During the summer of 2013, when we were in our mid20s, my friend Rachel asked if I wanted to join her, her boyfriend, and a couple of his friends on a camping trip up in the Catskills. It was shaping up to be a really nice, dry summer, and I knew her boyfriend and his buddies were chill. So, I think anyone would have found the invitation nice. But for me personally, I was way beyond stoked for the prospect of going on my first ever camping trip. And the reason it was my first stems from a time in
my life that I don't even remember anymore. I'm getting the story secondhand from my mom, who to this day is furious that my dad let this happen. But here goes. When I was just 3 years old, some of my dad's old college friends asked if he wanted to join them for a few hours of barbecuing up in one of New York's state parks. He did, and this resulted in toddler me accompanying him. But apparently, while Dad and his buddies were flipping ribe eyes and talking trash, yours truly went off for a little unsanctioned wander. Then
when dad and his friends realized that I'd wandered off, they went into a total panic. They went running around the park like men possessed trying to find me. And when they finally did, I was wailing so loud that they heard me long before they saw me. I didn't drop it either. I was still mad when he got me back home, which is how mom found out that he'd almost lost me during a barbecue trip to the woods with friends. And that was that. Mom developed this general anxiety about me being near any kind of forest
or wooded area, like the whole thing had given her some irrational fear. And this meant no hiking, no camping, and most definitely no summer camp. And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why I was so stoked to get that invitation. Eventually, Rachel and her boyfriend decided that we'd head up to a place called Papton Reservoir for a long weekend. Papton was 12 mi away from the nearest town, but with Highway 30 running all along its southern shore, it was nicely accessible with a couple of cabins and campgrounds, but still secluded enough to feel wild. At least
to a bunch of city people, it felt wild. But to us, wild meant fun. We drove up towards the end of July with the five of us packed into Rachel's old Honda, and we drove until we found a little peninsula with a parking lot, campground, and a boat launch. There were a couple of cabins on the opposite side of the highway, but apart from that, there was nothing but the reservoir, the highway, and what looked like endless woodland beyond. We stuck to our little peninsula for a while, unloading the car and setting up camp. And
then after a campfire dinner of beans and hot dogs, we had a few beers as the sun went down and then headed to our sleeping bags. The next morning, we headed down to the shore in ones and twos to get an early morning rinse. And then as the boys occupied themselves skimming stones across the water, me and Rachel decided to explore the other side of the highway. I was excited to explore the woods. I mean, it felt like this whole other magical world to me, even being as old as I was. But our little walk
served another purpose, too. As we walked up and down a short, dirt road lined with mostly empty cabins, Rachel told me all about how baby crazy she was getting. She wanted to start a family while she was still in her prime childbearing years, she said. But her boyfriend didn't seem anywhere near ready for that kind of responsibility. Apparently, they talked it over and Rachel wanted to stop taking her birth control, but she wouldn't until her boyfriend started taking the whole thing seriously. He claimed he was. She thought he wasn't. And we just kept on talking
about the whole thing as we walked away from the cabins and further into the woods. Since I had this irrational fear of getting lost in the woods, or not so irrational given my history, I had my compass with me and Rachel kept poking fun because I was almost constantly checking our direction. I made some joke about how since she was so worried about the direction her relationship was taking, then it was down to me to worry about the direction of her hike. And she just rolled her eyes as I laughed a little. But after a
few more minutes of walking, I wasn't really laughing anymore. I remember stopping dead in the middle of a trail and then turning very quiet. Rachel asked what had gotten into me, but I couldn't answer. I wanted to, but the words wouldn't come out. And when I finally was able, this is what I told her. Around the time I started middle school, I started having these reoccurring nightmares. Mom thought that they were some kind of belated trauma response to getting lost in those woods when I was still little, while dad thought that they were some manifestation
of my concerns with starting a new school. I had no idea why I was having them. I just know that it was hell waking up every night with my sheets soaked with cold sweat. I've been walking through the woods like dark fairy tale woods, all these twisted roots and branches with no leaves, and then I come across a small stone house. It was so small that it couldn't have been more than one room inside. And the inside looked completely dark, like whatever was in there was swallowing up all the light. In that nightmare, I'd want
to run away, but I couldn't. It was like my feet had grown roots and kept me glued to the spot as something shuffled into view from the edges of my vision. It was a creature with skin like tree bark and hair like flames. Then, as it staggered towards the little stone house, it would always smile at me before walking into the darkness inside. And it was that smile which used to scare the living hell out of me. The creature had blood all over its teeth and dripping down its chin like it had just eaten one
little girl and still had room for another. But then, instead of dragging me inside, the creature just turned its back and walked into the dark. But I still had this feeling of absolute dread gripping me because in my nightmare, I knew that sooner or later, I'd walk into the darkness all on my own, whether I wanted to or not, and the creature would be waiting for me. I'm sure a lot of you can now understand why I was so frightened by that nightmare, especially since I used to have it at least two or three times
a week for almost 2 years. Mom ended up organizing a visit to a child psychologist, but nothing she advised seemed to help. And then one day when I was a high school sophomore, the nightmares just kind of stopped. The psychologist said it was just the natural progression of things. And the sudden end to the nightmares was probably due to me feeling much more settled at school. I was so happy that I'd stopped having them that I didn't really care why I'd stopped having them. Then over the years that followed, reminders of the dream became less
and less frequent. Then with the stresses of high school, it faded to the back of my mind. And that's where they stayed too for maybe seven or eight years until I was walking through the woods and it all came flooding back to me. And the reason it came flooding back was because it felt like the exact same scenery as my nightmare from all those years before. It wasn't a debilitating kind of shock I was feeling like I didn't break down crying or start begging to turn back. But having that sensation hit me right between the
eyes, having it all looked so uncanny. It was definitely a freaky experience. Rachel, on the other hand, was looking at me like she didn't quite know what to say. And to be honest, I understood. We were both very rational, skeptical people averse to all things woowoo. Then there I was talking about an old nightmare I used to have like it was memories of a past life or something. She kept that look on her face for a moment before asking, "Is uh everything all right with you?" I was fine. At least I thought I was. Then
as we kept walking, I filled her in on the whole woodland activities ban that mom had imposed when I was a kid. I remember how Rachel laughed and said, "It's all starting to make sense now. You're basically an agorophobic." At the time, I thought she was right. I still think she was right in a sense. It's just not the same kind of right that I first figured as we were walking through those woods. As we turned back towards camp, that weird feeling in the pit of my stomach seemed to unnod itself, and I started to
enjoy myself again. I figured talking it out with Rachel had helped a bunch and it was my first time walking through a forest in almost 20some years. So maybe it really was just my mind playing tricks on me. But it wasn't. Something was out there just waiting for me to find it. So we had lunch, lounged around on the shore for a couple of hours soaking up the sun, and then went for a swim to work on an appetite for dinner. Then later, while sitting around the campfire, Rachel started playfully joking about my little deja
vu experience on our morning hike. It was a very good-natured attempt at humor, like she wasn't being mean or anything, but the comments sparked a wider conversation that, thanks to her boyfriend's buddies, touched on things like past lives, remote viewing, and other seemingly illogical stuff. Or at least it seemed illogical until I started thinking about it. Maybe it was the alcohol that got me thinking they could be right in some way, but I had felt deja vu before. And what I felt on that hike was very, very strong. Like if dja vu was Budweiser, then
what I experienced was like straight Titos. Same ballpark, just way more intense. I woke up the next morning feeling considerably more rational. And we repeated the morning ritual of heading down to the shore with our towels, soap, and bathing suits to wash away the mental cobwebs. We then had ourselves some breakfast while we decided what to do with our Saturday, then agreed to head out into the woods on an extended hike. Since I was feeling back to my regular self again, I was super excited to get back on the trails, and the next couple of
hours were just fantastic. The weather was great. Rachel's boyfriend and his buddies were great company and perfect gentlemen, really. And the trails weren't too rough or demanding for what amounted to my first real hike. We packed ourselves some lunch in the form of some crackers, jerky, and granola bars. And I know I drank like a metric ton of water, too, because it wasn't long before I needed to use the bathroom. I was a little shy about being outside around others. So much so that I ended up putting at least 50 or 60 yards between me
and the group before I felt comfortable enough to drop my shorts. And when I finally found a nice enough spot, I did my business, pulled up my shorts, and then kind of instinctually looked over my shoulder just to make sure that I was still alone. I looked one way, then the other, and that's when I noticed something about the treetops in the near distance, and how oddly familiar they seemed. Then, the longer I looked, the more that skin crawling feeling of deja vu came slowly creeping back. I kept telling myself I should stay put, that
I was messing with some kind of mental health thing, and that I'd lived a regret not being more cautious. But in the end, I just couldn't help myself. I had to know why I was feeling the way I did. And at the time, only the woods seemed like they had any answers. So, I walked towards the oddly familiar treetops, the trunks of which were hidden behind a low rise. And then, as I crested that, I suddenly felt myself beginning to feel faint. because what I saw was impossible. It was a small concrete structure, maybe shoulder
height and just a few feet wide, with a slanted concrete roof in the shape of an inverted V. The entrance was fairly small, but it was deep enough to shroud the furthest point in a haze of darkness. I'd seen it before. It didn't look exactly the same as I remembered, but I had seen it before, hundreds of times, in fact. and that horrible repetitive nightmare I'd done so much to forget. And I couldn't believe it. All those years of thinking it was something my imagination had cooked up and it had been real the whole time.
I can barely explain the feeling because the structure wasn't the exact same as the one from the nightmare. It wasn't a little stone cottage with a door and a window and whatnot, but at the same time, I just sort of knew like it had lit up some long dormant synapse in my brain that said, "We've seen this before." But if I'd seen it before, if I'd seen it in my nightmares, what about the monster I saw? The one with skin like bark and hair like fire? Being the skeptic that I am, and even though I
was 99% certain that no such supernatural creature exists in the world, having the ultravivid feeling of deja vu had me so unsettled that just for a moment, I found myself terrified something was about to emerge from the structure shadows. Obviously, that didn't happen because unless you're counting grizzly bears and tigers and all of that, monsters aren't real. But curiosity drew me further and further towards that structure until finally I was just a few feet away from its entrance. And like I said, it went back pretty deep. So deep I couldn't see all the way in
without crouching down and sort of peering inside to let my eyes adjust to the dark. Then when I did, I could see the shape of something covered up by layers of dead leaves and small branches. It felt like I was at the end of some years'sl long journey. I couldn't just stand up and walk away, no matter how strong the feeling of dread was burning away inside my chest. And so I leaned in further and brushed away some of the foliage covering the shape and saw a boot. It looked old, like it had been there
for years, maybe even decades. And I don't know what possessed me, but I decided to reach in and just drag it out. But when I did and I tugged it free, I saw a length of bone come with it. I knew it wasn't just an animal bone. Not because I'm some expert in anatomy or anything like that, but because of the way it shifted right as I moved the boot, like I disturbed something that had been resting for a very long time. I pulled back immediately as that magnetic feeling of curiosity turned to one of
overwhelming repulsion and I got up and I ran all the way back to Rachel and the group where I breathlessly relayed what I had just seen. I didn't say anything about my childhood nightmares or that weird feeling that I'd seen it or been there before. There was no time for anything like that because there was something very real in that strange concrete structure. I asked someone to call 911, but Rachel's boyfriend and his buddies insist on seeing the bones before they called anyone. And I get it. I don't think they didn't believe me so much
as they couldn't believe what I was telling them. I mean, we'd already kind of established that I was a total newbie when it came to hiking and camping and all of that. But when I said that I was sure that it wasn't an animal bone, I know they must have felt a hell of a lot of doubt and therefore wanted to see it for themselves. Well, we walked all the way out to the trees that I'd recognized and that weird concrete playhouse type thing. Then when they looked inside, they had almost the exact same holy
crap reaction I did. And then whoever's cell phone had bars ended up calling the cops. We had to wait around for an hour or so for them to arrive. But when they did, two cops pulled over to the side of the highway after we waved them down. Then we walked them out to that concrete structure and where a human skeleton was partially covered in leaf litter. They took one look at it before one of them started speaking into his radio and saying how they needed all kinds of assistance to secure the crime scene and examine
the remains. The cops asked us a bunch of questions while they waited for their partners to show up. But obviously no one really had anything to tell them except for me. Again, I didn't say anything about my nightmares. I just told them about finding the body after wandering off to go to the bathroom. And then after that, since we obviously weren't suspects, the cops told us that we were free to leave, but that they might be in touch. As we walked back to our camp, I felt terrible for being such a buzzkill. But I was
so freaked out from finding those bones that I couldn't get myself settled in again. So, I asked Rachel if it was okay to just give me a ride back home. She told me it was no problem at all. And then we kind of jointly rolled our eyes when the boys said that there was no way in hell they were leaving. They actually thought it was kind of cool that I'd found somebody and wanted to hang out to see if the media showed up. And that was whatever. I guess boys will be boys. And Rachel hadn't
mentioned what I told about my dream. And all they knew was that I got that creepy sense of deja vu. So I don't blame them for not totally understanding why I couldn't stay. But I just couldn't handle being there. And as we drove away, it felt like this huge weight was being lifted off my chest and I could breathe again. Rachel dropped me back off at my apartment and then decided that she'd stay with me overnight before driving back to the Catskills in the morning as the boys still needed a ride back home. She must
have figured that I needed someone to talk to and I really did because I couldn't reconcile the bizarre similarities between what I'd seen in my dream and what I'd found out in those woods. I'd never known anything to stretch my skepticism to its absolute limits, and it was not a pleasant experience. I didn't know if I was going crazy or not, and I clung to the hope that there was some kind of rational explanation for what was going on. Thankfully, it turned out there was some kind of rational explanation. I just inadvertently delayed hearing it
by avoiding talking to the one person I needed to, my mother. And for reasons that should be pretty obvious by now, I had no intentions whatsoever telling my mom about that camping trip. I didn't want to worry her or potentially start some kind of argument. So, I kept my mouth shut about it, and I continued to keep my mouth shut about it for a whole 24 hours or so before I finally broke and called her. She wasn't mad that I'd gone to the Cat Skills. She wasn't mad that I hadn't told her either. She wasn't
happy about it, but she appreciated that I was a grown woman who could make my own choices. I told her everything from feeling weird to finding that body. And then when I was finished, she asked where exactly we'd visited and I told her the cat skills. And after a couple of seconds of silence, she asked where exactly. Then when I told her we were camped near that reservoir, she says, "Oh god, let me call your father. I'll get right back to you when I'm done. She called back within minutes and then told me something along
the lines of, "Sweetie, I need you to brace yourself for me, but the place you went missing when you were a kid, it was up near that reservoir. The reason why it felt like you'd been there before. It's because you have." I guess these days I kind of kick myself for not putting it together sooner. But I guess it's also a testament to just how powerful the brain is in terms of filing away memories you think you've forgotten. I ended up contacting the cops who dealt with that body just to try and fill in the
gaps in the story a little. They didn't know the whole story either and at first they weren't too excited on sharing any details with me. But when I said that I gotten lost in the area as a child and had these sort of weird nightmarish/memories about a monster crawling into the concrete structure, they suddenly got very interested in what I had to say. I won't go into everything that was said. It was a long and meandering conversation that touched on a lot of stuff that I've already covered, but this is the long and short of
it. I'm 99% certain that I saw the person who died in that structure, which turned out to be half-finish housing for an electrical transformer or something like that, walk in there before they passed away. The cops said that they figured the guy was some hunter because there were scraps of camouflage clothing still clinging to that skeleton's leg bones, which was probably why the monster in my dream had skin-like bark. And then its hair that looked like fire. Well, you guessed it, an orange hunting cover that turned to flames in my nightmare. But what about the
blood all around that creature's mouth? Well, both me and the cops figured that following some kind of severe hunting accident, the guy realized that he was dying and probably wasn't going to make it. So, rather than die out in the open where his body would almost certainly be torn apart by animals, he crawled into that half-built transformer housing and then just laid down and died in the hopes that someone would end up finding him. The only thing the cops wouldn't talk to me about, and not because they didn't know it themselves, was what exactly caused
the wound which killed the hunter. They knew. I'm almost certain of it because they told me they'd completed a forensics exam of the bones. They just wouldn't tell me if it was a gunshot which killed the man, which possibly indicated murder, or if the wound had been caused by something like a sharp branch or a deer's antler or something, in which case it could have been nothing more than a tragic hunting accident. I'd like to be able to say that I'd helped in some way, too. But nothing I had to say did anything for the
investigation other than roughly confirm the date of the man's death, which the cops already had an idea of anyways, thanks to whatever they did. And I guess the only good thing that came of it for me personally was the clarity and closure I got from talking to the police. It was a relief like no other to know that I wasn't going crazy and that I had a damn good reason for feeling so off in those woods. Especially those woods where I had been traumatized so horribly when I was still just a toddler. I can only
hope that someday they figure out what happened so that poor man can finally rest in complete and everlasting [Music] peace. So, I've been wanting to get this off my chest for a while now, and I figured your channel might be the place to do it. It's the story of how me and my boyfriend Andy along with our friends Steve and Kathy decided to go hiking in Ocala National Forest up in northern Florida. It was supposed to be a fun week, you know, just getting out in nature away from work and all of that, but it
turned into the scariest thing I've ever been through. And I'm honestly shaking right now just thinking about it. It all started out so great. We drove up early Saturday morning, excited to hit the trails. The weather was perfect, too. sunny, warm, but not too hot. The forest was gorgeous with these huge trees and all kinds of birds tripping away and and we got up close and personal at one point with a deer just sort of standing there staring at us and Steve even tried to snap a picture but it bolted before he could. And so
we hiked for a few hours, not on some hardcore trail, just a nice and easy one. We took a bunch of pictures, ate some snacks, and then by the afternoon we were ready to set up camp. And that's when we stumbled onto this spot that looked like a disused campground or maybe even a trailer park. It was kind of rundown, like nobody had been there in forever. There was a clearing, some old fire pits half overgrown with weeds, and I'll be honest, it felt perfect. And we're thinking, yeah, this is it. And it made us
feel very adventurous, you know. And so we set up our tents, me and Andy and one, Steven, Kathy and the other. And then we gathered some firewood and got ourselves settled in. That first night was so much fun at first. We got a campfire going and the smell of wood burning just made everything feel cozy. We brought some beers. Nothing too crazy, just enough to relax. Kathy and I hooked up my little portable speaker to my phone and we played some music. We even danced around the fire a bit, probably looking like total dorks, but
we didn't care. It was one of those nights where you feel like nothing can go wrong, like you're in your own little bubble away from the rest of the world. We stayed up pretty late telling stories and joking around and until we finally got tired and crawled into our tents. I fell asleep fast, all happy and warm next to Andy, thinking it was the best weekend ever. And then everything went to hell. I don't even know what time it was, but I woke up suddenly. And then I smelled it. Smoke. But lots of it. Way
more than just a campfire. My eyes popped open. I looked out the tent flap and my god, there were flames everywhere. And it looked like the whole forest was on fire. It wasn't just a little campfire gone wrong. It was this huge roaring wall of orange and red. And I could hear it, too. This loud crackling and popping like the whole world was burning up around us. My heart started pounding so hard that I thought it would bust out of my chest. And I screamed and shook Andy awake, yelling, "Fire! And he wake up, there's
a fire. He bolts up, sees it, and his face goes pale. We could feel the heat already seeping into the tent, and the smoke was stinging our eyes, and we had to move, and we had to move fast. We scrambled out barefoot, half panicked, and ran to Steve and Cathy's tent. I was yelling their names, slapping the fabric, and Andy was shouting, "Get up! We got to go now!" They stumbled out, looking confused and sleepy. But when they saw the flames, they freaked out, too. And we looked around, and it was bad. The fire was
on three sides of us, closing in fast. The only way out was this patch of woods behind us that wasn't burning yet. I grabbed my phone and wallet from the tent floor. Andy snatched his flashlight, and Steve Kathy grabbed some bare essentials, too. We left everything, our bags, our food, the tents, all of it. And we ran for our lives. We ran into the woods, stumbling over roots and branches in the dark. Andy's flashlight was bouncing all over the place, barely lighting the way, and the smoke was thick, making it hard to breathe, and my
lungs were burning. I could hear Kathy coughing behind me. Steve was yelling at us to keep going, and we could still see the glow of the fire behind us, this terrible orange light chasing us behind the trees. And I was terrified. Fullon contemplating that we were going to die. Terrified. My legs were shaking, but I just kept running because what else could I do? And all I could think was, "We have to get out. We have to get out." And it was complete chaos. There were branches scratching at my arms. My bare feet were getting
cut up on the rocks, but I didn't care. And we had to get away from that fire at all cost. I kept looking back and it felt like the flames were right on our heels, like some monster out of a horror movie. And my mind was racing. How did this even happen? Did our campfire spread? Was it something else? Was it our fault? But there was no time to figure it out. We were running blind, hoping that we'd hit a road or something, anything safe. And then, just when I thought that it couldn't get worse,
out of the darkness, these people appeared. I didn't even see them coming. And then they were blocking our path. They seemed to be wearing masks that looked like they were made of cloth, only with the weird painted faces and rings around the eyeholes. And they had weapons, too. Some had baseball bats, others had belts, and one guy definitely had a chain because I remember the sound that it made when he swung it. There were maybe five or six of them, and they moved at us so fast that we couldn't really do anything. Before I could
even scream, they began hitting us. One of them grabbed me by the hair and yanked me back so hard that I fell. I hit the ground and then the sharp pain exploded in my side where he jabbed me in the ribs with his bat. I screamed, curling up, trying to cover myself, but he kicked me again right in the stomach. I could hear Andy yelling, but then he grunted loud, and I looked to see that the thug with the chain had whipped him across the back with it. He fell to his knees and I thought
that I was going to lose it. Steve and Kathy were getting it really bad and I saw Steve try to shield her but one of them cracked him in the shoulder with a bat and he went down. Kathy sobbing was trying to pull him up but they just kept coming. It wasn't just the beating that was bad enough. It was the things that they were saying too. And oh my god, it was the most disgusting vile stuff I've ever heard. They were yelling that we were going to die, that they do horrible things to us
first. Stuff I can't even type out because it makes me sick. It was like they enjoyed it, like they wanted us to be scared as possible. Every hit hurt so bad and my arm felt like it might be broken. My legs were all cut up from the falling and getting back up. I was crying, shaking, thinking this was it, that they were going to kill us right there in the woods with a fire roaring behind us. And that's when it hit me. It was probably them that set the fire just to corral us into their
trap. I don't know how long it lasted. It felt like hours, but it was probably just minutes. We kept trying to run, dodging between trees, but they'd chase us, laughing and swinging their weapons. Annie grabbed my hand at one point and pulled me up, and we just bolted, not even looking where we were going. Steve and Kathy were right behind us. I knew because I could hear them gasping and crying. And then all of a sudden those thugs just stopped following us and they started to yell. I don't know why. Maybe they were just done.
But I don't think so. I think something else out there scared them. Something even scarier than weapon wielding maniacs. Maybe a rival gang, a bear. Who knows? But we didn't stop to find out. We kept running, tripping over everything until we couldn't hear them anymore and the trees started thinning out. We finally burst out of the woods into this little town nearby. And I don't even remember how we got there, just that we were suddenly on a road, panting, bleeding. We were a mess. Clothes torn, bruises and cuts all over, barefoot, and shaking like crazy.
We found the sheriff's office and practically fell through the door. The sheriff looked shocked when he saw us, like he couldn't believe what he was seeing. Gave us some water and we told him everything. the fire, the masked guys, all of it. And my voice was shaky. I could barely get the words out. And he wrote it all down and said that he'd send someone out to check it out. We went to the hospital and the cops went out to that location we described. And sure enough, everything was burned, all of our things and a
lot of the surrounding trees. There was no sign of that gang, obviously, and it didn't sound like any of the young troublemakers in that area. I honestly still can't believe it happened. We were just trying to have a fun weekend and it turned into this terrible nightmare that I can't shake. I keep seeing those faces in my head and hearing their voices and feeling the pain all over again. And I haven't slept right since. Every time I close my eyes, I'm back in those woods running from the fire and those psychos. Andy's got nightmares, too.
And Kathy said Steve's been very quiet, like he's still kind of processing it. And we're all messed up in our own unique ways. And one thing all of us wonder was what was out there that could have scared those guys even more than they wanted to scare us. So yeah, I just had to tell someone about this. And I guess I want to warn you all, too. Be careful when you go out in those woods. I used to love camping, hiking, all that kind of stuff. But now I'm scared to death of it. You never
know who's out there with you. Crazy people like those thugs could be anywhere hiding and waiting. Tell someone where you're going. Stick to places that aren't so remote. And maybe don't camp at some creepy abandoned spot like we decided. I don't know if the sheriff ever found those guys or what started the fire, but I don't care anymore. I just want people to stay safe. This was the worst night of my life, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. [Music] On August 2nd of 1982, the Johnson family traveled from their home in the rural Canadian
community of Westbank to the Wells Grey Provincial Park in British Columbia. The group consisted of Bob and Jackie Johnson, both in their 40s, along with their two daughters, 13-year-old Janet and 11-year-old Karen. Accompanying them were Jackie's parents, George and Edith Bentley, who joined them for a two-week camping vacation at a place called Bear Creek near the site of an old derelict penitentiary. Intent on paddling up and down the nearby creek, the family of experienced campers brought along a small boat along with a camper van packed with food, water, and medical supplies. The Johnson's were ready
for just about anything, and it seemed like 2 weeks of wholesome woodland fun awaited them. Yet, unbeknownst to all, they were doomed to befall a tragedy of horrifying proportions. 2 weeks later, on the morning of August 16th, employees at Gorman Brothers Lumber noticed one of their fellow workers had failed to clock in. 44year-old Bob Johnson wasn't the kind of guy to pull a no-show, but since his boss had been informed of his recent camping trip to Wells Gray, he granted Johnson a few days grace to account for extenduating circumstances. The next day, he tried giving
Bob a call, but got no response. He tried again the next day, but once again, his call went unanswered. Finally, and following a week of slowly mounting concern, Bob's boss reported him missing to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Search and rescue teams began scouring the area surrounding Bear Creek, the Johnson's family's last known location. Yet to their confusion, neither the Johnson's nor their vehicles were anywhere to be found. What followed were four weeks of fruitless searching and bitter frustration until finally on September 13th of 1982, a mushroom picker stumbled across a burnedout car in a
woodland clearing not far from a steep logging road. This logging road was over 13 mi away from the location of the Johnson's camp. Yet, the wreckage bore an eerie resemblance to the car that the family had traveled to the park in. After being alerted by the mushroom picker, RCMP officers were immediately dispatched to the scene. And when they arrived, they made a chilling discovery. Following an examination of the burned vehicle's interior, officers found a pile of charred bones in the back seat. The remains were carefully bagged and transported for analysis. And while many had hoped
they might be nothing but animal bones, their worst fears were soon confirmed. The charred skeletons, which had been unceremoniously shoved into the car, dowsed an accelerant, and set a light, belonged to the missing Johnson family. In their subsequent investigation, police began interviewing local residents, one of whom claimed to have spotted the Johnson's camping much further away from Bear Creek than had originally been expected. After pinpointing the location of the second campsite, a search was organized and it didn't take long to find some beer caps of the brand known to be drunk by Bob Johnson along
with six spent 22 caliber bullet casings. However, the Johnson's 1981 Ford camper, not to mention the remainder of their possessions, were still nowhere to be found. For months, the investigation into the Johnson family's deaths failed to progress. In April of the following year, a television reenactment of the killings were filmed at the site of the murders, which was then broadcast across Canada. Police hoped the reenactment would yield fruitful leads, but despite being flooded with calls and tips, there were no breaks in the case. Police also went so far as to create a replica of the
family's Ford camper down to the very finest detail, including the aluminum boat, which had been strapped to its roof. Then in the late spring of 1983, they drove the trailer all the way from British Columbia to Quebec, hoping a sighting of it might prompt the right person to come forward. It was a bold move, but once again, it yielded no tangible results. And despite receiving 1300 alleged sightings, all were proven to be either at best mistaken sightings or at worst malicious disinformation. Eventually, on October 18th of 1983, and a total of 14 months following the
Johnson family's murders, their camper van was finally discovered by two forestry workers near Trophy Mountain. The location was just over 15 mi from the site of the murders and around 20 from where the Johnson's car was found. Forensic investigators determined that much like their car, some kind of accelerant had been used in the torching of the camper van, most likely gasoline mixed with some other variety of flammable liquid. It was also clear that someone had tried very hard to ensure the van was well hidden, and there was evidence someone had attempted to drive it into
a nearby gorge, but a patch of fallen logs had blocked their path. The RCMP had the van's burned out remains airlifted to its Vancouver crime lab. But although its remnants provided no clues, the location of its discovery proved of great interest to investigators. The abandoned logging road on Trophy Mountain, where the vehicle was found, was not easy to access, with one local resident saying that only someone who knew the area would have been aware of such an isolated spot. In other words, Johnson's killer lived chillingly close by. The theory prompted officers to return to their
door-to-door campasing with renewed vigor. And it was during this new period of questioning that they finally made a break in the case. After speaking with an unnamed member of a small rural community surrounding Wells Grey, police learned that around the same time as the murders, a man named David Shearing had asked them how to repair a hole in the door of a car, as well as how to reregister one. The 24year-old lived 3 mi from the site of the murders, and on November 19th of 1983, RCMP officers found shearing north of Cam Loops, where he
was due to appear in court on a stolen property charge. He was taken into custody and questioned extensively. What emerged was a classic story of the familial black sheep. Despite an extensive criminal record and a reputation for wild behavior, Shearing's father made his living as a prison guard and his brother was a sheriff in the provincial police force. He had been a solid student, graduated high school, and completed a heavy mechanics course. And somewhere along the way, something went wrong for young David. RCMP detectives Mike Eastm and Ken Lebo were convinced of Shearing's guilt and
gained his confidence by initially claiming his arrest was completely unrelated to the Johnson family murders. In fact, they got Shearing so relaxed that he agreed to be questioned without a lawyer and in doing so had walked right into the detective's trap. As it happened, David Shearing was actually one of the first individuals to have been interviewed by the RCMP following the discovery of the Johnson family's remains. The interview took place in Shearing's backyard, situated around a mile from the scene of the murders, and through one of his home's windows, an officer spotted a 22 caliber
rifle hanging on the wall, the exact same kind used in the murders. When asked why they didn't seize the firearm and tested to see if the casings fired from it match those found at the scene, Inspector Vic Edwards cited basic rights preventing unlawful searches and seizures. "I don't have any right to go into your house and examine your guns," he said. "The same as I didn't have any right to go into Mr. Shearing's house. We had no reason to suspect him." Initially, Shearing was led to believe that his arrest was related to a hit-and-run incident
before the detective suddenly confronted him with their theories surrounding the Johnson murders. Then, in his explanation, Shearing accidentally admitted to detectives that he had heard the murders were committed at Bear Creek, information that had not been released to the public yet. Then after a lot of effort and persuasive techniques, the two detectives managed to convince Shearing to confess to all six Johnson family murders. He also agreed to reenact the murders to show detectives exactly how things went down and even promised to turn over their possessions so they could be properly returned to their loved ones.
But perhaps most important to the case, Shearing agreed to give up the 22 caliber Remington pump-action rifle, which was forensically confirmed to be the murder weapon. Shearing initially confessed to shooting the four adults as they sat around their campfire. He then claimed to have shot the Johnson's two daughters as they slept in their tent, and that his only motivation for doing so was to rob them without risking any witnesses. He told the detectives interviewing him that after loading the Johnson's bodies into their car, he drove it to the mountainside undercover of darkness and then set
it on fire using 5 gallons of gasoline. He then claimed to have shot the Johnson's two daughters as they slept in their tent, and that his only motivation for doing so was to rob them without risking any witnesses. He told the detectives interviewing him that after loading the Johnson's body into their car, he drove it to the mountainside under cover of darkness and then set it on fire using 5 gallons of gasoline. He then attempted, but ultimately failed, to clean the campsite as best as possible, then drove the camper back to his home before burning
it after learning how difficult the re-registration process was. On the day Shearing's trial was set to begin, he plead guilty to six counts of secondderee murder. As part of the guilty plea, Shearing stated the following. I walked out of the bush from behind the camper and started shooting. I put the bodies in the car, tore in the back seat, and the two little ones in the trunk. I poured the gasoline. It just went woof. And I stood back and watched it burn. I went to the tent. I knelt down and I shot the other two.
The court had no choice but to accept Shearing's version of events, but to the detectives, his story didn't ring true. They knew he wasn't telling the whole truth, but their hunch wouldn't be confirmed until a later date. In his sentencing, Supreme Court Justice Harry McKay said, "What we have very simply is a cold-blooded and senseless execution of six defenseless and innocent victims for no apparent reason. The sentence I impose must express in clear terms the revulsion felt by the great majority of our citizens for this senseless and vicious mass killing. The victims were unknown to
the prisoner. They did not in any way provoke him. He knew they were camped at the site and carefully scouted the situation. He went home and returned either that night or the next with a loaded 22 rifle. Why? We do not really know, but the enormity of the crimes demand the maximum sentence. On April 17th, 1984, Justice Mccay sentenced Shearing to six consecutive life sentences with no possibility of parole for at least 25 years. It was the maximum possible penalty for seconddegree murder and the first time in Canadian history it had been handed out. Shearing
did not appeal his sentence. His mother, Rose Shearing, was stunned at the news of her son's conviction. "I hope it's a mistake or a bad dream," she said. "He's always been such a good boy." Greg Shearing, David's brother, said, "I have a lot of questions I'd like to ask the police. I have a hard time believing all of this." Following Shearing's conviction, Detective Mike Eastm, who'd long harbored suspicions of Shearing's dishonesty, pleaded for a chance to rein him in a search of the whole truth. When he obtained it, it was just as disturbing as he'd
imagined. At one point during the interview, Detective East told Shearing, "You know why I'm here? I think you abused those girls before you killed them. You told me some time ago that you would consider telling me the rest of the story after you were sentenced. Well, now I'm here to collect. It was only then that David Shearan revealed what really happened to the Johnson's two daughters. Shearing confessed that after first spotting the Johnson's family camped out near Bear Creek, he spent several days spying on them. He admitted to harboring deeply inappropriate thoughts towards 13-year-old Janette
and 11-year-old Karen and became determined to abuse them, even if it meant murdering their parents. Finally, on the evening of August 10th, Shearing walked into the campsite with his rifle and then shot all four adults in cold blood. Janet and Karen had been sleeping in their tent, and the sound of the shots woke them up. Shearing reassured them that he and their parents were protecting them from bad men, then went about disposing of the adults bodies. Once he was finished, he crawled into the tent with the girls and subjected them to acts of unforgivable depravity.
The next morning, after ensuring their parents' bodies were covered with a blanket, Shearing transported Janet and Karen to a nearby fishing shack. It was here he intended on continuing the abuse. In a stunning twist of fate, the shack was approached by none other than a prison correctional officer who was out supervising a fishing trip for well- behaved prisoners. The CEO visited the cabin to reassure Shearing regarding their presence in the area. But before he came to the door, Shearing hid the girls in another room, told them to stay quiet, then conducted a brief conversation with
the correctional officer without once arousing the man's suspicion. The next day, he moved the girls to his family farm. Then on August 16th, he walked them into a patch of woodland near one of his fields and shot them both in the head. He reportedly told the girls to turn around so he could urinate and then he shot them execution style. Shearing then took the bodies back to the Johnson's family car, put the girl's bodies in the trunk, and burn it. To confirm Shearing was now telling the truth, Detective East tracked down the prison guard the
killer was referring to. The CEO remembered the meeting exactly as Shearing had described it. And when Eastm's partner, a Constable Leel, hiked through the woods to pay a personal visit to the cabin, he found two sets of initials carved into the wood. DS for David Shearing and then JJ for Janet Johnson. The initials had been encapsulated in a crudely carved heart shape. a detail which made Lel's skin crawl. The same detective later reflected on how close the prison guard had been to saving Janet and Karen's lives. "That's how close everyone was," he said. "But for
a cruel act of fate, those two precious little girls would be alive today." In 1995, Shearing married a woman from Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. Heather Andis, who met her bloodthirsty debut in 1993, claimed her husband deserved a second chance. "I have seen so much change in this man since we met." She said, "I know the man's heart is in the right place, and I'm just here to back him up." In September 2008, exactly 24 years following his conviction for the Johnson family murders, David Shearing finally came up for parole. Yet thankfully, the Canadian National Parole Board
ruled that since he hadn't completed sex offender treatment and was rumored to still harbor violent fantasies, he was not yet ready for freedom. His second application filed in 2012 was also rejected when the petition of almost 14,000 signatures was presented to the National Parole Board. Shearing applied again in 2014, but mysteriously withdrew the request a month before his hearing. Perhaps he's tired of trying to fool the parole board into thinking he's a safe, sane, and stable human being. Or maybe he's accepted he's a danger to wider society and has submitted to being sequestered from it
for the remainder of his natural years. We might never know Shearing's reasons for withdrawing his appeal. And while some of us might wish to understand his thinking, I would caution against crawling around the mind of a man who murdered two innocent couples in order to prey on their two little girls. Hey friends, thanks for listening. Click that notification bell to be alerted of all future narrations. I release new videos every Monday and Thursday at 9:00 p.m. EST. And there are super fun live streams every Sunday and Wednesday night. My Wednesday night, this one will be
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