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Strange happenings prompt police to call in ghostbusters
By BRUCE SCHREINER Associated Press
writer
September 7, 2003
SHELBYVILLE, Ky. - Stumped by mysterious sights and sounds in their own headquarters, who did police call? Ghost hunters.
In the still of night, doors rattled and stairwells creaked in the city's police department. In the light of day, a secretary's desk drawer opened on its own. A city worker who toured the building late one night even reported feeling something grab her leg.
So the police took the probe to another dimension. "The way I treat it is not that there is a ghost, there's just things that I can't explain," said officer John Wilson, who contacted the Scientific Investigative Ghost Hunting Team, based in Louisville.
The team of professional paranormal investigators gave the brick building a preliminary review and will return this fall for a thorough probe. The group will set up cameras, tape recorders and infrared thermometers to capture any temperature variations.
The goal is to try to prove the strange occurrences aren't caused by paranormal forces, said Kay Owen, vice president of the nonprofit ghost hunting team.
"We'll go in and try to re-create
everything that they are experiencing," she said. "If they can
re-create it, it's not paranormal. It can be explained. It's a process of
elimination."
The team already determined the doors are hung properly on hinges.
In the spring, police in this town about 20 miles east of Louisville moved into the brick building, part of which was renovated and dates back to the 19th century. The rest of the headquarters was built new.
Wilson, a regular on the night shift, said Wednesday he started noticing unexplainable events soon after the headquarters opened. One night, he was stuffing paperwork into a mail slot when he noticed a door to his left jiggling. "It was like someone was trying to get in but didn't have the key," Wilson said.
Wilson checked and no one was on the
other side of the door.
The following nights, Wilson and other officers heard knocking on doors
and walls. Sometimes, doors opened and closed on their own. Quick checks
turned up no one responsible, he said.
Other nights, officers heard what seemed to be footsteps on the stairs,
but again no one was there, he said.
Once, officers and members of the ghost hunting team came across what seemed to be a strange column of heat in an upstairs hallway, Wilson said. He starting sweating in one part of the hallway where it was extremely hot, he said. A few steps away it turned cool, he said.
"We can't explain that. It's still under investigation," Owen said. Wilson said a half-dozen officers have seen or heard strange things at the headquarters. He said they aren't jumping to any conclusions.
"Nobody's seen a big, shadowy figure walking around or anything like that," Wilson said. "It's just lots of little things that make you scratch your head and wonder what's going on. I'm not making it out to be like Poltergeist."