Ever since February 1983, when 20th Century Fox released The Entity, there has been considerable speculation, conjecture, rumor and misinformation regarding what factually transpired during the investigation of the real-life case. As dramatic license was exercised in both the book and motion picture, the result was a moderately fictionalized account of the actual events. Making matters even worse is the fact that the original articles published on The Entity case were in scientific journals or periodicals that were not generally available to the public. Desiring to set matters straight on what actually occurred a quarter of-a-century ago in a Los Angeles suburb, I am reprinting the original article with only minor upgrades and adjustments to compensate for time. The only real omission here is the introduction to the original article which in many ways is redundant of information contained in Chapter 1.

ABSTRACT

Beginning on August 22, 1974, a ten-week investigation of a reportedly haunted house located in Culver City, California, demonstrated evidence that it was infested with and frequented by occurrences of poltergeist activity in the form of object movements, collectively observed apparitions, as well as cold and stench spots. Investigative visits resulted in six consecutive encounters between the investigators, numerous assistants, and various forms of phenomena reported here. Additionally, this particular case displayed a stereotypic, anxiety-ridden emotional environment generally associated with poltergeist incidents; teeming with pubescent and adolescent children with overt animosities existing between all family members.

The house demonstrated a heretofore unknown, or at least unreported manifestation in the form of dynamic 3-dimensional lights that behaved unpredictably in that they were not consistently photogenic in nature although appearing to the unaided eye as visible light for lengthy periods. With the limited resources, space and time available in this investigation, the subjective conclusions reached was that the observed phenomena were of a multiple and differential source origin, and cannot as yet be explained by any coherent theory involving RSPK or discarnate intelligence.

The enigmatic and inconsistent behavior of employed instrumentation further reinforces the fact that the causal element in this situation is an almost total unknown, which cannot even vaguely be operationally or functionally defined, and therefore remains as it always has been: a phenomenon.

The investigation of Doris Bither’s house came about as a result of her overhearing Kerry Gaynor’s (my associate at the time) conversation with a friend about haunted houses while at Hunters Books store in Westwood Village. Doris approached Gaynor in a somewhat hesitant manner and informed him that her house was haunted. After a brief discussion with Doris, Gaynor informed her that he would contact his associate and get back to her as soon as possible.

On our first visit to Doris’ tiny Culver City house, we spent the evening securing detailed information pertaining to the alleged phenomena that had been occurring over the past few months. The family consisted of Doris, a petite, middle-to-late thirty-year-old woman, a six year-old daughter, three sons, one ten, thirteen and sixteen. We questioned all members of the family with the exception of the six year-old daughter, whom we never saw.

Their accounts were fairly uniform in reference to a particular apparition whom they called “Mr. Whose-it." The alleged apparition would appear in semi-solid form and was a well over six feet in height, according to their testimony. Both Doris and her eldest son claimed to have seen two dark, solid figures with Asian features appear from out of nowhere within their mother’s bedroom, who at times appeared to be struggling with each other. This particular event occurred several times, with one episode where Doris claimed to have physically bumped into the apparition in the hallway. Neither Doris nor her eldest son would accept the possibility that the apparitions might have been imagined or simply prowlers or intruders who forcibly entered the house.

Doris believed most adamantly that these “Asian beings” were evil and indeed was quite emotionally distraught at the prospect of her family’s possible eminent danger. Considering what Doris was about to tell us, this belief on her part was well within the boundaries of rational thinking.

Undoubtedly, the most intense occurrence which Doris related to us was that she had been sexually assaulted by three semi-visible beings. Two of the smaller beings or apparitions literally held her down by the wrists and ankles, while the remaining form entered her. According to Doris’ testimony, this event took place on several separate occasions, each time leaving behind large and distinct black and blue wounds, especially around the ankles, wrists, breasts and groin area of the inner thighs.

Even more dramatic was Doris’ claim that during one particular attack, her eldest son overheard the scuffle and entered the bedroom. According to Doris, he witnessed her being tossed around like a ragdoll by the entities. She alleges that when her son came to her aid, an invisible force picked him up and threw him backwards into the wall. The son corroborated his mother’s story, speaking of the sheer terror he experienced during that struggle.

Unfortunately, Doris’ claim of “spectral rape” could not be substantiated due to her failing to report the incident to medical or other authorities. The fact that these alleged instances of paranormal rape occurred several weeks prior to our initial arrival, prevented us from observing her already healed bruises. Understandably, the resulting household environment was one of extreme anxiety and Doris’ relationship with her four children was anything but cordial, in fact, it was downright belligerent. I will refrain from going into all the bizarre stories that were related to us for we cannot substantiate them.

Needless to say, after hearing Doris’ incredible story, Gaynor and I looked at each other, collectively both rolled our eyes back while shaking our heads. Our initial impression was to totally discount Doris’ claims and simply refer her to one of the psychiatrists at the NPI. However, as we ourselves would have been somewhat embarrassed to even reiterate her totally incredulous account to a medical professional back at UCLA, we decided to think about it for a while rather than act on it. In retrospect, this hesitation turned out to be a wise decision

However, a few days hence, Doris called to inform us that five individuals outside her family had now seen the alleged apparitions. We immediately decided to return to the house armed with cameras and a tape recorder. Preceding this return, an investigation into the background of the house revealed two male deaths from natural causes since its construction, neither of which, in our opinion, was relevant to the study of the phenomena occurring within the residence.

Upon our second visit this house, we became increasingly aware of the broken-down, shabby nature of the wooden dwelling that had been twice condemned by the city. Nevertheless, the second visit to this house marked the beginning of was to become our most extraordinary investigation to date.

An intriguing factor, which in our opinion is highly significant, was that from the very first occasion we entered Doris’ bedroom, we both immediately noticed that the temperature was unusually low in comparison to the rest of the house, even though it was a hot August night and all the bedroom’s windows were closed.

This peculiar and penetrating cold varied in intensity as we moved throughout the bedroom, again reminiscent of “cold spots” experienced in other investigations. Also noticed upon first entering Doris’ bedroom was a strong olfactory sensation (smell) of rotting, decomposing flesh, such as might be experienced in a physiology lab or a morgue. Both the stench and cold spots faded in and out irregularly, sometimes completely disappearing. A thorough examination of the house offered no explanation for these anomalistic effects.

Another particularly noteworthy physical sensation within the bedroom was a strong sense of overpressure, that is, the feeling within the inner ear of being at the bottom of a very deep pool. Interestingly, this particular effect is perhaps one of the most common subjectively experienced sensations in suspected haunted/poltergeist environments.

The two cameras we arrived with on our second visit were a Polaroid SX-70 and a Honeywell Pentax 35 mm. SLR loaded with high-speed infrared film. The first of many to come, seemingly inexplicable happenings, occurred while Gaynor was taking to the elder son in the kitchen. Gaynor was standing approximately one foot away from the lower cabinets when suddenly the cabinet door swung open. A frying pan flew out of the cabinet, following a curved path to the floor over 2.5 feet away, hitting with quite a thud. Now, of course, the immediate thing to surmise is that the pan was leaning against the cabinet door and finally pushed it open as it fell out. But we cannot accept this explanation for the trajectory of the pan as it came out of the cabinet was elliptical. It literally jumped out!

After carefully examining the kitchen cabinet from which the pan was propelled we proceeded to Doris’ bedroom. There were four of us in the bedroom, which appeared to be the focal point of the phenomena according to Doris. Her friend Candy, who had joined us on this evening, and whom we were told was psychic, concurred.

We took a preliminary shot of the bedroom with the Polaroid SX-70 that came out perfectly. After about fifteen minutes Candy shouted out that there was something in the corner of the bedroom. After hearing Candy’s shouts I rapidly ran back into the bedroom from the kitchen where I was examining the developed first photograph and immediately aimed and fired the Polaroid camera.

The resulting photograph was completely bleached white, as though exposed to some powerfully ionizing radiation, which if present, might have had strong adverse effects on our bodies, perhaps even to the degree of causing burns and extensively damaging cells.

The resulting photograph was completely bleached white, as though exposed to some powerfully ionizing radiation, which if present, might have had strong adverse effects on our bodies, perhaps even to the degree of causing burns and extensively damaging cells.

About fifteen minutes later Candy again screamed out that there was something in the corner (not that she could see, but sense) and accordingly I fired off the Polaroid. Once again, the picture was badly bleached, although not as severely as the first one.

Inasmuch as we were both aware of my rather dubious distinction of being a “film fogger,” we decided it best to trade off taking pictures with each camera. However, at no time did either of us see anything in this corner of the bedroom.

A few minutes later, I took another picture, but this time it was in another room of the house, and oddly enough, the photograph came out near perfect except for lack of proper focusing adjustments. Following this, Gaynor used the Polaroid, as I did again, both within the bedroom, resulting in two perfectly normal photographs. It’s interesting to note that on both of these last shootings, Candy did not sense the presence within the room, as she did earlier.   Next Page