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Miscellaneous Vampire Reports

James_H

James_H

And I like to roam the land
Joined
May 18, 2002
Messages
7,629
http://www.azcentral.com/offbeat/articles/0113vampirepanic-ON.html

article there:
Vampire reports create panic in African village
New York Times News Service
Jan. 13, 2003 08:10 PM

BLANTYRE, Malawi - They wear dark clothing, it is said, and carry syringes to draw blood from their drugged victims, who sicken or die. The creatures have magical powers and a fondness for vanishing in graveyards, but no one has ever heard of them changing into bats.


"I've never heard of them drinking blood, either," said Gospel Kuseliwa, 22, who says he and his friends recently chased some bloodsuckers while patrolling in Chiradzulu, a village just 12 miles from Blantyre. The men, who had never heard of Dracula, said drinking blood sounded like a pretty bad idea anyway, particularly in this era of AIDS.

Malawi, despite the best efforts of its government, is in the grip of a form of hysteria. Vampires are attacking the villages, people say.

Men are finally fighting back. At night, when darkness shrouds the green hills and women and children hide in their huts, the patrols creep slowly through the cornfields. Twelve brave men peer behind towering anthills and whispering trees with pickaxes, knives and clubs at the ready.

Their prey, witnesses insist, is a modern-day vampire: Men carrying flashlights who disable their victims with sleeping gas. There have been no sightings here of caped men with sharp teeth.

The persistent complaints about vampires have outraged government officials, who describe the reports as ludicrous and issue press releases and statements to make it absolutely clear to local citizens, potential tourists and the world at large that Malawi does not have a vampire problem.

The repeated reassurances have not eased the deepening fears. Anxious crowds have already killed at least two people believed to be bloodsuckers. Several other people have been attacked, including three priests and the governor of Blantyre, who was stoned this month by a crowd of 200 people after a local chief accused him of harboring vampires in his home.

Hoping to end the mounting hysteria, the police have arrested nearly 40 people and charged them with spreading lies and falsehoods. Seven more were charged with the attack on the governor.

"We have asked those who have evidence to come forward and report to the police," said Paul Chifisi, the regional criminal investigations officer. "Some people have come forward. But when you ask, what are the injuries, what is the description of the suspect, they do not show any injuries or offer any description."

In the frightened villages, the government's opinions are dismissed. The debate here is mostly about whether bloodsuckers are spirits or human beings with magical powers. No one questions whether vampires are real.


They have smelled the acrid sleeping gas, people say. They have found abandoned syringes. Elesi Makwinja in Chiradzulu said she narrowly survived an attack and watched the vampires vanish into thin air with her own eyes. Another woman in Thyolo died after a vampire removed her precious blood, her relatives say.

"We don't know whether they are real people or spirits, but we know they are attacking," said Peter James, the brother of the middle-aged woman who died in Thyolo last month.

"It's been happening almost every week," said James, who says the police refused to investigate his report. "We have seen them, but we haven't got close. They were wearing dark clothes and always walking fast. I heard the government's statement on the radio, but we know that this is happening to us."




In these impoverished rural communities, which lack electricity, running water, adequate food, education and medical care, peasant farmers are accustomed to being battered by forces they cannot control or fully understand.

The sun burns crops, leaving fields withered and families hungry. Rains drown chickens and wash away huts, leaving people homeless. Newborn babies die despite the wails of their mothers and the powerful prayers of village elders.

People here believe in an invisible God, but also in malevolent forces - witches who change into hyenas, people who make beaded pins of stones, people who can destroy their enemies by harnessing floods. So the notion of vampires does not seem far-fetched.

"Our people in the villages are not educated; they believe anything," grumbled Eric Chiwaya, the governor of Blantyre, who was recovering from his wounds in the hospital."Nobody has proof of these bloodsuckers. What can I do with someone's blood?"

Some people speculate that villagers are dizzy with hunger and imagining things. Others blame hungry thieves for creating the havoc. President Bakili Muluzi accused the opposition of stirring up the trouble to tarnish his administration.

Then again, AIDS might be to blame. With so much shame and stigma surrounding the disease, some people might prefer to blame vampires for sickness and death.



Charles Kaiya interrupts a visitor's musings over the various theories to suggest another possibility: The villagers might be right.

He remembers another vampire scare in Malawi some 30 years ago. In the end, he says, police arrested a man with who was caught with syringes and bottles of blood in his refrigerator. Everyone knows that politicians lie, Kaiya said, which is why few people trust the government's position on vampires.

Kaiya's theory? Perhaps the government has promised to sell Malawian blood to donor nations in exchange for financial aid. "Maybe it's going to Saudi Arabia to get money," he said.
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I've texted a mate in Brum about this as I'm dead curious, have we any board-ers in that part of the UK. The reporter, Justine Halifax, has an interesting name for someone writing about waves of panic about indiscriminate attacks, too.

Vampire tales 'bloody ridiculous' Jan 13 2005

By Justine Halifax

Linky

Reports of a vampire-style attacker on the loose biting innocent people in Birmingham were today dismissed by police as an "urban myth" which is spiralling out of control.

The Evening Mail has been flooded with calls from terrified families, community leaders and schools concerned for the safety of residents in Saltley, Small Heath and Alum Rock.

All have heard rumours of a man biting people in the streets and knocking on doors attacking homeowners.

It follows reports of a man "going on the rampage" in Glen Park Road, Ward End, biting innocent bystanders last month, forcing frightened families to call police.

Witnesses say the attacker, described as black and in his late 20s, had bitten a man walking in the street and neighbours who came to his aid, including a woman who had "chunks" bitten out of her hand. There have since been rumours of similar attacks.

But West Midlands Police insist that, despite the high number of calls received, it has had no "reports of anyone being bitten" and have put it down to an urban myth.

A spokeswoman for City Road Primary School, Ladywood, said: "We have had many parents coming in concerned because they had heard somebody had been going around biting people."

Nazar Hussain, a community leader from Small Heath, said: "I have had lots of people get in touch with me worried about this, including two local schools."

But a police spokesman said today: "To date we have not received any reports from people stating they have been bitten and this appears to be an urban myth which is being fuelled by rumours."


[/url]
 
Nope, I haven't heard of it until reading that report. I was over in Brum yesterday at our offices and some of the people we support live on the borders of Saltley and Small Heath. No one has mentioned it at all plus I've just taken a call from my manager and I asked if she had heard of any unusual attacks occuring in the area (staff work alone out in the community and it is in our interest to know if there's a spate of attacks/muggings etc). Anyway, she laughed it off and thought I was mad when I mentioned about people having chunks bitten out of their hands.

I'm also quite gutted that I hadn't noticed it on the ic Birmingham site last night.
 
i have been staying with my parents for a month due to christmas and illness, but normally i live in birmingham and should be going back in a few days. i haven't heard anything from friends about vampires, but i'll keep an eye out when i get back.
 
A black vampire UL?

He doesn't happen to frequent elevators and have a dog called Lady or Whitey does he?:D
 
Vampire takes a bite out of Brum

Sam Jones
Monday January 17, 2005
The Guardian

Urban myths have occasionally been known to nudge the boundaries of credibility, but the people of Birmingham are finding it difficult to laugh off the possibility that a vampire could be lurking in the city.

Stories about a man who stalks the streets, sinking his teeth into passers-by, began to emerge from the Ward End area of the city last month.

According to the rumours, he bit a man walking along the street, then pounced on neighbours who came to his aid. One woman is said to have had a "chunk" bitten out of her hand. Local media have since been inundated with calls from people in the city's Saltley, Small Heath and Alum Rock areas, who have heard of attacks and of people being bitten after answering their front doors.

But West Midlands police believe they are dealing with a tall tale rather than a prowling bloodsucker.

They are baffled by the lack of forthcoming victims. "To date we have not received any reports from people stating they have been bitten. This appears to be an urban myth," a spokesman told the Birmingham Evening Mail. Those who claim to have seen the attacker say he is black and in his late 20s. Although police think he is probably nothing more than a bogeyman, some residents are no longer sure what to believe.

"All I've heard is that there's a fellow who is going round attacking people like a dog and biting them," said Josephine McNally, who works at the Old Barley Mow pub in Ward End. "It does put the wind up you."

Word had also reached the Saltley community leisure centre yesterday. "I've heard that this guy's a bit crazy and that he's been biting people" said one employee.

"I heard the story in the barber's the other day," said Father Anthony Rohan of the Holy Family Catholic church in Small Heath. "They asked me if I believed in vampires and I said no. Then the lollipop lady mentioned it to me as well.

"I'm not worried, though. I've got a lot of crucifixes in the house."
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Source
 
Emperor said:
"All I've heard is that there's a fellow who is going round attacking people like a dog and biting them," said Josephine McNally, who works at the Old Barley Mow pub in Ward End. "It does put the wind up you."

Word had also reached the Saltley community leisure centre yesterday. "I've heard that this guy's a bit crazy and that he's been biting people" said one employee.

"I heard the story in the barber's the other day," said Father Anthony Rohan of the Holy Family Catholic church in Small Heath. "They asked me if I believed in vampires and I said no. Then the lollipop lady mentioned it to me as well.
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The hysteria is spreading, then, this is why I was interested. I'm wondering if we could have a contempory 'Halifax Slasher' type case appearing here. It also made the 'and finally' section of the BBC news round up. See here.
 
swamp fink said:
Skitster: where did the original clipping appear?
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I thought I'd stuck the url in there, sorry, it's the Birmingham Evening News and the site is icBirmingham.

It's here
 
Thanks, skitster.

I love stuff like this. It's quite timely, too, as I've recently been seeking out stuff on the Gorbals Vampire and Sheffield Ghost hunts and wondering if we're ever gonna see the like again ...
 
swamp fink said:
Thanks, skitster.

I love stuff like this. It's quite timely, too, as I've recently been seeking out stuff on the Gorbals Vampire and Sheffield Ghost hunts and wondering if we're ever gonna see the like again ...
Click to expand...

I was thinking it was more 'Springheel Jack', 'Halifax Slasher', 'London Monster', 'Mumbai Monkey Man' territory but I've been assured by one person that there is someone out there biting people.

Fascinating stuff.
 
skitster said:
I was thinking it was more 'Springheel Jack', 'Halifax Slasher', 'London Monster', 'Mumbai Monkey Man' territory but I've been assured by one person that there is someone out there biting people.
Click to expand...

Emphasis added.

:rofl:

edit: Sorry, that comes across as far more obnoxious than i wanted. My implication was that in all such cases people ['I's] were assured the phenomenon was quite real. That's how these things work.

edit2: And, of course, it's still possible the phenomenon is real.
 
The Yithian said:
Emphasis added.

:rofl:
Click to expand...

I should have said "Not that that means anything" afterwards. When I first heard about the Brummie Vamp I thought "Yay! Contemporary Panic!" and pondered on whether the current trend for seeing kiddie-fiddlers, terrorists and other nasty sorts just about everywhere will kick off lots of London Monster style scares.

There's been no report to the police, the one woman who has, apparently been bitten, is not named and the location of the attack has not been given. So far, so much folk-rumour and the reason I mentions that one person I know said that there is someone out there biting people (without offering names, location, time or date or anything useful like that) is just so much more grist to the folklore-mill until any evidence comes along.

Better?

Edit: apology accepted old fruit but lord, don't let me be misunderstood.
 
Reality bites

Greets

Reality bites

Reports of a 'vampire' prowling the streets of Birmingham have struck terror into the locals, even though police say it is a myth. Why do people continue to believe in it? Because, says Stuart Jeffries, they need to

Tuesday January 18, 2005
The Guardian

A vampire is on the loose in Birmingham. And an inept one, if reports are to be believed. Which they aren't. Last month, this "vampire" went on a "rampage" in Glen Park Road, Ward End. The attacker reportedly bit a male pedestrian and then bit neighbours who came to the man's aid. One woman had "chunks" bitten out of her hand, according to reports, which feature lots of one-word "quotes" and very little in the way of named sources.

No matter. The Birmingham Evening Mail has been flooded with calls from "terrified" families, community leaders and schools. Oliver Luft of the Birmingham news agency Newsteam reported: "As the sun dips below the rooftops of sleepy terraced streets, residents rush home, quickly gathering up playing children, because after night falls a vampire hungry for blood stalks. Reports of a Dracula-style attacker on the loose biting innocent people has spread terror throughout neighbourhoods in Birmingham, causing many to fear the darkness of the night."

Such reports themselves spread fear. Thus, a spokeswoman for City Road primary school in Ladywood said: "We have had many parents coming in concerned because they had heard somebody has been going around biting people."

But police in Birmingham have not investigated this "case". Nor have any hospitals in the city reported treating more than the usual number of hard-bitten Brummies. A police spokesman said: "To date we have not received any reports from people stating they have been bitten and this appears to be an urban myth which is being fuelled by rumours."

Urban myths are always fuelled by rumours. Only last year, virtual inboxes throughout the US teemed with photographs of so-called camel spiders that were allegedly attacking US soldiers in Iraq. An anonymous caption read: "With a vertical leap that would make a pro basketball player weep with envy, these bastards latch on and inject you with a local anaesthesic so you can't feel it feeding on you." Entomologists later pointed out that camel spiders are neither venomous nor a threat to humans or camels.

The photograph of a camel spider was chosen as the top urban legend of 2004 by a US site that gleefully collects such faux photos, dodgy global emails and questionable stories that have spread across the land of the free and the home of the credulous. Here are some others that made it into the urbanlegends.com 2004 top 10:

Terrorists are buying up UPS (United Parcel Service) uniforms on eBay. A scary story, if true - but it was not: the FBI investigated the claim that $32,000 of UPS uniforms had been bought from eBay in the previous 30 days, and found it to have no substance.

Altoids mints help you perform fellatio. This myth gained notoriety when the 1988 Starr report stated that Monica Lewinsky handed to then president Clinton a printout of an email including this story during a secret White House rendezvous the previous year. Apparently, they don't.

A giant skeleton has been found in the Arabian desert. This skeleton was reported to confirm the legend of the people of Aad, who were so big that they could put their arms around a tree and uproot it. The Aad ultimately turned against God and, as you will know, were destroyed by Him. It turned out that the photograph of this "giant skeleton" had originally been entered in a Photoshop contest.

Jelly bracelets. Last year US parents were alarmed by stories that a middle school had banned girls wearing coloured bracelets. Each colour, it was widely claimed, indicated what kind of sexual favour they would perform. Despite the ban, the jelly bracelet phenomenon was spreading nationwide. Reportedly.

David Emery, chronicler of folklore for urbanlegends.com, defines urban legends as "apocryphal stories, told as true and plausible enough to be believed, about horrific, embarrassing, exasperating or ironic things that have supposedly happened to real people. In lieu of evidence, the teller of an urban legend is apt to rely upon good storytelling and the naming of allegedly trustworthy sources (eg a friend of a friend who swears it is true) to bolster its credibility. Legends tend to arise spontaneously and are rarely traceable to a single point of origin." No wonder, then, that the once-bitten of Birmingham have since become so publicity-shy. If, that is, they existed in the first place.

In this age of emails and texts, urban legends can spread faster and more widely than in the 1980s, when such books as The Choking Doberman and Other "New" Urban Legends by folklorist Jan Harold Brunvand became bestsellers. Emery offers tips on how to spot an email hoax. USE OF UPPERCASE LETTERS IS A DEAD GIVEAWAY. As is the use of exclamation marks!!!! If the text seems to be more about emotionally affecting you than communicating accurate information, it is likely to be a hoax. Finally, he suggests, ask yourself whether the information seems plausible.

I applied the last test to a video purportedly of the "Beast of Bodmin Moor" posted on news.bbc.co.uk website in July 1998. This "document" followed a 1995 government report in which zoologists concluded there was no evidence to support the claim that big cats lived wild in Cornwall. Since 1983, there had been 60 sightings of the beast in and around Cornwall. I remain sceptical: the image of the "big cat" I saw, though it purported to be of a three and a half foot long "beast", just needed the addition of a flea collar to be a dead ringer for the cat who sprays our front door. But how did he get all the way from Finsbury Park to Cornwall?

Urban legends pre-date emails and video footage. In the 1830s, a character appeared in the London streets called Spring-Heeled Jack. One woman reported to the police that she was attacked by a "tall thin man, enveloped in a long black cloak. With one bound he was in front of her, and before she had the chance to move, he belched blue flames from his mouth into her face." Jack was repeatedly "sighted" in London and identified as the offspring of the devil, with some "witnesses" reporting he had horns and cloven feet.

Peter Ackroyd writes in London - The Biography: "It is almost as if this bizarre figure emerged from the streets themselves, like a 'golem' which is supposed to be made from the mud and dust of a certain vicinity. The fact that 'Jack' , like a latter and more notorious 'Jack', was never apprehended serves only to deepen that sense of anonymity which suggests the monstrous figure to be some token or representation of London itself." Similarly, the Birmingham vampire will surely never be found - because the symbolic need for such a figure is infinitely greater than any forensic evidence that could be compiled.

Ackroyd's account of this urban legend is surely more interesting than those by people who have tried to explain away the uncanny nature of Spring-heeled Jack. In The Legends and Bizarre Crimes of Spring Heeled Jack, Peter Haining suggested that 'Jack' was a fire-eater who wore a mask to protect his face and had shoes with springs in their heels for leaping. This account, like Patricia Cornwell's "solving" of the Ripper case (pinning the murders on the painter Walter Sickert), is surely uninteresting because it doesn't account for the psychic need that makes such legends so richly embroidered and enduring.

Vampires, as Christopher Frayling, chairman of Arts Council England, points out, are the most enduring of urban myths - although "urban" hardly does vampires justice. He writes in The Vampire: Lord Ruthven to Count Dracula that vampires were part of rural 18th-century folklore. At that time, these bloodsuckers were inarticulate peasants "who attacked sheep and cows as often as their relatives". Lord Byron changed vampire legend for ever when, staying at a rented house on the shores of Lake Geneva in 1816, he suggested to guests - who included his physician, Dr Polidori, Percy Bysshe Shelley and Shelley's future wife, Mary - that they each write a ghost story. The most famous result of these is Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, but more relevant for us is Dr Polidori's novel The Vampyre, inspired by the story Byron told the assembled guests on an inclement day.

The story told of a man's encounter with Lord Ruthven, a libertine killed in Greece who becomes a vampire. Ruthven has a "dead grey eye" and a "deadly hue of his face" - a description that became a stereotype of the vampire look. The book inspired great interest in vampirism in London and Paris, and profoundly influenced Bram Stoker, author of Dracula.

But vampires needed to mutate again before they were fit to prowl the streets of Birmingham. One such change was effected by Anne Rice and Stephen King, who domesticated the legend (King's Christine, for example, was a vampire car). Vampires were no longer on the fringes of civilised Europe or decadent aristos. At this moment, says Frayling, "the vampire enters our bloodstream".

It has never really left, though vampires have changed again: now they are not ghoulish Transylvanian counts, but hip, sexy, immortal teens from southern California. Perhaps Tory leader Michael Howard should take succour from this the next time someone titters about his Transylvanian ancestry.

What does the vampire represent now? "It's about multiculturalism," says Frayling. "It's about how we view the Other. You can't demonise a group as was done in America in the 30s or England in the 50s." Instead, the modern vampire incarnates many things - sexual fantasies, fears of urban anomie, especially for teenagers. "It's an amazing myth. It's so flexible."

It is also a hellish myth, which is no doubt why Father Marcus Stock, director of schools for Birmingham's Catholic diocese, warned in 2003 that parents should be vigilant in letting their children watch programmes such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Charmed and Sabrina the Teenage Witch. "They seem to be appealing to a spiritual element which perhaps they are not finding from traditional faiths," Stock said at the time. "It is significant that the supernatural element of these programmes is finding fascination with these young minds."

And it is also no doubt why, whatever real human beasts may be stalking the streets of Birmingham, stories of a vampire hungry for blood will be chilling and thrilling its citizens for some time yet.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1392607,00.html

mal
 
It made the local TV yesterday and as I was in Brum earlier and asked my manager again, she has heard since that it may have come about from some fight or altercation in a street where someone was bitten earlier in the year.

Weird to think how many suburbs have been affected by the bunkum though, I've heard it is meant to have happened now in Alum Rock too.
 
I'm lovin this story!
I was in Brum yesterday, as I am weekly now and I really should have asked my staff about it.
It's only when you view an urban myth from afar that you realise how silly it looks, and how easy it is to believe if you "know someone who knows someone."

Incidentally wasn't brum just voted the accent people would hate to have the most (again).
I think it's great. If you listen, it's very expressive.
But they use "to be honest" too much.

One brummie to another;

"Do yo wan't a kipper tie?"

"Ta very much, milk and sugar please"
 
i think it might be true. my flatmate works in Alum Rock and her colleague claims she got bitten.

she was in a pub, and this bloke came up and said "i'm going to kidnap you." She said that he wouldn't get a ransom, and he said "no, i'm just going to kidnap you and ravish you all weekend." she told him to go away and he bit her on the arm. then he bit her friend on the cheek.
 
fluffle said:
i think it might be true. my flatmate works in Alum Rock and her colleague claims she got bitten.

she was in a pub, and this bloke came up and said "i'm going to kidnap you." She said that he wouldn't get a ransom, and he said "no, i'm just going to kidnap you and ravish you all weekend." she told him to go away and he bit her on the arm. then he bit her friend on the cheek.
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That might be a brummie mating ritual by the sound of it but there might be something there. That this person is a friend of a friend could be costrued as being a bit dubious. Did you get their name?
 
skitster said:
That might be a brummie mating ritual by the sound of it but there might be something there. That this person is a friend of a friend could be costrued as being a bit dubious. Did you get their name?
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yes, although my flatmate admits she is "a bit of a bullsh*tter".
 
fluffle said:
yes, although my flatmate admits she is "a bit of a bullsh*tter".
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Could you get a description off them? That'd be helpful (I think I'm going to write something about this somewhere).

Do that and I'll buy you a pint the next time I'm in Brum (although the only drinkery I know out there is the bar in the MAC centre in Cannon Park, it that any good compared to other Birmingham boozers?).
 
skitster said:
Could you get a description off them? That'd be helpful (I think I'm going to write something about this somewhere).
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sorry, i can't really get a description as that would mean convincing my flatmate to initiate a conversation, which frankly ain't going to happen.
 
fluffle said:
sorry, i can't really get a description as that would mean convincing my flatmate to initiate a conversation, which frankly ain't going to happen.
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A loss to forteana. Still, if there really is a phantom biter roaming Brum more should emerge.
 
Greets

there is also the lileihood that some lost souls might try doing "copycat" bitings? (or maybe there's a vampire news network sending out messages "go to birmingham -the people are very tasty"?) :D

mal
 
birmingham vampire

The Birmingham vampire has been dismissed as an urban myth. Some years ago there was poltergeista cticity in the same area. There are two more vampire =stories of the modern day, one which I cannot mention and the other is the Kirklees Vampire which occured about ten years ago, around Robin Hood's Grave, and which was supposed to be dealt with at the time. This new story is interesting. Obviously if people were being bitten by a vampire and turning into vampires the place would soon be overun and the hospital and coroner would be looking at some strange symptoms and deaths.
 
types of vampire

Also people are getting mixed up with what si meant by vampire

The traditional vampire is an undead person who lives in a coffin and comes out at night to bite people. They then turn into vampires.

Its thought that this is based on folk stories before disease was fully understood and people died from things like tb involving haemorrhages


the modern vampire is a living person who likes to drink blood, the often dress up in clothes like in Dracula films.

The two types are often confused and of course while thre are many living people who go in for this blood drinking situation, the reality of the traditional vampire is soemthing which needs much more research and "proof" to give it any basis in fact.

Barbara
 
...but the Brum character is nothing like either of these two, just (from the description) a nutter who allegedly goes around biting people 'like a dog'.

It just sounds better for the media to call him a vampire. Mike Tyson bit someone's ear off, and you don't see him called a vampire - but that seems much closer to the present case.
They might as well called him a cannibal, or maybe a werewolf...
 
Going back up to Brum on Monday.
Really looking forward to it. I'm going to look out for people biting eachother outside Next in the Bullring, in "copycat" cases.
I think I'll pop in there first, to get myself a poloneck jumper.
 
Try again...


WILL NO ONE SAVE US FROM THESE EVIL VAMPIRE HORDES?
 
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