A Wisconsin man accused of beating his wife is saying that a ghost did it.
Police in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin arrested Michael West, 41, after responding to a domestic disturbance on the night of Jan. 15, according to a criminal complaint posted by thesmokinggun.com.
West's wife Rebecca was "crying very hard and was bleeding out of her nose" when cops arrived at the scene, according to the complaint.
She told police her husband punched her in the face several times and strangled her until her vision went black after an argument about financial issues.
When police asked Michael West what happened, he said his wife had fallen several times, injuring her face.
When police asked about the marks on her neck, West changed his story.
"A ghost did it," he said, according to the complaint.
Cops said West cursed and tried to resist as they arrested him. [1]
This "ghost" story reminded me of this story told by Richard Baxter. Baxter describes a demon that impersonated the atheist Sadducee husband of a believing wife. The spiritual wife noticed immediately that this was not her real husband. What proceeded was a haunting by the demon.
But the night following, the gentlewoman, with several other godly women, being in the house, the noise of whirlwind began again, with more violence than formerly, and the apparition walked in the chamber, having an insufferable stench like that of a putrified carcass, filling the room with a thick smoak, smelling like sulphur, darkening the light of the fire and candle, but not quite extinguishing it; sometimes going down the stairs, and coming up again with a fearful noise, disturbing them at their prayers, one while with the sound of words which they could not discern, other while striking them so that the next morning their faces were black with the smoak, and their bodies swollen with bruises.
Thereupon they left the house, lest they should tempt the Lord by their over-bold staying in such danger, and sent this Atheist the sad news of this apparition; who coming to England about May last, expressed more love and and respect to his wife than formerly; yet telling her, that he could not believe her relation of what she had seen, as having not a power to believe any thing but what himself saw; and yet would not hitherto go to his house to make trial, but probably will e’er long, for that he is naturally of an exceeding rash and desperate spirit. ~Richard Baxter The certainty of the world of spirits fully evinced -1691 [2]
But the night following, the gentlewoman, with several other godly women, being in the house, the noise of whirlwind began again, with more violence than formerly, and the apparition walked in the chamber, having an insufferable stench like that of a putrified carcass, filling the room with a thick smoak, smelling like sulphur, darkening the light of the fire and candle, but not quite extinguishing it; sometimes going down the stairs, and coming up again with a fearful noise, disturbing them at their prayers, one while with the sound of words which they could not discern, other while striking them so that the next morning their faces were black with the smoak, and their bodies swollen with bruises.
Thereupon they left the house, lest they should tempt the Lord by their over-bold staying in such danger, and sent this Atheist the sad news of this apparition; who coming to England about May last, expressed more love and and respect to his wife than formerly; yet telling her, that he could not believe her relation of what she had seen, as having not a power to believe any thing but what himself saw; and yet would not hitherto go to his house to make trial, but probably will e’er long, for that he is naturally of an exceeding rash and desperate spirit. ~Richard Baxter The certainty of the world of spirits fully evinced -1691 [2]
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