Peter Sacco is a psychologist who writes articles on topics such as ghosts, spirit possession, and poltergeist. As a psychologist and researcher of paranormal phenomena, he has his own special view of these phenomena.
He lives in the Niagara Falls region, in the city of St. Catherine's. This place is the leader in the number of ghost reports in North America, which gives it the ability to investigate such cases without leaving home. Sacco is a professor of criminal psychology, host of the television show Niagara's Most Haunted, and the author of the recently published book Niagara's Mysterious and Frightening Cases.
First, briefly about the famous incident mentioned in his book, and then an interview with Sacco "The Epoch Times".
Poltergeist, Police Officer and Priest
In February 1970, the St. Catherine's poltergeist even caught the attention of TV presenter Johnny Carson, who mentioned the incident on The Tonight Show.
A loud banging on the walls made the neighbors call the police. Numerous police officers visited the house, expecting to see an everyday quarrel, but a completely unexpected sight appeared before them.
Sacco interviewed officers, including Bob Crawford, who handled the case. The police witnessed many strange things.
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Crawford saw a little boy who, sitting in a chair, was flying around the room. On another occasion, officers saw a boy pinned to the floor by a chair. One of the policemen tried to pull the chair away, but some unnatural force held him, and he could not remove it. It stopped after a few minutes.
Then a saucer flew across the room at the police officer's head, as if launched by an invisible hand. The officer, fortunately, managed to dodge and hurriedly left with his colleague, saying that the police were unable to solve the problem that had arisen in the apartment.
The priests were called into the house. When the first priest entered, the chair flew at his feet like a bowling ball against a skittle. After the priests spent some time in the apartment, the problem seemed to be resolved.
Crawford recalls: “The boy was sitting on the lap of an adult and something was pulling him away. Several police officers tried to restrain the child. It seemed that some superhuman force was pulling the boy. Crawford said that he was sure that the boy was not faking these movements. His body and other objects twitched suddenly and with great force. Some events, like the rising couch and bed, cannot be explained. They investigated other possible sources of noise in the walls, including heating systems and animals such as mice, but ruled out them.
Poltergeist is considered to be the result of psychokinesis. The person at the center of events, in this case a little boy, could unintentionally influence the surrounding objects with his psychological state. In such cases, to resolve the situation, you just need to train the person to control their psychokinesis, says Sacco.
Interview with Peter Sacco
There are a lot of prejudices around these phenomena, as a result, many people do not dare to discuss such a topic. However, in this story, the police took the poltergeist seriously and openly discussed this supernatural phenomenon. Can you provide any comments from a group psychology perspective? There is also such a phenomenon as a mass hallucination. Could this be the case in this case?
Sacco: First of all, teaching the psychology of crime and working directly with the police for many years, I know one thing: the police will never just talk about something like that, because usually they are the people who reject such things more than others. Nevertheless, several police officers at once told me about the incident.
I also spoke with one person who believed it was mass hysteria. But there were police officers from different departments, I believe that police officers are not the kind of people who can easily succumb to mass hypnosis or mass hysteria.
Why don't cops succumb to mass hysteria when they receive a UFO report? There were completely different policemen, they had different views on life, on religion, and there was a state prosecutor who had nothing to do with the police. He entered the house and saw a couch floating in the air with three adults sitting on it. He ran out of there so quickly that it was not even funny …
I personally met with these people, I saw the look with which they described what they saw, it told me a lot. I totally believe them.
Some people are of the opinion that ghosts are the souls of people who have unfinished business or have strong attachments in this world. If ghosts do exist, what is their psychology? Do you have any suggestions?
Sacco: When I spoke with parapsychologists who are experts in this matter, I got some answers. One of the reasons is that we live in a place where there were military battles, for example, the Anglo-American war of 1812, there were many tragic deaths, some of the ghosts do not even realize that they were killed.
Another factor is energy, residual energy, it looks like a photographic image. When a person is engaged in vigorous activity in a certain place, he releases this energy, it is fixed in time or, one might say, in the Universe. Some people have the ability to see it.
For example, some people can see an aura. I have never met a single person who could 100% deny that the aura does not exist. If I point to the Moon, there is a halo around the Moon, this is the released energy, what is it called? This is the aura. The aura exists due to the release of energy.
Can an obsession with an unclean spirit be the cause of some mental illness, as was believed in antiquity?
Sakko: I believe that in some cases, yes. I think one should look at things openly. We have to be realistic, we don't know everything. Taking the Big Bang theory, for example, who made the Big Bang? This is an uncharted area.
I want to believe that before the creation of the world there was an unknown mind, creator, essence, God. I think you can really admit the possibility that things like demons or other entities can exist in this unknown world, call it what you want.
Some, or even many, reports of paranormal activity are falsified. Tell me, what makes people think such things?
Sacco: Some people who enjoy making things up like this suffer from delegated Munchausen syndrome.
Editor's note: Munchausen syndrome is a psychological disorder in which a person behaves as if they are suffering from a physical or mental illness while healthy. Munchausen syndrome is considered a disorder because it leads to severe emotional problems.
In delegated Munchausen syndrome, the child's guardian, usually his mother, invents painful syndromes in her child, or deliberately causes them to make the child look sick. It is a psychological disorder and a form of child abuse.
These people want attention, it gives them the feeling that everyone cares about them. Of course, sometimes this is done just for fun, they just want to prank someone. It's like a simulation where people pretend to be sick in order to avoid responsibility, attention, or some kind of benefit like insurance. It happens that a person thinks as follows: “I live in an apartment and I don’t want to pay rent. I hate this place because of my rental obligations, so I'll come up with a poltergeist."
As a psychologist, you can judge the psychological state of people. And as a writer and TV presenter who openly discusses these strange phenomena, you've probably interacted with many people talking about the paranormal. Are there criteria to help determine if a story is true or fictional?
Sacco: As corny as it sounds, we look at whether the story looks ridiculous or not. The story should inspire confidence, preferably with several witnesses, or historical records of similar things that happened in the past.
Once we were shooting a film on the site of an old mill that burned down about a hundred years ago. During the fire, there were casualties, and people living in the vicinity reported that they still see ghostly flames, and some even hear screams.
