Sunday, May 6, at 7:00 a.m. Mrs. Velena Harrison, 70, was in the bathroom of her home at 750 S.E. 61st street in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. She was bathing before going to church when her husband Luther Harrison, 73, heard her scream. He went into the bathroom and immediately noticed blood on the outside of the bathtub. He assumed his wife had somehow hurt herself and went to help her out of the tub. That's when he noticed that the blood was forming on the outside of the tub spontaneously "like beads of sweat" then dripping down the side of the tub. Mrs. Harrison got out of the tub and reached for a towel. Mr. Harrison says that as soon as her hand touched the towel it became saturated with blood. He noticed that blood was "oozing" out from under a heater that is mounted on the wall and was also coming from under the vanity. Mr. Harrison says that they were not scared and describes their mental state as "very confused." They decided to go to their bedroom. With each step Mrs. Harrison took, a blood-soaked "three-toed" footprint preceded her down the hall and into the bedroom' which also began to manifest blood on the carpeting and on the bed. The Harrisons are a very religious couple and they both started to pray. While they were praying, they say the "thing" exited the house. Mr. Harrison described the bathroom as "looking as though someone were bludgeoned". The Harrisons called the police. The police arrived, interviewed the couple, and took samples of the blood including the towel and pillowcase to be analyzed. I questioned Mr. Harrison about the history of the house. He said they have owned the house since 1969 and they knew the previous owners. The house has no known history of murder or any other violent crime and has no history of paranormal activity. The Harrisons had been camping the week before at Lake Arbuckle but recalled nothing unusual about the trip. The Harrisons had been alone in the house all week with the exception of the Avon lady and her daughter who had visited briefly the night before. I spoke with a representative of the Oklahoma City Police Department and he confirmed that the substance found in the bathroom had proven to be human blood. He said the blood at the Harrisons was confined to a space only 2 feet off the floor and below, which he found very interesting. The police said that the blood was not "arterial" and appeared to be "surface blood that had been oxygenated". He said the blood was "cast off blood" and appeared in a splatter pattern. The blood appeared to have traveled at a high velocity and, according to the police, there were no seepage marks and was only on the surface fibers of the carpet. The police thoroughly searched the house and didn't find a container that had held blood or any other physical evidence that the event had been staged. However, the police are not ruling out a hoax and seem convinced that Mrs. Harrison in particular may have had something to do with staging the event. They base this on several facts. Mrs. Harrison has an allergy shot once a week and the police found two syringes but neither contained evidence of holding blood. Mrs. Harrison is deeply religious and her brother is a Pentecostal minister. She was heard by the police on the night of the event stating "maybe this will bring people back to church" which it does indeed seem to have done. When questioned by the police, Mrs. Harrison seemed defensive and quoted the bible frequently according to the police. I spoke with the police earlier today and the Harrisons have agreed to come in Wednesday, May 17, for DNA testing. Both Mr. and Mrs. Harrison have cooperated with the police and the media and seem willing to do whatever it takes to prove that they did not stage this event. After speaking with Mr. Harrison personally, I am impressed with his apparent sincerity and I find him to be a very credible witness. He and Mrs. Harrison have offered to allow me into their home to conduct paranormal investigations and I intend to this weekend. They have also sent me a large piece of the bloodstained carpet and a washcloth containing blood for our own analysis. During the past week I was asked repeatedly by the Harrisons and the media if I knew of any other cases like this one. The Harrisons in particular were concerned with stigmata type phenomena. While there have been cases of personal effects that belonged to a victims of stigmata appearing to bleed before the victims were themselves affected, I don't feel that this is the case here. The items are usually of profound personal significance to the victim and how attached could Mrs. Harrison possibly be to her bathroom? I also have to wonder if the Harrisons deep religious convictions could have somehow shielded them from the usual terror and overwhelming feelings of evil that coincide with demonic visitations. Most cases of blood appearing in this type of scenario is associated with an evil entity or horrific event. I am reminded of the spontaneous "rains" of blood and flesh that are recorded throughout history. Hopefully the DNA tests will help us solve this mystery. The results should be in by the end of this week and we will be conducting our own series of tests. We will post the results as soon as we get them and hopefully I'll have some pictures as well as answers after my visit with the Harrisons this weekend. Wednesday, May 17. There have been several interesting developments today concerning the incident in Oklahoma City. Luther Harrison called me earlier today to confirm that I would be investigating their phenomena Saturday, May 20. I assured him that I would be there and he surprised me by requesting that the media, and in particular an ABC affiliate reporter, not come with me to tape my investigation. This surprised me because Mr. and Mrs. Harrison had given the reporter my name and phone number initially and because they had always seemed eager to talk to the press. I told him that I preferred working without media involvement and I had no problems with the media not being involved. About an hour later, I received a call from my contact at the Oklahoma City Police Department. He told me that the Harrisons had been in earlier to have their DNA tested and that during a two hour interrogation Mrs. Harrison had asked that the video recorder in the interrogation room be turned off and had then admitted that the blood in the bathroom was hers. He said that she had admitted this after being told that if she did the police would not prosecute her or her husband for falsely reporting a crime. He said that during the interrogation the detective had asked her to place her hand on the bible and swear that she had not staged the event and that she placed her hand on the bible and said "If I did this I don't remember". According to the police Mrs. Harrison admitted the blood was hers only after Mr. Harrison had been asked to leave the room. However, my source also told me that there are still some unanswered questions and despite the high price of DNA analysis the police are preceding with the tests. The police are also concerned with anomalies in the splatter pattern of the blood. Several officers have expressed their bewilderment at how the blood could have been distributed at such an apparently high velocity. The police said that Mr. Harrison did not deviate from his statement that the blood appeared spontaneously before his eyes. After this conversation with the police, I decided to call the Harrisons and question them about this information. Mr. Harrison was eager to talk and he confirmed that Mrs. Harrison had admitted that the blood was hers but he also said that the only reason she said it was because of the lengthy interrogation. Mr. Harrison said that the officer that was questioning them said that the only way the interrogation was going to end was if Mrs. Harrison confessed. He said the officer also told them that if they could not resolve the issue today then the police would start digging up the Harrisons yard looking for bodies. Mr. Harrison said the officer told them "just tell us you did it and we'll forget it". Mr. Harrison told me that the blood was not his wife's and that he had seen the blood miraculously appear "like beads of sweat". He then recounted for me once again the very same story he told me the day after the episode. Nothing in his account changed. He added that he believed the thing that visited his house to "be of a devilish nature" and that he wanted me to try and find some answers for his own peace of mind. He said that both he and Mrs. Harrison had lost weight over the past week because they were so upset that they couldn't eat and that Mrs. Harrison had been having nightmares. He assured me once again that neither he nor Mrs. Harrison had anything to do with the blood that appeared in their home. He urged me to come to his home and try to find an explanation. I told him I would be there Saturday and that I hoped I could help them. I spoke with my police contact later and he promised me results from the DNA tests as soon as they came in. He said "if the DNA doesn't match the Harrisons we will have to reevaluate the whole situation". He offered to show me the crime scene photographs and the test results should I decide to go to Oklahoma. I am having a hard time believing that a 70 year old woman would have the means and the motive to stage such an elaborate hoax. I believe Mr. Harrison to be 100% convinced that the event was of a paranormal nature. The police believe Mr. Harrison is telling the truth as he sees it. There are still too many unanswered questions. Where did the blood come from? How did it get into such an unusual splatter pattern? Why would the Harrisons call the police if they had deliberately staged this event? If anyone out there has any theories we would certainly like to hear them. In The End.... I spoke with the Oklahoma City Police today and they have the results from their analysis of the blood. The blood matches Mrs. Harrisons. The police have concluded their investigation and they feel they have proven this episode was a hoax. The police believe that Mrs. Harrison staged the event by withdrawing several syringes worth of blood from herself and then spraying it around the area. They think the motive was to bring people back to church. I definitely feel Mr. Harrison was not aware of his wife's involvement, if indeed she was, until last Friday when he abruptly canceled my visit to his home. I still find it hard to believe a 70 year old woman would stage something like this but I must admit that the Harrisons lack of response to everyone involved in this case makes them look guilty. Like I have said previously, even though the blood matches hers, there are still other paranormal explanations that could apply. Unfortunately it seems we will not have a chance to prove or disprove anything. If Mrs. Harrison did stage this I hope it will not affect the way people respond to other paranormal cases. There are spirits out there and as Shakespeare said "there are stranger things in heaven and earth........" ~Kriss |
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