The Villisca Axe Murder House in Villisca, Iowa is a well-known tourist attraction for ghost hunters and horror lovers. In 1912 an unsolved murder of six children and two adults that had their skulls completely crushed by the axe of an unknown perpetrator. These murders are still unsolved.
In 1994 it was purchased and restored to its original condition. Costing $428 a night to stay at this old haunted home, where visitors always report strange paranormal experiences. Visions of a man with an axe roaming the halls or the faint screams of children.
But in November of 2014, a man on a regular recreational paranormal visit with friends ended up terribly hurt. Apparently his companions found him stabbed in the chest, which were self-inflicted. The incident happened at around 12:45 am, which was about the same time the 1912 axe murders took place.
Utah Murder-Suicide
In September of 2014, a Utah teen returned to his home to find his parents and three siblings, ages 11, 12, and 14 overdosed in a locked bedroom of their Springville home. All five were tucked into covers in and around their parents bed. The parents had a notebook that they’ve been writing in, a ‘to-do list’ had been scribbled on the pages. This list appeared as if the parents were getting ready to go on vacation. With items like ‘feed the pets’ and ‘find someone to watch over the house’ were written. It appeared to be a murder-suicide, but there was no suicide note or any prior indication that they would do this, no explanation. Police could not figure out why two parents would kill themselves and three of their four children.
For a year, no one knew what would drive the parents to do something so unthinkable. According to family members and an police investigation, the parents were driven by a belief that the apocalypse was coming and a obsession with a convicted killer.
Investigators found letters written by Kristi Strack, the mother, to one of the states most infamous convicted killer, Dan Lafferty, who was convicted in the 1984 fatal stabbing of his sister-in-law and her 1 year old daughter. During trial Dan said he did it in the name of God. Kristi and her husband became friends with him and even visited him in prison.
