By Tim Binnall
Cops in an Indian city have been instructed to collect and investigate local ghost stories and haunting claims in the hopes that the accounts could help solve cold cases. According to a local media report, the Ahmedabad Police Department issued the unusual edict to all of its officers this week. "If a person is seeing a ghost or seeking occult intervention," explained a law enforcement official, "it could be due to guilt or suspected involvement in or knowledge of an untoward incident in the past." Lest one think the tactic is merely silly superstition, the department has reason to believe it could help with cold cases, as two such spooky tales serendipitously provided solutions to a pair of murder mysteries over the last few months.
In the first instance, which unfolded back in November, a man overhead lamenting that he was being tormented by a ghost led police to look into the strange situation. A subsequent investigation, aided by a cleric enlisted to 'help' the man ease his mind, led to cops uncovering a rather wild case wherein the suspect and his girlfriend killed her husband and buried him under the kitchen floor of their home, which the killer couple then abandoned. Amazingly, were it not for the man's complaints about the haunting, the victim may have never been found, as his disappearance was not reported to authorities.
Then, earlier this month, similar circumstances led to a woman's mysterious 1992 disappearance being solved. Once again, authorities reportedly caught a break in the case when they learned that the husband of the missing woman and his brother had been on a desperate search to find a mystic who could eradicate "an overwhelming sense of guilt and terror" that had gripped them since they killed her over three decades ago. While in both cases, the feelings and experiences of the perpetrators may have been more psychological than paranormal, one imagines the police in Ahmedabad do not particularly care as long as the tormented keep talking.