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INTRODUCTION - OCCULT INVESTIGATOR

Van Helsing, Blade and Buffy battled vampires, Derek Rayne, the mysterious leader of the old TV series, Poltergeist The Legacy, fought fallen angels, and Father Karras exorcised the Devil himself. So, I suppose it was life imitating art when I approached a licensed New York detective agency to create a special division to investigate occult and paranormal cases. I felt it was time for a hardnosed approach aiding the victims of paranormal bad guys. After all I argued, the world is enamored with the strange and the bizarre and more importantly many are literally “haunted” by curses and the unseen. Shouldn’t there be an organization like t he X-Files where people could turn to for problems others would think are bizarre? On a general level, society just can’t be amazed or frightened enough by the world of the occult. Some of pop culture’s most successful books focus on the afterlife and how we can communicate with the dead. There’s a never-ending fascination with ghosts, haunted houses, witches, devil worship, voodoo and every manner of monster. So shouldn’t there be a real-life agency dedicated exploring, investigating and if need be kicking the ass of a few malevolent demons?

But paranormal investigators, channelers, mediums, would-be ghostbusters, even professional exorcists are a dime a dozen filling the pages of every New Age journal and web site known. They all claim that they could solve any occult problem that comes along. And many are well versed in the occult world – scholars in their own right who are experts in every field of the dark arts. Many “ghosthunters” are enamored with technical gadgets and spy equipment and will record every bump in the night. But the legion of authors, societies, organizations etc. lacked one important aspect – real world investigative smarts. Metropolitan police departments always have their token “occult expert” but they’re usually concerned with murders and heinous acts that the cops can’t pin on anyone or anything tangible. And religious organizations will only deal with the devil – and then only after thousands of hours of testimony and dare I say it – proper tithing? There are no civil service manuals or tests that one takes to become an investigator despite the myriad “paranormal investigation” study courses, societies, schools and organizations. Even the few universities that actually have programs like Duke University’s Rhine Research Center, are much more concerned with true scientific PSI research and collecting tons of data than expOccult Investigatorng spooks, demons or curses.

So I concluded that people who really needed help – normal people – would only turn to an organization dedicated to investigating strange events – if it could first prove there wasn’t any earthly fraud or bilking going on before they went after any “other worldly” troublemakers. The new breed of investigator needed to have bonafide occult credentials and a network in place to first cut through and uncover any dubious obstacles so it could then concentrate on what truly could not be explained.

But enticing a professional investigative firm that’s used to uncovering corporate espionage, protecting celebrities and following would-be criminals to throw in with a paranormal and occult investigator to bust spooks wasn’t easy. Fortunately I had enough background and in the study of the occult (I also wrote a book on using magick in the workplace called Money Magick) and some pretty scary stories to convince the owner of a prominent New York detective agency to at least open the door to the possibility of taking on an X-Files-type crew.

The first question I’m asked is usually accompanied by a smirk and cocked eyebrow: “So…“how did you become a ghostbuster in the first place?” And when I met with Vincent, the owner of Intercontinental Investigations in New York, it was no different. So, I had to be honest and say that I never set out to become a ghostbuster in the literal sense of the word, even though I admit the movie of the same name was rather cool for its time. I told him about my idea to create a new kind of paranormal investigative agency – one that could bust ghosts and frauds all at once. Vincent was intrigued and asked me to explain my background.

The short story was that my interest in all things occult started at a very early age when the mundane aspects of life gave way to the fantastic worlds of witches, ghosts and demons. When I first discovered that there was another world – a dark side – that secretly coexisted with our everyday grind I began to make it my business to explore that more mysterious and bizarre plane where people see floating images at their bedposts at night, hear moans and screams coming from abandon rooms and are plagued by magical “curses”. It excited me to think that the stuff of horror movies could be true. I fantasized that maybe there really were witches casting spells on people and flying on their brooms at night while I lay asleep in bed. Maybe vampires really did have those awesome powers where they could fly like bats and dematerialize into the fog. If these pilgrims of the night actually existed I wanted to find them, to meet them and most of all learn how they made their magic.

It was a hobby at first, reading the school library books on ghosts, psychics, mediums and strange creatures. But my appetite for the occult grew with an epiphany. I came across a book titled Ghosts I’ve Met, by preeminent ghost hunter, lecturer and occult expert Dr. Hans Holzer, (who coincidentally later became my friend, advisor and professor at the New York Committee for the Investigation of Paranormal Occurrences). Holzer‘s book was not the run-of-the-mill ghost book – he named names, as they say. His eyewitness accounts of paranormal events were so vividly described that by today’s standards the book would have immediately been made into a reality TV series. Holzer didn’t just write about ghosts and the occult, he lived in that world. That book and subsequent titles took me by the hand and said, “See, there really are ghosts and witches and this is who they are and where they live. Another milestone was when I interviewed the late Dr. Raymond McNally for my college newspaper. McNally is the author of In Search of Dracula – the first real investigative work on the Dracula myth that opened the doors to Transylvania as more than a mythical place of monsters. The dedicated author was also a scholarly and levelheaded person who took the dark side seriously, presenting some real evidence that vampires exist. ” Eureka! I finally had hard facts that can prove the unreal is real. That’s all I needed. I was hooked on scary stuff, and even if I didn’t believe what I couldn’t see, the yearning to uncover the mysterious became my quest.

My obsession lasted for years, and despite my enthusiasm I always looked at every description of a paranormal event with a skeptical eye, more so that I wouldn’t be disappointed than a non-believer. But I hadn’t found any hard evidence to support a bonafide paranormal event. Sure, I visited a number of haunted houses and attended myriad occult ceremonies and rituals, but I had never been blown away by what I witnessed. No ethereal wisps flew around the room, no demons spun their heads off and shot green vomit at me and I never, ever saw a ghost. That was until I went to work as a reporter for an occult news magazine in the early ‘70’s called Beyond Reality. After a few months writing about Bigfoot, UFOs and vampire graves, my editor assigned me to stay the night at the infamous Amityville Horror house on Long Island. The results are stuff for another book, but the experience made me a believer that regardless of how it’s described – there ARE other planes of existence we haven’t a clue about.

After a few hours of chatting and recounting my own brand of ghost story, (and bringing in Silvana, my “Emma Peele-like” psychic Czech colleague, dressed in her catwoman leather outfit) Vincent and I decided to create a specialized arm of his detective agency dedicated to cases involving the occult and paranormal. I christened the groundbreaking agency X-Investigations – the world’s only paranormal agency affiliated with a licensed detective agency that had the resources to solve cases both in this world and the next!

The stories that follow are hand picked cases based on real investigations straight from X-Investigations private files that have been chosen to allow you to draw your own conclusions as to whether the events were truly paranormal. Some have photographic evidence to help you decide. Others will baffle you. The names of the clients have been changed to protect people who are concerned that they would be labeled “crackpots” or witches if their peers and neighbors discovered their dilemmas. Some were frightened about retribution from others in the occult world.

Sit back and become an armchair detective with a Sam Spade of the supernatural. And by the way… now, who ya gonna call? - the Occult Investigator!