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Just when you think that human beings can’t possibly treat each other any more horribly…you turn on the news or read the paper and your mind gets blown all over again.
Because the truth is that the world can be a really terrifying place.
What’s the most disturbing true story you know?
Here’s how AskReddit users responded.
1. End of summer.
“Early 1980s I was visiting my cousin in Cincinnati. We played with the neighborhood kids all summer.
The week I was leaving the family that lived two houses down from my cousin, the husband came home from work and k**led his family with an axe.
There were 4 kids, his wife and he took himself out with a shotg**.”
2. Civil War.
“My dad and uncle were part of a small costal towns defense force in Lebanon in the late 1970s when the civil war was was on the brink of breaking out.
Fighting broke out and the skirmishes that were taking place evolved into an all out a**ault on the town. On one of the last nights before the ma**acre took place invading forces k**led my grandfather, one of my uncles and his entire family, 3 children and his pregnant wife.
My dad was called to the house in the morning when the fighting subsided. He had to help carry his family and load their bodies in the back of a truck where they took them to the local cemetery for a quick funeral service before they fled the town.
He said when they got down to the beach and were waiting for boats to load up the refugees and take them to safety they looked back and saw the entire town with smoke billowing up from it.
It was like a horror story for me to find out about it. I’ve never asked my father how he has dealt with it. But after so many years he moved back to that coastal village just south of Beirut and he loves it with all his heart.”
3. Crazy story.
“The d**th of Brian Wells. The story behind the Netflix show, “Evil Genius”.
Basically a bunch of lunatic sadists grabbed a pizza delivery guy and strapped a bomb around his neck to get him to rob a bank.
He obliged and the bomb went off anyway — happened on camera with police watching.”
4. Sick.
“The “Toy-Box K**ler”, even worse than horror movies though.
He kidnapped girls, played a record of him explaining how he is going to t**ture and r**e them every day in a soundproofed truck trailer and had a mirror installed in the ceiling so the victims would see it all happen to them.
His wife was in this s**t too.
I just can’t understand how sick people can be at worst.”
5. Scary.
“When I was in college, a kid asked his friend to meet him a motel near campus because he was contemplating s**cide.
When the friend got there, the kid was not s**cidal, but confessed his love to the friend and said he got the room so they could have s**. The friend turned him down, said he wasn’t gay and had no interest in him and went to leave.
The kid snapped, k**led the friend, dismembered his body and threw it in the hotel dumpster. Went back to campus like nothing happened.
It didn’t take long for the police to catch the kid, but the fact that he k**led and dismembered his friend and so casually went back to campus was pretty f**ked up.”
6. K**ler couple.
“Fred & Rose West.
Both had s**tty childhoods, Fred had a s**ual relationship with his mum and his dad (a farmer) taught him b**tiality. He s**ually abused young girls and when he was arrested, was really blasé about it because he thought everybody did it. He didn’t stop. He eventually m**dered several young women and buried them under his patio.
He’s been suspected of being responsible for the disappearance of other women. His wife had an equally disgusting childhood. She had a s**ual relationship with her dad and s**ually a**sed her brother on a regular basis. When she met Fred, he became a pimp of sorts to her because he loved watching her with other men.
When her dad found out, he started paying her for s** too. She and Fred physically & s**ually a**sed many women and their own children, again, both believing it was perfectly normal behaviour, but somehow still managed to escape social services and would dodge suspicion by taking their kids to different hospitals when they were beaten to the point of injury.
They went decades dodging suspicion and getting away with their crimes, they slipped through the net on several occasions when they could have easily been stopped, which is probably the most disturbing thing about this.
He hung himself before he could be sentenced. She was given several life sentences and is still alive. She’s never admitted to anything.”
7. This is insane.
“I’ll never be able to get Sean Doyle’s d**th out of my head and it still haunts me. Doyle was pushed/fell down an open manhole that was venting steam from a leak in the mainline.
He was steamed alive and did not d** instantly. First responders were unable to rescue him and had to stand around listening to him scream while he d**d slowly. His outer layer of skin had peeled off. Because being steamed to d**th doesn’t k**l your nerve endings like being burned to death, Doyle felt everything until he d**d.
Dr. Judy Melinek was the NYC medical examiner and she wrote:
“Around Christmas 2002, bartender Doyle went out drinking with pal Michael Wright and Wright’s girlfriend. As they all walked home, Wright thought Doyle was hitting on his girlfriend, and witnesses later told cops they saw a man getting “the s**t beat out of him.” He was heard screaming, “No, don’t break my legs!” and another witness said he saw someone throw Doyle down an open manhole.
The drop was 18 feet. At the bottom was a pool of boiling water, from a broken main. Doyle didn’t d** instantly — in fact, as first responders arrived, he was standing below, reaching up and screaming for help. No paramedic or firefighter could climb down to help — it was, a Con Ed supervisor said, 300 degrees in the steam tunnel.
Four hours later, Sean Doyle’s body was finally recovered. Its temperature was 125 degrees — the medical examiners thought it was likely way higher, but thermometers don’t read any higher than that.”
8. A friend.
“One of my good friends was kidnapped, s**ually a**aulted and m**dered by her uncle when we were in fifth grade.
As a long time true crime junkie, I’ve heard some pretty horrific cases, but it was really surreal experiencing something you “see on the news” in real life. The case was even featured on an episode of the FBI Files.
The day of her disappearance was easy to remember because we went on a field trip to the aquarium and our groups joined together for lunch outside as our moms were both chaperones.
My last memory of her was of her hysterically laughing at me because she was the first to notice I put my elbow right into my chocolate pudding cup while wearing a long sleeved white tee….then just jumps sitting in the library while a detective told all of us 10 year olds they didn’t think someone was randomly snatching kids off of the street.
It pops back into my head when stuff about Versace/Andrew Cunanan comes up, as he k**led Lee Miglin in Chicago (we’re from the suburbs) right before my friend went missing. For months I knew when the Cunanan manhunt segment aired, they’d discuss Lee, then my friend.”
9. Monster.
“Mostro di Firenze (Italian for “Florence Monster”).
He was a serial k**ler who typically m**dered young couples in the countryside of Tuscany, proceeding to mutilate parts of the women’s bodies carrying them away with him. He acted sporadically and with a span of YEARS between k**lings, making it difficult getting caught, and he operated in very remote areas that are far from each other.
The thing that is remarkable about it, even if the m**ders themselves aren’t as horrendous and terrible as others, is the whole social and political drama he caused in Italy in the mid-80s.
A process full of comedy, which is difficult to elaborate in a simple way. His identity is still practically unknown today.”
10. Hitman.
“The mafia hitman Richard ‘The Iceman’ Kuklinski would sometimes restrain his victims in places that were infested with rats. Over time, the rats would discover the helpless person, swarm them and devour them alive.
Kuklinski would tape the whole thing and watch it later on to try and elicit an emotional response from himself. Watching the tapes later made him, in his own words, “A little nervous”.”
11. A sore subject.
“My great uncle went mentally insane then s**t his brother multiple times and k**led him.
My other great uncles and papa are scarred as they witnessed this.
I don’t know much details as this is still a very sore subject.”
12. One night at work.
“I was a manager at a local movie theater, and 18 at the time.
I was nearing the end of a 13 hour shift and had just sent the closing employees home. I was waiting for the movies to end so I could lock up for the night. Around 11:30 pm I walked out of the manager’s office to go turn off the projectors when I was approached by a customer asking if there was a manager.
When I told him it was me, he told me he had just come from the bathroom and he had called an ambulance. I asked why, and all he would say was there was blood, a lot of blood. I think he didn’t want to traumatize me.
Turns out, a guy had come in off the street, written “f life and everyone” on the wall, and slit his own throat.”
Now we want to hear from you.
In the comments, tell us about the most disturbing true story that you know.
Thanks in advance.
