10 MORE Horrifying Urban Legends That ACTUALLY Happened
1. Theres Something In The Water Several variations of this
urban legend exist, but they all share the same premise: Innocent
people make the unfortunate (and disgusting) discovery that their
drinking water has a not-so-refreshing added ingredient. Some
stories tell of H2O laden with blood, feces, sewage, and pretty
much anything else that would make you want to vomit. Turns out,
however, that this urban legend actually happened at the Cecil
Hotel in Los Angeles. In 2013, guests of the now-closed hotel
noticed that the water was rather, um, gross, but they kept using
(and probably drinking) it anyway. After the complaints continued,
hotel staff went to check out the problem and made a gruesome
discovery inside one of the water tanks. They found the floating
corpse of a young woman, which means that the foul- tasting water
was due to the added hint of decomposing body juice. Excuse me
while I go cry now.
2. The Body In The Chimney The old body-in-the-chimney legend
has been told time and time again; perhaps to deter little kids
from playing where they shouldnt. What many folks dont realize is
that this particular story happens to be true. In 2010, Bakersfield
resident Dr. Jacquelyn Kotarac was involved in an on-and-off
relationship with William Moodie when she decided that she wanted
to get into his home. The only problem was that she didnt have a
key, so she either had to leave or figure out another way of
getting inside. Her ultimate decision? Break in by sliding down the
chimney. Welp, her plan failed, and she got stuck and eventually
died. Her body was found three days later. Lets just hope Santa
Claus doesnt run into the same problem.
3. The Murderous Chef Surely youve heard the legend of the
murderous chef who flew off the rails and decided to put something
new on the menuhuman. This is precisely what happened in the case
of David Veins, a California Chef who murdered his wife. So, whats
a chef to do when he has a dead body and nowhere to hide it? Well,
cook it in his restaurant of course. Seriously . . . Veins
slow-cooked his wifes body because he thought that would be the
most clever way to dispose of the evidence. His plan didnt work,
and thankfully he was caught before he could serve his new
ingredient to restaurant patrons. Veins even described his
horrifying methods on tape revealing, I just slowly cooked it and I
ended up cooking her for four days."
4. The Killer In Cops Clothing This is one of the scariest
urban legends out there because were hard-wired to trust law
enforcement, so to think that an officer might be a killer in
disguise is truly terrifying. Even more terrifying is the fact that
this scenario is not merely a scary storyit has actually happened
several times. The most well-known case is that of Ted Bundy, the
sadistic sociopath who lured women with his superficial charm and
clever tactics. Bundy dressed as a police officer and approached a
young woman named Carol DaRonch to tell her that her car had been
broken into. Bundy then offered to take her down to the police
station, and she agreed. Once in his car (which was not a police
car), DaRonch grew suspicious and tried to exit the vehicle. Bundy
attacked her and tried to handcuff her, but she escaped with one of
the handcuffs still fastened to her wrist.
5. Frozen Solid There are plenty of urban legends about people
getting frozen inside a block of ice, but the story usually ends
there. Well, back in 1981, this icy legend became a reality, but
with an added plot twist. 19-year-old Jean Hilliard was found
frozen solid in North Dakota after temperatures had plummeted to 22
below zero. Hilliard had been walking home when she collapsed in
the snow, and when she was found the next morning, her body was so
stiff that neighbors had to load her into the car diagonally to
transport her to the hospital. Doctors described the Hilliards
frozen body comparing her to a piece of meat out of a deep freeze.
How official. They assumed that she was dead, but they wouldnt be
able to tell for sure until she was thawed, and thats when the
crazy part happened. Once Hilliards body temperature reached a
normal level, she woke up. And get thisSHE. WAS. COMPLETELY. FINE.
It was as if nothing even happened, and doctors had no medical
explanation for her recovery.
6. Body Farms The term body farm is creepy enough on its own,
and there are lots of urban legends out there about vast areas of
land scattered with corpses and human body parts. Welllll, it turns
out that body farms are 100% real, but theyre slightly different
than the serial killer dumping grounds you hear about in urban
legends. See, real body farms are used by crime scene investigators
and forensic anthropologists to study decomposition patterns in
different conditions. The United States currently has three body
farms. Yes, they are scattered with real human remains. They may be
totally legal and for science, but that doesnt make body farms any
less creepy!
7. Death By Garbage Truck Every little kid has been scared to
death by urban legends about the troublemakers who hid in trash
cans, only to get crushed to death by the garbage truck. First off,
kids probably shouldnt play in trash cans. And second, this legend
really happened multiple times. In one incident, a 17-year-old boy
from Luxembourg, France was crushed to death by a garbage truck. No
one knows why the teen decided to enter the trash can in the first
place, and it will likely remain a mystery forever. Another similar
incident occurred when a trash worker was crushed while trying to
load items into his truck. Yet another garbage truck horror story,
a drunk man sleeping in a dumpster was loaded into a garbage truck,
but luckily, this particular incident did not end in death. Garbage
workers heard the man screaming and were able to shut off the
crushing mechanism just in the nick of time.
8. The Sadistic Surgeon You may remember the Waking Up In The
Middle Of Surgery legend that made an appearance on part one of our
list. Well, that seems like a walk in the park compared to the
Sadistic Surgeon legend, which goes a little something like this:
Evil surgeon pretends to be a talented and prestigious doctor, only
to mutilate his patients while theyre under the knife. That would
never happen, right? Wrong. Meet Glen Tucker, a prominent plastic
surgeon who left several patients mangled after botched surgeries.
Apparently, mutilating patients was just the surface of his inner
demons. At 80 years old, Tucker fatally shot his wife, their cat,
and then himself. The entire story is far too complex to cover on
our list, but you can read all about it here.
9. The Grave Robber The grave robber is a somewhat iconic
character that has made many appearances in horror movies over the
years. Its usually some creepy old man who goes around digging up
graves and collecting the corpses for who knows what reason.
Depends on the movie, I guess. Unfortunately, this once-fictional
character is no longer a figment of our nightmares. Case in
pointRussia, 2011. A man dubbed the Cemetery Collector was arrested
after authorities discovered 29yes, 29unearthed corpses inside his
home. Thats not even the worst part. The man, who was not named,
used the corpses for his own creepy pleasure, dressing them up in
womens clothing in order to create life-sized dolls. If thats not
the creepiest thing thats ever happened, then I dont know what
is.
10. Hangin Out With A Dead Guy Youve seen Weekend At Bernies
right? If not, its a hilarious movie about two guys who parade
around with a dead guy to fool people into thinking he was still
alive. Its totally unrealistic and would never, ever, happen in the
real world. At least thats what we all thought before we heard
about two friends who allegedly took their dead friend out for a
night on the town. It gets weirder, just wait. So, Robert Young and
Mark Rubinson went to pick up their buddy, Jeffrey Jarrett, for a
wild night on the town. They encountered a problem when they found
Jarrett passed out drunk at home. They assumed hed sober up soon,
so they scooped up their drunk buddy, loaded him in the back of the
car, and headed out to party. They hopped around to several
different spots including bars, strip clubs, and even a mexican
restaurant using Jarrets bank card the whole time. Well, Jarrett
never did sober up because he was, uh, dead. The party animals were
charged with abusing a corpse, identity theft, and criminal
impersonation.
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One
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