If you go down in the woods tonight…

One time tested theme which seems to pop up frequently in reports from adult Satanic ritual abuse claimants (and at least one MK Ultra claimant we’re aware of, ahem) is that of being chased through forests.

We have Becki Percy dashing about through an unspecified wooded area in Hull with a camera on her head; Fiona Barnett relating her experience of being chased through the “Pedowood”; and who could forget Angela Power-Disney’s astonishing adventures of being “hunted” in the forest by military types who only wanted to urinate on her?

Of course a forest at night is an inherently spooky place, full of strange shadows and unfamiliar noises seemingly magnified in darkness, so it’s not terribly surprising that forests (like tunnels) seem to play a strong supporting role in the SRA myth. We were interested to note that one of the very early SRA trials was alleged to have taken place in Epping Forest, on the eastern outskirts of London.

‘Girl tells court of sacrifices in Epping Forest’

The headlines were lurid, and the news coverage was heavy during the November 1991 trial at the Old Bailey. A contemporaneous report in The Herald stated:

A girl alleged to have been sexually assaulted with her sister during satanic rituals in Epping Forest, yesterday told a jury she was warned she would be ”cut up and hanged” if she reported what happened to her.

The 10-year-old, on her second day in the witness box at the Old Bailey, said: ‘My mum said that if we told, all the gypsies would come and cut us up and hang us. I was scared. I believed it.’

Five people, including the girls’ parents, are on trial facing 20 specimen charges dating back to 1982 and including rape, buggery, indecent assault, and conspiracy to commit indecent assault.

The girl recalled her mother telling her that one of those who had abused her, a 58-year-old man, was ‘a Christian and a true gypsy’.

The prosecution said the girl and her sister, now 14, would describe for the jury how they were taken at night to the Gypsy Smith memorial stone in Epping Forest, drugged and made to drink blood from a freshly-killed rabbit before being sexually abused by adults, including their parents.

Mr Michael Lawson, QC, told the jury the elder sister had claimed that babies were sacrificed at the end of the rituals. …

The girl said she and her sister would be taken ‘about three times a week’ to naked rituals in the forest and given drinks which made her feel ‘dizzy and sexy’.

She described being ordered to lie on the ground while a series of men sexually abused her.

Among those present at the ceremonies she knew were her mother, her father, and the other three defendants. …

Babies and girls a few years younger than herself would be sacrificed, she said. Her father and the 63-year-old male accused would produce them from behind the stone.

Her godfather would put the baby or child on the stone then take a knife and either stab them or slit their throats.

An interesting point which struck us right away is that, given the story of baby or child sacrifice, none of the accused were charged with murder.

And indeed, according to the encyclopædic SAFF website, the police found no forensic or other evidence to back up the children’s initial testimony. After a six-day trial, the case was dismissed:

In the Epping Case Judge Justice Turner dismissed the case saying that the girl’s evidence was “uncertain, inconsistent, and improbable.” The key to the collapse of the Epping Case was simply that the defence council asked the child whether she was lying and she said she was. She admitted to making up the names of people she had claimed were involved. She admitted that her testimony about Ritual Sacrifice might not be true.

“I am not sure if it did happen or if I was just imagining it.. the bits with the killings and that, I am not sure of”.

While the Epping Forest SRA allegations were the first mention of forests or woods in the UK version of the Satanic panic, we were interested to note that a similar story popped up in Chicago two years earlier.

Craig Tisdale, an animal control officer [dog-catcher, shurely?—Ed.] from the Winnetka Police Department, warned hardened police officers of the ghastly dangers which could await them in Chicago’s forest preserve woods:

This is new and growing: The demented cults that use the woods to coldly sacrifice animals-and, it is feared, possibly even humans-in satanic rituals. According to law enforcement officers, this happens more than most of us can imagine.

And the cops themselves are warning each other to be careful.

”If you’re walking deep in the woods and you see anything like this, get back out and call for help,” a veteran of cult investigation told the annual meeting of Illinois conservation police last week in Peoria. ”If you see animals hanging from trees, get out. If a person comes up to you and says he’s seen something ‘funny’ going on, get out and get some help. That could be a warning.”

Warning of what? Tisdale showed the officers videos of “Satanic sites” which had been found in the Chicago area:

There was a broken angel tombstone marker along with several animal carcasses near an abandoned cemetery close to O’Hare. There was an inscribed rock altar in another woods. The most sensational find was a ceremonial gravesite in the deep forest near southwestern Willow Springs last November.

That one brought out police in full, for the initial signs were ominous. Along with ritualistically butchered deer and other animals, investigators found an inverted cross and a child’s gym shoe near the shallow grave. Trees were splattered with what seemed like blood and painted with satanic symbols. Grottoes and the grave dripped with candle wax.

Fortunately, no human remains were found, and the ”blood” turned out to be theatrical makeup. But the police believe that these sites hint of a violence to come.

So…nothing had happened, no evidence of anything untoward had been found, but let no one claim that saner heads prevailed:

(Tisdale) said current investigations conclude that satanic ceremonies invariably have the goal of human sacrifice. ”We are convinced, but cannot prove, that babies and others have been used,” Tisdale said. ”We believe that some of these established groups breed babies for sacrifice. We suspect that runaways are enticed, then kidnapped and used. These could be street kids from Clark Street on the North Side. Kids aren’t reported missing from there. They’re already missing from other areas-Des Moines, perhaps.”

No human sacrifices had taken place…yet.

And Tisdale knew, but could not prove, that “babies and others” had been sacrificed, and that babies had been bred for sacrifice. While no teenagers had been reported missing, he “suspected” runaways had been enticed. And since they hadn’t come from Clark Street, they must have been missing from faraway cities. Or something.

Tisdale wants to see a county, state or federal task force formed to investigate cult problems. He said the Chicago Police Department and state police Division of Criminal Investigation currently have detectives assigned to cults.

But all they can tell you right now is to stay out of deep woods near cemeteries late at night when fires are flickering, especially when the moon is full.

Oooweeeeooooo…and cue the scary violins.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com