The Dead Files (2011) s02e04 Episode Script

Fear at the Family Tree

They're all dead together.
They know who I am.
I don't know what the hell that was.
It floated around the pool table.
Apparitions here follow us home.
- The ground is cursed.
- It's like a little pit of hell.
A child hasn't got a chance.
Something grabbed my elbow.
I could feel his hands around my neck.
He is very pissed off.
There's something down there.
My name is Amy Allan.
A lot of dead people are here.
I see dead people.
This is not good.
I speak to dead people.
.
He is very pissed off.
And they speak to me.
.
The house is angry.
But there's only one way to know if my findings are real.
He's killed people.
I rely on my partner.
I'm Steve Dischiavi.
I'm a retired New York City homicide Detective.
.
He got shot at his house? And I know every person, every house has secrets.
Aren't you terrified being here? It's my job to reveal them.
That sounds like something out of "The Exorcist.
" But Steve and I never speak.
.
We never communicate during an investigation.
.
Until the very end.
It's bad.
And we uncover if it's safe for you to stay.
.
I'd like some answers.
Or time to get out.
Amy and I conduct our investigations separately.
I interview the witnesses, gather the facts, and sort through the history of each location.
At the end we come together to see if there's any correlation with our findings.
I'm just outside of Salt Lake City, Utah, in a small town called Santaquin.
Leslie owns and operates Leslie's family tree restaurant.
She and her employees apparently are seeing apparitions and hearing some strange noises.
She sounded pretty desperate on the phone, so I'm hoping our investigation will give her some answers.
Throughout the day I've been having strange feelings.
I.
.
Was feeling, like, this insanity, like.
.
Like murderous intentions.
Before Amy can do her walk, I need to clear the location of anything that can influence her investigation.
This place is especially difficult because its walls are covered with old personal photographs.
People can leave behind a wake of residual energy that can last for centuries, which is why it's crucial for me to take my time and try to connect with the location at the beginning of the walk so I don't miss anything.
The ground is cursed.
It is.
.
Holy land.
So something's gonna happen in this place.
.
Which probably isn't good.
Steve.
Leslie.
Good to finally see you.
Uh, you sounded very worried when we spoke.
I have been.
Lately we've been doing quite a bit of remodeling and different things up here, and the activity has just gotten more and more.
We have a lot of really weird electrical problems going on.
We have appliances that will turn on and off.
We have clocks that run backwards.
And sometimes the power in the whole building will go out for no reason.
I'm seeing this guy.
This person is really.
.
Unhappy about this structure.
They're unhappy about the location.
I think they're gon.
.
They're gonna do something relatively soon.
Uh, he's pretty good with, uh, things that are electrical.
He's saying, like, "how many times" "does something have to happen before people freaking, like, get it?" He's, uh, got issues.
Now how long do you have this place? I've owned it for six years.
And before that my Mother owned it for 20 years.
It was a dance hall.
It was the old post office years ago.
It was a place where kids would come in and play games, machines, stuff like that.
What's so urgent now that you need our help? Well, I possibly could be getting ready to retire, and I'm worried about my daughter working here and even maybe her children in the long run.
I'm very concerned about their safety.
Change, change, cha.
.
Like a constantly.
.
Uh, transitioning space.
Whatever is here.
.
Has an idea of what it should be.
.
And it's not been that yet.
So that's not good.
Back in here was the dance floor.
About six years ago we started renovating this, and it's gotten very, very active.
We hear kids back here playing, laughing all the time.
In fact, I've even seen a young man back here.
- Really? - Yep.
Only lasted for a couple of seconds, but I did see the profile.
There's some kids even.
Are you interacting with them or just observing them? They're staring at me, and I'm staring at them.
I think they're getting orders.
I don't know who this guy, Henry.
.
- To do what? - To.
.
That they're not allowed to talk.
Like, they're not allowed to hang out, because he's pissed off.
He is very pissed off.
- What is this? - This is a.
.
Trapdoor that leads to our basement downstairs.
Nobody ever goes down there.
It's just too scary.
I'd like to go down, if that's okay.
Oh, okay, you'll.
.
You better go first, because I don't like it.
This is not making me feel good.
This is.
.
All right.
It's okay.
I've been in a lot worse places, trust me.
There we go.
Now, Leslie, you said that you have a weird feeling down here.
What's going on? I've heard voices.
When I have had to come down here, I just feel like somebody is watching me.
- Like you're not alone? - Exactly.
Like I'm not alone.
Okay.
You know it was a saloon upstairs.
Do you know if anything would have happened down here? Well, it used to be a boxing ring where the locals would come down and box.
.
- Okay.
- About 40 years ago.
And after that it was also an illegal gambling hall.
People would spend money.
.
And have a party.
Things were good.
What sort of stuff did they do? - Just, you know, spend money and stuff.
- On what? - Hmm, gambling.
- Okay.
But now everybody's all angry.
It's like a little pit of hell.
Good times again.
Things were very good when people would spend money.
But now everybody's all angry, because they cannot do what they want to do.
I'm sensing a very hostile presence in the basement.
Whatever is here is sending me a very strong message that it wants me gone.
I gotta get away from this guy.
He is full of anger.
Crissa uh, I understand you've been working here for about six months.
- You've had a couple of things go on.
- Yeah.
Not long after I started here, it felt like something grabbed my elbow.
It really made me uncomfortable that something had touched me.
What else? Anything else? I've had my little girl here, and she was walking around one day and started talking, saying that there were ghosts here.
It really shocked me, and I got worried about having her here all the time.
Crissa, has she ever mentioned that there were kids she were talking to or anything like that? She did kind of say something about a little boy, but she changed the topic really fast.
Anything else? I saw an old man sitting at that table right over there.
But I thought it was an honest-to-goodness person sitting there, so I went through the doors, and as soon as I could see again, he was gone.
One of our tasks is to dust the pictures on the walls.
And that picture right there.
.
I saw that guy.
I know it's him.
He used to come here.
When he was alive.
.
A lot.
I think he thinks, like, we're gonna kick him out.
Like, he's saying, "this is mine.
Get out.
.
" "Or I'm gonna screw your world and life up.
" Like, he doesn't care if he hurts somebody.
He doesn't care if he kills.
.
He doesn't care.
He doesn't have a conscience.
So he's the perfect guy for this job.
He's, like, really nuts, this guy.
Something is obviously going on at the restaurant now.
But I'm gonna go speak with Leslie's Mom, Nan.
She's the original owner of the restaurant.
And I want to see how far back these issues go.
Nan, thanks for sitting down with me.
I interviewed Leslie and a couple girls that work at the restaurant, so I actually had a couple questions for you.
Did you ever experience anything? I had several things.
Uh, one day we had a clock.
.
I seen it going backwards.
.
- But there was no battery in it.
- Wow.
It was just kind of mind-boggling, you know? And I had one waitress, she took some dishes from the back dining room into the kitchen.
When she came in.
.
And the vacuum was going.
And she come out, and she says, "I quit.
" And I says, "what do you mean, you quit?" And she says, "I'm not kidding.
That vacuum's in there going," and it's not plugged in.
" Is there any specific location that employees won't go into? None of 'em wanted to go over into where the pool hall originally was.
Did they tell you why? We used to hear, like, little kids playing.
Well, it seems like there's a few things going on - at that place.
- Yeah.
I seen this ghost, and it come out through the back door, and it was about maybe a foot and 1/2 off the floor.
And it floated around the pool table and went over and went through the door to the east.
What.
.
What did it look like? I could tell it was a woman, because it had a dress.
In fact, one of the customers that come in all the time came in one night, and he says, "I just seen a lady back there," "and she's about 2 feet off the ground, and she went through the wall.
" I'm hearing a woman crying.
Crying.
She's scared.
As a sensitive, I can feel what a dead person is experiencing.
And whatever has happened to this woman has her very upset.
Oh, there's a lot of, like.
.
Man, I just want to start punching somebody really hard.
Like, I just want to start punching somebody.
Clocks running backwards, unexplained power outages, appliances turning on and off by themselves.
.
Strange stuff, but there could be a simple explanation.
So I've called in an electrician to give the place a once-over.
You know, it's a long shot, but sometimes electrical surges can cause appliances to turn on and off on their own.
If that's the issue, it's important to rule it out right off the bat.
Well, I checked everything out, and there's definitely nothing in there that would cause these kinds of problems.
Okay, so nothing you saw could cause any appliances to turn on and off by themselves.
- Definitely not, no.
- Okay, - what about clocks going backwards? - Definitely not.
Okay.
What about power outages? Not without someone physically turning something off.
All right, good.
That's good.
I think.
I think he likes fire.
And that's why he likes the electronics.
He feels like this is his.
.
His land, and we should probably leave.
This.
.
This guy's making me ** angry, like I'm gonna ** kill somebody.
I think there's a lot of spirit.
.
Souls that are trapped in there.
They've been contaminated.
You know, somebody did a ritual and, like, cursed it.
And that stuff can really screw people up.
A Native American did it.
Like, they physically did a ritual.
You know what? They just need to ** knock it down, to be perfectly honest.
Okay? They just need to knock it down.
What's wrong? You're making strange faces.
Hmm, I think that's where the people stay.
What people? Dead people? - Mm-hmm.
Yeah, they're dead.
- So that's.
.
Where they are now? I feel like they're all dead together, like a mass grave, because they're.
.
You know, I think they're dead together, bodies are together in the grave.
As an investigator, all I can say is that when several people report seeing the same thing, there's usually something to it.
So I'm headed over to the local library to see if I can make sense of whatever's going on here.
Working homicides in the N.
Y.
P.
D.
You get to see some pretty wild stuff.
But as a father, nothing can prepare you for what I discovered in the library's archives.
Not one, but four very young children were killed in a very short time span, all of them in the town's flood control channels that just happen to run behind the family tree restaurant.
And there's some kids even.
Hmm, there's, like, four kids.
And they did not know each other in life.
They died at different times? Yes.
I think that they died of.
.
All of the same kind of stuff.
I see water.
Is there water under here? With over 25 years of investigative experience, I can tell you one thing.
Small-town police chiefs know a lot about the local history.
So I'm headed over to meet with Santaquin's Chief Howard.
I'm hoping he can tell me more about how these kids drowned.
I've uncovered some drownings um.
.
Of young children, actually, here, pretty close to where the restaurant was.
Can you explain any of what happened? There's been a number of children that have drowned - up until the early '50s, 1951.
- Right.
It's deceptive, the look of this ditch as it's dry.
But in the springtime, you can have a ditch such as this, and within a matter of seconds it can be full and running rapidly.
And a child hasn't got a chance.
And there's been two adults that I'm aware of.
Back in the '30s was a 70-year-old man.
And then in the late '60s, early '70s, a man fell in and was pulled out just a block up the street.
One of the children that, uh, drowned in the '40s in this ditch, his younger brother lives just across the street now.
He's a good friend of mine, Dennis Lamb.
- He knows he was found here? - He does.
And he lives in the house right across the street? - Correct.
- Holy **.
Dennis, I uh, was speaking with the Police Chief in town.
He mentioned that your brother was one of the drowning victims over here.
- Do you know what happened? - I.
.
I know what happened.
My Mother was in the house doing things, and Robert had gone outside.
And my Mother got worried and wanted to run outside to find out where he was at, and he was gone.
And so she knew immediately that something was wrong.
Was he missing for a while - and there was a search for him? - No.
Or did.
.
Was it.
.
That must have been unimaginable for your Mom.
She was completely devastated.
She felt responsible.
She felt it was her fault.
I.
.
I can't imagine it.
No, you're not supposed to bury your children.
That's the first time I've actually cried over him.
Can you talk more about the crying woman? This woman was very depressed.
And whatever was happening to her was very traumatic.
What is she doing? It's a lot of anger.
And rage.
You know, so, like, she's crying, but she's angry to the point where she wanted to, like, kill or harm.
There are kids of various ages.
Boys.
And there are several men.
And I think that they're afraid.
So you were saying, Dennis, that your brother had passed away, but several other people had drowned in these ditches, you know, an old man, too.
You know anything about an old man? Yes.
My father was out irrigating his garden, and he found him lodged under a.
.
A bridge.
This is unbelievable.
Dennis' father loses his own child in one of these drainage ditches then finds an old man in another.
What are the chances of that? Did your father ever talk to you about him? Just that he was stuffed under the bridge.
And they had quite a time getting him out.
What? - Mm-mmm.
.
- What's wrong? Well, I saw, like, a little gremlin-ly kind of.
.
That was kind of creepy.
Can you describe what you saw? It was this thing.
.
That had super-long arms, weird hips that kind of like came up.
Like, how big is it? Pretty ** big.
He's a scary guy.
I don't like him.
This guy knows how to get inside of people.
He can, like, influence them.
What do you mean? He can go in their bodies and make them do **.
I'm finally on my way to meet with Leslie's daughter Bobbie, who's been out of town.
I need to see if she's experienced anything that could corroborate what her Mother and Grandmother have told me.
Well, Bobbie, I talked to your Mom, talked to some of the people that work here.
They told me what they've been experiencing.
So I need to hear from you if you've been experiencing anything.
Yeah, I've experienced a lot of things moving, a lot of noises.
I've had blenders turning on and off, lights flickering.
I've seen a little boy in the West room.
Your Mom owns it now.
You're looking to carry on the tradition and.
.
- Yes.
- Actually take over.
- Yes, I'd like to.
Yes.
- Why? Uh, I mean, aren't you terrified being here? I am.
Um, it's been in the family for so, so long that I don't want it to go anywhere else but to me.
If Amy told you you better not stay here, you gotta get out, what would you do? Well, if it was gonna put my family in danger, I guess we'd get out, because family comes first.
The entity I saw on my walk was one of the most bizarre I've ever encountered.
I sat down with the sketch artist and forced myself to describe its grotesque features.
If you were to describe the face, what shape would it be? Normal here, but just kind of bigger here.
How were the eyes on the face? There's no eyelids.
Just bulbous.
- Pupils? - No, it was just white.
Interesting.
Okay.
A hunchback.
You could actually see, like, the vertebrae, like.
.
It was weird.
You wouldn't want to meet this guy anywhere.
- Are we anywhere in the ballpark? - Well, yeah, this looks good.
Okay.
Well, Bobbie, you told me a lot.
- I mean, is there anything else going on? - There is one more thing.
There's an old man that's been lurking around here, and he followed me home one night.
Explain that to me.
What happened? Well, I went home and was getting ready for bed and laid down, and every time I closed my eyes, I could feel his hands around my neck, pulling me off my bed.
And so I shook really hard and opened my eyes, and I seen him up by my closet.
And he just disappeared into the ceiling.
It was him.
It was him.
Like, I know it was him.
Without a doubt, it was him.
Amy and I conduct our investigations separately.
Not only do we not cross paths, but we never discuss each other's findings until now.
Leslie, you actually called us in, because you're concerned about turning the restaurant over to your daughter.
Yes.
So with that, Amy, if you could just tell us what you encountered when you first did your walk.
Initially, what I got was this male telling me that the whole building needed to be pushed back.
And it had been a lot of different things.
This part of the building my grandpa built 40 years ago.
And we turned it into a restaurant about 26 years ago.
Okay.
The old part of the building was a saloon.
- Mm-hum.
- Uh, they did boxing in the basement.
- Interesting.
- Gambling.
Change, change.
Cha.
.
Like a constantly.
.
Uh, transitioning space.
Whatever is here has an idea of what it should be.
And it's not been that yet.
When I came in, I was talking to this gentleman.
His name is Henry.
And he said that he is trying to.
.
Communicate to you guys via electronics.
Part of the issue that they're having is appliances turning on and off by themselves.
Okay.
I brought an electrician in to check it out.
Uh-huh.
Nothing wrong with the electricity here.
Okay.
Interesting.
So what else did you see during your walk? There were children.
There were about four of them.
And there's some kids even.
Are you interacting with them or just observing them? I'm just.
.
They're staring at me, and I'm staring at them.
They all did die from the same thing.
Yeah, there's one I actually almost ran into turning a corner.
Oh, wow.
And then I witnessed one, dark hair, very thin.
I did uncover during the investigation that four kids drowned.
.
Oh, wow.
In an irrigation ditch right around the corner from here.
I actually got one of the death certificates of this poor kid, this kid Robert Lamb.
He was 17 months old, a little, cute kid.
He literally washed up right behind the restaurant.
.
- Wow.
- So they really suffered when they died, these kids.
- It's.
.
It's a little heartbreaking.
- Yeah, definitely heartbreaking.
I did see a woman.
Then walking down the stairs hearing a female crying and just feeling the despair.
She was very depressed.
And like, whatever was happening to her was very traumatic.
- My Mother has seen her.
- Yeah.
Uh, neighbors around the line area have seen her.
That's freaking me out.
This kid, Robert Lamb.
.
I just happened to find out that his brother was still alive and living here.
When I spoke to him, I asked him about his Mom.
And she came out looking for her son who wandered off, and somebody found him in the ditch right across the street.
She blamed herself for years, which I guess any Mother would do.
Amy, you mentioned about a guy named Henry.
Bobbie and Crissa.
.
Crissa's an employee.
.
Have had an interaction with an elderly man.
Yes.
There's a photo here of a man that she says she's pretty sure is him, and that's this older guy here.
That's interesting.
I got his death certificate on this man.
This guy's name is William Wallace York.
Now you seem to think it was the same guy also.
Yeah, I got a really bad feeling when I seen him.
- Explain that to Amy.
- After work late at night I went home.
As soon as I got in bed and closed my eyes, I could feel hands around my neck trying to pull me off the bed.
Oh, boy.
This is not good.
A lot of the dead people here are not good.
Amy, is that the guy you sketched? No.
Uh, what I sketched was.
.
A very strange thing.
Okay, you guys want to take a look at the sketch? Yeah.
- I'm nervous to.
- Yeah.
I don't see the sketch Amy does until the end.
Are you kidding me? This is what you saw? I know.
It's really strange.
Oh, my gosh.
What I sketched was a very strange thing.
Okay, you know what? Let's take a look at the sketch.
Are you kidding me? Oh, my gosh, are you kidding me? - Are you serious? - Wow.
Oh, wow.
I don't normally get chills.
I got chills just now.
- Oh.
- Yeah.
Me, too.
That was peering out from the ladies room in the other part of the building.
What? - Mm-mmm.
.
- What's wrong? Well, I saw, like, a little gremlin-ly kind of.
.
That was kinda creepy.
This guy knows how to get inside of people.
He can, like, influence them.
What they can do is project images that will scare you or disarm you into thinking that it's good.
And so it could be this thing.
It could be a child.
Bobbie, didn't you tell me that something followed your Mom home? Yeah, it was a little boy about 7 years old.
She felt like it was innocent.
You know, whatever it needs from you, it will become.
There is this older man.
He works for this thing.
And, um, they have an agenda.
They are out for themselves.
And they will manipulate to get what they want.
These people want energy to.
.
Become powerful.
I never thought we'd find something like that.
What he likes to do is tag people.
And then he can pull them back when they die.
He wants more people to die.
Okay, Leslie, you've heard and you've seen what we uncovered in the investigation.
Uh, the most pressing question here tonight is, is it safe for you to take this restaurant and pass it on to your daughter? If you want this thing to stop, you gotta listen to Amy.
I would like to tell you to leave.
.
But I can't, because you kind of inherited a situation.
And something needs to be done pretty quickly.
You know, you guys obviously didn't start this.
You know, unfortunately, it's your responsibility to take care of this.
What I think happened here is that there was an upset Native American.
Who actually did a curse.
And the people who have been trapped need to be released.
This is going to be a really, really difficult process.
What I would do is find out the tribe that was here and then find an elder from that tribe to help you.
You want a blessing.
You want a cleansing.
You want this curse to be broken.
And bring in possibly different religious leaders to help move on all the different people.
How.
.
How many are we talking? As many as possible.
I know it's so big and intense.
But if you walk away, you could still be affected.
You could die, and you could become trapped in an eternity in agony.
- What are you gonna do? - Well, first thing - we're gonna do is check our history.
.
- Yeah.
- And find out what Indian.
.
- What Indian tribe was here.
And we'll move on to getting it blessed.
It sounds like a lot of steps, but we'll take 'em.
Well, you guys are pretty passionate about this restaurant.
It sounds like you want to fight.
- We are.
Yeah.
- Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
You are.
You're fighting for your life here.
It won't be easy, but if Leslie and Bobbie follow my advice, the dead can finally be released and set free.
Only then will it be safe to pass this family restaurant on to future generations.

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