Many paranormal investigators believe that hauntings can be caused by trauma suffered by people who lived in the past. The theory goes that the people who suffered these tragedies cannot “move on” to the afterlife, and thus are stuck here on Earth, doomed to forever answer questions and demands such as “is there anybody here with us?” or “if you are here, give us a sign of your presence.” So naturally, ghost hunters tend to flock to places like old mental institutions, battlefields, tuberculosis hospitals, places where suicides or murders occurred, and so on.
In cases of the old asylums, as they were called back then, mentally disabled people were often treated very poorly in the best of conditions, and in the worst, were subjected to torture and bizarre medical experiments. And, lest anyone think that these terrible asylum atrocities are a blemish on our history only from the 19th century, one need look no further than to the Willowbrook State School, which was located right here in my home borough of Staten Island, NY. Horrible abuses there continued into the 1970s, and the last children left the school in 1987 when it was finally closed down for good.
Usually, tales of such places being haunted come many years after these horrific events take place. But apparently some now-fired workers of a center for disabled people are blaming paranormal activity for abuses suffered by patients there.
PUEBLO, Colo. (CBS4) – At least eight people have been fired due to alleged abuse at a center for the disabled in Pueblo where staff told investigators that “paranormal activity” was to blame.
A federal investigation found numerous cases of abuse at the Pueblo Regional Center for people with severe intellectual disabilities.
A federal report indicates that several residents had words like “die” and “kill” scratched into their skin. Staffers claim the words appeared by “paranormal activity.”
Another patient was allegedly burned with a hairdryer to raise her body temperature.
The alleged abuse occurred before November 2015 and as recently as April.
The Arc of Pueblo serves as legal guardians for nine of the people who live at the center.
“It was just unbelievable that in this day and age people would treat other human beings in this way,” said Arc of Pueblo Executive Director Stephanie Garcia.
The Department of Human Services oversees the Pueblo Regional Center. It released a statement reading that it will “continue to improve staff training in a number of areas.”
We’ve done stories in the past where burglars or other criminals have blamed their behavior on ghosts or other paranormal activity (Bigfoot Hunter Claims He Was Looking for Sasquatch, Not Marijuana; Homeless Man Blames Zombies for Hotel Break-In; Man claims demons and ghosts told him to destroy hotel room), but this is a new kind of low. I can understand a single person hallucinating or being mentally ill and thinking ghosts are telling him to commit a crime. I don’t understand numerous members of a staff all lying about ghosts or demons or whatever to cover up the fact that they were willfully abusing these poor people. This whole facility needs to be investigated very closely.
I have worked at 2 nursing homes and was told that most have a death room. Well in one nursing home I was told by many residents in the death room and the one connected by a bathroom to it, that there was someone in their rooms telling them to get out. I reported these, but the nurses would say they were delusional. The residents were listed as confused, and even though I believed them, I wasn’t much help in getting their rooms, changed. That is until a resident that was listed as alert across the hall claimed she heard 2 people arguing. And the man (ghost?) wanting our resident out even came to her room and talked to her! They finally moved that resident after I reported that.