene, catching her easily in the front yard. She begged her father to stop, but John swung the axle. Blood seeped from the gash left in her head as John turned away from his bleeding child.
He next spotted Merlin running across the yard, and called out to him. The boy froze in place. John ordered Merlin to take his horse and ride to his uncle’s farm. He wanted Merlin to tell his uncle what had happened that morning.
Petrified, Merlin obeyed. He ran to the barn, saddled up his horse, and prepared to off to his uncle’s house.
John then returned to the kitchen, where he finished off Gladys and Roy with additional blows to the head. It was at this point that Hulda returned to the main house. Upon entering, she discovered her children dead on the floor. John then struck her in the face with the axle. Hulda stumbled out the back door and into the yard. John followed her, smashing her in the head, then leaving her for dead.
Meanwhile, Irene had come to her senses. The first thing she saw was her stepmother in a heap in the back yard. She staggered over to the injured woman. Hulda was badly hurt, but still alive. She told Irene to run away and find help. Irene complied, and went straight to Allen Taylor’s farm.
With the last of her strength, Hulda crawled onto the porch, and died.
By the end of the inquest, the entire region knew what John Hoskins had done. He showed absolutely no remorse about his crime, even relating details of that day to his jailers.
Local authorities brought Hoskins to trial almost immediately, and by March 1, 1919, he had pled guilty to murder. He was sent to Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison, Iowa, to serve out a life sentence. Irene and Merlin were sent to live with their grandparents in Nevinsville.
In 1959, forty years after the murders took place, a 78-year-old John Hoskins was granted parole after his original sentence was commuted. Surprisingly, he went to stay with Irene, who was now living in California. Life outside prison didn’t suit John, however, and he asked to be returned to Iowa. The state obliged, and a parole officer escorted Hoskins back to Fort Madison.
He died there in 1963. John’s headstone is plain, and makes no mention of the heinous crimes he committed on a cold January day in 1919.

STORY: GREEN PAJAMAS=====
Weird things can happen anywhere – including Jacksonville, Illinois, the home of American Hauntings Ink. In April 1959, one of the most mysterious disappearances of the American twentieth century took place when a man named Bruce Nelson Campbell stumbled out of his Jacksonville motel room one night, dressed only in a pair of green pajamas, and was never seen again. What happened to the New England stockbroker has never been determined – he simply vanished without a trace.
That April, Bruce Campbell, age 57, and his wife, Mabelita, drove to Illinois from Northampton, Massachusetts. The reason for their visit was meant to be a happy one. They had traveled to see their newly-born first grandson, son of Bruce, Jr., who was an assistant professor of chemistry at MacMurray College, in Jacksonville.
For some reason, the long drive to Illinois was especially hard on Campbell, and he began feeling sick while he was in the car. The stock investment counselor became confused and disoriented, and when they arrived in Jacksonville, Mrs. Campbell checked them into the Sandman Motel, a small, family-owned establishment that was typical of motor lodges of the day. It was located on the northwest side of town, on Walnut Street, where a Casey’s store now stands. Each room had a door that opened to the outside and parking was located right outside the guest’s room. Campbell was put immediately into bed after they checked into the motel. Bruce, Jr. arranged for Dr. E.C. Bone, a local physician, to visit his father. Dr. Bone gave him some medication to help him sleep, but it didn’t seem to work. Two days passed before Campbell seemed to show some signs of improvement.
On the evening of April 14, Campbell visited with his family. Bruce, Jr. later recalled that his father was “rational but still disoriented” during his last visit with him. Twice, later on that night, Mrs. Campbell said her husband asked her if their station wagon, which was parked outside of their room in the motel’s parking lot, was locked up. She told him that it was, shortly before going to sleep.
She later woke up at 2:15 a.m. and saw that the other double bed in the room was empty – her husband was gone. She immediately got out of bed to look for him, and when she realized that he was not in the bathroom, hurried to the door of the room, which was unlatched. There was no sign of him in the parking lot and the desk clerk on duty said that he had not seen anyone walking past the office. The Campbells’ car was still sitting in the lot. The doors were locked and it was undisturbed.
Because of her husband’s weakness and disorientation, Mrs. Campbell quickly called the police. When officers arrived at the motel, she offered a description of the tall, balding man with a slight limp and explained that when he left the motel room, he was wearing only a pair of bright green pajamas, a wrist watch, and a ring with the Delta Upsilon fraternity crest on it. His wallet containing all his money, his shoes, his eyeglasses, and his car keys were still in the motel room.
Police officers searched the surrounding area, the darkened streets and the Jacksonville downtown area, but there was no sign of Campbell. The next morning, a request was put out for information. Theories of murder, suicide, and amnesia led searchers to local creeks, farm buildings, and wells. Jacksonville Police Chief Ike Flynn and Captain Charles Runkel surveyed the entire area, both in a fixed-wing aircraft, and later, by helicopter. They found nothing. The next day, local firefighters joined the search, using a boat to dredge Mauvaisterre Creek. About 150 students from MacMurray College joined the search, too. On the third day, the entire 235-member male population of MacMurray – students and staff – joined with 50 students from Jacksonville High School to help comb the area.
The Jacksonville Courier reported that the massive volunteer search team, broken into smaller groups, covered a six-mile-radius around Jacksonville, including creeks and ponds. It was assumed that, since there were no reports of a barefoot man in green pajamas walking around the city, and, since the Sandman was on the north side, that Campbell must have traveled north into recently planted farm fields. Unfortunately, this assumption turned out to be overly optimistic. Despite the search, no trace of Campbell was found. Dozens of reports of tall hitchhikers from the surrounding area, including White Hall, Murrayville, Woodson, New Berlin and Alexander, kept the police busy for days, but the leads went nowhere.
Police Chief Flynn told the newspaper, “We have looked everyplace that has been suggested and have run out of ideas on what to do next. A fortune teller told us that Campbell was seven miles from Jacksonville, either northeast or northwest of the city. We have even looked there.”
Whoever this psychic was, they might have been on to something, however. The newspaper reported that the last solid lead – pretty much the only solid lead – came in when police were about a week into the search. A farmer who lived several miles northwest of the city told investigators that he had been awakened by shouting on or near his property on the night that Campbell went missing. The police checked the area, but nothing was found. Chief Flynn told the Courier that the case was “one of the most baffling mysteries that has occurred here.”
The search for Bruce Nelson Campbell, the “man in the green pajamas,” continued for days and weeks and then it stretched into years. Mabelita Campbell had reluctantly gone home after two weeks of fruitless searching. But the family refused to give up hope that he would be found alive until 1967, when he was finally declared legally dead. Mrs. Campbell passed away in 2004, never learning what had become of her husband.
After several months of extensive searching by the Jacksonville police, the FBI launched its own investigation into the case. On the first anniversary of Campbell’s disappearance, it was revealed that the distraught Campbell family had spent almost all of their savings on private investigators who distributed Mr. Campbell’s photo and description to police departments around the country. They’d also offered a $5,000 reward for information, which no one ever collected. Unfortunately, this was the only thing that the FBI learned about the disappearance. Like the private investigators who worked the case, the federal agents found no trace of Campbell.
The case of the “man in the green pajamas” turned out to be the last significant case of Police Chief Ike Flynn’s career. Just weeks after the vanishing, Flynn retired and Charles Runkel was promoted to succeed him. Runkel later recalled, even though he was off duty, Flynn never let the case go. He died of cancer several months after he retired, haunted to his grave by the missing man. Until the very end of his life, he never stopped checking in at the department to see if any new clues had surfaced. They had not – and even today, the case remains unsolved.
What became of Campbell? No one knows. He simply walked away on the dark nighttime streets of Jacksonville and was never heard from again.

STORY: TINY APARTMENT=====
I live in a small flat in Cape Town, not an old flat, I believe it used to be a garage. I have been experiencing strange occurrences my whole life, but now that I have moved out of my parent’s house it seems to have increased. It could be because I am able to just be myself, I have always been sensitive to these things so maybe a lack of distractions has made the occurrences happen more frequently.
It started with strange sounds and finding objects in different places than before and the feeling of being watched, you know, the usual. It wasn’t until recently that I started to feel a little scared and I’m sure it’s because my fiancé and I have been going through a difficult time together and there has been an increase in negative energy.
About a month ago I woke up from a noise that sounds like stuff being dragged across a table, got up and checked but saw nothing. Often what we do when we’ve had a tough week we pull the bed into our tiny lounge and watch tv and play games until we fall asleep, we will do this for the whole weekend. The first night I was struggling to fall asleep, I was sick and had a general feeling of unease. At around 3am I heard very fast knocking on the front door. It being 3 am and us living in a security complex I figured it was just a spirit trying to tell me something. For once I was wrong because about 10 seconds later I woke up from a friend calling us from our back yard (just about had a heart attack). While my fiancé went outside to reprimand our friend I suddenly went stiff and heard something in my right ear say quite angrily “GET OUT” and then all went calm. I figured I was just sleep deprived and heard something else that could have sounded similar.
The next morning, I woke up and did the usual breakfast and quick clean up. At around 2pm my fiancé points to the wall and asks” What’s that?”. There was a red drip on the wall, straight down. Our wall has a bit of a texture so for anything to drip down in a perfectly straight line is really unusual, never mind the fact that it is in the middle of the wall above eye level and red and only one, not a sign of any other red marks anywhere. I wipe it off the wall and continue with my day. The next day we wake up to another red drip mark in the kitchen this time, same red as the day before just a different wall. Again, no sign of red anywhere else. These marks were in places where we would definitely have seen them during our normal daily routines.
Two days later I found my hamster dead in her cage, she was old but had gone from super energetic to barely emerging from her nest in the space of one day. I knew this day would come but when I found her she had her eyes open and her front paws pressed together.
I was a little freaked out about the drip marks but shook it off, no physical harm done so I did not feel threatened. The week starts again so the bed goes back into the room and the week continues. I think it was a Wednesday night, we were watching tv and we heard what sounded like hammering coming from the ceiling. We have nobody above us or next door to us or even next door to that flat, the hammering continues for about 15 minutes. We decided it was time to go to bed so I get my bed ready, go pee and head back to the lounge to get my glass of water. My water was on a table that is against the back wall of the lounge also where my hamster cage used to be. As I approach the table a huge bang comes from the wall that shakes the paintings hanging against it. I couldn’t move any closer, I left the water and just went straight to bed. Didn’t sleep well that night.
Since then activity has stopped. The odd feeling of being watched here and there but nothing else. I have developed insomnia since then though. It’s difficult to distinguish if our negative energy was making things worse or if something bought negative energy into the house. It was like a cloud was hanging in our flat which since then has been lifted.

BREAK=====
Up next is the true story of the events that led to the making of the movie “The Entity”. The truth may be even more terrifying than the film. Coming up.

STORY: THE ENTITY=====
The investigation on August 22, 1974, in Culver City California was to be like any other one Dr. Barry Taff had done. Believing that this would be an open and shut case they showed up at Doris Bither’s house. Not expecting much. Little did they know this would be one of the biggest cases in the annals of paranormal history.
Dr. Barry Taff and his associate Kerry Gaynor were overheard talking about the paranormal by a woman in a local bookstore. The woman approached the two men and told them that her house was haunted. She gave Kerry Gaynor some details of the haunting, in which Gaynor told her that he would discuss this with his associate.
Dr. Barry Taff and Kerry Gaynor arrived at the 11547 Braddock Dr. Culver City home on August 22, 1974. Doris Bither, a petite woman, in her 30s greeted them. Doris Bither lived in the small home with her six year-old daughter and her three sons. Her daughter was six years old, and her boys were ten, thirteen and sixteen.
The house at the time was in shambles. Squalid living conditions and a tumultuous relationship between the mother and male children is what investigative team observed upon their first visit. The investigators reported a feeling of overpressure in their ears while being inside the home. According to Taff, the house was twice condemned by the city.
From what is known, Doris Bither suffered abuse from her parents as well as had several abusive relationships with men. There was obvious tension between the three young boys and the mother. The psychodynamics of the home were extremely negative. It seems that the boys, especially the eldest, would harbor some dark and resentful feelings towards their mother. The unconscious mind that is troubled by a physically or verbally abusive environment and negative upbringing is like a lightning rod to paranormal activities. Either attracting poltergeist activity or psychosomatically creating it.
Doris Bither claimed that spirits would physically attack her. The reports ranged from Doris walking around her home and bumping into the ghosts, to actual spectral rape. Of course, Taff and Gaynor were skeptical of all this. Ghost apparitions are a hard thing to prove and collect evidence for (from a scientific perspective). “Ghostly rape” is even harder to believe. It was not until they saw the bruises in her inner thighs and all over her body, as well as people outside the family corroborating by testifying that they had also seen apparitions that both investigators started to take heed as to what Doris was saying. Doris claimed that the ghosts were of Asian men. The children, also saw these beings. The visions were so frequent that they children dubbed one of the more prominent ghost as “Mr. Whose-it.”
The claim of rape by these beings is one of the most interesting aspects of the case. Doris Bither reported that two of the beings were the smallest ones and would hold her down while the biggest or tallest one of them would rape her. Dori’s eldest son would admit to seeing her mother being tossed around the room. In one instance he tried to intervene and was thrown across the room by the unseen force.
To both investigators, this must have been the most bizarre claim to date. How can you prove “spectral rape” or even claim it? it would seem that a person would have to be insane to even admit this. The team decided to setup shop and brought in high-speed cameras and photographers as well as other investigators to help capture something on tape. In a famous report, all investigators and equipment, as well as Doris, were in the small bedroom. Cramped and anxious to see any paranormal activities, they decided to have Doris conjure up the beings by having her call them. Doris began swearing and yelling at the spirits while 30 or so investigators were crammed in her room.
To much surprise, lights started manifesting around the room. As Doris kept provoking the beings, a greenish mist started to form in a corner. As if it was coiling, the green mist started swirling and growing. Within seconds the form of a man’s upper torso started to become visible in the mist. Very large and a lot of muscles is what they reported seeing. The torso of the being did not show facial details, but did show the investigators musculature. From what they gathered, this was a male entity. An investigator soon fainted after seeing this.
No matter how many high-speed cameras were setup to capture this, or that the team even had professional camera men present; none of this ever came out on film. The pictures only shows what appears to be a free floating arc light in the middle of the room as well as some light orbs. The most famous and incredible of these photographs is the one that shows Doris sitting on a bed, investigators surrounding her and the free floating arc of light in the middle of the picture. What’s incredible and equally unbelievable is that the arc of light appears smooth, even though this is a room with corners and one would expect bends in the arc as when someone uses a projector to display an image and the image hits corners in a room. The image will bend. The photographic evidence produce by the team shows the arc of light floating above Doris Bither with no bends, even though behind it, we see the room’s corner.
Dr. Taff also reported that the eldest son would go on a say that the activities intensified when ever he played certain music. Black Sabbath & Uriah Heep were the albums played. The songs that mention or were about devil worshiping is what seemed to upset the poltergeist. Asking the boy to play the songs in question, Dr. Taff did observe that the lights and orbs did increase.
The investigative team observed lights and poltergeist activity for about two and a half months. As time went by, the activities decreased.
It is important to point out a few factors in this case; Doris’ addiction to alcohol and her being abusive and belligerent almost on a daily basis, as well her unwillingness to seek help for her abuse and deal properly with it. Because of her refusal to properly deal with her own psychotic issues, I believe that her energy and the energy in her home manifested itself as poltergeist phenomenon.
We have to take into consideration that the paranormal activities were extremely powerful only when Doris was present in the home. Doris almost always in a drunken stupor seemed to be the center of it all. While intoxicated, Doris would attract the phenomenon almost on cue. There were times when she was present with the team and was not under the influence of alcohol that the poltergeist did not manifest itself. Which we can only conclude that when Doris’ mind was clouded and her inhibitions minimized, her psychokinetic energy took over.
It is not a far stretch of imagination to say that there were some very concerning underlying themes in this case. Let’s take for example how Doris claimed that there were three entities that attacked her. These entities controlled her life and to some extent oppressed her. It will not be a stretch, from a psychological stand point, that these entities could have been a physical manifestation of the relationship Doris had with her own three sons. From the reports of Dr. Taff, we know that her relationship with her sons was not a Norman Rockwell painting. As I discuss this event with my fiancee, she makes a very good and intelligent point: Doris had suffered abuse almost all her life. The fact that she abused alcohol and self-medicated to avoid the post-traumatic stress from her abuse could have had a metaphysical effect in her life.
My fiancee has the following thoughts. One, Doris Bither could have been extremely psychic or “sensitive”. Doris could have had a great talent, but her own refusal to deal with her past abuse and the fact that she self-medicated and kept her mind clouded did not let her use that talent. Instead, because of her addiction and self hate, she could have manifested this poltergeist as another way (besides the alcohol) of attacking herself.
Doris Bither and her sons (especially the eldest) could have been psychic. It is well known that parents sometimes pass down their psychic abilities to their kids. In other words, psychic parents produce psychic kids. If the parent was psychic, and the kids were psychic, the tumultuous relationship in the home could have produced a staggering amount of psychokinetic energy. Enough energy to physically manifest poltergeist activity. The feelings that Dori’s kids could have had against her and her addiction can be represented by the Hephaestus Syndrome. Hephaestus being the Greek god of fire and metallurgy, was kicked off Mount Olympus by his abusive mother. Hephaestus held a very turbulent relationship with his mother. Chaos and love combined in a love/hate relationship.
The same way Doris’ sons could have had a relationship with Doris. A strong love/hate relationship fueled by past abuse, alcohol and psychic abilities is a powerful concoction for poltergeist or psychokinetic energy. We can formulate this manifestation of the “spectral rape” by Doris’ description of her attackers: two of the smaller entities held her down, while the biggest one raped her. We can speculate that the Bither household was very unstable. Her coming-of-age son (the biggest one of her three sons) was probably harboring some resentful feelings towards his mother and her lifestlye. She in turn, saw her son as another man in her life trying to control her or attack her; therefore in turn subconsciously materializing the rape or attack on herself and using her current feelings and occupants in the house as the basis for the rape. This would not corroborate with her son testifying that he was too attacked and thrown across a room, but psychokinetic energy can be powerful enough to affect physical objects from what I’ve studied.
Another theory my fiancee mention could be that Doris Bither could have attracted 3 evil spirits into her life. It could be argued that Doris Bither could have been abused by three influential men in her life (father, uncle, grandfather or someone she trusted). The combination of her self-medicating and having psychic abilities as well as self-loathing could have made her into an attractive victim to malevolent forces. Her turbulent lifestyle and energy as well as her kid’s energy could very well have manifested her feelings into something very evil in a metaphysical level. Post-traumatic Stress Syndrome and psychic abilities can have a great effect one a person. A person that does not know about their abilities and/or is under the influence of a drug can have a great effect on their surrounding environment. Take into consideration the infamous “Bell Witch” haunting.
The Bell Witch Haunting is an old legend. In 1817, John Bell reporting poltergeist phenomenon. The case was made famous by the reports of then General Andrew Jackson (who later became president of the U.S). John Bell’s daughter, Betsy Bell, was at the center of this haunting. She was physically attacked by the ghost(s). There is a theory floating out there that the child was extremely psychic and had suffered from sexual abuse (possibly from her father). Accounts of levitation, spectral noises and disembodied voices were reported. The theory states that all this phenomenon could have been produced by Betsy Bell herself. Living in an unpleasant environment and seeking help, she started to manifest these attacks.
After Doris Bither left her Culver City home, the phenomenon was ceased to exist in the house. Future residents of the house have not reported anything out of the ordinary. The house remains to this day ghost free and is in good conditions.
Dr. Barry Taff reported that Doris Bither moved from Culver City to Carson CA. From Carson to San Bernadino CA, and from San Bernadino to Texas and finally back to San Bernardino. While jumping around the two states, Doris reported that the phenomenon “followed” her and her family to every place they moved to. Feeding the notion that the poltergeist phenomenon was a manifestation of her unstable environment and mind. He also reports that her psychological state is made apparent when she reported being impregnated by the ghost. Medical test showed her to not be pregnant but suffering from an ectopic or a hysterical pregnancy.
No one can say for sure what could have been going on with the family in that small Culver City house. Since Doris Bither has not been heard of since the late 80s or 90s (depending on some reports) and her kids have not come forward, we cannot know for certain.

SHOW CLOSE=====
Thanks for listening. If you like the show, please share it with someone you know who loves the paranormal or strange stories, true crime, monsters, or unsolved mysteries like you do! And please leave a rating and review of the show in the podcast app you listen from – doing so helps the show to get noticed! You can also email me anytime with your questions or comments through the website at WeirdDarkness.com. That’s also where you can find all of my social media, listen to free audiobooks, shop the Weird Darkness store, sign up for the newsletter to win monthly prizes, find my other podcast “Church of the Undead”, and find the Hope in the Darkness page if you or someone you know is struggling with depression or dark thoughts. Plus if you have a true paranormal or creepy tale to tell, you can click on TELL YOUR STORY – or call the DARKLINE toll free at 1-877-277-5944. That’s 1-877-277-5944.

All stories in Weird Darkness are purported to be true (unless stated otherwise) and you can find source links or links to the authors in the show notes.

“The Man In The Green Pajamas” written by Troy Taylor & Lisa Taylor Horton

“Tiny Apartment, Big Presence” written by KatsWhiskers

“A Day That Began with Death: The Hoskins Family Murders of 1919”, written by John Brassard Jr.

“The Entity Haunting: The True Story of Doris Bither” written by Xavier Ortega

Again, you can find link to all of these stories in the show notes.

WeirdDarkness™ – is a production and trademark of Marlar House Productions. Copyright, Weird Darkness.

Now that we’re coming out of the dark, I’ll leave you with a little light… “Bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” — Luke 6:28

And a final thought… “A meaningful silence is always better than meaningless words.” – Unknown

I’m Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.

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