6 True Scary Valentines Day Stories | 2021

[Music] i used to love valentine's day i used to love all the cutesy displays and valentine's themed stock items we put out in the walmart i worked at and i used to love picking out something special for my boyfriend after planning a little date night with him but we're not together anymore and i'm not much of a romantic these days either in fact i dread february 14th coming around each year because it reminds me of one of the single worst moments in my entire life so like i said i worked at walmart when this all happened and it actually happened in the store too i love the decorating and checking out the romantic stock that we've gotten in that year but i usually try to get valentine's day off or if i was working it i'd trade shifts with a co-worker but this one year i can't get off and no one would trade with me so i was stuck working eight till five on valentine's day but it's no big loss i can wait for my presents and me and my boyfriend arranged to do something after work anyway so i took it on the chin right after i finished my lunch break i happened to be walking by one of the valentine's displays when i see this older guy staring at some of the items i thought it was the cutest thing ever this sweet older gentleman looking to pick his wife up something romantic or maybe he had his eye on someone in the nursing home he was at either way it was super adorable to me so i saddled up to the old guy and asked him who the lucky lady is he's all startled for a moment again kind of super cute and has to compose himself before he gives me his answer there was no one special in his life he was just something of an old romantic and seeing cutesy displays like ours on valentine's day made him long for lost loves of his i remember he said that i then asked if he had his eye on anyone new and he starts talking in a way i found kind of confusing at first like i thought i may have misunderstood maybe lost the context a little but after a minute of him just sort of babbling i realize he's not making any sense at all he keeps skipping from thought to thought just like a stream of broken consciousness coming out of him it was right about then that it hit me that he wasn't all there that was also about the time that i realized he wasn't that old either i mean all his hair was gray he had like an old man jumper on but he was so animated when he talked he seemed sort of spry like full of nervous energy and at a push i'd say he was in his mid 50s but something about him just seemed off and i was starting to think that initiating conversation hadn't been the best idea on my part i wish him luck with who the lucky lady turns out to be then slowly make a move to walk away but he stops me not with a word i mean he physically stops me from walking away he didn't grab me or anything at first it was just his fingers gently half wrapping around my wrist but it was enough to really put me on edge then he asked me in a way that seemed both extremely childlike and extremely sinister both at the same time will you be my valentine it was so surreal that initially i thought he had to be joking like no sane person would ask anyone that in a serious way not like that anyway so i just sort of laugh it off before apologizing and letting him know that i was seeing someone and right as i do i try to pull my wrist out of his hand he tightens it wraps his entire fist around my wrist and squeezes i just froze for a moment and almost two years of working at that walmart i've never had so much as an issue with a customer maybe it's because i'm short and blonde maybe it's because i'm just lucky because that whole interaction went from zero to 100 so fast and given my total lack of experience in any kind of conflict management i just had no idea what to do so i froze the guy starts turning red in the face and he continues to squeeze my wrist as hard as he could there are veins bulging out of his neck he's trembling so hard his eyes are starting to water and he is strong like really freaking strong then what he did next haunted me for months afterwards he gets his face right in mine while i'm absolutely frozen in terror and start singing he tried to keep his voice down but he couldn't get the words out without his words trembling from whatever weird rage fit he was going through after two lines i just start screeching for help but as soon as i start making any noise one of his hands shoots up around my throat and pushes me back hard against a shelf and when he starts squeezing i stop being able to scream then one of his other hands goes somewhere else somewhere i really wish he hadn't put it but when he did i finally found the strength to really fight back but it was over moments later some other customer come barreling down the aisle when he heard my scream and tackled the guy so hard that he almost floored me too and if the guy seemed crazy before he got tackled afterward he turned into a full-blown lunatic he actually bit the guy who first got him down and if it wasn't for security showing up as quick as they did i think he might have actually gotten free he was legitimately frothing at the mouth by the time the cops showed up i've never seen a person look like that before that guy was more animal than man by that point and the fallout was huge walmart sent me to some trauma management thing that didn't help at all and sent emails around to the other associates promising they'd do better with security and stuff but it was all just for show i gave statements to the police too and for a while it looked like i'd have to go to court to testify against the guy that assaulted me but as it turned out he was found unfit to stand trial and instead of going to real prison he ended up in some state hospital somewhere else when it was all said and done i just tried to get over it it was one of the more horrific moments of my life sure but i refused to let it define me and for a long while i worked on my overall mental health and particularly my sense of self-esteem i thought it was good after that i thought it was fixed so there was no way of me anticipating what would happen when i met a friend at this 50s diner that was our favorite place to eat we're just sitting there conversation on hold while we eat and the song comes on on the old jukebox until the lyrics started everything was fine but then these two girls started singing some words that i thought i'd gotten out of my head completely i know you belong to somebody new but tonight you belong to me i recognized it instantly from the weird little changes in pitch in the girl's voices but it was the exact same song the guy in walmart had sang before he grabbed me i know i caused a bit of a scene when i got up and fast walked out of there with my friend calling after me but i honestly didn't care i couldn't breathe while that song was my ears i just couldn't be there i suppose trauma is weird like that no matter how much you think you have it under control it's still there bubbling away just beneath the surface but i do work at it and i managed to neutralize how that creepy old song made me feel too i mean it took a while but i managed it like i said i'm not going to let what happened define me and i'll wear my wounds with pride but valentine's day is most definitely ruined for me [Music] back when i was in my early twenties i met a girl who set my entire world on fire she was smart beautiful and had passion for art we're gonna burn together she'd say not in the literal sense of course it's just that romance that we got swept up in was without a doubt the most intense thing i'd ever been involved in with my entire life it was like a wildfire just burning out of control nothing had topped it before and nothing has topped it since but let's just say that neither of us were in a particularly good place in our lives and as passionate as the relationship was it wasn't exactly healthy for the most part she was very very possessive and i'm not going to lie i thought that was kind of hot at first but that got really old really fast and her behavior started to cause arguments between us she would explode at the mention of any other girl i once mentioned something to do with my sister and she immediately interrupted to accuse me of being unfaithful even after i explained the girl i was talking about was my sister she stayed mad it just defied all logic but i was in love so i stayed with her so we're together for 17 and a half months and that time included some of the best and worst moments of my life so far but in the end the bad started to outweigh the good and faced with another valentine's day with her i decided i couldn't do it anymore i made the decision to break up with her and as you might imagine she did not take it very well at all at first she was in complete denial saying that there was nothing wrong with our relationship and that she had no idea why i was trying to break up then she got angry like really angry started throwing around accusations and threats none of which i thought that she was capable of acting on then came the tears and the final acceptance by far the hardest part for me she was crazy but i didn't think she was a bad person and it sucked to have to hurt her like that she insisted on staying in touch maybe staying friends or something but i had to go no contact it was the only way we'd really get over each other i felt like a monster but i did it anyway about a month goes by and i'm sitting in my apartment alone on valentine's day i'm sort of over this girl but i'm also sort of not and with it being valentine's day i'm thinking about her a whole lot so when my phone buzzes and i see its attacks from her i'm like rushing to see what it says i deleted her number but you know when you just always remember the last four digits of someone's number yeah that so all this message says is we were supposed to burn together and that just kind of broke my heart right there i thought about calling her maybe try and patch things up and in retrospect maybe that's exactly what i should have done but in the moment i just tried to stay strong and stick to the no contact rule i tried to take my mind off stuff stayed away from all the romantic movies and valentine's episodes that the tv networks were trying to force down my throat but still i just couldn't shake the lonely feeling i had in me so later that night i'm kind of intoxicated just sitting on the couch when my phone buzzes again i just know it's her like knew it in my gut and surprise surprise it was i debated just quickly clearing the notification and ignoring the message but my curiosity got the better of me and i found myself reading it i knew the first line said we were supposed to burn together again from the notification but only when i opened up the whole thread did i see that underneath the first part it just said but now you're going to burn alone again it hit me right in the feels it was incredibly clingy i know but at the same time you can't even deny how poetic that is poetry that's all i thought it was just that old metaphor we used to share i didn't think that she'd take it as far as she did i didn't think she meant literally burn because sometime after that i'm on my couch and i just started smelling smoke i go through the stages of like thinking i've drunkenly forgotten that i'm cooking then thinking the neighbors are burning food on accident then thinking someone is making a campfire outside or something just pure denialism really not wanting to believe that the apartment building was actually on fire then the fire alarm starts going off a rush downstairs and no shoes or socks just a pair of shorts and a t-shirt and run off the back of the building to the fire escape point and on the way i see smoke billowing out from under the door of the apartment below me minutes later a fire truck is parked outside the apartment building spraying water into the apartment below me which had been absolutely scorched it was one of the more surreal experiences of my life these firemen are asking me if i'm okay if i needed one of those foil blankets it was february and it was freezing outside but all that could come out of my mouth is like i know who did this i know who did this one of them tells me to get in touch with the police if the cause of the fire was criminal so i immediately do because like i said i had a good idea of who set that fire in the first place like i wasn't quite sure how she done it but having my ex-girlfriend text me like you're going to burn alone and then all of a sudden there's a house fire that was a no coincidence to me no coincidence at all and over the next couple of weeks i had to go and stay in my mom's place while some renovation work was undertaken at my smoke damage department but i did get in touch with the police who thanked me for the tip and said that it get in touch with me if the cause of the fire was found to be arson only it wasn't they called a little while later to say that the fire department investigator had determined that some faulty wiring was to blame for the blaze and so they wouldn't need any testimony from me i brought up the text messages my ex had sent me how her words seem to precede the fire in a way that was just too apt to be coincidence but again they insisted that no arson was to blame i even called her and texted her saying that i knew what she had done that she wouldn't get away with it but as you can imagine she played dumb saying things like i don't know what you're talking about you shouldn't be contacting me it's something that messes with me to this day and there are so many unanswered questions that frankly i'm not sure i want to know the answers to i just know that one moment she's texting me telling me i'm going to burn and the next my apartment building's on fire i'm not saying my ex broke into the apartment downstairs and did something to the wiring but it's even crazier of me to suggest that she willed something like that to happen or like engineered it or something i know how paranoid that sounds so i tend not to put that theory out much but it had such a profound effect on my mind that i still moved apartments not long after just to be safe because to me there's still something very frightening about that time in my life something i can't quite explain and now when i remember that old like we're going to burn together it doesn't set me a light anymore all it does is make my blood run cold [Music] every year without fail i get a valentine's day card now i might be mistaken but most people reading this are thinking oh lucky you or why is that something to complain about and nine times out of ten you might be right but the thing is i have no idea who sends them and have actually spent a great deal of time trying to figure out who it wasn't something that was creepy when it started off in fact getting a card from a secret admirer was a pretty awesome feeling the first card came when i was 13 years old right about the time i needed a little confidence boost but then when they started arriving year in and year out i got to thinking it was just my mom sending them or something i confronted her about it on valentine's day when i was 16 and she insisted it wasn't her i mean really insisted saying she'd tell me if she actually knew who it was i ended up asking all my close family and friends but none of them admitted to sending me an anonymous card so cut to me being in college it's coming up to valentine's day and i realized that for the first time in a long time i might not actually get a card that year only i did same style same handwriting same mystery person that must have sent it but here's the thing i had literally just moved dorms like a week prior because of a burst water pipe in my original dorm room but the valentine's card is addressed to the new dorm room which was on the opposite side of campus literally the only person in the world who had my new address was my mom so cue the second confrontation about the valentine's card in like two and a half years one that again ends with her violently assuring me that she hadn't given my address to anyone so the question remained who was sending me those cards it really creeped me out for a while but it was something that i grew to live with again i mean it seems like such a non problem right i keep getting valentine's day cards people would always just laugh i'm 33 years old in may of this year i've moved apartments three times in the past six years after my mom died it got to the point where i'd move and not a single member of my family knew my address until i told them so the second time i ran a little experiment i didn't tell a single person that i moved only my new landlord the utility companies and me knew i was living in this new place i waited two months like that having to pick up mail at the old apartment keeping my address secret until one particular day rolled around february 14th not a single other person knew my address and i still found a valentine's card in my mailbox [Music] beginning on november 22 1986 the life of oscar pistorius was unusual from the get-go he was born missing the outsides of both feet and was also missing his fibula the fibula or lower leg bones that extend from the knee to the outside of the ankle parallel to the shin bone its job being to stabilize the ankle and support the lower leg muscles given that he was without such support his feet were essentially useless so at just 11 months old doctors made the decision to remove oscar's lower legs entirely at that point if you'd have speculated that the young amputee might grow up to be a professional runner people might have called you crazy but in fact that's exactly what oscar became thanks to a piece of cutting-edge paralympian technology that came to be known as running blades manufactured using carbon fiber reinforced polymer material the curved design of these blades is intended to store kinetic energy like a spring allowing the wearer to jump and run effectively the blades are so effective that at the 2011 world championships in athletics oscar was the first amputee to win a non-disabled world track medal and at the 2012 summer olympic games despite not winning anything pistorius was the first double leg amputee participant a titanic achievement we can all agree naturally these victories and appearances made oscar an international sensation and he received an incredible amount of fame wealth and attention as a result oscar met south african model and paralegal riva steencomp at a party in november of 2012. the pair hit it off and soon began dating pretty seriously as for a while it seems that riva was phenomenally smitten with oscar many of her more superficial friends would wonder aloud what riva saw on him but those close to her knew what it was when riva was in her early twenties she had broken her back in a horse riding accident and was forced to essentially learn to walk all over again it was one of the most debilitating and humbling experiences of her entire life and she never forgot how much strength and willpower it took to conquer her temporary disability she saw that same kind of fortitude and oscar and it made her love him for it the pair spent christmas of 2012 together and after a few months more of steady dating decided to spend valentine's day of 2013 together too it was the perfect date to mark the blossoming of their new relationship and both parties must have been feverishly excited at the prospect of such a romantic occasion but what they didn't know was that an evening that would begin with love and affection would end in a nightmare of terror and violence that would set the world's media aflame according to oscar his valentine's date with riva went marvelously well the pair shared a romantic meal watched a movie and then after a little too much wine spent some time in bed together before falling asleep then in the early hours of the following morning oscar awoke to hear a noise coming from the ensuite bathroom one that sounded an awful lot like the window sliding open oscar continued to lie there listening in the darkness and in the moments that followed he swore he'd heard someone actually trying to climb in through the bathroom window moving as quietly as possible he slid off of his bed to retrieve a loaded pistol that he had hid nearby and arguably oscar might be right to be so vigilant despite having a population six times smaller than the united states south africa has 23 percent more violent crime and the wealthy pretoria neighborhood that oscar called home had been previously targeted by violent home invaders approaching the bathroom door with his pistol locked and loaded oscar was terrified his new girlfriend was lying in bed just feet away and there was potentially a violent home invasion about to occur and he hadn't had time to put his prosthetic legs on he was walking on his stumps later oscar would say this made him feel utterly defenseless he then heard a noise that to him sounded like whoever was on the other side of the bathroom was about to rush into the bedroom to do god knows what with them he panicked and fired four shots through the bathroom door the first thing oscar did was turn back towards his bed where he had expected riva to be scared out of her wits having been woken up by the gunshots but there was no riva only an empty bed it was then that oscar realized who was behind the door it wasn't some violent home invader it was his girlfriend riva he tried to open the bathroom door but it was locked from the inside oscar then grabbed a cricket bat and began to smash down the door and succeeded in creating a large hole through which he was able to crawl he then unlocked the door grabbed the unconscious riva then actually carried her downstairs in preparation for the ambulance he had called riva was rushed to the hospital but was pronounced dead after attempts to revive her failed for oscar it was a living nightmare it seemed that he tried to defend the girl he loved but in doing so had ended up killing her instead at his trial oscar seemed genuinely remorseful admitting that he had shot riva by accident and how doing so had destroyed his life completely it was mostly established by witness testimony that oscar and riva had a very healthy relationship and were very much in love valentine's cars were presented as evidence affectionate whatsapp exchanges that were brought before the court as proof that there was nothing overly sinister about riva's death that it was nothing more than a tragic accident but other evidence was submitted to evidence that suggested that there was trouble in paradise in one particular text message sent less than three weeks before her death riva told oscar that she was scared of him sometimes she said that whenever oscar snapped that she was terrified and went on to describe his behavior as nasty riva's mother june steencomp also had doubts that her daughter's death was merely a tragic accident she told a courtroom that she didn't believe oscar's story at all that none of his actions suggested that he felt protective of her she believed that riva and oscar had a horrible fight or argument that evening and that she'd fled to the bathroom because she was scared and had naturally locked the door behind her i think he may have shot once and then he had to go on and kill her because she would have been able to tell the world what really happened what he's really like she later told journalists asserting that there was no doubt in her mind that oscar had killed her daughter because she'd wanted to break up i believe their relationship was coming to an end she said in her heart of hearts she didn't think it was making either of them happy as the trial concluded oscar pistorius was convicted of manslaughter having escaped the murder charge that state prosecutors were hoping for the conviction came with a prison sentence of just five years but a combination of cooperating with law enforcement and good behavior in prison meant that oscar was just released just ten months into his sentence he was still under house arrest and had community service to complete but the fact remains that someone was able to take a life and see the inside of the jail cell for just 10 months even in light of the accidental nature of riva's death just 10 months seem like an alarmingly light sentence but over the course of years successive appeals and mounting evidence all pointed towards the likelihood that oscar's version of events was just pure spin and that somehow he had actually known it was riva in the bathroom that night before he opened fire this assertion that oscar pistorius had deliberately murdered his girlfriend gained so much traction that by 2017 oscar's sentence was upgraded to murder and he was sent back to prison for an additional 13 years it was a strange and drawn-out process maybe even more bizarre by the fact that south african courts don't have juries so any and all evidence was reviewed solely by a handful of prosecutors and judges before any fresh sentence was handed out what exactly this new evidence showed isn't available to the public just yet but whatever it did or did not prove it led to a south african judge to throw the full weight of the judicial system behind one of their country's biggest sports stars whatever that evidence was it must have been pretty damning indeed and if the death of riva steen comp wasn't simply some tragic accident then the implications are horrifying a young model went over to her sports star boyfriend's home not for any valentine's day romance but to break up with him this person was so enraged by the rejection that she was forced to lock herself in his bathroom he tried to smash the door down with a cricket bat and when he realized she might use her cell phone to call for help he fired four shots through the wood of the door one of which struck her in the skull on a day of the year when couples everywhere should be getting together romancing each other and enjoying their companionship valentine's day of 2013 became one of terror pain and death for young riva steenkop who died scared and alone in the bathroom of a man she barely knew on a rainy valentine's day evening in february of 1971 19 year old jesse mcbain drove over to meet his girlfriend patricia mann at her college dormitory in durham north carolina they had arranged to celebrate their most romantic day of the year by attending a valentine's dance at the nearby watts hospital patricia was studying nursing and her practical lessons took place at watts so as a potential future member of the nursing staff there she had managed to land an invitation to the dance at approximately 11 30 jesse and patricia had one last dance said their goodbyes and began to walk back to jesse's car they then drove over to a deserted housing development area that would later become the neighborhood of crowdsdale no house had been constructed yet but a few sections of road had been laid out in an area that was shrouded by a quarter miles worth of greenery those that ventured down there were likely to find collections of beer bottles cigarette butts strewn among the trees it was a place people went to screw around exactly the kind of private out of the way place the two young lovebirds might need to go to get a little alone time patricia's 1am curfew came and went and her friends back in the girls dorm assumed she'd sneak back in at some point on her tiptoes yet little did they know that they'd never see her or her boyfriend ever again the following morning patricia still hadn't returned from her date with jesse this was the first time the young woman had ever broken her dormitory curfew and those close to her were quickly beginning to worry they knew patricia to be a deeply mature and responsible young woman who always played by the rules and took authority seriously and to their knowledge jesse was an affectionate respectful boyfriend one that patricia seemed very much in love with but not even youthful romance would be able to make the young nursing student break curfew slowly but surely as the day progressed the concern of patricia's roommates went from mild to grave what started with a few questions turned to them calling around local hospitals in case they'd been in a car accident they then filed a missing persons report with the durham county sheriff's department but were still so anxious that they began to physically search for their missing roommate on foot they roamed the surrounding area canvassed her usual hangout spots around town and on campus until someone had the idea to go search the lovers lane over at the housing development it was here that the searchers would find jesse's empty car parked in one of the quieter spots on the development the car was locked and on the back seats there were two warm coats presumably belonging to jesse and patricia there was no damage to the car everything about the scene seemed perfectly in order except of course for the fact that the last two people to travel in it seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth by this point local police have informed both jessie and patricia's parents that their children are missing at first all involved had entertained the idea that the couple's disappearance was nothing more than a misguided but romantic attempt to elope to skip town get hitched and settle down somewhere new but investigating police quickly began to realize that there was something distinctly sinister about the case there had apparently been no attempt by either jessie or patricia to inform anyone of their plans not even close friends and the idea that neither would at least leave a note or letter to a relative seemed highly unlikely over time those closest to patricia began to assume the worst i just got the sickest feeling in my stomach said the cousin of patricia's i just knew something terrible had happened for two weeks after they were declared missing a team of police officers and local volunteers mounted an intensive search of the surrounding area combing through the wooded areas around lovers lane for any trace of the missing couple they followed up lead after lead and tip after tip but no one could find hide nor hair of jessie or patricia with frustration mounting police decided to widen the range of the search area and enlist the help of helicopter support and specifically train forensic divers but in the end it was the misfortune of a surveyor in nearby orange county that provided the police with their most important lead on february 25th 1971 a full 12 days after jesse and patricia went missing robert kirby is walking along a dirt road in the backwoods of orange county north carolina when something catches his eye among the trees maybe 50 meters or so off the trail the surveyor thinks he sees what appears to be the limb of a mannequin lying among the fallen leaves curious he wanders over to check it out but the distinct shape of a human leg he sees is not that of a plastic mannequin it's real human flesh he rushes to a nearby roadside diner to have someone call the police and by the end of that forensic investigators discovered not one but two human corpses up in the woods of orange county and they turned out to belong to none other than jesse mcbain and patricia mann finding the young couple and decomposing was bad enough for the searchers but the manner in which they'd obviously been dispatched of was massively disturbing to them the couple had their hands tied and then were made to stand back against the trees so another larger rope could be wrapped around them once their killer had secured them in place he began to torture them jesse's ear and mouth were both found to have blood in them and a variety of large and small abrasions to his lips and forehead suggested he was beaten senseless before he was killed at some point jesse and patricia's killer had ripped their eyelashes off before continuing to savagely beat them then when whoever had tied them up had grown tired of beating them they wrapped rope collars around their necks using a kind of knot that could be repeatedly tightened over and over again we can only assume that the killer used these rope collars to slowly choke the life out of jesse and patricia gradually tightening the rope collars over a drawn-out period of time until neither was able to breathe each of the couple's bodies had all of their valuables intact too jesse was still wearing an expensive wrist watch and a class ring when his body was found patricia was also wearing jewelry and her purse was left back in the abandoned car their deaths were not part of some robbery their killer has absolutely no monetary gain in mind when he'd taken them neither were there any signs of indecent assault on patricia she had a great deal of bruising around her face and neck but nothing below the waistline there was no ulterior motive all their killer had wanted to do was torture and kill the investigation that followed was severely hampered by different agencies complete lack of collaboration for example the fbi seemed to consider the local sheriffs as frankly beneath them and a feeling of contempt quickly grew between the two groups everybody worked on the case as individuals as detective tom horn once put it not a lot of information was being shared by the various agencies and the rivalry was tremendous a lot of work was done but it was individual so there were definitely some missed opportunities yet even with the appalling level of disorganization that pervaded a number of likely suspects emerged as a result of some tip-top police work some had to be ruled out after taking polygraph tests which proved their innocence but one of the men who failed was actually a doctor at watts hospital who had previously worked with patricia mann when the police sought to question him again he completely refused to cooperate and would only release a statement through a defense attorney he began to keep on retainer this made him the number one suspect in the entire case and to this day there's never really been anyone else who's garnered such legitimate scrutiny but without the proper evidence to charge him very little action was taken against any of the supposed killers no one ever really zeroed in on anyone detective horn stated and as a result the case quickly went cold 43 years later in 2014 detective tim horn was still working for the orange county sheriff's department when a cousin of patricia's carolyn spivey contacted him with some fresh information regarding her cousin's murder along with his partner at the time detective horn opened up the previously closed case file pouring over old statements in boxes and evidence they re-analyzed the possibilities of former suspects considered new ones and began to condense as much of the multi-agency information as possible into the pursuit of one solid suspect and they succeeded detective horn then contacted almost every single one of the detectives who worked on the case back in 1971 and gathered them together for a presentation it was one which would show them how he'd piece together multiple pieces of the decades-long puzzle only to come to one solid conclusion that it was the watts doctor a man patricia had actually known that had murdered her and her boyfriend jesse when the presentation was finished what followed was a prolonged silence to all in attendance tom horn's hard work had presented them the best opportunity yet to end a mystery that had persisted for almost half a century they had their suspect they had evidence now it was time to make their move using what's known as m back detective horn was able to extract a dna sample from the knotted ropes used to tie up and strangle jesse and patricia an mvac is basically a wet vacuum dna collection system that is designed to extract strands of dna from difficult to reach places places just like the fibrous folds in a length of rope what came back was a dna sample that didn't match either jesse or patricia and so in all likelihood it belonged to the killer detective horn then requested a dna sample from their number one suspect the watts doctor that patricia had worked with horn's argument was that after all this time the doctor would finally be able to clear his name and prove that it wasn't him that executed the young couple but the doctor refused having his defense attorney contact law enforcement to release a statement in legalese and that might just be the most suspicious thing about our doctor because it really does raise the question of what he has to hide yet despite such obvious suspicion this doctor has never been charged and whatever new evidence led to him being asked to provide a dna sample hasn't been shared with the public we can only assume the durham county sheriff's department are in the process of putting a serious case against the man and are trying to find some way of forcing him to give a sample of his dna and with that dna sample law enforcement might just be able to end this 40 year old mystery of who could be cold and cruel enough to wrench a loved-up young couple away from one of the happiest nights of their lives only to torture and eventually execute them in a secluded wooded area turning a romantic valentine's night into the very last that each of them would spend on earth to all outside observers it appeared that dr john hamilton and his wife susan had the perfect loving marriage in the 14 years of blissful union john's passionate love for his spouse had led him to lavish her with expensive gifts and luxurious vacations a brand new porsche on their wedding day being just the beginning of a long list of romantically motivated purchases but john wasn't just generous with his money he was apparently generous of heart too and spent a great deal of time reminding susan just how much he loved her in a variety of heartwarming ways when susan professed a yearning for employment for a purpose outside of being a housewife john gave her a job at his highly esteemed obstetrics and gynecology clinic in oklahoma city he was there for her in every way and by all counts they were a textbook case of romantic longevity but that's what makes it all the more horrifying that on valentine's day of 2001 dr hamilton's arrival at the family home kicked off a chain of events that would turn their perfect little world into a living nightmare as you can imagine in a marriage as loving as john and susan's valentine's day was held in high esteem every single year they were married they exchanged gifts and cards often haven't planned some kind of romantic rendezvous be a dinner and a movie or a walk around a local park but on valentine's day of 2001 john was needed in the operating room of this clinic fairly early in the morning too any exchange of gifts would have to wait until his lunch break but just as he had promised john ducked out of the clinic as soon as he was able and drove home to spend a romantic half hour with his wife after which he would have to return to another surgery he called her name as he walked through the front door but she didn't answer john suspected that his wife might have some kind of surprise in store for him and he felt a ripple of excitement run through him as he walked up the stairs towards the master bedroom he called his wife's name again but still there was no answer and it was then that something caught john's eye lying on the floor of the second floor bathroom it was susan she was in a crumpled lifeless heap with blood pooling underneath her paramedics were called to the scene but susan couldn't be revived those in attendance noted that she appeared to have been strangled with two of her husband's expensive silk neckties but the blood on the bathroom floor was undoubtedly from the series of bloody head wounds she had due to repeated blunt force trauma the wounds being so severe that parts of her brain were exposed while her face was completely unrecognizable to his absolute horror dr john hamilton was the number one suspect in his wife's murder from the very beginning police have since publicly stated that there were many factors which led them to such a conclusion the first being that there was no sign of force entry to the home whoever killed susan had the keys to the residence it was also a crime in which nothing of value was stolen and one in which there were no bloody fingerprints left in the bathroom which had blood almost everywhere this meant that there was a distinct chance that whoever killed susan was extremely professional incredibly lucky or had the time and privacy to scrub the scene of incriminating evidence before the body was found on top of that while searching the home police got their hands on a valentine's day card that susan had written to john presumably that year and the message inside wasn't nearly as loving and cheerful as you might imagine i bought this two weeks ago so i guess maybe it doesn't seem as appropriate but i do love you have a great day susan the contents of the card raised a lot of questions concerning the state of the hamilton's marriage evidently it suggests that there had been some kind of incident or argument one that had caused a degree of turmoil and somewhat soured the valentine's feeling as it later turned out this incident involves susan catching john making phone calls to a woman employed as a topless dancer police actually found hundreds of calls to this person on john's cell phone during their investigation and heard from close friends of susan that she had confessed to considering a divorce to the cops the explanation seemed simple john had murdered his wife to prevent her from running off with half of his money but at his trial much of the local community came out in support of dr hamilton and refused to believe that the man was capable of such a horrific crime especially given that the victim was his own beloved wife but when the paramedics who attended the 9-1-1 call john made were questioned in court the jury began to notice some disturbing inconsistencies in the story hamilton testified in court that after he contacted emergency services he had gotten to work trying to perform cpr on his wife's bloody corpse and this appeared to be true as the paramedics confirmed that when they arrived john had been performing chest compressions but as people who performed cpr on an almost daily basis the paramedics noticed something peculiar about john's technique it was incredibly ineffective from a regular person with no first aid training that could be understandable but but john was so bad that it almost looked like he wasn't actually trying to revive susan at all which for a medical professional is very suspicious john also claimed that he had tried performing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation on his wife but the paramedics claimed that john had no blood on his mouth or face when they arrived there was so much blood around the victim's head that there was no way john could have performed mouth to mouth and not gotten any on him some of susan's blood was also found on the steering wheel of dr hamilton's car and despite his claim in court that he had simply moved the vehicle to make room for emergency vehicles a prosecutor was able to make use of the overall suspicion to claim that this was evidence that john had been considering an escape attempt at one point during the trial the prosecution's case against dr hamilton appeared to be floundering hamilton's defense attorney had brought a number of key character witnesses to testify in court and all had built a picture of john as nothing but a loving husband and he believed that the nail in the prosecution's coffin will be the testimony of a crime scene investigator named tom bevel an expert on blood splatter at crime scenes bevel was essentially brought in to confirm that the blood splatter on dr hamilton's shirt the same one he was wearing during his attempt at cpr was consistent with a man simply trying to revive his murdered wife while in a state of extreme panic and grief at first tom bevel did indeed testify that much of the blood splatter could well have been from the doctor's attempts at cpr but as it turned out bevel had noticed something that other investigators had overlooked he had made note of the small flecks of blood that could be found on the inside of hamilton's right sleeve a pattern he had seen many times before on the clothing of people who had killed someone with a blunt object and the seconds that followed the courtroom was deathly silent an expert defense witness had testified against the person they were supposed to be defending and in just a few words tom bevel had condemned dr hamilton to prison when later asked why he had made the decision to essentially act as a witness for the prosecution bevel claimed he just had to tell the truth he said he had sworn on oath something that override any allegiance he may have had to his client after that it only took two hours for a jury of his peers to find john hamilton guilty on the charge of first degree murder or after a judge sentenced him to life in prison those that followed the case were highly disturbed by the sudden turn of events john had and still does maintain his innocence even to this day but more and more evidence points to the idea that he killed his wife in cold blood his defense team even floated the idea that he must have been innocent because the guilty timeline would mean that john went to work and performed flawless surgeries right after murdering the love of his life this might well be true but in the light of the guilty verdict it's all the more damning because it suggests that dr john hamilton was able to beat his wife's skull in on valentine's day then remain calm and collected enough to go and perform complicated medical surgeries and if it's true then maybe a more fitting name for dr hamilton would be dr death hey friends thanks so much for listening click that notification bell to be alerted of all future narrations and if you got a story be sure to submit them to my subreddit r let's read official and give and receive feedback from the community and maybe even hear your story on the next video and join a live stream to catch an invite to my discord and if you want to support me even more grab early access to all future narrations for just one dollar a month on patreon and maybe even pick up some let's read merch on spreadshirt and check out the let's read podcast where you can hear all these stories in long compilation form and save huge on data located anywhere you listen to podcasts links in the bio thanks so much friends and remember save the drama for obama

Channel: Lets Read!

Views: 160,225

Rating: 4.9226618 out of 5

Keywords: Valentines Day Stories, true valentines day Stories, valentines day horror stories, Scary valentines day stories, valentines day, true scary stories, scary stories, scary true stories, true horror stories, horror stories, true stories, stories from reddit, lets not meet, true creepy stories, scary horror stories, reddit, true scary stories from reddit, true horror stories from reddit, subscriber submissions, reddit scary true stories, lets read, ASMR, creepy stories

Id: 0pqtzU5oVTk

Length: 51min 54sec (3114 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 01 2021