'Portals to Hell' Season 2: Katrina and Jack encounter spirits of guards and inmates at Ohio State Reformatory
In this episode of 'Portal's to Hell', Katrina Weidman and Jack Osbourne visit the Ohio State Reformatory, in Mansfield, Ohio, which was made famous by the 1994 film 'Shawshank Redemption', starring Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman. The reformatory has been a site of paranormal activity for decades, but lately, volunteers working there have reported increased activity and negativity. Some of the locations within the reformatory that Weidman and Osbourne intend to investigate have never been televised before.
History
Formerly known as the Intermediate Penitentiary, it was built between 1886 and 1910, but the name was formally changed to the Ohio State Reformatory in 1891. It began as a reformatory for young non-violent offenders ranging from ages 13 to 30 and opened its doors to its first 150 inmates in 1896. The entire reformatory was constructed to appear like a fortified castle because the architect intended to fill the offenders serving time in the prison with a sense of dread, so they could be reborn back into their spiritual faith. However, with the rise in crimes and offenses, the prison started to become over crowed and at a time, at least 3000 people were housed there, when the cells were only made to hold a thousand inmates.
In the 1960s is when the conditions of the reformatory worsened. The prison started taking in violent offenders who committed crimes of a serious degree like murder, rape, and assault. In the 1970s, the reformatory became a maximum-security prison and was in operation until 1990, when a US Federal Court ruling ordered the facility to be shut down. The reason for the closure was because, for one, the prison was heavily understaffed and inmates were violent to the point that they would kill each other within prison walls. There are also reports of full-blown torture having taken place.
The hotspots
People have been experiencing paranormal activity here for decades, claiming to hear voices, cell doors slamming on their own, and even seeing apparitions. To this day, volunteers working at the prison continue to find shanks and shivs in the hotspot areas of the prison. Weidman and Osbourne met with Kathy and Greg Feketik, volunteers at the reformatory and paranormal investigators who gave them a guided tour and more information on the hauntings. They said that the activity had become more apparent in the last year and also believed that it was negative as volunteers have complained of feeling extremely uncomfortable while they work.
East Admin
The East Admin was the living quarters assigned to house the superintendent and his family on site. In 1950, tragedy struck when Helen Glattke, the wife of the superintendent at the time was getting ready for church one fateful Sunday morning. She attempted to reach up for a box on the top shelf of the closet, but unbeknownst to her, her husband's handgun had been stashed there. When she retrieved the box, the gun fell to the floor, discharged, and shot her in the lung. She died three days later at a local hospital, but Kathy and Greg say that she's still roaming the halls of the East Admin second floor. She used to make her own rose-scented perfume, and Kathy said any time you walk around the East Admin halls, you are bound to smell rose water, which surprised Osbourne who said he smelled it the minute he walked into the hall, but just assumed it was one of the other people wearing it.
The third floor of the East Admin, in particular, is not somewhere Kathy and Greg would willingly go to because they feel a completely different vibe here. Kathy said she'd heard the sound of chains being dragged across the third floor when she'd been on the floor below. The two volunteers believe there is negative energy on this floor and it is a very active area. Greg also played an audio clip that he had recorded that sounded like chains clanging to a surface, but said they were never able to identify the source.
West Attic
In 1930, a fire burned down most of the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus, killing almost 322 inmates. Since the prison had been destroyed, the law enforcement needed another location to house some of the other inmates, so they decided to transport them to the Ohio State Reformatory. Back then, the reformatory was still intended for incarcerating non-violent offenders, but now the leftover inmates that they were bringing in from the penitentiary were proper felons who had committed heinous crimes like rape and murder. They weren't held in jail cells, however, and were confined to a dark and dingy room in the West Attic.
The West Attic was pitch black, blanketed in darkness, and held about 300 inmates who were not sequestered in cages. Instead, there were allowed to move freely inside the space. Kathy described them to have been crazy, and she believes that is the reason for the strange activity in here. She narrated personal experience where she mentioned coming to the West Attic with some other women and feeling a presence right in front of her face, in close proximity to her. She called it "sleazy" and said it had an uncomfortable feel to it and all of a sudden, she felt herself being touched inappropriately.
The activity has increased and become more aggressive in the past year, the Feketiks said. Greg described another incident when a person he was familiar with had come up to the attic to provoke the spirits and incite some reaction when he complained of a sudden burning sensation on his back. Upon lifting his shirt, they found bloody welts that looked like they had been caused by a sharp object, like a shank.
East Cell Blocks
The reformatory prison is the largest free-standing cell block in the world. It is six tiers high, cells stacked one over the other and really small in size, enough to house one inmate comfortably. But depending on overcrowding situations there were at least three inmates shoved into one cell, and some of the inmates were also those on death row. James Lockhart, a 22-year-old inmate who was housed in cell #13 on the fourth tier, had been denied parole in 1960. Feeling despondent, he went back to his cell, stealing flammable liquid from a furniture shop, doused himself in it, and set himself on fire. People believe that his ghost still haunts the cell. As Greg began leading the rest of the group to the next hotspot, the sub-basement, he felt something grab his arm suddenly, while still in the East Cell Block.
Sub-basement
Greg and Kathy say they don't like going down to the sub-basement because the area is crazily active, with the latter even claiming she has been physically touched. Instead, Hallie Statham-Kitzer, the program coordinator at the reformatory, and Alena Ross, a fourth-generation employee gave Weidman and Osbourne a guided tour of the basement.
The sub-basement, Statham-Kitzer explained acted as a space for solitary confinement. It was called the 'eight-by-eight', where convicts were shackled to the floor for eight hours, shackled standing up for another eight hours, and this was on repeat for as long as they were there. They were barely fed any morsel of food. The original solitary confinement was a hole in the ground that has since been covered and was made of dirt walls, dirt floors with a door on top. The guards would open the door, let the convicts down, and shut it behind them. The rumor is that two inmates who had been held in the hole on a rainy night were drowned when water from the streets seeped in and shortly after the hole caved in.
Ross said she has personally experienced her hair being pulled forcibly when she was in sub-basement, and Statham-Kitzer saw a shadowy figure of a tall person block the light source to the basement when she was investigating with other volunteers.
Testimonial from a former inmate
Weidman and Osbourne met with Mike Humphrey, a former inmate, who was incarcerated in cell #4 for 12 months between 1968 and 1969 at age 18. He spoke of his imprisonment and told the investigators that it would get very violent in the cells, and he had personally been involved in many fights. He also carried a shank that he had made from a piece of metal. Furthermore, he narrated a paranormal experience from one night when he was on the top bunk and heard the sound of keys as if a guard was on his nightly rounds. He looked outside waiting for the guard to walk by and even heard him pass by his cell, but there wasn't anyone physically there.
He mentioned another instance where he was with his son and getting ready to go down to the central guard room when he saw a woman walk out of a room at the end of the hall. She was adorned in a green ball gown with her hair up and looked like she was from the early 20th century. When h asked her if she was lost, she turned to the side and just vanished into thin air, although she had appeared solid and human.
Humphrey also estimated that there have 278 confirmed deaths in the reformatory, all of whom have bee buries in the cemetery on restricted reformatory grounds.
Investigation
Weidman and Osbourne began investigating, the East Admin Second Floor and heard the sound of a clink and a clear huff as if someone were exhaling a breath. They managed to communicate with the spirit of Helen through the Geoport who clearly said through the device that she had gotten shot in the room and even wore green, which also confirmed that Humphrey had indeed seen her in the hallway. Weidman heard a rumbling sound from the third floor, but they failed to identify a source.
They went to the East Cell Block and directed questions to any spirits that might be present there and only heard a door squeak. Osbourne stayed to investigate the East Cell Block while Weidman moved to the West Attic. Osbourne picked up a strong signal on his Rampod when he visited Humphrey's former cell and even heard incessant tapping noises that seemed to have been in his close proximity.
Weidman heard a hissing sound as she began to explore the West Attic. Women especially have had negative experiences there, and Weidman decided to test that on herself. She immediately heard a tapping noise and even felt something shift like there was a movement from behind her. Osbourne monitored Weidman through the cameras set up in the room from the van. Weidman heard the sound of footsteps and used the Geoport to communicate with the spirits in the West Attic. Osbourne then went down to the sub-basement alone to see if he can record any reactions and heard some noises along with some shadow movement.
Weidman concluded that no amount of investigation would suffice to answer all of the unsolved questions about the hauntings in the reformatory.