Speaker 1: We open on a pristine, tree lined avenue of some
Speaker 1: affluent North American suburb as a paper boy cycles merrily along,
Speaker 1: casually tossing papers towards the grand mansion houses that line
Speaker 1: the street. The camera pans to the left, centering on
Speaker 1: one such mansion. It's perfectly manicured front lawn and grand facade,
Speaker 1: offering up a vision of wealthy domestic perfection. But as
Speaker 1: we move in closer beyond the facade, we find a
Speaker 1: very different story. In an upstairs bathroom of a draggled
Speaker 1: and hairsuit, Henry Morrison, early forties and in casual dress,
Speaker 1: stands at the sink, staring intensely into the mirror, his
Speaker 1: face covered in blood. After removing a pressed and cleaned
Speaker 1: suit from a pre prepared suitcase, he steps into the
Speaker 1: shower and washes the blood from his face before shaving
Speaker 1: his beard and trimming his hair. Moments later, he stands
Speaker 1: once again in front of the mirror, the image of
Speaker 1: a calm go getting professional. Soon, the smartly dressed Henry,
Speaker 1: now with a briefcase in his hand, is walking down
Speaker 1: the stairs, pasted a blood stained wall covered in happy
Speaker 1: family portraits of Henry with his wife and kids, Finally,
Speaker 1: as he steps down into a large entry hall, stopping
Speaker 1: calmly to right and knocked over chair, we see the
Speaker 1: true horror within, ignored by Henry as he makes his
Speaker 1: way to the front door. The floor of the living
Speaker 1: room behind is littered with the blood and bodies of
Speaker 1: those same wife and children, paying no attention to the dead,
Speaker 1: bloodied body of a young girl clutching a teddy bear
Speaker 1: in the foreground. Henry lets himself out and closes the
Speaker 1: door behind him. Outside he breaks into a whistle and
Speaker 1: collects the paper from the lawn, then steps into the
Speaker 1: quiet of the street and disappears up the road. The
Speaker 1: opening scene of Joseph Ruben's nineteen eighty seventh film The
Speaker 1: Stepfather is widely considered one of the most effective and
Speaker 1: shocking in cinematic history. Sadly, it is also loosely based
Speaker 1: on a true story. In nineteen seventy one, John Liszt
Speaker 1: was a well respected father of three and churchgoing resident
Speaker 1: in the town of Westfield in New Jersey, USA, with
Speaker 1: a well paid job at City Bank and a mansion
Speaker 1: on the hill to go with it. In November of
Speaker 1: that year, however, unbeknownst to his family, List had been
Speaker 1: laid off and found himself heavily in debt after surreptitiously
Speaker 1: skimming money from his elderly mother's credit card to pay
Speaker 1: the bills. Liszt's reaction to his predicament, in an all
Speaker 1: too common act perpetrated by men in similar positions, was
Speaker 1: to murder his entire family rather than revealed to them
Speaker 1: the truth of it all, believing the shame of it
Speaker 1: would have been too much for them to bear. After
Speaker 1: carefully lying the bodies down together, he made arrangements to
Speaker 1: stop the milk and the mail, then packed a bag
Speaker 1: and fled. Understandably for a small town like Westfield, which
Speaker 1: prided itself on its reputation as one of the safest
Speaker 1: towns in America, the shock of John lists crimes a
Speaker 1: violent reminder that all is never quite as it seems,
Speaker 1: opened a chasm of horror that took many years to repair,
Speaker 1: but as so often happens, no doubt, aided by the
Speaker 1: old Liszt family home being mysteriously burned down the following year.
Speaker 1: The events were eventually expunged from the collective memory and
Speaker 1: passed off as an aberration until it was as if
Speaker 1: they had never happened at all, and before too long,
Speaker 1: the illusion of pretty perfection was soon restored to the
Speaker 1: small but cultured town. Forty years later, however, as the
Speaker 1: summer of two and fourteen approached, all that was about
Speaker 1: to change. You're listening to Unexplained and I'm Richard McClane Smith.
Speaker 1: Located just twenty miles west of Manhattan, the leafy town
Speaker 1: of Westfield, described by the New York Times as wheret
Speaker 1: small town meets urban, was first established in seventeen twenty
Speaker 1: as a small village enclave of the much larger Elizabethtown,
Speaker 1: first founded by English settlers in sixteen sixty four. Today, Westfield,
Speaker 1: comprised roughly of thirty thousand residents, is considered among the
Speaker 1: most wealthy in all of the United States, with average
Speaker 1: household income coming in at just under two hundred thousand
Speaker 1: dollars per annum. Chances of becoming a victim of violent
Speaker 1: crime in the town are listed by the website neighborhood
Speaker 1: scout dot com as being one in six thousand and
Speaker 1: eighty seven, compared say, to the town of Bessemer on
Speaker 1: the outskirts of Birmingham, Alabama, which the site lists as
Speaker 1: being one in thirty four, all of which made it
Speaker 1: the perfect location for Derrick and Maria Broadus, who a
Speaker 1: few years previously had joined the increasing number of affluent
Speaker 1: young families relocating to the town as they looked to
Speaker 1: escape the big city for a quieter life. In two
Speaker 1: thousand and fourteen, now with three younger children in tow,
Speaker 1: they were hoping to upsize, and after months of searching,
Speaker 1: had finally found everything they were looking for. Built in
Speaker 1: nineteen o five, at almost four thousand square feet of
Speaker 1: prime real estate, six to five seven Boulevard was located
Speaker 1: in a neighborhood described by local paper The Westfield Leader
Speaker 1: as one of the most beautiful in all the town.
Speaker 1: With its grand colonnaded front porch and imposing facade, and
Speaker 1: boasting six bedrooms and three and a half bathrooms, it
Speaker 1: was every inch the dream home, and on June second,
Speaker 1: two thousand and fourteen, after a short bidding war, it
Speaker 1: was all theirs sold for just over one point three
Speaker 1: million dollars. Eager to move in and begin their new
Speaker 1: life on Boulevard, the Broadesses immediately set about renovating the property,
Speaker 1: employing construction workers to help. On June fifth, however, Derek
Speaker 1: broadus was at the property alone, having decided to carry
Speaker 1: out some light redecorating himself after work. It had just
Speaker 1: gone ten pm when Derek finished up and wandered out
Speaker 1: into the front porch and took a moment in the
Speaker 1: warm summer air to enjoy the serenity of his new
Speaker 1: surroundings as he pictured himself waving neighborly helloes to passers by,
Speaker 1: and his wife and kids welcoming him home from work.
Speaker 1: There was just one last thing to do before heading
Speaker 1: back to the old house. Reaching into the mailbox, he
Speaker 1: found the usual bits of junk mail and some post
Speaker 1: for the previous owner, but then also something else, a
Speaker 1: peculiar looking letter made out to the new owner, with
Speaker 1: curiously no return address. Derek examined the thick black lettering
Speaker 1: for a moment and then opened the envelope. The letter
Speaker 1: was dated June fourth, having been written before the sale
Speaker 1: of the house had even been made public. Dearest new
Speaker 1: neighbor at six five seven Boulevard, it began, allow me
Speaker 1: to welcome you to the neighborhood. How did you end
Speaker 1: up here? Did six five seven call to you with
Speaker 1: its force within the house has been the subject of
Speaker 1: my family for decades now, and as it approaches it's
Speaker 1: a hundredth and tenth birthday, I have been put in
Speaker 1: charge of watching and waiting for its second coming. My
Speaker 1: grandfather watched the house in the nineteen twenties, and my
Speaker 1: father in the nineteen sixties. It is now my time,
Speaker 1: it continued. Do you know the history of the house?
Speaker 1: Do you know what lies within the walls? Why are
Speaker 1: you here? I will find out. I see already that
Speaker 1: you have flooded it with contractors so that you can
Speaker 1: destroy the house as it was supposed to be. You
Speaker 1: don't want to make six five seven Boulevard unhappy. You
Speaker 1: have children. I have seen them so far. I think
Speaker 1: there are three that I have counted. Are there more
Speaker 1: on the way? I asked the woods to bring me
Speaker 1: young blood, and it looks like they listened. Was your
Speaker 1: old house too small for the growing family? Or was
Speaker 1: it agreed to bring me your children? Once I know
Speaker 1: their names, I will call to them and draw them
Speaker 1: to me. Who am I? There are hundreds and hundreds
Speaker 1: of cars that drive by the house each day. Maybe
Speaker 1: I am in one. Look at all the windows you
Speaker 1: can see from six to five seven Boulevard. Maybe I
Speaker 1: am in one look out any of the many windows
Speaker 1: and six five seven Boulevard at all the people who
Speaker 1: strolled by each day, Maybe I am one of them.
Speaker 1: The boulevard used to be the street to live on.
Speaker 1: You made it if you lived on the boulevard. Welcome, friends, Welcome,
Speaker 1: Let the party begin, signed the watcher. Derek stood for
Speaker 1: a moment in a complete state of shock, then, remembering
Speaker 1: where he was, looked toward the street, scanning hurriedly for
Speaker 1: any sign of a figure lurking behind a tree or
Speaker 1: a face at the window of the houses opposite. Seeing nothing,
Speaker 1: he dashed straight back inside, locking the door behind him,
Speaker 1: then switched off every light in the house, before returning
Speaker 1: to the window to check on the street as he
Speaker 1: dialed nine one. The officer arriving soon after, wandered aloud
Speaker 1: if Derek had any idea why anyone would do such
Speaker 1: a thing. Did he have any enemies, perhaps that he
Speaker 1: was aware thereof. Derek couldn't think of anyone. After suggesting
Speaker 1: that he moved any construction equipment inside lest someone tried
Speaker 1: to throw it through a window, the officer could offer
Speaker 1: a little else than to suggest that Derek remained vigilant
Speaker 1: and to let them know if anything else occurred. That night,
Speaker 1: as he made his way back to his family, Derek
Speaker 1: went through all the possibilities as to what this could be.
Speaker 1: A prank by kids, a disgruntled former owner, or was
Speaker 1: it perhaps even neighbors who had missed out on purchasing
Speaker 1: the place themselves. Though he hadn't wanted to worry Maria,
Speaker 1: there would be no hiding this from her. That night,
Speaker 1: the couple did their best to reassure themselves that it
Speaker 1: wasn't anything to worry about, but couldn't help being drawn
Speaker 1: to one line in particular. They read it again. I
Speaker 1: asked the Woods to bring me young blood, and it
Speaker 1: looks like they listened. The Woods were the former owners
Speaker 1: of the house. Was it possible that they were already
Speaker 1: aware of this before they sold it? The couple emailed
Speaker 1: John and Andrea Woods that night. The next morning, Andrea
Speaker 1: replied though they had experienced nothing remotely like it in
Speaker 1: the twenty three years they had lived at the property,
Speaker 1: she claimed. They did, however, receive a similar letter a
Speaker 1: week before they sold the house to the Broadestes. The letter,
Speaker 1: also signed off by the watcher, had made it clear
Speaker 1: that whoever it was was well aware that a new
Speaker 1: family would soon be moving in and that the watcher
Speaker 1: believed themselves to be the true owners of six five
Speaker 1: seven Boulevard. Stunned and angered by the revelation, with the
Speaker 1: sale having already gone through, there was little option but
Speaker 1: to do what they could to find the culprit and
Speaker 1: nip the whole thing in the bud. Later that day,
Speaker 1: on Maria's insistence, Andrea and John Wood drove down from
Speaker 1: their new home in Massachusetts to accompany her to the
Speaker 1: Westfield Police Department. Detective Leonard Lugo, who was assigned to
Speaker 1: the case, offered to do whatever he could to look
Speaker 1: into it, but, just as the officer had explained the
Speaker 1: previous night, in the meantime, with little else to go on,
Speaker 1: it was a case of doing their best to ignore
Speaker 1: it and looking out for any other suspicious activity. Just
Speaker 1: as Andrea had suggested in her earlier email, Lugo also
Speaker 1: speculated that the culprit could well be one of their
Speaker 1: new neighbors. Maria did her best not to seem too
Speaker 1: awkward as she made small talk with the other guests,
Speaker 1: whilst also keeping an eye on her three young children,
Speaker 1: who were busy making the most of the spacious garden.
Speaker 1: Under any normal circumstances, receiving an invitation to a neighbor's
Speaker 1: barbecue would have been something to celebrate, a perfect reflection
Speaker 1: of the general sense of benevolence they had first associated
Speaker 1: with the area. Now, however, despite their host's obviously good intentions,
Speaker 1: it had become little more than an elaborate lineup, as
Speaker 1: the broadestes found themselves treating everyone with suspicion. It didn't
Speaker 1: help that the family was still to move into the property,
Speaker 1: but it was impossible to ignore the sense conjured up
Speaker 1: by the anonymous letter that they were still very much
Speaker 1: outsiders here, something which was especially hard for Maria, who
Speaker 1: had grown up in the town across the other side
Speaker 1: of the garden. Deryck was on high alert when he
Speaker 1: soon found himself talking to John Schmidt of two doors
Speaker 1: down from six five seven, who inquired if Deryck had
Speaker 1: yet to have a chance to meet the Langfords who
Speaker 1: lived in the property between them. As revealed in an
Speaker 1: article written by Reeves Weedermam for the New Yorker magazine,
Speaker 1: the house was occupied by ninety year old family matriarch
Speaker 1: Peggy Langford, along with a number of her children, who
Speaker 1: were all in their sixties, one of whom Michael, was
Speaker 1: described by Schmidt as somewhat of a reclusive character. The
Speaker 1: following day, after Derrick informed Detective Lugo about his conversation
Speaker 1: with Schmidt, Michael Langford was brought in for questioning. However,
Speaker 1: after denying or knowledge of the letters, he was promptly released.
Speaker 1: Despite letting him go, Lugo informed the Broadestes that they
Speaker 1: were unlikely to be receiving any more letters. Though by
Speaker 1: no means conclusive, the detective's assessment offered some relief, and
Speaker 1: as the days went by, the Broadestes tried to focus
Speaker 1: their energy on completing renovations so they could finally move
Speaker 1: in to their new home. And so it was with
Speaker 1: a cautious optimism that Maria arrived at the house on
Speaker 1: June nineteenth to check on the progress of the works
Speaker 1: and to pick up any mail. But as she pulled
Speaker 1: the jumble of letters from the mailbox, Maria's heart sunk.
Speaker 1: Are you always taking care of your family? Do you
Speaker 1: often take care of others and not yourself? Now it's
Speaker 1: time to take care of yourself, To make time for you.
Speaker 1: You deserve it. Teledoc gives you access to a licensed
Speaker 1: therapist to help you get back to feeling your best,
Speaker 1: to feeling like yourself again. With teledoc, you can speak
Speaker 1: to a licensed therapist by phone or video. Therapy appointments
Speaker 1: are available seven days a week from seven a m.
Speaker 1: To nine pm local time. If you feel overwhelmed sometimes
Speaker 1: maybe you feel stressed or anxious, depressed or lonely, or
Speaker 1: you might be struggling with a personal or family issue,
Speaker 1: teledoc can help. Teledoc is committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches,
Speaker 1: so they make it easy to change counselors if needed.
Speaker 1: For free. Teledoc therapy is available through most insurance or employers.
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Speaker 1: Unexplained podcast today to get started. That's tela DC dot
Speaker 1: com slash Unexplained podcast. This time I am addressed directly
Speaker 1: to a mister and missus Braddyth. It read welcome again
Speaker 1: to your new home at six five seven Boulevard. The
Speaker 1: workers have been busy and I have been watching you
Speaker 1: unload castles of your personal belongings. The dumpster is a
Speaker 1: nice touch. Have they found what is in the walls,
Speaker 1: Yet in time they will. I am pleased to know
Speaker 1: your names now, and the names of the young blood
Speaker 1: you have brought to me. You certainly say their names often.
Speaker 1: Having claimed to have seen one of the daughters using
Speaker 1: an easel on the back porch, the Watcher asked, is
Speaker 1: she the artist in the family? It has been years
Speaker 1: and years since the young blood ruled the hallways of
Speaker 1: the house. Have you found all of the secrets it holds? Yet?
Speaker 1: Will the young blood play in the basement or are
Speaker 1: they too afraid to go down there alone? I would
Speaker 1: be very afraid if I were them. It is far
Speaker 1: away from the rest of the house. If you were upstairs,
Speaker 1: you would never hear them scream. Who has the bedrooms
Speaker 1: facing the street? I'll know as soon as you move in.
Speaker 1: It will help me to know who is in which bedroom.
Speaker 1: Then I can plan better. Who am I? I am
Speaker 1: the Watcher and have been in control of six five
Speaker 1: seven Boulevard for the better part of two decades. Now.
Speaker 1: The Woods family turned it over to you. It was
Speaker 1: their time to move on and kindly sold it when
Speaker 1: I asked them to. I passed by many times a day.
Speaker 1: Six five seven Boulevard is my job, my life, my obsession,
Speaker 1: and now you are too. Bradas's family, Welcome to the
Speaker 1: product of your greed. Greed is what brought the past
Speaker 1: three families to six five seven Boulevard, and now it
Speaker 1: has brought you to me. Have a happy moving in day.
Speaker 1: You know I will be watching. The following day, Derek
Speaker 1: and Maria led Detective Lugo through to the back porch
Speaker 1: and pointed out the easel that was still set up there.
Speaker 1: Lugo looked out to the garden beyond, searching for any
Speaker 1: clear sight lines from the neighboring properties, since no one
Speaker 1: could have seen their daughter painting from the street, either
Speaker 1: the watcher lived directly next door or behind the house,
Speaker 1: or they had walked up off the street and observed
Speaker 1: her while hiding in the garden. Once again, however, Lugo
Speaker 1: had nothing but circumstantial evidence to go on, and though
Speaker 1: they had by then established that the letters were being
Speaker 1: rooted through a northern New Jersey distribution center, there was
Speaker 1: no way to pinpoint the culprit through the letters alone.
Speaker 1: Frustrated by the police response, the Broadestis took matters into
Speaker 1: their own hands. Webcams were installed and diagrams drawn up
Speaker 1: outlining which of their neighbors could possibly have seen or
Speaker 1: heard the various incidences referred to in the letters. Some nights,
Speaker 1: Deryck would just sit alone in the house, surveying the
Speaker 1: street of any sign of the enigmatic Watcher. On July eighteenth,
Speaker 1: a third letter arrived. Six five seven Boulevard is turning
Speaker 1: on me. It is coming after me. I don't understand why.
Speaker 1: What spell did you cast on it? It used to
Speaker 1: be my friend, and now it is my enemy. I
Speaker 1: am in charge of six five seven Boulevard. It is
Speaker 1: not in charge of me. I will be patient and
Speaker 1: wait for this to pass and for you to bring
Speaker 1: the young blood back to me. Six five seven Boulevard
Speaker 1: needs young blood. It needs you come back. Let the
Speaker 1: young blood play again like I once did. Let the
Speaker 1: young blood sleep in sixty five seven Boulevard. Stop changing
Speaker 1: it and let it alone. It cries for the past
Speaker 1: and what used to be in the time when I
Speaker 1: roamed its halls. The nineteen sixties were a good time
Speaker 1: for six five seven Boulevard, when I ran from room
Speaker 1: to room imagining the life with the rich occupants there.
Speaker 1: The house was full of life and young blood. Then
Speaker 1: it got old, and so did my father. But he
Speaker 1: kept watching until the day he died. And now I
Speaker 1: watch and wait for the day when the young blood
Speaker 1: will be mine again. With the arrival of the third letter,
Speaker 1: it was clear that the watcher was not about to
Speaker 1: go quietly, so the Broadestes decided it was time to
Speaker 1: take their investigation to the next level. They began by
Speaker 1: hiring a former FBI agent to analyze the letters. Though
Speaker 1: such an approach is by no means concrete, their assessment
Speaker 1: presented two intriguing notions, one that the writer was more
Speaker 1: likely to be female or at least not aggressively masculine,
Speaker 1: due to the general inoffensiveness of the language, and the
Speaker 1: other being that they were not merely a prankster, but
Speaker 1: someone with a genuine sense of resentment toward the new owners.
Speaker 1: A private detective was also hired, but proved ultimately ineffective,
Speaker 1: and all the while, the couple found themselves in an
Speaker 1: increasingly precarious position. Having already sold their current home, they
Speaker 1: had to decide whether to bite the literary bullet and
Speaker 1: move in to their new home or seek alternative accommodation.
Speaker 1: In the end, being too afraid to risk their children's safety,
Speaker 1: and crippled by the pressure of keeping the truth about
Speaker 1: the letters from their neighbors, they decided eventually to forego
Speaker 1: the switch to six five seven and moved in with
Speaker 1: Maria's parents instead. In early December, having run out of leads,
Speaker 1: Detective Lugo informed them that the police were ending their
Speaker 1: investigation by the end of the year. Seeing no other option,
Speaker 1: the couple made up their minds to sell the house
Speaker 1: and be done with it all. In February two thousand
Speaker 1: and fifteen, six to five seven Boulevard was put back
Speaker 1: on the market for an asking price just short of
Speaker 1: one point five million dollars, over a hundred thousand more
Speaker 1: than the broadestes had originally bought it, taking into account
Speaker 1: the recent renovations. Having felt lied to in the original sale,
Speaker 1: the couple also decided to be completely open about the
Speaker 1: sinister letters to any prospective buyers. Only there was one problem.
Speaker 1: Rumors about the letters had already begun to circulate. Within
Speaker 1: three months, the couple had dropped the asking price by
Speaker 1: a quarter of a million dollars, but it was to
Speaker 1: no avail. In the end, there was no need to
Speaker 1: disclose the letters because nobody made an offer and the
Speaker 1: house was taken off the market. Having continued to make
Speaker 1: mortgage payments, not to mention spending thousands of pounds and
Speaker 1: property taxes for a house they didn't want. The couple
Speaker 1: reached their last resort in June twenty fifteen. They filed
Speaker 1: a legal complaint against the former owners for failure to
Speaker 1: disclose their awareness of the watcher. Since all such legal
Speaker 1: disputes become a matter of public record once they are filed,
Speaker 1: it wasn't long before the extraordinary story of the Westfield
Speaker 1: Watcher was picked up by the press and soon after
Speaker 1: became international news as the Broadesses and Woods prepared to
Speaker 1: battle it out in court. The sudden spotlight on the
Speaker 1: picturesque town and the sinister goings on concerning six five
Speaker 1: seven Boulevard left many residents feeling exposed, and the local
Speaker 1: police scrambling to explain they hadn't caught the suspect yet another, detective,
Speaker 1: Baron Chambliss, was promptly assigned to look into it again.
Speaker 1: When a DNA sample taken from the envelopes was found
Speaker 1: to be from a female, he turned his attention to
Speaker 1: Abbey Langford, the Broadest's neighbor and sister of Michael Langford.
Speaker 1: One afternoon, after instruction from Detective Chambliss, a security guard
Speaker 1: at the local department store where Langford worked waited for
Speaker 1: the perfect moment before secretly confiscating a plastic water bottle
Speaker 1: she had been using. The bottle was in turn tested
Speaker 1: for DNA, but the result wasn't a match. The investigation
Speaker 1: was back to square one, and soon another theory was
Speaker 1: beginning to emerge. For those who aren't familiar with the
Speaker 1: Netflix documentary Making a Murderer, directed by Laura Richardi and
Speaker 1: Moira Demos, it details the trial of two men who
Speaker 1: many believe may have been wrongfully convicted of murder. Watching
Speaker 1: as the story progressed and the prosecution's case became increasingly problematic,
Speaker 1: what struck me as particularly interesting, almost more than the
Speaker 1: possible injustice of it all, was the ferocity with which
Speaker 1: many members of the local community refused to accept that
Speaker 1: there was any doubt to the guilty verdict. It is
Speaker 1: a strangely common reaction, this compulsion for a community to
Speaker 1: come together and, in the absence of any clear truth,
Speaker 1: commit to some kind of closure, whatever the cost be
Speaker 1: it by finding a hapless scapegoat who best fits the
Speaker 1: profile or by denying that a crime was even committed
Speaker 1: in the first place. It is almost as though the
Speaker 1: continuation of the illusion that nothing bad could ever happen,
Speaker 1: or at the very least finding a way to neutralize
Speaker 1: that bad thing, is more important than getting to the
Speaker 1: real truth of the crime, or, in the case of
Speaker 1: making a murderer. For many in the local community, having
Speaker 1: somebody locked up for the crime and being able to
Speaker 1: move on from it appeared to take precedence over whether
Speaker 1: the accused were innocent or not. In the case of
Speaker 1: the Westfield watcher, no doubt scarred by the not two
Speaker 1: distant crimes of John List, the community prompted for the latter,
Speaker 1: driven by concern for house prices and local reputation, many
Speaker 1: began to wander aloud, a view shared on social media
Speaker 1: and in homes throughout the town if the Broadestes hadn't
Speaker 1: merely got out of depth with their purchase and made
Speaker 1: the whole thing up to cover themselves. After attempting to
Speaker 1: sell the house in two thousand and sixteen, the Broadestes
Speaker 1: once again came up short. As a last resort, they
Speaker 1: put in a bid with a local planning authority to
Speaker 1: sell the property to a developer who would replace it
Speaker 1: with two separate homes. The proposal was later defeated at
Speaker 1: a town hall meeting when over a hundred local residents,
Speaker 1: including Abbey Langford, turned up to vote against it. By then,
Speaker 1: Derrick and Maria had spent over a hundred thousand dollars
Speaker 1: in taxes for the house with no compensation. Some relief arrived, however,
Speaker 1: when soon after they finally succeeded in renting the place out.
Speaker 1: Efforts continued meanwhile to put the house back on the market.
Speaker 1: Despite all the ensuing drama, it had been almost two
Speaker 1: years since the Broadestes had received their last letter from
Speaker 1: the Watch. Perhaps their luck was beginning to turn after all.
Speaker 1: Two weeks after the renters moved in, Derek arrived at
Speaker 1: the property to carry out some routine maintenance work when
Speaker 1: they handed him a familiar looking letter. It was dated
Speaker 1: February thirteenth, twenty seventeen. You wonder who the watcher is?
Speaker 1: Turn around, idiots. Maybe you even spoke to me, one
Speaker 1: of the so called neighbors who has no idea who
Speaker 1: the watcher could be. Or maybe you do know and
Speaker 1: are too scared to tell anyone. Good move. I walked
Speaker 1: by the news trucks when they took over my neighborhood
Speaker 1: and mocked me. I watched as you watched from the
Speaker 1: dark house in an attempt to find me. Telescopes and
Speaker 1: binoculars are wonderful inventions. Six five seven Boulevards survived your
Speaker 1: attempted assault and stood strong with its army of supporters
Speaker 1: barricading its gates. My soldiers of the boulevard followed my
Speaker 1: orders to a t all hail the Watcher. As the
Speaker 1: letter continued, it was clear that revenge was on their mind.
Speaker 1: Maybe a car accident, maybe a fire, Maybe something as
Speaker 1: simple as a mild illness that never seems to go
Speaker 1: away but makes you feel sick day after day after
Speaker 1: day after day. Maybe the mysterious death of a pet.
Speaker 1: Loved one suddenly die. Planes and cars and bicycles crash,
Speaker 1: bones break, you are despised by the house and the Watcher. One.
Speaker 1: Thank you to Hannah Jones for suggesting this week's story.
Speaker 1: If you enjoy listening to Unexplained and would like to
Speaker 1: help support us, you can now go to Unexplained podcast
Speaker 1: dot com. Forward slash support. All donations, no matter how
Speaker 1: large or small, are massively appreciated. All elements of Unexplained
Speaker 1: are produced by me, Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and
Speaker 1: rate the show on iTunes. But feel free to get
Speaker 1: in touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding the stories
Speaker 1: you've heard on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation
Speaker 1: of your own you'd like to share. You can reach
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