Latest / Crime and Horror / Mysterious notes led to a horror show - MrBallen

Transcript

Mysterious notes led to a horror show - MrBallen · Crime and Horror

0:00
Speaker 1: Today's story is about a family in England who were
0:02
Speaker 1: living these totally ordinary lives. They were farmers, they were
0:06
Speaker 1: just simple people when in nineteen eighty four, something really
0:10
Speaker 1: strange began happening to them that basically turned their lives
0:14
Speaker 1: upside down like it was a complete nightmare. In fact,
0:16
Speaker 1: in many ways, it was almost like they were living
0:19
Speaker 1: the plot of a crazy detective novel, except it was real.
0:24
Speaker 1: But before we get into today's story, if you're a
0:26
Speaker 1: fan of the strange, dark and mysterious delivered in story format,
0:30
Speaker 1: then you've come to the right place, because that's all
0:32
Speaker 1: we do, and we upload two, three, even four times
0:34
Speaker 1: every week. So if that's of interest to you, please
0:37
Speaker 1: buy the Life Button a dozen jelly donuts, but don't
0:40
Speaker 1: tell them you've secretly removed all the jelly. Also, please
0:43
Speaker 1: subscribe to our channel and turn on all notifications so
0:47
Speaker 1: you don't miss any of our weekly uploads.
0:49
Speaker 2: Okay, let's get into today's story.
1:11
Speaker 1: On the morning of March thirtieth, nineteen eighty four, a
1:14
Speaker 1: forty three year old dairy farmer named Graham Backhouse walked
1:17
Speaker 1: slowly across this huge fenced and field on his farm
1:21
Speaker 1: in Horton, England carrying along a bucket of cowfeed, and Graham,
1:25
Speaker 1: like usual, was exhausted from all the endless daily chores
1:30
Speaker 1: on this farm that he was in charge of. Five
1:33
Speaker 1: years ago, his father had died and he had inherited
1:36
Speaker 1: this farm, and so now he was taking over this
1:39
Speaker 1: massive property with all these these animals and all these
1:42
Speaker 1: just daily chores. It was backbreaking work, and so it
1:45
Speaker 1: was like every day was a slog, just like today.
1:49
Speaker 1: But Graham was actually a terrible farmer. He did the chores,
1:54
Speaker 1: he did the things he was supposed to do every day,
1:56
Speaker 1: but he did not know how to run this farm.
1:58
Speaker 1: And so over the last five years that that he'd
2:00
Speaker 1: inherited the big family farm, he had basically run it
2:04
Speaker 1: into the ground because he just didn't know what he
2:06
Speaker 1: was doing. But he was sort of stuck because there
2:08
Speaker 1: was no one else to take over the farm. And
2:10
Speaker 1: so it's like every days he's doing all this backbreaking
2:13
Speaker 1: work and the profit for the farm is dwindling lower
2:17
Speaker 1: and lower and lower. It's like he was just trapped
2:19
Speaker 1: in this vicious cycle that he didn't know how to
2:21
Speaker 1: get out of. But in some ways, what was even
2:23
Speaker 1: worse than that is that Graham never even wanted to
2:26
Speaker 1: be a farmer. I mean, like, as a kid, he
2:28
Speaker 1: grew up here on this property and he washed his
2:31
Speaker 1: dad every day do this labor and you know, work
2:34
Speaker 1: until the wee hours of the morning nearly every day.
2:37
Speaker 1: And he was an amazing farmer. He was amazing at
2:40
Speaker 1: taking care of this property. But Graham didn't want to
2:42
Speaker 1: do that, like he knew he didn't. What he really
2:44
Speaker 1: wanted to do was be a writer. That's what his
2:47
Speaker 1: passion was. And so any chance he got as a kid,
2:50
Speaker 1: he was like, you know, writing things down, poetry, you know, journaling,
2:53
Speaker 1: whatever it was. But then his dad sort of suddenly
2:56
Speaker 1: died and he's handed the farm and it's the family legacy,
2:59
Speaker 1: and so here he was just sort of saddled with
3:02
Speaker 1: in a way, golden handcuffs, except he was destroying those handcuffs.
3:06
Speaker 1: There was no gold in them. It was about to
3:08
Speaker 1: be like an insolvent farm, and it was all his fault.
3:11
Speaker 1: And then on top of all the guilt and the
3:13
Speaker 1: shame and the embarrassment of how badly this was going,
3:16
Speaker 1: he also recently had begun getting into these heated disputes
3:20
Speaker 1: with his neighbors over the property. Lines, and so it's
3:23
Speaker 1: like all around him is just constant problems. And so
3:27
Speaker 1: now as Graham dutifully trudged through the field with his
3:30
Speaker 1: bucket of feed, his mind is swimming with all the
3:33
Speaker 1: other things he has to do that day. And as
3:35
Speaker 1: he's walking along, he sees something odd on one of
3:39
Speaker 1: the fence posts up ahead, and as he got closer
3:41
Speaker 1: to it, he began to hear this really loud buzzing
3:44
Speaker 1: of lots of flies in the area. And then finally
3:47
Speaker 1: when he got up to the fence post, he saw
3:49
Speaker 1: why the flies were here, because on the fence post,
3:52
Speaker 1: the thing he saw was a severed lamb's head, and
3:56
Speaker 1: the flies were swarming all around it. And then before
3:59
Speaker 1: Graham could process like why this lamb's head was here,
4:02
Speaker 1: which immediately appeared to be intentional. It didn't seem like
4:05
Speaker 1: a lamb had somehow gotten trapped here or something like
4:08
Speaker 1: somebody took this head and put it here. He's sort
4:11
Speaker 1: of looking around and he sees taped to the fence
4:14
Speaker 1: right nearby is this piece of paper with a message
4:17
Speaker 1: on it, and it was basically in all capital letters,
4:20
Speaker 1: and even from a distance he could have been able
4:22
Speaker 1: to read it and it just said you next. Now,
4:27
Speaker 1: of course this is like collectively a shocking scene. This
4:30
Speaker 1: is a very obvious threat to Graham. Someone has has
4:35
Speaker 1: placed these things here to threaten Graham. But believe it
4:38
Speaker 1: or not, when Graham saw the letter, not so much
4:40
Speaker 1: the lamb head, but the letter, he sort of didn't
4:44
Speaker 1: breathe a sigh of relief, not at all. But he
4:46
Speaker 1: had actually gotten over the past couple of weeks several
4:49
Speaker 1: other letters like this, So this is just a continuation
4:53
Speaker 1: of something that's been going on here. The animal head
4:57
Speaker 1: that was new, that was a clear escalation here, but
4:59
Speaker 1: the letters that had been happening, the notes had started
5:02
Speaker 1: around the end of the previous month when one had
5:05
Speaker 1: arrived at his house by mail, which had just directly
5:08
Speaker 1: threatened Graham, and then he and his wife had gotten
5:11
Speaker 1: even more messages after that, and all of them were
5:14
Speaker 1: threatening to hurt Graham and also his family. Now Graham
5:17
Speaker 1: had gone to the police and told them, and they
5:19
Speaker 1: had said, you know, do you know anyone that might
5:22
Speaker 1: want to hurt you guys? Do you have any enemies
5:23
Speaker 1: or anything? And Graham like he wanted to say, oh, no,
5:27
Speaker 1: definitely not, but realistically he knew probably over the course
5:31
Speaker 1: of his life in this small town. I mean, Horton
5:33
Speaker 1: is like this really small village. There's a good chance
5:36
Speaker 1: that he might have made some people mad somewhere along
5:38
Speaker 1: the lines. You know, he wasn't perfect, but in his
5:41
Speaker 1: mind he basically got along with everyone, and so he said, no,
5:44
Speaker 1: I don't think so. But the police, after getting Graham's statement,
5:49
Speaker 1: they didn't really do any investigating from what Graham knew.
5:52
Speaker 1: They basically had just filed a report and called it
5:55
Speaker 1: a day. But now as Graham is standing here by
5:58
Speaker 1: his fence and there's this animal head here again, this
6:01
Speaker 1: is like a clear escalation. It's no longer just notes.
6:04
Speaker 1: We now have a dead animal involved. This is like
6:07
Speaker 1: a real threat. So Graham at this point is mad,
6:10
Speaker 1: feeling like the police really let him down, and he
6:13
Speaker 1: ripped the note off the fence and he headed back
6:15
Speaker 1: to his house to call the police again. Ten days later,
6:19
Speaker 1: on the morning of April ninth, nineteen eighty four, Graham
6:22
Speaker 1: was inside one of his barns and he was milking
6:24
Speaker 1: a cow, and he had the radio on and the
6:25
Speaker 1: music turned all the way up as he worked. Graham
6:28
Speaker 1: ten days before had called the police and told them
6:31
Speaker 1: about the severed lambhead and the note, and at this
6:34
Speaker 1: point they said that they would actually start an investigation,
6:37
Speaker 1: but Graham had not heard anything from them since they
6:40
Speaker 1: said that. But at the same time, he also hadn't
6:42
Speaker 1: gotten any other threatening notes since. So even though Graham
6:46
Speaker 1: didn't feel like whatever was going on was over, he
6:49
Speaker 1: still felt like, you know, he and his family did
6:51
Speaker 1: need to find a way to just you know, try
6:53
Speaker 1: to live their lives like normal, because what else could
6:55
Speaker 1: they really do. And so today was just going to
6:58
Speaker 1: be a day where he and his family just tried
7:00
Speaker 1: to go about their business as they normally would. The
7:03
Speaker 1: kids were at school, and Margaret, his wife, had some
7:06
Speaker 1: errands to do in town, and Graham was on milking duty.
7:09
Speaker 1: And today the cows were really lively, and so they're
7:12
Speaker 1: mooing constantly, and the music that Graham's playing is really loud.
7:16
Speaker 1: So the barn is like just full of noise. In fact,
7:20
Speaker 1: it was so noisy that Graham didn't hear the barn
7:23
Speaker 1: doors open up behind him. However, he did hear voices
7:27
Speaker 1: suddenly begin shouting inside the barn, and he turned around
7:31
Speaker 1: just as two locals that he recognized from his village
7:34
Speaker 1: charged into the barn, waving their arms frantically at him,
7:37
Speaker 1: telling him something, and so Graham he lunges and turns
7:40
Speaker 1: off his radio and he turns to these locals, and
7:42
Speaker 1: he said, like, what what's going on? And they told him, like,
7:45
Speaker 1: your wife, she's been in this terrible accident. You need
7:48
Speaker 1: to come outside right now. And so Graham he's shocked
7:51
Speaker 1: by what they're saying, but he's thinking, like, I thought
7:54
Speaker 1: my wife was in town running errands, Like what do
7:56
Speaker 1: you mean come outside? And so he jumps up and
7:59
Speaker 1: he runs with the lows outside, and he looks towards
8:01
Speaker 1: his house, the farmhouse, and he sees there's all this
8:05
Speaker 1: gray smoke curling up into the air, and so Graham
8:08
Speaker 1: sprints to his house. He runs around to the backside
8:11
Speaker 1: where the driveway is where the smoke appears to be
8:13
Speaker 1: coming from. And as he turns the corner, he sees
8:16
Speaker 1: his car and it's like damaged in some way, and
8:19
Speaker 1: the smoke is definitely coming off the car. And he
8:21
Speaker 1: turns the corner fully and he looks onto his front
8:24
Speaker 1: yard and there laying there in a bloody heap is
8:28
Speaker 1: his wife. And so Graham he's just so shocked for
8:31
Speaker 1: a second he's paralyzed, and then he turns and he
8:34
Speaker 1: screams at the other two, the locals who had just
8:36
Speaker 1: told him about the accident. He yells for them to
8:39
Speaker 1: call the police, and then he runs for his wife.
8:52
Speaker 1: About twenty minutes later, Graham stood by his front steps
8:55
Speaker 1: with a police officer while a team of paramedics loaded
8:58
Speaker 1: his wife into an ambulance. Amazingly, despite her horrible injuries,
9:02
Speaker 1: especially to her legs, she was still alive. But Graham
9:06
Speaker 1: couldn't actually go with her to the hospital right now
9:08
Speaker 1: because he had to give a statement to the officer,
9:11
Speaker 1: because it would turn out there had been a bomb
9:15
Speaker 1: underneath one of the car seats in the car Graham's
9:18
Speaker 1: wife was driving that had detonated and it merely killed
9:21
Speaker 1: his wife, and so now they needed to figure out
9:24
Speaker 1: how the heck this happened, and so Graham needed to
9:27
Speaker 1: give a statement while the bomb squad, which was swarming
9:31
Speaker 1: his property looked everywhere to make sure there weren't more
9:34
Speaker 1: bombs here. And so, of course, like Graham at this
9:37
Speaker 1: point is shocked. He's so worried about his wife. He
9:40
Speaker 1: doesn't really know the state of her injuries. You know,
9:42
Speaker 1: she was just kind of whisked away and he wasn't
9:44
Speaker 1: allowed to go with her, and so his mind is
9:47
Speaker 1: very occupied with his wife. But then also there was
9:50
Speaker 1: a part of him that was just furious, like he
9:53
Speaker 1: had told the police about these threats to him and
9:56
Speaker 1: his family that had only really been escalating over the
9:58
Speaker 1: past several weeks, I mean, ten days ago. There's that
10:01
Speaker 1: that severed lambhead on his post with the words you next, Like,
10:06
Speaker 1: clearly this was getting worse, and the police seemed to
10:09
Speaker 1: have done nothing, and now here they are demanding he
10:12
Speaker 1: explained what happened, and so he's furious, and so Graham
10:15
Speaker 1: again reiterates to this officer that there had been all
10:18
Speaker 1: these threats to he and his family over the past
10:21
Speaker 1: several weeks, and really it seemed like the threats had
10:24
Speaker 1: been directed at him. And he actually pointed out to
10:26
Speaker 1: the officer that the car that had the bomb in
10:29
Speaker 1: it that you nearly killed his wife, that was actually
10:32
Speaker 1: his car. It was his Volvo, and his wife never
10:35
Speaker 1: drove that car. The only reason she was driving it
10:37
Speaker 1: today is because her car had an ignition issue. So
10:40
Speaker 1: this was like anomalous that she was in the car,
10:43
Speaker 1: and so obviously the bomb was intended for him. And
10:46
Speaker 1: so as Graham is relaying all these details to this officer,
10:50
Speaker 1: they both start hearing all the shouting coming from sort
10:53
Speaker 1: of far away in the front of the property, towards
10:55
Speaker 1: the front of the driveway, and they turn and they
10:58
Speaker 1: see a mailman has driven his van onto the driveway
11:02
Speaker 1: and is driving right up towards the house. And remember
11:05
Speaker 1: this is now a crime scene, and it's sort of
11:07
Speaker 1: a new crime scene, and there's all these officers everywhere,
11:10
Speaker 1: and they haven't fully roped everything off yet, and this
11:13
Speaker 1: van is basically just driving up into the crime scene.
11:16
Speaker 1: And so all the officers down in front are like whoa, whoa, stop, stop, stop,
11:20
Speaker 1: And they stopped the mailman, who's like what is going
11:23
Speaker 1: on here? And he's like, hey, I just have the
11:25
Speaker 1: mail for them, and he hands a stack of letters
11:28
Speaker 1: to one of the police officers, who then tells the
11:30
Speaker 1: mailman to turn around and get out of here, and
11:32
Speaker 1: so he drives out of there, and then the officer
11:35
Speaker 1: with the mail comes up the driveway and he hands
11:38
Speaker 1: it over to Graham, and so Graham has just told
11:40
Speaker 1: the officer the guy he gave a statement to about
11:43
Speaker 1: all these threats he's been getting and how he thinks
11:45
Speaker 1: it's all tied to this bomb. And wouldn't you know it,
11:48
Speaker 1: the letter sitting at the top of the stack of
11:50
Speaker 1: mail that he was just handed had very familiar handwriting
11:53
Speaker 1: on it. It looked just like all the other threatening
11:57
Speaker 1: letters that he and his family had gotten for the
12:00
Speaker 1: previous few weeks. And so Graham he turns to the
12:03
Speaker 1: officer and he's like, I know this is another threat.
12:07
Speaker 1: This envelope that contains another threat for sure, And the
12:10
Speaker 1: officer he's like, do not open it. We're going to
12:12
Speaker 1: take that. It's now evidence. Fifteen days later, on April
12:17
Speaker 1: twenty fourth, Graham left his house and began walking down
12:20
Speaker 1: the road. And the fresh air was really helpful to
12:23
Speaker 1: Graham because right now he was feeling very anxious. Margaret
12:27
Speaker 1: miraculously had survived, but she was still in the hospital.
12:31
Speaker 1: She was still getting surgeries because you know, the bomb
12:33
Speaker 1: had done quite a bit of damage to particularly her
12:36
Speaker 1: lower half. There was all this shrapnel that had been
12:38
Speaker 1: embedded in her legs and her hips, and so she'd
12:41
Speaker 1: be there for quite some time. As for the children,
12:44
Speaker 1: I mean, they were not affected directly by the bomb,
12:47
Speaker 1: but of course they were, you know, so upset because
12:50
Speaker 1: their mom's been hurt and they're scared because of all
12:52
Speaker 1: these threats, like is there going to be another attack?
12:55
Speaker 1: Like it was awful for them, and so Graham you know,
12:57
Speaker 1: did his best to be strong for them, but it
12:59
Speaker 1: just didn't makes sense to have them at the home
13:01
Speaker 1: with him. I mean, it was it was dangerous. They
13:04
Speaker 1: were scared all the time. So he had sent them
13:06
Speaker 1: to stay with his mother basically to keep them safe
13:09
Speaker 1: and keep them calm and sort of away from him
13:11
Speaker 1: until this whole thing sort of blew over or whatever
13:14
Speaker 1: this was, until it ended. And so Graham is just
13:17
Speaker 1: stuck at this farm by himself, you know, basically spiraling
13:20
Speaker 1: twenty four to seven. Like he hates being here. He's
13:23
Speaker 1: always hated this farm. He resented the fact that he
13:26
Speaker 1: had to look after it, and it was just going
13:27
Speaker 1: so badly. And now it's like he has an actual,
13:30
Speaker 1: like active threat against him and his family and his
13:33
Speaker 1: wife's almost been killed. Like life is just it couldn't
13:36
Speaker 1: be worse right now. And then on top of that,
13:38
Speaker 1: you know, the police were clearly investigating what happened here
13:42
Speaker 1: and investigating these threats, but so far Graham had not
13:45
Speaker 1: gotten any answers now. Immediately following the bombing, for like
13:49
Speaker 1: the few days that followed, the police gave Graham and
13:52
Speaker 1: his family around the clock physical protection because again, there's
13:55
Speaker 1: like this active threat out there. But after a few days,
13:58
Speaker 1: when nothing else happened, and you know, it was really
14:01
Speaker 1: you know, taxing the police to be constantly monitoring this family,
14:05
Speaker 1: they throttled that back and instead just gave Graham a
14:08
Speaker 1: panic button that he could press in case he or
14:10
Speaker 1: his family had some emergency at the property. And so
14:13
Speaker 1: the police are gone and Graham just has this panic button.
14:16
Speaker 1: His wife's at the hospital, his kids are away, and
14:18
Speaker 1: he's just again stuck at this farm, and he's just
14:21
Speaker 1: so upset, he's so stressed out, and in this place,
14:25
Speaker 1: this mental place he's in where he's just wondering what's
14:27
Speaker 1: going to happen in the future. He began to think
14:29
Speaker 1: about who really would want to do this to him,
14:32
Speaker 1: Who could he really fixate on that would want to
14:35
Speaker 1: cause he and his family harm, And he actually came
14:37
Speaker 1: up with one suspect that began to make more and
14:40
Speaker 1: more sense the more he thought about them. His neighbor.
14:44
Speaker 1: Graham's neighbor was a guy named Colin, and in town,
14:47
Speaker 1: it was no secret that Graham and Colin didn't get along,
14:50
Speaker 1: primarily because they bickered over property lines. Now, Graham and
14:55
Speaker 1: Colin's arguments never actually escalated into violence, but Graham knew
14:59
Speaker 1: that sometimes tis their fights got really heated, and it
15:02
Speaker 1: seemed entirely plausible that Colin might want to exact some
15:07
Speaker 1: physical violence on Graham. And so now Graham was actually
15:11
Speaker 1: walking over to Colin's house and he was just going
15:14
Speaker 1: to talk to him. Because even though these two really
15:16
Speaker 1: didn't get along, like they were capable of speaking to
15:19
Speaker 1: each other, this was not totally unusual. And so his
15:22
Speaker 1: plan was he was just going to go over there
15:24
Speaker 1: and intentionally not bring up sort of like the elephant
15:28
Speaker 1: in the room here, which is, you know, the bombing
15:30
Speaker 1: and the threats and the ongoing criminal investigation. Graham was
15:35
Speaker 1: just going to go over there and basically just make
15:37
Speaker 1: his presence known and just sort of see how Colin
15:40
Speaker 1: reacted to him, see if he acted strange, see if
15:42
Speaker 1: he could pick up on any suspicious behavior by Colin.
15:45
Speaker 1: And so he turned the corner and he walks up
15:48
Speaker 1: Colin's driveway, and Colin was actually out in front, and
15:51
Speaker 1: Colin sort of turned and saw Graham and did not
15:54
Speaker 1: look pleased to see him, and he didn't walk up
15:56
Speaker 1: to greet him or anything. He just stood there staring
15:58
Speaker 1: at him. But Graham confidently strode up the driveway and
16:01
Speaker 1: he just started talking to Colin and they had this
16:04
Speaker 1: sort of weird, stilted conversation where neither man really wanted
16:08
Speaker 1: to see the other, but they really didn't talk about
16:11
Speaker 1: anything of substance, you know, Graham didn't really explain why
16:14
Speaker 1: he was there. They just had this weird small talk,
16:17
Speaker 1: and then they said their goodbyes, and Graham turned and
16:20
Speaker 1: he walked away. And as Graham walked back to his property,
16:24
Speaker 1: it started to become more and more clear in his mind,
16:27
Speaker 1: like how bizarre it was that in this conversation, which
16:30
Speaker 1: you know, of course it was awkward, these guys don't
16:32
Speaker 1: get along, but how weird it was that Colin didn't
16:36
Speaker 1: ask why Graham had come over. He didn't bring up
16:40
Speaker 1: the bombing, he didn't ask about, you know, Graham's wife,
16:43
Speaker 1: he didn't ask about anything. It was like this weird,
16:46
Speaker 1: super neutral conversation, and for Graham, it just made Colin
16:50
Speaker 1: feel that much more suspicious. A few days later, on
16:54
Speaker 1: the night of April thirtieth, Graham was in his office
16:57
Speaker 1: inside of his farmhouse, staring down at a blank notepad.
17:00
Speaker 1: Graham was trying to write, because that used to be
17:03
Speaker 1: something he loved doing, but you know, tonight he just
17:06
Speaker 1: couldn't be creative. I mean, no arrests had been made
17:09
Speaker 1: in this case. His wife was still at the hospital,
17:11
Speaker 1: his kids are still out with his mom. You know,
17:14
Speaker 1: no progress has been made on this case. Like, he
17:17
Speaker 1: still feels like there's this imminent threat out there. And
17:20
Speaker 1: also the police had very recently interviewed Collin and nothing
17:24
Speaker 1: came of it. So it just sort of seemed like
17:26
Speaker 1: nothing was going on. But all the problems he had
17:29
Speaker 1: were still very much there. And so as Graham is
17:32
Speaker 1: sitting there feeling terrible, he hears this loud, sudden knocking
17:36
Speaker 1: on his front door, and immediately, you know, Graham's on edge.
17:40
Speaker 1: One he wasn't expecting visitors, and two really generally he
17:44
Speaker 1: didn't get guests, especially this late at night, and considering
17:48
Speaker 1: everything going on right now and the fact that no
17:50
Speaker 1: arrests have been made. I mean, he's fearful, he's paranoid,
17:54
Speaker 1: but you know, he's here all alone. He can't just
17:57
Speaker 1: ignore the fact that somebody's here, and so very apprehensively
18:00
Speaker 1: he gets up and he begins making his way out
18:03
Speaker 1: to the front door. When Graham was about to open
18:06
Speaker 1: the door, there was another pounding on the door, like
18:08
Speaker 1: whoever was out there was really eager to talk to him,
18:11
Speaker 1: And so Graham, like his pulse is racing, and he
18:14
Speaker 1: grabs the doorknob, he turns it, and he opens it,
18:17
Speaker 1: and the instant he saw who was standing out there,
18:21
Speaker 1: Graham knew he had to turn and run and press
18:24
Speaker 1: that panic button. Just a few minutes later, Detective Superintendent
18:28
Speaker 1: Tom Evans with the local police charged up the walkway
18:32
Speaker 1: of Graham's farmhouse with a team of officers right behind him.
18:35
Speaker 1: Evans was the lead investigator on Graham's case, like the
18:38
Speaker 1: entire ongoing threat and bomb case, and he'd been notified
18:42
Speaker 1: that the panic button that they had installed in the
18:44
Speaker 1: farmhouse had just gone off, so his team was responding
18:48
Speaker 1: to see, if, you know, maybe the person or people
18:51
Speaker 1: who were targeting Graham and his family had struck again.
18:54
Speaker 1: When Evans got up to the front door, he tried
18:56
Speaker 1: the handle and found that it was open, so he
18:58
Speaker 1: opened the door and he announce that police were here
19:01
Speaker 1: and they were coming inside, but there was no answer,
19:04
Speaker 1: and so Evans and his team went inside, and pretty
19:07
Speaker 1: much immediately when he stepped inside, he saw a dead body.
19:11
Speaker 1: There was a man laying on his back in the
19:14
Speaker 1: hallway and his chest was covered in blood. However, when
19:18
Speaker 1: Evans approached him, he realized that this was not Graham,
19:22
Speaker 1: this was someone else. This man was much older than Graham,
19:25
Speaker 1: he was in his sixties, and at first he just
19:27
Speaker 1: had no idea who it was. But then after a
19:30
Speaker 1: second Evans actually recognized him. It was Colin, Graham's neighbor,
19:34
Speaker 1: who they had actually interviewed fairly recently during their investigation. Colin,
19:39
Speaker 1: in addition to having what appeared to be you know,
19:41
Speaker 1: one or several gunshot wounds to the chest, was holding
19:44
Speaker 1: a knife in his right fist. Before Evans and his
19:47
Speaker 1: team could take note of anything else here, they began
19:50
Speaker 1: to hear moaning coming from the kitchen. So Evans sold
19:52
Speaker 1: a few of his officers to stay with the body,
19:55
Speaker 1: and then Evans and another officer slowly made their way,
19:58
Speaker 1: you know, guns drawn into the kitchen to see what
20:01
Speaker 1: was going on, and when they turned the corner and
20:03
Speaker 1: looked into the kitchen. I mean it was a bloody mess.
20:06
Speaker 1: There was blood really on everything, chairs, tables overturned, and
20:11
Speaker 1: then lying on the ground in the center of all
20:13
Speaker 1: the chaos, cradling a shotgun was Graham backhouse. And Graham
20:17
Speaker 1: was a mess. He was the one who was moaning.
20:20
Speaker 1: He had this just horrible knife wound on his face
20:22
Speaker 1: and he was bleeding profusely, and he also appeared to
20:25
Speaker 1: have a gash across his chest and also across his stomach.
20:28
Speaker 1: Evans and his partner they run over to Graham and
20:31
Speaker 1: they kneel down next to him, and you know, Graham,
20:34
Speaker 1: he's in rough shape, but he's clearly, you know, stable,
20:36
Speaker 1: he can talk. He's in a lot of pain. And
20:39
Speaker 1: Evans asked him, like, hey, what happened? And Graham, who
20:43
Speaker 1: again like he's in quite a bit of physical pain here,
20:45
Speaker 1: so every time he speaks, he's sort of like gritting
20:47
Speaker 1: his teeth. But he was able to explain to Evans
20:50
Speaker 1: that he heard a knock on his door. He opened
20:52
Speaker 1: it up, and there's call in his neighbor and it
20:55
Speaker 1: was unclear what he was doing here, And before long
20:58
Speaker 1: the two men are are getting in this art and
21:01
Speaker 1: then Graham said that Colin sort of inexplicably admitted that
21:05
Speaker 1: he was the one who planted the bomb. He was
21:07
Speaker 1: the one who was leaving all these threats. And then Graham,
21:11
Speaker 1: who was about to run and press the panic button.
21:13
Speaker 1: Right before he did, he said, Colin pulled out a
21:16
Speaker 1: knife and then started chasing after him, and at that point,
21:19
Speaker 1: Graham said, he bolted, he grabbed his shotgun. He was
21:22
Speaker 1: able to get a shot off in self defense, and
21:24
Speaker 1: then he did press the panic button, and he had
21:26
Speaker 1: no idea what happened to Colin, but he figured he
21:28
Speaker 1: was dead. The paramedics eventually arrived and it was determined that,
21:40
Speaker 1: you know, Graham's injuries were serious, but he would survive. However,
21:43
Speaker 1: he was still ushered out into an ambulance and brought
21:46
Speaker 1: to the hospital. And then after Graham was gone, the
21:49
Speaker 1: police once again roped off the farmhouse and began processing
21:53
Speaker 1: the scene, taking pictures of everything and collecting evidence. And
21:57
Speaker 1: then after they were done doing that, the police also
21:59
Speaker 1: went next door to Colin's property and roped that off
22:03
Speaker 1: and searched that as well to look for evidence, and
22:06
Speaker 1: they discovered under some leaves on his property was actually
22:09
Speaker 1: a piece of pipe that exactly matched the bomb that
22:13
Speaker 1: was used to blow up the car that nearly killed Margaret.
22:16
Speaker 1: So at this point it seemed extremely likely that Colin
22:20
Speaker 1: really was the bomber. But over the next few days,
22:24
Speaker 1: as Evans and his team analyzed all the other forensics
22:27
Speaker 1: and items and photographs that they'd collected, they noticed something strange.
22:31
Speaker 1: And then they found another new piece of evidence that
22:35
Speaker 1: actually was even more damning and far more significant than
22:39
Speaker 1: that pipe that was found on Colin's property. This new
22:42
Speaker 1: evidence was just a very mundane, everyday object. However, this
22:47
Speaker 1: object told Evans that he and his team had gotten
22:51
Speaker 1: this entire case completely wrong. What was really going on
22:55
Speaker 1: here was like nothing Evans had ever experienced in his
23:00
Speaker 1: higher nearly thirty year law enforcement career. In fact, what
23:04
Speaker 1: was happening here was closer to something out of a
23:06
Speaker 1: detective novel. So Graham Backhouse really did love to write,
23:11
Speaker 1: and he had dreamed of being a writer. Specifically, he
23:14
Speaker 1: actually had wanted to write detective stories, and in some ways,
23:18
Speaker 1: over the last few weeks, during all this madness, he'd
23:22
Speaker 1: sort of done exactly that. Using his spiral notepad, he'd
23:27
Speaker 1: concocted a very over the top exciting narrative full of
23:31
Speaker 1: twists and turns and intrigue and murder. Except the thriller
23:36
Speaker 1: that Graham was putting together, this detective story was not
23:40
Speaker 1: all fiction. In fact, most of it was very, very real.
23:43
Speaker 1: It would turn out, the threatening notes, the severed lamb's head,
23:48
Speaker 1: the bomb that nearly killed his wife, all of those
23:52
Speaker 1: were Graham's ideas. The farm because of Graham, was in
23:56
Speaker 1: a lot of debt, so Graham took out a series
23:59
Speaker 1: of life life insurance policies on his wife and then
24:03
Speaker 1: planned to murder her with a bomb that he made.
24:06
Speaker 1: But before he did that, he wrote and planted a
24:09
Speaker 1: whole bunch of threatening notes around the property, and he
24:12
Speaker 1: mailed to himself that way police would think there was
24:15
Speaker 1: like this maniac on the loose that was after his family,
24:19
Speaker 1: and that Graham was nothing more than a victim. However,
24:22
Speaker 1: Margaret didn't die from the bomb, and Graham panicked. He
24:26
Speaker 1: worried that police would eventually realize it was him who
24:29
Speaker 1: planted the bomb, and so he decided he would frame
24:33
Speaker 1: his neighbor call In as the fall guy. Since it
24:36
Speaker 1: was widely known in the village that they didn't get
24:38
Speaker 1: along except while Graham had managed to create a new
24:42
Speaker 1: twist and outrageous turn in the storyline, Unfortunately, he was
24:47
Speaker 1: just as terrible at covering up his crime as he
24:49
Speaker 1: was at farming. Colin's murder scene had a whole bunch
24:52
Speaker 1: of evidence that clearly proved Graham had set the whole
24:56
Speaker 1: thing up. The blood spatter was completely off, and Graham
25:00
Speaker 1: had no defensive ones. But the big clue that led
25:03
Speaker 1: the police to actually arresting Graham was his own spiral notepad.
25:08
Speaker 1: They'd found the notepad in Graham's office, and on one
25:11
Speaker 1: of the sheets was a very unique looking circular doodle
25:14
Speaker 1: that clearly Graham had drawn on it. And when he
25:17
Speaker 1: drew this doodle, the pen had made an impression on
25:20
Speaker 1: the sheets underneath it, and Graham had used some of
25:23
Speaker 1: those sheets underneath the doodle after he had done the
25:26
Speaker 1: doodle to write those threatening notes. And so the police
25:30
Speaker 1: they had those notes because you know, Graham had been
25:33
Speaker 1: turning them over as evidence of this maniac and they
25:36
Speaker 1: had previously noticed that on these notes, in addition to
25:39
Speaker 1: the letters, there appeared to be like an imprint on
25:43
Speaker 1: the piece of paper that was like a very unique doodle.
25:45
Speaker 1: And now they were staring at the original doodle on
25:48
Speaker 1: his notepad, and so that allowed them to directly link
25:51
Speaker 1: the threatening notes right back to Graham. Graham Backhouse was
25:55
Speaker 1: found guilty of murder and attempted murder and given two
25:58
Speaker 1: life sentences. He would die in prison of a heart
26:01
Speaker 1: attack in nineteen ninety four. Thank you so much for
26:09
Speaker 1: watching today's episode. Let me know what you thought of
26:12
Speaker 1: it in the comments below, And remember, we have a
26:14
Speaker 1: whole playlist of places you Can't go episodes ready for
26:18
Speaker 1: you to binge right now, So go ahead and click
26:21
Speaker 1: here and give them a watch, all right, until next
26:24
Speaker 1: time see it.