https://www.spookyisles.com/south-shields-poltergeist-darren-w-ritson/
Anyway, that's a link to Darren Ritson's thoughts on the South Shields case after the passage of 15 years - and the involvement of other investigators such as Alan Murdie and Steve Parsons who later sifted through the oral, written and photographic evidence collected at the time.
I find this one quite a fascinating case, due to the length of time it went on for and the pretty extreme nature of some of the events.
Ritson strikes me as someone who's still pretty open-minded about the whole thing, admitting that he still has no idea what causes reported polt phenomena, and accepting that there
could have been hoaxing involved, but he's at a loss to explain how or why it would have been done.
One thing that still does niggle at me a little though - the whole 'text messages from a phone which had the battery and SIM card removed' incident, which was described as inexplicable, and had baffled phone engineers.
What I've never heard mentioned was that a fair few mobile telephony services back in the mid-2000s allowed a user to log on to their website using a home PC, and send text messages which, to the recipient, would show up as being from the sender's mobile. BT Genie (later 02) and Orange/EE both allowed this, as the messages didn't use up your credit or your mobile plan's inclusive texts allowance (remember those?) - my then-girlfriend and I used the service a lot to stay in touch with each other while at uni, as we could message each other from the faculty computer rooms while
browsing the NME webforum composing earnest and learned essays of great academic value.
So, in theory, someone with Marc's mobile number and account login details could have been remotely sending messages to Marianne's phone, while Marc's mobile phone was disassembled on the table in front of the couple and the two investigators.
Not saying that's what happened, or that I've any clue as to
why that would have been happening - but it may provide a possible non-paranormal explanation for a phenomenon which still seems to be viewed as inexplicable by the investigators.
Anyway. The book's still a decent read, I reckon.
) When the investigator has the run in with the tall dark shadowy scary thing, he then notices a puddle on the floor which he touches with his fingers and concludes its polt wee.
