Halloween is a cheerful party with a sinister twist. People dress up as zombie, skeleton or mother-in-law, with the aim of terrifying people. Children go door-to-door collecting candy and the horror movies are endless. But there are also real killers out there on Halloween. We list a few horrifying examples in this article. These murders were committed on Halloween.
Dad poisons his son with candy
Ronald Clark O’Bryan killed his 11-year-old son by poisoning him with Halloween candy. He put cyanide in five Pixy Stix straws and gave them to his son and four other neighborhood kids. He did this because he thought that then the suspicion would fall on his neighbor. When his son ate the candy, he complained that it tasted bitter, and he began to vomit. Not much later, the boy died in hospital. O’Bryan confessed to the murders after an intensive interrogation and stated that he wanted to take the life insurance policy that he had taken out on his son. He was eventually given a lethal injection.
Child shot dead during trick-or-treating
Tony Bagley was a 7-year-old boy who was shot and killed while trick-or-treating. The child was collecting candy with his mother, sister and aunt when suddenly a man in a tracksuit showed up and fired his gun at them. The mother was hit in the chest, the sister in her liver and the aunt in the leg, but young Tony was hit in the head and died on the spot. The boy’s stepfather was briefly a suspect in the case, but was soon released due to lack of evidence. In the end, no one has ever been convicted of the murder that was the talk of the town during Halloween in Las Vegas.
Killed with an AK-47
On Halloween night in 2008, 12-year-old TJ Darrisaw knocked on the door of Quinten Patrick, a convicted drug dealer. The boy had gone trick-or-treating with his father and younger brother in disguise. The drug dealer was wary, as not only the police but also rival gang members had been targeting him lately. When TJ knocked on his front door, he didn’t hesitate. He picked up his fully automatic AK-47 and fired 29 rounds through the front door. TJ was hit several times and died on the way to the hospital. His brother and father were also hit, but survived the hail of bullets. The drug dealer was given a life sentence.
The Toolbox Killers
The Toolbox Killers were the nicknames of Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris. They were so named because they used household tools to horribly torture their victims. Their fifth and final victim was murdered on Halloween night 1979. Shirley Ledford, 16, was kidnapped while trying to hitchhike home after a party. The two sadistic killers raped her, tortured her with pliers and smashed her skull in with a sledgehammer. They then dumped her body in the yard of a suburban house. The Toolbox Killers were eventually arrested because Norris talked about the murder to an ex-convict. The evidence was overwhelming. They had videotaped all the torture and murder, which was found at Bittaker’s home.
