THE ABDUCTIONS OF LYNDA JONES: Missing Time, Alien Pregnancy, Men In Black, and Decades of Terror
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My dad worked in the mines of Kentucky in the steel mill in Gary, where I eventually joined him. Through him, I learned what hard work was and saw that the men and women like him were the backbone of our community. Through my law practice, I've been fortunate enough to give back to those in need with food programs, clothing and toys for children, and educational support. Every day through the Allen Law Group, I want to make my community and my father proud.

In the summer of 1979, Linda Jones and her children experienced a chilling encounter near Manchester, England that would haunt them for years to come. What began as an innocent evening stroll along a riverbank turned into a terrifying ordeal involving a mysterious orange rugby ball-shaped object and inexplicable missing time. But this was only the beginning of Linda's strange experiences.

As Linda delved deeper into her memories through hypnotic regression, a disturbing pattern emerged.

Her encounter was not an isolated incident, but part of a lifelong series of bizarre events involving strange beings, men in trilby hats, and unexplained medical procedures. With each revelation, Linda's story grows more complex and unsettling, raising troubling questions about the nature of her experiences and their possible connection to alien abduction.

I'm Darren Marlar and this is Weird Darkness. 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...

On May 25, 1979, American Airlines Flight 191 crashed moments after takeoff from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, resulting in not only almost 300 lives being lost, but also leaving behind ghostly figures trying to make their connecting flights or retrieve their luggage.

In 1966, Richard Speck committed a crime so horrific it gave birth to the term "random mass murder" and changed America forever. His brutal slaying of eight nursing students in Chicago shocked the nation. His time in prison? Depraved. Decimation was a horrifying practice where one in ten soldiers would be randomly selected and beaten to death by their own comrades.

It continued much longer than most think, well into the 20th century. In the 1800s, a man named Samuel Rowbotham sparked a controversial movement by claiming the Earth was flat. And the Flat Earth theory continues to attract people even today.

The Ark of the Covenant, a legendary religious artifact, has captivated imaginations for millennia, sparking countless theories about its true nature and whereabouts. What many seek, however, is what is inside. But first... Linda Jones' story of alien abduction is filled with missing time, bizarre beings and unexplained medical procedures, including some regarding fertility.

Her encounter raises disturbing questions about the nature of the alien abduction phenomena and its potential impact on unsuspecting individuals – perhaps even you or me. We begin there. Now, bolt your doors, lock your windows, turn off your lights, and come with me into the Weird Darkness!

The strange and sometimes terrifying story of Linda Jones is one that has made its way into the mainstream UFO narrative. It is a chilling case. It is also consistent with the theories and observations made by many investigators of other aspects of alien abduction. Certainly, as we'll see from Linda, she eventually remembered being taken and the horrific experiences that came with it.

But how many others have had similar encounters? Maybe not all of them have put their pasts behind them, except in their minds. The Linda Jones case is one found in several UFO books, most notably "Without Consent" by respected author and UFO researcher Philip Mantle. Really, what happened to Linda Jones that night in 1979? Or was it only the first of many such encounters?

Linda Jones and her husband Trevor had just come in from chatting with a neighbor at their home on the Didsbury estate of Manchester. Summer had really come into its own and their two children, five-year-old Christopher and fifteen-year-old Lisa, were making the most of it by enjoying long days in the sun. Linda and the kids drove a half hour to the open farmlands west of Liverpool, where Linda's friend Pam met them after her husband Trevor dashed off for his job at the factory.

Her friend would save some time, and Linda could take the children to look at wildflowers. She was fond of them. They separated at Simon's Bridge around 7:30 p.m. But Trevor was not due home from work until 10:30 p.m., and she got her pocket Oxford dictionary of wildflowers out and walked slowly along the riverbank, identifying each flower in turn as she went.

The lightness of the evening was only ever so slightly beginning to die down by 9pm when Linda felt a fairy tale stillness in her bones. Except that serenity was shattered as Lisa spoke up, "Mum! The moon is coming at us!" Linda turned, but not before she saw her daughter and then the odd thing descending from the twilight sky. It sounded like it was coming their way from the nearby golf course on the other side of a stand of trees.

Years later, she would remember, looking back at it, the shape was like a rugby ball, only really big and bright orange in color with a spinning effect. It appeared as if this huge object was traveling towards us but sideways. For a moment, she watched the surreal display before yelling to her kids, "Get down!" dropping herself and each kid next to her. She had been braced for an eruption. Maybe it fell out of a plane from the nearby airport.

But when no such sounds came, she lifted her head to look again. They had the impression that the object passed directly overhead and then disappeared behind a ridgeline. She thought for a minute and glanced at the nearby environment. Just like that, she realized the effect was different from a few moments ago when they first saw their low-flying object. Now there was no sound but for the heavy silence. The usual bustle from the relatively distant road made only a murmur.

Taking her children by the hands, she walked with a steady gait toward where the object had vanished over an embankment. Once at the top, her cousin described seeing an "odd" object resembling something that looked like it was from a Bible flying around 25 yards away, hovering just above the ground.

She would later say, "The thing was about 60 feet wide and hovering only two or three feet above the ground. It was disappearing and reappearing. It had a light on top of it, a very bright light that seemed to be a separate entity from the object itself." Linda could not stop gazing into the mysterious light before she had a sudden urge to go and walk toward it. As she did, the light seemed to shine brighter. She pushed forward with persistent strides.

When she approached the weird object, a glowing orange ball exited it, traveling toward her. Despite this, Linda pressed on. The next thing she heard was Lisa's voice from behind her: "Mom, come back! Come back!" It was the plea that snapped her out of it. Coming back to herself now and afraid of what she had done, she turned and fled with her children in tow.

At that moment, Lisa suddenly shouted as they sprinted back along the bank in the direction they were originally traveling. "It's here again!" When she turned, the object was flying beside her. Screaming at Lisa to keep running, she picked up her younger son. They crossed over a grassland area, but their reality started warping as they did. The grass suddenly grew six feet tall for a moment. Not only that, it was folding down on itself like something was pressing upon it.

Although terrified and witnessing the grass behave like nothing she had ever seen before, Linda kept going straight into it. She could see her housing estate. Clutching Christopher and with Lisa just a step behind, the two bolted through their house and slammed shut every door they could. When she got in, Linda saw that Trevor was there already. He gazed back at her and, puzzled, asked bluntly, "Why are your eyes like that?"

She looked into the mirror and saw how red and scaly her eyes had become. She described to her husband what had just happened. They would also sketch the object while it was fresh in their minds. Only then did Linda realize she was missing about 90 minutes of time. It all happened at approximately 6.30 p.m. Eastern, lasting no longer than 10 minutes from the time it took to flee back home.

But when they had been back indoors ten minutes later, it was now 10:50 p.m. It was over a year before Linda started to think again about the strange incident. Yet in early winter of 1980, she would gladly volunteer to be hypnotically regressed, just to experience those 90 minutes again. All this happened several times, but each session was filmed on video for a total of 10 hours,

Linda preferred to describe these sessions as too distressing. It got to the point that she could not watch most of those tapes. She remembered, "...I was in tears to see myself hypnotized. It made me very angry at times when I thought it appeared so. It was just too much." What she does know, as well as anyone can ever hope to, is what really occurred on that sultry summer's evening by the River Mercy.

Through the hypnosis sessions, through memories that resurfaced uninvited, and even for her own children who contain those precious pieces of memory, she spent 90 minutes that are about to return fully. She remembered how several people were running towards it and them when she was about to flee the object with her children. The "men" wore long dark coats and trilby hats. They carried two satchel-type bags, one for each.

A strange mist also seemed to have materialized out of thin air that she didn't remember from before. The men ran past her to the object, eventually disappearing into the mist. Again, a black column of vapor came over, in the midst of which appeared more men. They wore one-piece jumpsuits and were all said to have appeared similar. The next thing she felt was like floating up. The next thing she remembers is waking up in an odd room.

She says strange beings were entering the room around her. When they appeared, the men were in formal attire, with long necks and sporting oriental features. Linda said she had a peculiar sense of déjà vu that one of them looked like somebody she met before. The next thing she remembered was being on a table. A cold sensation was put on her legs.

She raised her head to take a look around. It felt like an exam to her. However, every time she tried to lift her head, one of the beings would flash a light directly into her eyes until she had no choice but to look away. Linda was unable to remember what exactly the test consisted of, as regression of her own memory would not allow it.

One thing she had observed before awaking from her hypnotic regression is that after the event, for no apparent reason and without a clinical cause being identified at the time following 1986, her menstrual cycle was in essence out of phase with itself on occasion.

It had been far from her thoughts, yet when a strange set of marks appeared on her arm from nowhere, which then eventually disappeared over the day, sometimes in hours, she started to wonder if there was any connection to that odd evening at River Mercy, to the extent that she would eventually go to her GP. She was, to put it mildly, stunned when he talked about her recent pregnancy and miscarriage after examining her.

The last time she was pregnant and gained weight, it stayed that way after having her son. He was firm in his conclusion and so now Linda would be referred to a specialist. They would verify that scarring of her fallopian tubes was due to an ectopic pregnancy. But this time, she was even more surprised with the results. She was convinced she had never miscarried and certainly not an ectopic pregnancy because that is excruciatingly painful and deadly if left untreated.

She would later clarify, "I have never had an ectopic pregnancy. I don't know how. I do not know what came over me. However, I realize that about other stuff in my life now." The first incident of her going to the police with accusations against what her husband remembered happened in 1972. That evening, the couple was driving on the country roads. At around 9 p.m., they thought of dropping by their neighborhood pub on the way home.

But it started spinning as he approached the traffic light. These bright lights were behind them, as Trevor observed. And then, after spinning for what felt like a good few moments, the car was static once more, stopped at some traffic lights with their green twinkling. Trevor felt a bit uneasy. But when they got to the pub, it was in total darkness. They glanced at their watch to see that it was 2:30 a.m. They remember nothing of those five and a half hours.

There was also the memory of the men in trilby hats. She remembered seeing the same kind of men over and over throughout her life. One time she called the police after finding one of these creepy men in her backyard. After they got there, they walked around the courtyard.

It wasn't until several minutes had passed and they had not come back inside that she came out to see them, white-faced and open-mouthed. When she asked if anyone was there, they said that they saw a person, but he had vanished, completely vanished. In the following years, more and even stranger incidents would take place.

Some years after she was left the anonymous warning, a letter arrived asking her to go into the hospital for tests and checkups. After she tried to chase down the results, the hospital said they had no records of her appointment, or the doctor tasked with checking on her. Strange written requests still arrived for strange tests. Working as a beautician in the early 80s, her name badge would have all of its lettering removed.

The year before, in 1988, while driving home from Nottingham with her husband after visiting friends, they had another bad experience. As they drove along the deserted country roads, every so often the headlights would dim down to near darkness, only to come back in full intensity again. It brought Trevor back, his visibility cut by the breaking lights, so he steered to the shoulder of the road. He was left to hope now that a car would pass by so he could follow it.

Then, all of a sudden, Trevor told Linda to "look up" and there, directly in front and above, was the bright, circular something large. It soared slowly at first, then up and away as little more than a speck in just a split second. A car came whooshing by seconds later and they put the sighting out of their minds to follow its taillights as it knifed through the blackness before them. But after a few miles, the car disappeared completely

Satisfied with how the lights illuminated his path, Trevor said that he moved on to search for a fork that might have led them somewhere. But they were only on a straight road. The couple also reported experiencing three hours of lost time. She went on to disclose that she disappeared one day when she was a little kid in a similar strange incident.

It was just like she found out, but in light of everything else that would come to pass later on as an adult who knows better versus a child always aiming for autopilot innocence. The episode might be revisited yet again. While she was playing in a field near their house, her parents started calling for her. They would even tell her that she had been gone for hours. In addition, she claimed to have never left the field at all.

Yet her parents, and supposedly neighbors who assisted in searching for her, had reportedly already swept through the field several times before. But there was never anything in it to begin with, all three different times. The men in their trilby hats would appear still more frequently, prowling into her memories. While she could never remember an overt face-to-face experience with them, they were always quietly, invisibly in the background of strange occurrences.

odd events, which she had apparently blocked out on her own. Maybe something relevant when you consider the Men in Black encounters and that it's correspondence from the CAA. They asked her to give a detailed message text, which they could forward to the Ministry of Defense, the MOD. They also indicated that they had tracked an unknown object on radar as well. Yet when UFO investigators went to check these reports, the MOD would claim it knew nothing about them.

What are the allegations from Linda Jones? She seems like a good witness. After all, Mantle is a respected and serious researcher. Moreover, the repeating decades-long psychic sequential series of extraterrestrial kidnappings right from one's tender age is found in scores of other alien abduction instances across continents.

Most concerning and curious given her recent history, Linda had not known she was pregnant, resulting in at least a suspected ectopic pregnancy. Researchers such as Dr. David Jacobs have made claims that this and abduction research suggests that alien abductions are actually part of a hybridization program. This might be one reason why they even bother to contact humans in their best efforts at disguise yet again.

That would certainly explain the multiple abductions and the apparent usage of Jones' womb as a baby mill at least once theory. Moreover, there are other cases where this has happened or could have been done with another woman and her family. Like Brett Olden and not far behind a friend from across the pond, Diane Swanson in Las Vegas, when they had everything happen to them in their bedroom during a bizarre abduction in 1987 with a couple arriving home expecting their first baby.

All would be subjected to experiments. All would talk of their abductors as grey aliens. More grotesquely, they would take the baby out of Diane while still in utero. She was stunned and conducted a doctor the next day. This was equally surprising to the doctors. They replied during an investigation airing on television, like that a scalpel went in and removed the fetus.

Could it possibly all be as insane, if not more so, than the notion that they could secretly abduct one in every 200 people without inciting mass panic? Are their hybrids already here with us?

Coming up... On May 25, 1979, American Airlines Flight 191 crashed moments after takeoff from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, claiming 271 lives in one of America's deadliest aviation disasters. But the tragedy didn't end there. In the months and years that followed, residents near the crash site reported eerie encounters with ghostly figures desperate to make connections or retrieve luggage.

These chilling reports suggest that for some passengers of Flight 191, their journey may not have ended on that fateful day. Plus, in 1966, Richard Speck committed a crime so horrific it gave birth to the term Random Mass Murder and changed America forever.

His brutal slaying of eight nursing students in Chicago shocked the nation, leaving women looking over their shoulders to this day for fear of the same thing happening to them. Even after his death, Speck continued to haunt the public consciousness with shocking revelations from prison that proved his depravity knew no bounds. These stories and more when Weird Darkness returns.

My dad worked in the mines of Kentucky in the steel mill in Gary, where I eventually joined him. Through him, I learned what hard work was and saw that the men and women like him were the backbone of our community. Through my law practice, I've been fortunate enough to give back to those in need with food programs, clothing and toys for children, and educational support. Every day through the Allen Law Group, I want to make my community and my father proud.

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On May 25, 1979, one of the most horrific disasters in Chicago and American history took place at O'Hare International Airport when American Airlines Flight 191 literally fell from the sky, killing all of the 271 passengers and crew on board. The flight was meant to be a non-stop journey from Chicago to Los Angeles, but it never left the Windy City, and it left an eerie haunting behind.

It was a beautiful holiday weekend in Chicago, and the sunny skies gave no indication of the horror that was about to take place. The passengers of Flight 191, including a number of Chicago literary figures bound for Los Angeles in the annual American Booksellers Association conference, mixed with the throngs of people at O'Hare Airport. They boarded the McDonnell Douglas DC-10 just before 3 p.m.,

The DC-10 was a top-of-the-line aircraft, and this particular model had logged more than 20,000 trouble-free hours since it left the assembly line. The crew was top-notch as well, including Captain Walter Lux, an experienced pilot who had been flying DC-10s since their introduction into service eight years before, and First Officer James Dillard and Flight Engineer Alfred Udovich, who had nearly 25,000 flight hours between them.

At 2:59 p.m., the plane was cleared to begin its taxi onto the runway. And then at 3:02 p.m., Flight 191 started down the runway. All went smoothly until the aircraft reached a point about 6,000 feet down the runway. The tower controller saw parts of the port engine pylon falling away from the aircraft and a white vapor coming from the area. A moment later, the plane pitched into rotation and lifted off,

As it did so, the entire engine and pylon tore loose from their mounting, flipped up and over the wing, and crashed down onto the runway. Immediately, the tower controller tried to raise the plane over the radio. "Aberrican 191, do you want to come back? If so, what runway do you want?" There was no reply from the aircraft, but it proceeded to climb normally, only dipping the left wing for a moment. It quickly stabilized, and the plane continued its descent.

About 10 seconds later, at a height of around 300 feet, the aircraft began to bank to the left, first slightly, then sharply. The nose of the plane dipped and as the aircraft began to lose height, the bank to left increased until the wings were past vertical, then fell to the earth. The left wingtip hit the ground first and the sound of tearing metal was followed by a massive explosion.

The rushing fireball swept across the field, traveling about a half-mile northwest of O'Hare, and roared into an abandoned hangar on the site of the old Ravenswood Airport at Towhee Avenue just east of a mobile home park. The burning plane crossed mostly open ground, narrowly missing some fuel storage tanks on Elmhurst Road and the crowded I-90 expressway.

Two people on the ground were killed and several mobile homes were damaged, but the entire crew and all of the passengers on the plane were killed instantly. The disaster stunned the entire country, leading to scores of questions about the DC-10 aircraft and how the loss of only one engine had sealed the fate of Flight 191.

The findings of a long and grueling investigation by the NTSB were released on December 21, 1979. It attributed the cause of the crash to an engine pylon that had been damaged at an American Airlines maintenance facility in March 1979. The engine had needed some routine maintenance, and to save time and costs, American Airlines, without the approval of McDonnell Douglas, had instructed their mechanics to remove the engine and pylon as a single unit.

A large forklift was used to support the engine while it was being detached from the wing. This procedure was extremely difficult to execute successfully because the engine assembly had to be held perfectly straight while it was being removed. This was almost impossible to do without causing a crack. After the accident, cracks were found in the bulkheads of many other DC-10s.

The fracture in the plane used for Flight 191 went unnoticed for weeks, getting worse with each flight. During Flight 191's takeoff, enough force was generated to finally cause the pylon to fail. At the point of rotation, the engine detached and was flipped over the top of the wing. A tiny crack had caused the flight to end in disaster. A number of ghost stories followed in the wake of the crash.

According to Des Plaines police officers, motorists began reporting odd sights within a few months of the crash. They called in about seeing odd, bobbing white lights in the field where the aircraft had gone down. First thought to be flashlights carried by ghoulish souvenir hunters, officers responded to the reports, only to find the field was silent and deserted. No one was ever found, despite patrols arriving on the scene almost moments after receiving a report.

More unnerving, though, were the accounts that came from the residents of the nearby mobile home park, which was adjacent to the crash site. Many of these reports came within hours of the crash when residents claimed to hear knocking and rapping sounds at their doors and windows. Those who responded, including a number of retired and off-duty police and firefighters, opened their doors to find no one was there.

Dogs in the trailer park would bark endlessly at the empty field where the plane had gone down. Their owners could find no reason for their erratic behavior. This continued for weeks and months and even escalated to the point that doorknobs were being turned and rattled. Footsteps were heard approaching the trailers, clanging on the metal stairs, and on some occasions actual figures were confronted.

According to some reports, a few residents opened their doors to find a worried figure who stated that he had to get his luggage or had to make a connection standing on their porch. The figure then turned and vanished into the darkness. The tragedy and the strange events that followed caused many of the residents to move out of the park, but when new arrivals took their place, they too began to report the weird happenings.

One sighting was described by a man out walking his dog one night near the area where Flight 191 went down. He was approached by a young man who explained that he needed to make an emergency telephone call. The man with the dog looked at this person curiously for he seemed to reek of gasoline and also appeared to be smoldering. At first he just assumed the man had been running on this chilly night and steam was coming from his clothing.

but when he turned away to point out a nearby phone and then turned back again, the man had vanished. The man with the dog had heard stories from other local residences about moans and weird cries emanating from the 1979 crash site, but he never believed them. Until now. He was now convinced that he had encountered one of the restless passengers from Flight 191 for himself.

How else can horror, rooted in the unimaginably human, be translated into a male criminal whose crimes are so terrible that we needed to come up with a new phrase just for his monstrousness? The term "random mass murder" was coined to describe the chilling acts that Richard Speck performed.

Mass murders had happened before Speck's crimes, but the horror of what he did literally terrified a nation, and some would argue changed all life thereafter in this country. Speck was born on December 6, 1941, in Kirkwood, Illinois. His family was already large, with Richard being the seventh of eight children born to Benjamin and Mary Speck.

After Speck was six, his father died and his mother soon married Carl Lindbergh, moving the family to Dallas, Texas. Lindbergh and Speck's biological father were vastly different. While Benjamin Speck was a responsible man, Lindbergh was an alcoholic drifter. Lindbergh influenced young Speck, who began drinking early and eventually dropped out of high school. Speck was serving multiple life terms for the murders of eight nursing students on July 14, 1966.

The crimes took place on Chicago's South Side, a neighborhood where most felt comfortable in their homes without ever bothering to lock their front doors. All that changed with the Richard Speck killings. Mothers were too scared to let their kids out on the playground, and women worried about going outside even just to hang up a load of laundry. The crime of the century was committed by a man that frightened an entire nation.

On the evening of July 13, 1966, Speck entered a townhouse at 2319 East 100th Street in Chicago while drunk and armed with a gun and knife. Six student nurses were in the home sleeping, and Speck awakened each one of them, gathered them into one room, and tied them up with bedsheets. Two other women who arrived home while Speck was binding the nurses were also tied up,

He then took each one of the women, one by one, into another room and stabbed or strangled each one. The nurses did not die quickly. Some were sexually assaulted before being murdered. At the time of the murders, 22-year-old Filipino exchange student Corazon Amurayo was also staying at the townhouse. Amurayo managed to slip under a bed as the killings took place and was undetected by SPEC. For seven hours, she stayed pinned under the bed,

Amurayo, who had a clear view of Speck's face, described him to the police, describing a tattoo on Speck's left arm that read "Born to Raise Hell." Chicago was a city on edge two days after the murders as police continued to search for their suspect, but it wasn't long before he was caught. That same day, Speck sought treatment at the hospital for a self-inflicted knife wound,

An emergency room doctor recognized the tattoo Amarillo had described after reading a news article and called the police, who promptly arrested Speck. During the trial, Amarillo bravely testified that Speck was responsible for killing her friends. Speck was first believed to have killed in 1966. Mary Kay Pierce, a bartender at one of Speck's favorite taverns, Frank's Place, was found dead in a shed behind the bar.

Her autopsy revealed that she died from a fatal blow to her stomach, which lacerated her liver. Speck was a suspect in Pierce's murder and brought to the police station for questioning. But an onset of nausea abruptly ended his interview. Speck left the station, promising to return after he felt better. Instead, he packed a bag and immediately got on a bus to Chicago. Less than a year before turning 20, Speck met 15-year-old Shirley Malone at a fair in town.

Malone soon became pregnant with Speck's child, and they married in January 1962. Their daughter, Bobbie Lynn, was born in July. Despite spending much of his marriage behind bars, Speck still found time to torment his wife. Malone said that Speck would frequently violate her at knife point, demanding sex four to five times a day. After four years of marriage, Malone filed for divorce from Speck. Speck delved into a life of crime as early as 11 years old.

In 1955, at age 13, he was arrested for trespassing. He managed to stay out of trouble for a while but was arrested again in 1963 on forgery charges. Not long after, Speck tried to sign and cash a co-worker's paycheck but was caught by police. He was sentenced to three years in prison for the crime, though he served a little over a year before being paroled. Four months after his release, he pulled a knife on a woman and was sent back to prison for two more years for aggravated assault.

He was later released but would be arrested at least another 40 times in the following three years for various offenses, including drugs, sexual assault and robbery. Speck took his motives to the grave. At first, he told his attorney, Gerald Getty, that he had been drinking and blacked out, with no memory of anything during the blackout. He even implied that the men he was drinking with could have been his accomplices.

One legend alleges that Speck was angry after being turned down for a job and took out his frustration on the victims. It's also been theorized that Speck initially entered the home to burgle it. Speck's life was a record of violence and sexual assault, culminating in murder. When researching chromosomal abnormalities in serial killers, doctors investigated whether having an extra chromosome could explain violent tendencies.

Many medical professionals believed that an extra chromosome and criminal activity were linked. In 1966, a geneticist approached Speck's attorney with findings, albeit unsubstantiated. Speck's lawyer was overjoyed as he could argue that Speck's violence was due to his extra Y chromosome. However, Speck was tested and did not have the extra chromosome. The geneticist later recanted his statements about chromosomal defects.

Speck stayed occupied in the general population at Statesville Prison. He worked as a wall painter and socialized with fellow convicts. Speck claimed to receive plenty of fan mail and interview requests, which he usually ignored. However, in 1978, he was contacted by Bob Green, a journalist for the Chicago Tribune, and agreed to an interview.

In this interview, Speck confessed to the murders for the first time, saying, "Yeah, I killed them. I stabbed them and I choked them. If that one girl wouldn't have spit in my face, they'd all be alive today." Speck also claimed that he did heroin for the first time that night and partly blamed the murders on his drug use.

A jury found Speck guilty after only 49 minutes of deliberation and sentenced him to death by electric chair in April 1967. However, in 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional. Speck's death sentence was overturned, and he was re-sentenced to multiple life terms with parole. He had seven parole hearings held every few years and was rejected each time.

Speck's partying lifestyle outside of prison followed him even more so inside prison. He was taken to a hospital after complaining of chest pains and died of a heart attack on December 5th, 1991, the day before his 50th birthday. His family did not claim his body, fearing his grave would be desecrated. Instead, he was cremated and his ashes were scattered in the Joliet, Illinois area. Even in death, Speck wreaked havoc.

In May 1996, TV journalist Bill Curtis was shooting footage for a documentary on prison conditions and visited Statesville Prison where SPEC had been held until his death. Curtis was given a covert videotape at the facility. The tape showed an aged SPEC in women's underwear, with breasts from hormone treatments, engaging in sex with a cellmate, and using drugs.

In the video, Speck boasted, "If they knew how much fun I was having in here, they would turn me loose." Curtis featured parts of the video in his TV show, American Justice, causing national news and leading to a major scandal within the Illinois Department of Corrections. When Weird Darkness Returns In the 19th century, a man named Samuel Rowbotham sparked a controversial movement by claiming the Earth was flat, based on a simple experiment along a canal.

His ideas, though scientifically unfounded, gained traction and evolved into a persistent belief that has surprisingly endured into the modern era, growing larger year by year. From Victorian-era wagers to present-day Internet communities, the Flat Earth Theory continues to attract those who embrace unconventional ideas, ignoring or downright rejecting scientific consensus.

But first, decimation, a brutal form of military punishment originating in ancient Rome, struck fear into the hearts of soldiers for centuries. This horrifying practice, where one in ten soldiers would be randomly selected and beaten to death by their comrades, wasn't confined to ancient history. It persisted well into the 20th century. That story is up next. If you're a lineman in charge of keeping the lights on,

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For water bottles. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates not available in all states. Potential savings will vary. They've been here for thousands of years, making their presence known in the shadows. They might be seen by a lonely motorist on a deserted road late at night, or by a frightened and confused husband in the bedroom he's sharing with his wife. Perhaps the most disconcerting part of this phenomenon boils down to this question.

Has the government been aware of their presence all along and is covertly working with them towards some secret end? In the audiobook, Runs of Disclosure, what once was fringe is now reality. While listening, you'll meet regular people just like you who have encountered something beyond their ability to explain.

You'll also hear from people of great faith and deep religious belief who continue to have these strange and deeply unsettling encounters. Author L.A. Marzulli explores these ongoing incidents to discover the answers to these questions: Who are they? What do they want? And why are they here? Can you handle the truth? Listen to this audiobook if you dare!

Rungs of Disclosure – Following the Trail of Extraterrestrials and the End Times by L.A. Marzulli Narrated by Darren Marlar Hear a free sample on the audiobooks page at WeirdDarkness.com Perhaps of all ancient armies, the Romans were the most feared.

Roman generals would stop at nothing to keep their men in order, reserving one of the worst forms of punishment, decimation, for disobedience. The Roman army made limited but wise use of decimation. This usually required the disobedient legion to be divided into groups of ten, with each soldier drawing lots. The soldier who drew the shortest straw would lose his life at the hands of the other nine members.

While this form of military punishment may seem especially barbaric, it didn't disappear from the fall of Rome. Decimation in one form or another actually continued until the 20th century. According to ancient origins, "decimation" is a word that means the removal of a tenth in Latin. This is pretty much the gist of this brutal punishment.

A Greek historian Polybius described it around 150 BC. Usually the punishment was reserved for soldiers who had deserted their posts during battle. The offending unit would have to draw lots, and one poor randomly selected soldier would be bludgeoned to death by his comrades. Polybius wrote, "...obtaining some, he then proceeds to punish them and figures many times the sum selected as an example of cowardice. In this way they are made and define examples before all."

The punishment was carried out with one soldier bearing a heavy implement, striking those below without mercy. The men who survived faced further punishment after having to kill their own comrades. They were exiled from the protection of the camp for days, with nothing to eat but barley instead of wheat, as Polybius writes. It was not employed as often as some claim, but more than one Roman general or military commander used it.

The first recorded instance of decimation occurred in 471 BC. A few years later, the Roman historian Livy described how Appius Claudius Sabinus was disgusted with his men after they were horrifically defeated by the Volsci. He executed those who returned bearing arms or standards, as well as the centurions guilty of leaving their posts, and then selected every tenth soldier from the rest. Frontinus, the ancient Roman senator and writer, suggests they were clubbed to death.

Fewer sources are available for specific dates and details of other decimations. Around 315 BC, the military hero Fabius Rullianus executed all the soldiers from two defeated legions by beheading them for having previously been enemies. Similarly, an otherwise unknown general, Aquillus, decimated centurions that had retreated in front of the enemy by rotating among the groups and choosing one man out of every twenty to reignite fearsome losses.

Since the turn of the millennium, decimation has progressed only slowly. In 35 BC, Mark Antony, following his defeat by the Parthians, used decimation on his troops. Over 200 years later, in 286 AD, Emperor Maximian is said to have ordained an entire Christian legion to be subjected to decimation every day until there were no men left, as they were being bullied into fighting their fellow Christians.

All in all, decimation was still a relatively rare, if nightmarish, punishment by the Roman Empire. As Polybius writes, the very prospect horrified the soldiers. The Roman Empire existed until 476 AD, and decimation did not die with it. This form of punishment remained in use for several more centuries. After the fall of the Roman Empire, decimation continued to be applied, albeit sporadically.

After several battles from 1618 to 1648 during the Thirty Years' War, it was practiced on the winners. During the years 1864 to 1870, paratroopers were decimated, and in World War I, soldiers were sometimes subjected to decimation by their comrades.

In addition, according to Ancient Origins, in 1917, during World War I, Italian General Luigi Kodoma allegedly decimated the 141st Catanzaro Infantry Brigade after the soldiers mutinied. About 750 people died in total. In the same year, French military leaders ordered the decimation of the mixed Algerian infantry regiment for 2,000 soldiers who did not dare to attack the Germans.

Four years later, the Finns used decimation to execute communist rebels captured during the turn of 1918 to 1919. Thus, decimation, an ancient form of punishment, retained its vitality. The Romans used it rarely, but by that time it had already acquired a terrible reputation. Soldiers who had to fight in the Samnite Wars, the Thirty Years' War and World War I were deathly afraid of being shot by their comrades, who chose their victims by lot.

As Polybius explained, "The menaced danger requires all to strive equally, so that since no one knows on whom the lot will fall, and since the public disgrace of a man trying for barley rations befalls them each alike, this is what most brings spirit into being fearful, but also effective." The world was recognized as an oblate spheroid in the ancient Hellenistic era, a fact confirmed by modern observers.

The following year, Samuel Rowbotham began writing "Satetic Astronomy: Earth, Not a Globe" , which became known as the "Flat Earth Bible." The Old Bedford River, an artificial cut constructed in the early 17th century to partially siphon water from the waters of Elley, was completed on April Fool's Day. Apparently too late. The canal, just over six miles long, runs perfectly straight, providing an ideal testing ground to measure the Earth's curvature directly.

In his book, "Satetic Astronomy", Rowbotham recalls, "The water is perfectly at rest. There are no locks or sluices of any kind to disturb it. So that greatly helps us in determining whether there is any convexity in the Earth." The boat started to paddle away from him, with a flag on the mast three feet below water level. Rowbotham waded into the river, watched this using his telescope, and held it at a height of about eight inches above the low-running water.

He stated that the boat did not get out of his sight when viewed from anchor to six miles away, which would have been impossible if it were on a ball. With the support of the community and experimental data, Rowbotham set out to demonstrate his flat-earth theory. His observations were published in 1849 in a pamphlet entitled "Satellite Astronomy", written under the pseudonym "Parallax".

Rowbotham claimed the Earth was flat based on everyday experiences, such as saying it does not look arched and that lighthouses are observed at too great a distance from spherical geometry. Rowbotham later provided a more detailed exposition of his Zetetic philosophy in Earth, Not a Globe, 265 pages, claiming the Earth is actually an enormous flat disk centered at the North Pole and bounded along its southern edge by a wall of ice. Antarctica.

Rowbotham further assumed that the distances from Earth to the Sun and Earth to the Moon were both 3,000 miles, while stating that the cosmos was only 3,100 miles away from our flat planet. In 1870, a follower of Rowbotham named John Hamden offered to wager £500 that he could prove by repeating the experiment detailed by Rowbotham himself that the Earth was flat.

Naturalist and surveyor Alfred Russell Wallace took up the challenge. Wallace understood that gradual changes in air density at the interface between two media could bend light rays back towards Earth, allowing observers to see farther than usual, wallacing a series of disks on poles along the water to demonstrate the curvature of the Earth. Some of the disks in the middle seemed better for comparison. One might look higher, another about right.

Contrary to the evidence, Hampton refused to accept and participate in the demonstration. However, the referee, John Henry Walsh, editor of the Field Sports magazine, ordered Hampton to pay the bet to Wallace. After paying up, Hampton swore vengeance upon Wallace and launched a 20-year campaign of persecution, blackmail and libel.

Hampton took him to court, declaring that the world could not be determined as round or flat by only two men, and went on to write offensive letters of abuse aimed at Wallace, including death threats. Hampton remained a notorious figure in England, and his execution ended that torment. Meanwhile, Rowbotham was broadening his suggestions.

His talks perturbed the scientific community, and letters from worried citizens began arriving at HM Astronomer, inquiring whether any proof existed to undo his radical suggestions.

A writer for the Leeds Times added, "He certainly did one thing. He showed that there is no argument in science so simple that a contentious special pleader cannot answer it, nor any degree of charlatanry irreconcilable with cleverness and great knowledge of his theory to render what ought to have been an easy triumph for truth into as difficult a matter as possible." Robotham himself died in 1884, but his ideas lived on.

His ideas were adopted in the United States by the Christian Catholic Apostolic Church and popularized through their radio station. William Carpenter, a printer from Greenwich, carried his work into the United States, writing "Theoretical Astronomy: Examined and Exposed: Proving the Earth Not a Globe," 1865, writing under the pseudonym "Common Sense."

He subsequently moved to Baltimore, where he wrote "100 Proofs the Earth is Not a Globe", which included such claims as "There are rivers that flow 400 of miles towards the level of the sea without falling more than a few feet", notably in East Africa. The Universal Zetetic Society was established in 1893 by Lady Elizabeth Ann Mould Blount, an English nature author and social reformer with the primary aim to address misinformation regarding Biblical cosmology.

She believed that the Bible was an authority regarding all things natural and said you cannot be a Christian if you believe that the earth is round. Which, as a side note, is ludicrous, as the Bible itself argues otherwise. Isaiah 40:22 cites "the circle of the earth" and Job 26:10 states, "He has inscribed a circle on the face of the waters as the boundary between light and darkness."

The Bedford Level Experiment, the most famous scientific experiment in Flat Earth history, was originally conducted and repeated several times by Rowbotham or Parallax with similar results. It was successfully replicated again by Lady Blount in 1904. Using a high-speed telephoto lens camera, she had photographs taken over a six-mile length on the non-tidal River Bedford near Wellney. At each end of the section was an eight-foot light suspended above the water that could be precisely targeted.

The photographer, who mounted his camera two feet above the water at Wellney, observed a floating mirage, describing it as an "aquarist, shimmering vapor that seemed to hover unsteadily upon the surface of the canal." The present-day Flat Earth Society, previously known as the International Flat Earth Research Society, was founded in 1956 by Samuel Shenton.

The English conspiracy theorist spoke to youth clubs, political and student organizations, and was a television news fixture who never missed an opportunity to get into newspapers. When the Soviet Union launched Sputnik in 1957, he retorted that satellites could just as easily circle a flat-disk world, asking, would sailing around the Isle of Wight prove that it were spherical?

Shenton's passing in 1971 coincided with the society's peak, hitting a membership of some 3,500. The internet message boards and social media have helped sustain the growth. Today there are probably millions of flat earthers. Up next on Weird Darkness... The Ark of the Covenant, a legendary religious artifact, has captivated imaginations for millennia, sparking countless theories about its true nature and whereabouts.

Far from being a weapon of mass destruction or alien technology, this sacred chest held profound religious significance for the ancient Israelites, symbolizing their covenant with God. Despite its mysterious disappearance over 2,500 years ago, the Ark continues to intrigue scholars. Drivers who switch and save with Progressive could save hundreds. With that kind of money, you could go big time on a fancy water bottle with Ultra Titanium Alloy.

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For water bottles. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates not available in all states. Potential savings will vary. Now there's a new way to share weird darkness with the weirdos in your life. It's a skill on your Amazon Echo device. Just say, play Weird Darkness, and you'll immediately start hearing the newest episode. With your Amazon Echo or smart device, you can let me keep you company all day and all night. And it's easy to tell your friends how to tune in, too. Just tell your Amazon device, play Weird Darkness, to start listening.

Hold the kaleidoscope to your eye. Peer inside. One twist changes everything. A woman awakens in a grotesque, human-sized arcade game. A mysterious cigar box purchased at a farmer's market releases an ancient djinn who demands a replacement prisoner. An elderly woman possesses the terrifying power to inflict pain through handmade dolls.

An exclusive restaurant's sinister secret menu includes murder-for-hire and harvested organs. With each turn through these 20 tales, Reddit NoSleep favorite AP Royal reshapes reality, creating dazzling patterns of horror that entrance as they terrify.

The Kaleidoscope: 20 Terrifying Tales of Horror and the Supernatural by A.P. Royal Narrated by Darren Marlar. Hear a free sample on the audiobooks page at WeirdDarkness.com. ... adventurers and believers alike, with many desiring the contents within. But what is inside the Ark of the Covenant?

Whenever we hear the word "ancient" before a certain technology, we've been conditioned by spectacular movies and TV shows to think of the Ark of the Covenant first - a capacitor of some kind, a power source, or a communicator to talk to ancient aliens. Some even insist it was a powerful weapon of mass destruction

There have also been fantastic non-canonical claims that beams of light came out of the Ark and destroyed entire armies, although these claims are not found in the Bible. More on that later. The Ark also held the Ten Commandments, but if you read the passages from Hebrews, Exodus, and Numbers, you'll understand that's only part of the story.

The Bible states in Hebrews 9:1-5, "The first covenant had regulations for worship and also an earthly sanctuary. A tabernacle was set up. In its first room were the lampstand, the table, and the consecrated bread; this was called the holy place. Behind the second curtain was a room called the Holy of Holies, which had the golden altar of incense and the gold-covered Ark of the Covenant."

This ark contained the gold jar of manna, Aaron's staff that had budded, and the stone tablets of the covenant. Above the ark were the cherubim of the glory, overshadowing the atonement cover. The Book of Exodus states that when Moses climbed Mount Sinai to receive the Law, which he then gave to the Israelites who had recently fled slavery in Egypt, God told him to create an ark of which his glory might dwell.

Derived from the Greek word for "chest," an ark is a container. A covenant is a binding testament, decree, or contract. When the original Hebrew texts were translated into Greek, known today as the Septuagint, translators used these terms. The Ark of the Covenant was meant as a religious symbol representing a contract between God and Israel, not as a technical device or weapon.

The Ark, approximately 2.5 feet high and wide by 4.5 feet long, was constructed from wood, overlaid with gold leaf and carried on two elongated poles inserted into four golden rings mounted to the sides. It was stored in the Holy of Holies, the inner sanctum of the Tabernacle or Tent of Meeting during the Israelites' 40 years wandering in the Sinai Desert.

When the Israelites conquered Canaan, it was installed in a sanctuary at Shiloh and later traveled with King David to Jerusalem, where it was placed in Solomon's future temple. This event so inspired David that he danced before the Lord, which his wife despised him for. By 586 BC, the Ark had disappeared from history after the Babylonians destroyed Solomon's temple. Its location remains unknown, despite numerous attempts to find it.

Some believe it lies in a temple in Ethiopia, taken there by the son of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. Others think it's hidden in the caves of Qumran, buried beneath the Temple Mount, or even locked away on Oak Island off Canada's coast. Most scholars believe it was destroyed, and some doubt it even existed.

The Ark is most famously known for housing the Ten Commandments. However, Exodus 16 and 25, along with Numbers 17, also mention other items: a gold jar of manna and Aaron's staff that had budded. The Bible provides more context for these items, emphasizing their religious significance. The stone tablets with the Ten Commandments represented God's law, which the people violated.

While Moses was on the mountain receiving instructions from God, including a prohibition against idols, the people were worshipping an idol shaped like a calf. Hence, the tablets symbolized their denunciation of God's law.

The pot of manna symbolized God's provision. Manna was the bread from heaven that God provided when the Israelites needed food in the desert. It could not be hoarded, teaching the people to trust in God's daily provision. However, the people eventually complained, longing for the food they had in Egypt, making manna a symbol of their rebellion against God. Aaron's rod that budded represented God's chosen leadership.

When the Israelites challenged Aaron's priesthood, God instructed Moses to have each tribe place a staff in the Tent of Meeting. The staff that budded would indicate God's chosen leader. Aaron's staff budded, reaffirming his leadership. The mercy seat on top of the Ark featured two cherubim with wings that met in the middle, looking down at the contents of the Ark. They symbolized the rejection of God's law, provision, and leadership.

On the Day of Atonement, the high priest would sprinkle the blood of a sacrificed lamb on the mercy seat, symbolizing atonement for the people's sins. The Ark has become the subject of considerable speculation. Some posit that God enlightened Moses on Mount Sinai with a light radiation emitted from within the Ark, explaining why Moses wore a covering over his face. Others suggest the Ark was a transponder for communication with ancient aliens.

The Ark is said to have given armies courage during battles. The one man is said to have been killed for touching it without being fully consecrated. However, the text suggests Moses' face was not glowing, but that he wore a veil out of shame. The Ark of the Covenant remains an enigma, possibly waiting to be discovered in its 2,500-year-old tomb. For the Israelites, it was a simple, potent religious symbol reminding them of their relationship with God.

It served as inspiration on the battlefield, much like the Crusader's Cross or any army's flag. There are no death rays or Indiana Jones-style curses associated with it. In 1 Samuel 5, the Philistines captured the Ark and placed it in the temple of their god Dagon. The next day, they found Dagon fallen before the Ark. The Philistines moved the Ark from village to village, but no one wanted it. After seven months, they returned it to the Israelites with a trespass offering.

The Ark of the Covenant has become a legend, with stories and myths surrounding it. However, it remains a religious icon central to Jewish and Christian theology, symbolizing God's law, provision, and leadership, and the atonement for humanity's sins. Thanks for listening! If you like what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don't miss future episodes.

All stories used in Weird Darkness are purported to be true unless stated otherwise, and you can find links to the authors, stories, and sources I used in the episode description, as well as on the website at WeirdDarkness.com. Weird Darkness is a registered trademark. Copyright Weird Darkness. And now that we're coming out of the dark, I'll leave you with a little light. 2 Thessalonians 3 verse 3, The Lord is faithful, and He will strengthen and protect you from the evil one.

And a final thought, and a little reminder for myself today. Discipline is a choice. It's simply consistently choosing the hard right over the easy wrong. I'm Darren Marlar. Thanks for joining me in the Weird Darkness.

Do you like my horror-able humor episodes called Mind of Marler? If so, and you'd like more, it now has its very own podcast. Comedic creeps, sarcastic scares, frivolous frights, macabre madness. Every week I dive into strange history, twisted true crime, and paranormal weirdness. All the stuff you'd expect from me on Weird Darkness, but delivered with dark comedy, satire, and just the right amount of absurdity.

Monsters, myths, mysteries, mirth, and more every Monday with Mind of Marler. I like alliteration, can you tell? You can find a list of where you can subscribe to the podcast at WeirdDarkness.com under the menu tab for podcasts.