Man Dies In Haunted House, Mistaken For Prop For Almost 2 Weeks

WAUKEGAN, Illinois –

Halloween in Waukegan, Illinois is anticipated by the entire town, as every October for the past 8 years, the Graham family has unveiled their haunted house to the neighborhood, with the event drawing thousands of visitors throughout the season.

The event became so popular that for the third year in a row, local police had to set up barricades to keep both automobile and pedestrian traffic moving along at an orderly pace, and the Graham’s started pre-selling tickets to the event to keep track of visitors.

“That’s how we noticed something was off,” said Hank Graham, owner of the Wicked Waukegan Haunted House. “The tickets came up one short when we counted out the receipts at the end of the day. That was the first or second night of the attraction, at the beginning of this month.”

The mystery of the incorrect ticket count was solved late last week when a 6-year-old visitor told his parents he was very frightened of the “old, dead stinky man” on the second level. “I heard the little boy say that,” said Hank, “and I thought – ‘Oh great!’ If kids are getting a scare, well, that’s the whole fun of it. Every year we add new props – we have mummies, skeletons, and mannequins, plus the ol’ peeled grapes as eyeballs in a bowl, strobe lights, fog machines – crowd favorites, I guess you’d call them. Unfortunately, it was not one of our props that had scared the boy.”

That same evening, 31-year-old Susan Johnston, screamed in terror as her children, who she was accompanying through the haunt, accidentally bumped into what they thought was a prop dummy, and discovered it to be an actual dead body.

“I told them to be careful as we went through, but my little Grace, I think she touched him and it knocked him over, and his arm literally ripped right off his body! Blood and other bodily fluids got all over Grace’s jacket and in her hair, and my son Ricky got some sort of slime all over his hand. They were both terrified. It smelled so bad when we first walked in, but we thought it was all just part of the attraction. Both of my children vomited right there on the floor.”

According to police, a 71-year-old man, whose identity has not been released pending notification to the family, had leaned up against a corner of the building after climbing the stairs to the second floor, and had apparently passed away. “We don’t yet know whether he had a heart attack or an existing illness that may have caused his death,” said Officer Allison Garfield, who had been on the scene to direct traffic. “It was mayhem after he was discovered, though. People ran from the building screaming, but not in a good, fun way as you’d expect at a place like this.”

“To think that someone could live all alone in this world in a way that no one would notice you gone for multiple weeks, and he made a trip here all by himself to have some fun…We didn’t notice him ourselves – it’s just awful,” Said Lynn Graham. “We have so many props up there I guess I thought Hank put him up there, and he thought I did.”

The local health department shut down the Halloween exhibit, but authorities did not file charges against the Graham family. “It was just an unfortunate accident,” said Officer Garfield. “These are just some wonderful people who open their home every year for people to have some fun, and this just put a shadow over the whole thing.”

The Grahams have closed their attraction for the remainder of the season, but said they do plan to re-open the haunt next year.

ST. PETERSBURG, Florida –

A local St. Petersburg man is behind bars today after a bizarre event occurred while fishing. Tim Pope, age 64, was arrested late Sunday evening by police officers for tampering with a crime scene. Pope was fishing in a Florida river early Sunday morning, which his wife says he has been doing every Sunday for the past 20 years.

“Ever since we moved to Florida 20 years ago, he would go to that river and fish every Sunday,” said Mrs. Pope. “If some people go to Church or watch football as their religion of choice, then Tim’s religions is fishing.”

While out early this morning, Pope inadvertently hooked a human corpse – something that any die-hard fisherman can tell you is not as nice as hooking a huge bass. Like any good fisherman, though, when realizing that what he had pulled to shore was of a sub-par nature, he threw the body back in the water.

“I haven’t gotten to speak to him to much, but he told me he didn’t know what to do with the body. At first, pulling it in, he thought he had caught the biggest fish of his life. When he discovered it wasn’t a fish at all, he just unhooked it and tossed it back. [Tim] doesn’t own a cell phone, so a few hours later when he finally was finished and arrived home, he told me the story and I had him call the police. Stupid me, because their first stop after the call was to our house to arrest him for tampering with the body!” said Mrs. Pope.

Tim Pope is still currently in lockup in St. Petersburg, after refusing to take any money out of his retirement savings to post bail. If he’s convicted of a crime, he could be facing several years behind bars. The arresting officers have refused to make a statement, but the station has reportedly been receiving a lot of angry calls from local town residents.

“I don’t care what anyone says about it,” said Pope during his initial police interview. “It’s not a big deal. I didn’t kill the guy, I just pulled him in. What was I supposed to do? It’s not like he was going to fit in my cooler. Would you have arrested me if I’d caught a tire in my line and threw that back? Littering is a crime too, you know!”

“Tim is friends with a lot of people in our neighborhood, and I know that along with myself, people have been calling the police station night and day expressing how they feel. My husband doesn’t deserve to be jailed for this; it was a fisherman’s instinct to throw the body back in the river,” said Mrs. Pope.

Police have continued to search for the body over several miles of river, but so far have come up empty-handed. Reports indicate that police are actually using Pope’s confiscated fishing rod and lures in attempt to hook the body for a second time.