By Tim Binnall
A pair of self-described ghost hunters in England say that they broke into the home of a recently deceased man because they had heard that his house was haunted. The bizarre incident reportedly occurred back in January when a resident of the town of Accrington passed away and rumors began to circulate throughout the community that his home was the site of strange paranormal activity.
Having heard these whispers for a few weeks, Jason McCash and Naomi Ruth Haworth decided to investigate the matter for themselves and proceeded to break into the now-abandoned building. When police arrived shortly thereafter, the duo offered a rather fantastic explanation for their presence. "They claimed to be ghost hunting," explained the prosecutor at their sentencing hearing last week after the pair pled guilty to 'criminal damage.'
This assertion was echoed by McCash's defense attorney, who added a bit more color to the claim. He explained to the court that the region is "a veritable hot-bed of paranormal activity, including every type from witches, headless specters, to ghosts and Roman soldiers and everything in between." Additionally, the lawyer said, his client had a "particular interest in the paranormal," and so the stories of a haunted house in the town captured the imagination of the would-be ghost hunters, who threw legal caution to the wind in pursuit of an encounter with the spirit realm.
Unfortunately for the duo, the judge presiding over the case was highly skeptical of their 'supernatural' excuse. "Your explanation for being found in this house as trespassers is in my judgment utterly ludicrous," she declared, "and I don't accept it for one minute." Be that as it may, the pair only received a year's probation for the misadventure and managed to avoid going to jail for the ill-advised ghost hunt.