Weird Darkness: Paranormal & True Crime Stories

Five days ago the prosecutor told a judge that serious felony charges were headed to the grand jury as part of the Siders case, but refused to say what those chargers were. On Friday the indictments came back, and the answer has made this case even darker and more evil than it was before. I need to place a trigger warning on this one, because it even shocked me when the news broke. 

SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/SidersCase20260822

Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736

*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

Something has been scratching at the pantry door since he was ten years old, and now that he's inherited the house, it has started leaving claw marks.

EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/mitm-monsterinthepantry

SOURCES and RESOURCES: “The Monster In The Pantry” by Christopher Maxim: https://www.reddit.com/r/ChristopherMaxim/

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

Midnight In The Macabre (MITM), originally aired: August 22, 2026

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

Scout Brooks has spent one day training to become an intergalactic hero, preparing to rescue Professor Nog's old friend Farrow from a hostile alien race holding him captive somewhere among the stars. But as the mission prepares to launch, someone has been secretly watching Fort Nogs from the shadows outside — and their intentions remain a mystery.

Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1655277373

Find more family-friendly frights and creepy games to play on our website at http://MicroTerrors.com!

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/microterrors

Other stories, novels, and more from author Scott Donnelly: https://amzn.to/3LymHaU

Other narrations, podcasts, and audiobooks from voice artist Darren Marlar: https://WeirdDarkness.com
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Weird Darkness©, 2026
Micro Terrors: Scary Stories for Kids™, 2026#MicroTerrors #WeirdDarkness

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

A drug said to turn victims into compliant “zombies,” some of the strangest true crime cases ever recorded, the bizarre history of chastity belts, the terrifying legend of Baba Yaga, and the mysterious Oera Linda manuscript.

EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources):  https://weirddarkness.com/ZombieCrimes

READ or DOWNLOAD the full transcript of this episode: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/yckk7x3v

FEATURED STORIES IN THIS EPISODE: It’s nickname is “Columbian Devil’s Breath” – and it’s so powerful it can turn perfectly healthy people into mindless zombies. We’ll look at the dangerous and deadly drug, Burundanga. (A Drug That Creates Zombies) *** The chastity belt has, through the ages, become more of a humorous analogy or punchline than the real thing. But then, that’s appropriate – seeing as it actually began as a middle-ages joke. (The Strange Truth Behind Chastity Belts) *** A fearsome witch, she is said to kidnap, roast, and eat children in the woods. No – this is not the story of Hansel and Gretel. This witch is much more terrifying – she is the Baba Yaga. (The Legend of Baba Yaga) *** The Oera Linda book is a manuscript written in a form of Old Frisian, purporting to cover historical, mythological, and religious themes of remote antiquity, from 2194 BC to 803 AD. Many are fascinated by what it says others claim it is a hoax or forgery. What is the truth behind the Oera Linda? (What Is The Oera Linda?)

CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…
00:00.00.000 = Show Open
00:02:14.954 = A Drug That Creates Zombies
00:09:24.427 = Freaky True Crimes ***
00:27:30.339 = The Strange Truth Behind Chastity Belts ***
00:35:20.257 = The Legend of Baba Yaga
00:43:12.549 = What Is The Oera Linda? ***
00:52:32.916 = Show Close & Bloopers
*** = Begins immediately after inserted ad break

LISTEN ON PODCAST APPS:
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.com/wdapps
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*

SOURCES and RESOURCES:“A Drug That Creates Zombies” by Brandon Michaels for Graveyard Shift: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/yckryre8
“Freaky True Crimes” by Patrick Thornton for Unspeakable Times: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/2p9fsamf
“The Strange Truth Behind Chastity Belts” by Genevieve Carlton for Weird History: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/yc7nzbfx
“The Legend of Baba Yaga” by Genevieve Carlton for All That’s Interesting: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/2p8urkfa
“What Is The Oera Linda?” by Bipin Dimri for Historic Mysteries: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/yttpw84r
(Over time links may become invalid, disappear, or have different content. I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible. If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story, or if a credit is incorrect, please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately. Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases.)

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Originally aired: March, 2022

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

In a castle sunk so deep beneath the trees that no daylight has ever reached it, a man who has never seen the sun or heard a human voice starts climbing the one ruined tower that rises above the forest, having decided it is better to see the sky once and die than to live without ever seeing it at all.

EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/mitm-theoutsiderlovecraft


SOURCES and RESOURCES: “The Outsider” by H.P. Lovecraft (Weird Tales in April 1926)

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

Midnight In The Macabre (MITM), originally aired: August 21, 2026

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

A man boards the 4:15 out of London in December of 1856, shares a locked compartment with a fellow passenger the whole way, and steps off to find that everyone insists he traveled alone.

Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/OTR

CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…
00:00:00.000 = Show Open
00:01:30.028 = CBS Radio Mystery Theater, “The 4:15 Express” (July 07, 1978) ***WD
00:44:56.311 = Danger Dr Danfield, “Harriet Miller” (September 29, 1946)
01:11:23.113 = The Devil and Mr. O, “Rocket From Manhattan” (September 20, 1945)
01:39:46.924 = Diary of Fate, “Matt Cooper” (July 20, 1948) ***WD
02:07:09.368 = Dimension X, “No Contact” (October 28, 1950) ***WD
02:36:43.929 = The Eleventh Hour, “Debt” (ADU)
03:01:35.365 = Escape, “Flood On The Goodwin” (November 01, 1949)
03:30:09.980 = Everyman’s Theater, “Cat Wife’ (October 18, 1940)
03:59:09.387 = Exploring Tomorrow, “The Stowaway” (April 30, 1958) ***WD
04:16:04.216 = Dark Fantasy, “The Demon Tree” (December 05, 1941) ***WD
04:40:50.714 = BBC Fear on 4, “The Judge’s House” (April, 1989)
05:09:59.925 = Show Close

(ADU) = Air Date Unknown
(LQ) = Low Quality
***WD = Remastered, edited, or cleaned up by Weird Darkness to make the episode more listenable. Audio may not be pristine, but it will be better than the original file which may have been unusable or more difficult to hear without editing.
CUSTOM WEBPAGE: https://weirddarkness.com/WDRR0750

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

A Bigfoot skeptic driving Colorado's Highway 149 on July 28th reported a dark figure stepping out of the treeline to look at her, and the only evidence is two barefoot impressions in the dirt.

SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/SlumgullionPassBigfoot

LORI AND BILL BOWLING’S VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIeemwcMlNc

Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736

*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

Vinton County's prosecutor filed two motions explaining why the mother and the grandmother in the case should stay in jail, and in one of them he mentioned charges nobody outside the courthouse has seen yet.

SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/SidersCase20260820

Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736

*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

A woman from Cleveland moved to Wisconsin, took the surname of Watts – a man serving five life sentences for killing his entire family – and filed to marry him. Women have been doing this for well over a century, and the ones who later walked away have almost never been asked why.

BOOK: “They Told Me My Newborn Died – They Lied” by Darren Marlar: https://amzn.to/4ihvu3k

EPISODE BLOG PAGE (includes sources): https://weirddarkness.com/wattsandlizzie

READ or DOWNLOAD the full transcript of this episode: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/yzmw3jdn
This episode includes references to suicide and to the deaths of children. If you are struggling, you are not alone, and help is available. https://WeirdDarkness.com/HOPE is a free directory of mental health resources, organized by country, for anyone anywhere in the world who needs somebody to talk to. And if you’re in the United States or Canada, you can get immediate help over the phone by dialing 988.

FEATURED STORIES IN THIS EPISODE: Eight years after Chris Watts strangled his pregnant wife and smothered their two daughters, a woman from Cleveland has moved to Wisconsin, started signing his surname, and filed paperwork that now sits on a prison warden's desk. And Chris Watts is not the only man in permanent lockup who is seeking matrimony. Later, we’ll look at the women who build relationships with men who will die behind bars, and what draws them in.

CHAPTERS & TIME STAMPS (All Times Approximate)…00:00:00.000 = The Foreboding
00:01:51.635 = Show Open
00:03:19.353 = Ten Seconds At Dodge Correctional
00:20:26.768 = Shannan, Bella, Celeste and Nico ***
00:48:21.294 = He Will Write Back ***
01:04:25.333 = Dead In All Respects ***
01:24:35.204 = Nobody Counts Any Of This ***
01:29:55.177 = Show Close
*** = Begins immediately after inserted ad break

LISTEN ON PODCAST APPS:
Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://weirddarkness.com/wdapps
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.
Originally aired: August 19, 2026

This episode of Weird Darkness covers the marriage application Chris Watts filed from a Wisconsin prison eight years after murdering his pregnant wife and their two young daughters, and the long record of women who write to, visit and marry men who will never get out.It opens at Dodge Correctional Institution in Waupun, Wisconsin, where an inmate may touch a visitor twice, once at the start of a visit and once at the end, an embrace reporting puts at roughly ten seconds. On August 12th, 2026 the Daily Mail reported that Chris Watts, 41, and a 39-year-old Cleveland realtor named Lizzie Henderson had applied to marry inside the Wisconsin prison system. Lizzie had moved from Ohio to Wisconsin with her mother, filed a sealed petition for a confidential name change on September 12th, 2025, and appeared in prison visitor logs roughly twenty times during 2025, plus a visit on Christmas Day of 2024. Wisconsin handles these requests under policy 309.00.06, PIOC Marriages, which routes the application through a marriage coordinator and leaves the decision with the warden. No ceremony or license has been documented, and Watts has no projected release date.From there the episode goes back to the family. The Watts family doorbell camera recorded Shanann Watts arriving home at 1:48 in the morning on August 13th, 2018 at 2825 Saratoga Trail in Frederick, Colorado. She was 34 and fifteen weeks pregnant with a son the couple had named Nico, raising daughters Bella, four, and Celeste, three, and selling Thrive for Le-Vel while her husband worked for Anadarko Petroleum and carried on an affair with co-worker Nichol Kessinger. Watts failed a polygraph administered by Colorado Bureau of Investigation agent Tammy Lee, blamed Shanann for the girls' deaths, then retracted it. A drone over an Anadarko site called CERVI 319 found Shanann in a shallow grave and both girls submerged in crude oil inside storage tanks with eight-inch hatches. Judge Marcelo Kopcow sentenced him on November 19th, 2018 to five life sentences plus 84 years. In a February 2019 interview at Waupun, Watts described smothering Celeste in his truck while Bella sat beside her, and hearing Bella's last two words, "Daddy, no!", every time he closes his eyes.The second half opens in the autumn of 1921, when French railways ran extra trains to Versailles for the trial of Henri Désiré Landru, a furniture dealer who placed lonely-hearts advertisements in Paris newspapers and murdered eleven people. Women mailed him proposals of marriage while he awaited the guillotine. The modern version runs through Meet-An-Inmate, launched in 1998, and WriteAPrisoner, founded by Adam Lovell in 2000, which post profiles written on paper because American prisons allow no internet access; Susan Smith drew more than six thousand letters before pulling her listing in 2003. Hybristophilia, the term journalists reach for, was coined by sexologist John Money in 1986 and has never appeared in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual. Sheila Isenberg's Women Who Love Men Who Kill, forensic psychologist Katherine Ramsland's "perfect boyfriend" model, and sociologist Megan Comfort's San Quentin fieldwork in Doing Time Together supply what the women themselves say they are getting.Two 2025 studies found that actively seeking out romanticizing TikTok content correlated with attraction while passive exposure predicted nothing. The risk is documented in the killings of Regina Capobianco and John Mann by her pen pal Thomas Knuff in Parma Heights, Ohio, and in the strangling deaths of Stephanie Dowells and Tania Thomas during family visits at Mule Creek State Prison. The marriages run from Nina Van Zandt, who married Haymarket defendant August Spies by proxy in 1887 and may have married an innocent man, through Ted Bundy and Carole Ann Boone, Doreen Lioy and Richard Ramirez at San Quentin, the Twinkie that served as Erik Menendez and Tammi Saccoman's wedding cake, and James Whitehouse, who wrote to Susan Atkins in 1985 and went on to Harvard Law School to serve as her attorney. All of it rests on Turner v. Safley, the 1987 Supreme Court decision in which Justice Sandra Day O'Connor noted that most inmates are eventually released, leaving the man who never will be an untested case. Rhode Island's 1909 civil death statute declared lifers "dead in all respects", and Britain barred whole-life prisoners from marrying in 2024 after Milly Dowler's murderer Levi Bellfield was granted permission.The episode closes on the women who leave, absent from every study in the field. Lynn Hartman ended her engagement to Steven Avery in October of 2016 and wrote that she had been fooled by the Netflix documentary. Paula Williamson married Charles Bronson at HMP Wakefield in November of 2017, had it annulled in 2019, and died that July at thirty-eight. Anna Eriksson divorced Lyle Menendez in 2001 and still argues for his release. No agency counts prison marriages, and every figure circulating online is unsourced. Chris Watts belongs to a long file rather than a new one, having received his first letters from strangers within weeks of his December 2018 sentencing, before he had written a word to any of them.

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS has new episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit WeirdDarkness.com/Listen • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.

A humanoid robot barista set a world record on its first weekend behind the counter in Beijing, and the balance of power between humans and machines now rests almost entirely on how politely people behave in line.

WEIRD DARKROAST COFFEE: https://weirddarkness.com/coffee/ (Yes, it’s a real thing!)

SOURCES, LINKS, AND PRINT VERSION: https://weirddarkness.com/RobotBarista

Look for this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio, Amazon Music, Pandora, TuneIn Radio, and other podcast apps. Get a list of free listening apps here: https://pod.link/1078714736
*No AI Voices Are Used In The Narration Of This Podcast*

WeirdDarkness® is a registered trademark. Copyright ©2026, Weird Darkness.

LIKE WHAT YOU’RE HEARING? WEIRD DARKNESS posts episodes 7 DAYS A WEEK! Listen FREE wherever you get podcasts or visit https://weirddarkness.com/listen. • Paranormal • True Crime • Ghosts • UFOs • Cryptids • Unexplained • Want even more? Become an OFFICIAL WEIRDO for commercial-free episodes, bonus episodes, weeknight live chats, audiobooks & more at https://WeirdDarkness.com/OFFICIAL

More episodes, additional podcasts, books, original music, in-depth paranormal and true-crime articles, and much more at https://weirddarkness.com.