Beware the Night (6 page)

After thorough physical and psychological tests found no diagnosable disorder, she was released—and contacted Bishop McKenna for an exorcism. During the ritual, nothing happened until the bishop touched a relic to her head and said, “Devil, if you are in her, I adjure you in the name of Jesus Christ Our Lord to reveal yourself.”

The demon spoke in the mother’s normal voice, saying “I am the spirit of a person.” Already it had betrayed itself, since human spirits aren’t subject to exorcism.

The bishop ignored this and asked, “Why did you enter her?”

The response was extremely revealing. “Because she offered herself through a Ouija board.” I can still remember how this woman sat through the ritual still as a statue, with only her eyes moving in a strange circular motion. It’s a very sad story, because the ritual ultimately failed. We never saw the young mother again and can only pray that she hasn’t given up fighting the demon that enslaved her though a Ouija board.

In the Westchester case, however, Joe and I felt that these foolish children were probably not to blame—and assured them that we didn’t hold them responsible for the troubles that had befallen their family. Although their Ouija board use may have brought the demon, we didn’t want to burden them with guilt, especially since we had another suspect. As the interview continued, we learned that the mysterious ex-tenant had a dark side that went well beyond his taste in wall colors. Although the Villanovas weren’t able to give us a lot of detail about him, they’d recently found out that Mr. Paint-It-Black had a criminal record and was rumored to be into a lot of strange stuff, including the occult. Admittedly, the evidence against him was circumstantial, but we both felt it was he who had invited the powerful demon—or demons—into this home.

Just as we were wrapping up the questions, Luciana let out a horrible shriek. The demon had brazenly attacked her, right in front of us! A curved red gash now ran down her smooth check, like a taunting calling card from the Devil. While we were videotaping the mark, she screamed again. The unseen force had just pulled her hair, hard enough to jerk her head to the side.

That settled it: Even though an exorcist was involved, the evil in this house was so strong that we decided to attempt our own ritual in the house that very night. Although we weren’t as well prepared as we’d like to have been, we didn’t get into the Work to walk away from people in trouble. To leave a family alone in this situation would be a crime.

Soon after we began the Pope Leo XIII prayer, a minor form of exorcism we use in the Work, all the dogs in the neighborhood—including the Villanovas’ pet, who had been following us around from room to room, with his St. Benedict medal jingling on his collar—became extremely agitated. Joe and I had never heard such deafening barking and howling in our lives, and asked the family if this had ever happened before. The answer was no, so we knew that at that very moment, demons were fleeing the house.

The most powerful spirit, however, wouldn’t be banished so easily. It knew it was close to a full possession, so it chose to stay and fight, while the lesser forces ran from our relics and holy water. While we were in the basement, near the doors I’d backed away from earlier that night, it brazenly attacked again.

Carl came racing down the stairs. “Come quick! Something’s happening to Gabby!”

In the living room, we found the mother trembling uncontrollably, as if she were having a seizure. The demon was trying to possess her—right then and there. In a breathless, gasping voice, she told us she could feel it entering her body. Then she went completely rigid. Her mouth opened stiffly, like a marionette’s jaw, and she stammered, “H-h-holy ones, begone! H-h-harm will come to all!”

We couldn’t believe our eyes—we’d seen possessed people before, but never had a diabolic power invaded someone while we were standing there with holy water in hand, conducting an exorcism. We knew we were in the presence of one of Hell’s more dangerous devils.

We weren’t about to be chased off by some demon, no matter how terrible its powers might be, so we came on strong, our guns blazing. Holding up our two relics of the True Cross, Joe’s and mine, we touched the precious slivers to Gabby’s head and used the most potent weapon of all—the name of Jesus Christ—to command the evil force to depart and leave this woman in peace. Powerful as this spirit was, it couldn’t withstand the ultimate torment, and grudgingly released its grasp on Gabby. She slowly returned to her senses, as if waking up from a dream, and had no memory of what had occurred.

There was still dreadful danger in this room, so we checked that everyone was still wearing a St. Benedict medal, and then anointed each person with blessed oil. Now that the family was secure, we resumed the ritual, reading the Pope Leo XIII prayer numerous times throughout the house until we were practically hoarse. All that wasn’t enough to bring the case to a close: We knew that we’d managed to weaken this demon and halt its attempts at possession, but to get rid of it entirely, we’d either need a full team of investigators or an ordained clergyman, trained as an exorcist.

We were still reluctant to leave the family, knowing that phenomena would still take place, though to a lesser degree. But we took comfort in knowing that they now had the means to fight back. We’d exposed the demonic charade and put an end to any communication with the foul spirit. We’d also given the family weapons: holy water, blessed salt, and, most of all, the name of Jesus Christ on their lips.

We continued our prayers until Father Williams, the parish priest, arrived. After we brought him up to speed on our investigation, he agreed that the family would now come under his guidance, until Father Hayes was able to perform an exorcism. As we packed up our equipment, the look on the little boy’s face was like a kick in the gut to me. “Daddy,” he cried. “Don’t let these people leave!”

We hated to go but were sure the family was in good hands. Unfortunately, we were wrong. Several months later we got a call from the Villanovas: They were still under supernatural siege. To his credit, the local priest had followed through with what he promised, but due to health problems, the exorcist wasn’t able to come after all.

Joe and I had learned a lesson or two from our first visit, and after intense spiritual preparation, we returned on a Saturday afternoon with three investigators and enough supplies to exorcise an entire city block. Sadly, Dominick was now in terrible financial straits: Because of the problems his family was having, he’d missed too many days of work and had lost his job as a bookkeeper. Unless he found new employment soon, the bank would foreclose on his house. Hearing this news fired us up with even more determination to expel the demon and allow this good man to get on with his life.

First, we sent the women and children to a nearby church with Chris, one of our investigators, for their protection, then got a quick update on the situation from Dominick. After our first exorcism, the spirit left the family alone a day or two: a normal M.O. for the demonic, who love psychological warfare. Just as the Villanovas thought they were safe, the attacks resumed. Shoes, books, and jars began flying around again but rarely hit anyone. Doors inexplicably slammed, and the imprint of a face appeared on the dining room ceiling.

While the violence toward Luciana had dwindled—she still suffered an occasional scratch—the demon had now taken to venting its wrath on religious articles. Holy water we’d left on our last visit mysteriously turned brown in its bottle, and the figure of Jesus Christ was torn off one of the children’s rosaries. After two priests blessed the house, the imprint of an animal skull appeared on the basement mirror. In one of the stranger manifestations I’ve heard of, a pale, disembodied arm grabbed at the bride-to-be when she was sitting on the living room loveseat; and a featureless black shape was seen drifting down the stairs.

You may be wondering why Father Williams, the parish priest, didn’t conduct an exorcism himself. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to get his bishop’s permission to do this—a requirement in the Catholic Church before a priest can perform the ritual. However, he did his utmost to help and support the family, not just with spiritual guidance, but by spending an entire night in their house, along with another priest. I admire both priests’ guts for this: It couldn’t have been easy for them to spend so much time in a demonically oppressed home. In fact, during their stay, they actually witnessed a terrifying phenomenon, when a bedroom bureau began jumping around right in front of them.

For two hours, we fought the Devil room by room. Armed with blessed incense, holy water, blessed salt, and the most potent weapon of all, our relics of the True Cross, we stationed investigators on each floor to hold simultaneous rituals, thus attacking the demon from above and below. We worked in pairs, so one person could focus on conducting the ritual, while the other was alert for any sign of demonic activity. And more important still, the backup investigator kept a close watch on his partner—to make sure that the person doing the exorcism wasn’t being attacked himself. External phenomena don’t need to be taking place: The attack also can be psychological, like the stark terror that seized me in the basement of this house on our previous visit. If an investigator has any psychic abilities, he or she could be assailed through those powers. Since an attack could come at any time, to either partner, everyone must be constantly on guard.

We began by opening every closet, cabinet, and drawer in the room we were exorcising, leaving no dark, enclosed space for the demonic to hide. Because they are spirit and have no physical bodies, malignant beings can conceal themselves anywhere. Next, we lit blessed incense, which helps dispel negative vibrations and repel evil spirits, since they are tormented by anything holy or blessed. As always, we started the ritual with the St. Michael prayer, one of two prayers that were divinely revealed to Pope Leo XIII. While celebrating mass in 1884, the Holy Father was suddenly seized by such a profound rapture that he fell to the floor as if dead. When he woke, he told his cardinals of a terrible vision he’d had, in which the Devil taunted Jesus by saying that, given enough time and power, he could destroy mankind. Our Savior gave Satan permission to test humanity over the decades to come. No sooner did the Pontiff finish relating this prophecy than he asked for pen and paper and wrote prayers to help defeat Satan.

Pope Leo XIII directed that the first of these prayers, officially titled “Prayer to St. Michael the Archangel,” be added to the official Catholic mass. It calls upon the archangel to “be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the Devil” and “by the power of God thrust into hell Satan and the other evil spirits who prowl about the world seeking the ruin of souls.” This prayer was said at the end of mass until 1968, when it was eliminated as part of the changes of Vatican II. It continues to be recited in Traditionalist Catholic churches, and Pope John Paul II recently urged it be restored to the modern Catholic mass, feeling that the grave evils of this world mean that we need St. Michael’s intervention more than ever before.

Pope Leo XIII’s second prayer, “Exorcism Against Satan and the Rebellious Angels,” which we call the Pope Leo XIII prayer for short, is extremely powerful against the demonic. The Holy Father exhorted priests to say this prayer as often as possible to curb the Devil’s power and prevent him from doing harm. He gave the faithful permission to say it in their own name, as they would any approved prayer, “whenever action of the Devil is suspected, causing malice in men, violent temptations, and even storms and various calamities.” That’s exactly what we did in the Villanovas’ home, moving from room to room as we prayed. We sprinkled all four corners of each room and the interior of every closet with holy water to consecrate the area, then repeated the process with blessed salt, which has the same effect, except that it has the virtue of lasting longer.

As we performed the ritual, we burned so much blessed incense that the place looked like it was on fire. Ironically, this case, which had begun with a figure who rose from a cloud of smoke, was ended in the swirling, sweet-smelling fumes of holy incense and the sound of fervent prayers, which made the house so hostile to the demonic that “the lady” was forced to disappear, this time for good. A feeling of peace pervaded the home, signaling that we’d succeeded in evicting the spirit. When the women and children returned from the church with Chris, they rejoiced that their ordeal was over.

The family’s gratitude was humbling because we knew it wasn’t us who should be thanked, but God, whose Son gave us authority over evil in His name, and all praise should be given to Him. We led the Villanovas in a prayer of thanksgiving to Him who is above all.

Chapter Three

Cops and Soul Robbers

E
VEN IN MY
wildest boyhood fantasies, I never imagined I’d grow up to be a cop—or a demonologist. Actually, I considered both occupations pretty scary, though I loved to read about them. One of my earliest memories was going into the Queens Center Mall and seeing the book
The Exorcist.
I talked my mother into buying it for me and couldn’t wait to get home and start reading it. I found the story extremely frightening. When the movie came out, I begged my parents to take me. Because of all the hype about it being the scariest film ever made, they debated if I was too young to see it but relented after quite a bit of pleading from me. They knew how much I loved horror movies.

Standing in line outside the Utopia Movie Theater on Union Turnpike, in Queens, I was filled with a mix of excitement and apprehension. I was the only kid my age in line, and that added to my fear. Throughout the film, I was riveted to my seat, but what sticks out in my mind and terrified me the most was when the eyes rolled back in the girl’s head and only the whites were showing. I’m sure that most people’s vision of what demonology is all about came from that movie: Mine certainly did—until I participated in real exorcisms, years later, and learned that only in the imagination of Hollywood screenwriters do people’s heads spin around. And although I’ve heard of people levitating during the ritual, I have yet to see it happen myself. All that revolting green vomit was more Hollywood hype, but I know of cases where possessed people have vomited stranger things than that—such as worms or nails—during an exorcism.