The letters started in 1976; the citizens of Circleville, Ohio, were living in fear. Numerous residents had received ominous anonymous letters from somebody who claimed to be watching them and watching them they certainly were… The letters detailed private and personal information and were always written in block letters, most likely in an attempt to obscure the true identity of the author. Over 1,000 letters were sent. While many of the citizens were targeted, the vindictive writer seemed to zone in on one person in particular.
Mary Gillespie was a local school bus driver and she was the brunt of the abuse. She received disturbing letters in which the writer disclosed where she lived and frequently threatened her children. In addition to the threats, the letters detailed an apparent affair Mary was having behind her husband, Ron’s, back. Mary denied these claims but they soon wended through the tight-knight community who judged Mary for her apparent wrongdoings. A letter soon arrived for Ron, threatening that his life was in danger if he ignored the affair. After ignoring the letter, in August of 1977, Ron received a phone call. It was presumed the phone call was from the “Circleville Writer.” After slamming down the phone, he grabbed his gun and told his family he was going to confront the letter writing before storming out of the house. He was never seen alive again. Shortly after leaving, his wrecked car was discovered, slammed into a tree on a road that Ron had driven on thousands of times before. Bizarrely, his gun had been shot once. Initially, police claimed foul play was involved but that suddenly changed: it was accidental, they claimed. If this were true then how does it explain the gun being fired?
As if Mary hadn’t been tormented enough, the letters continued but now, the mysterious writer was even more aggressive. He was now placing menacing signs up along her bus route for the whole town to see. On the 7th of February, 1978, Mary decided enough was enough. Previously she had ignored these signs but today, she saw one that infuriated her. She saw a sign along her bus route that threatened her daughter. Nobody was in the bus so she pulled up alongside the sign and went to tear it down. To her horror, when she ripped it down, she realised it had been booby-trapped. Behind the sign was a gun that was set up to shoot when the sign was moved. Thankfully, there was a flaw in the mechanism and it didn’t fire. An investigation uncovered that the gun was registered to Mary’s brother-in-law, Paul Freshour. He staunchly denied he was involved and reported that his gun had been stolen during a recent break in.
Despite the fact that Paul’s fingerprints were not found on the gun or any of the letters or booby trap, he was found guilty of attempted murder. A handwriting expert concluded that the handwriting in the letters matched Paul’s handwriting. However, they came to this conclusion after asking him to replicate the letters in the same style of writing - block capitals. This is unheard of when it comes to handwriting analysis. If you’re attempting to replicate a particular writing style, then you’re going to be obscuring your own. Furthermore, a search of his home uncovered nothing that indicated he was guilty in regards to the letters or the booby trap. Nevertheless, he was sentenced to 7 to 25 years for attempted murder. Investigators and citizens alike assumed that now Paul was behind bars, the letters would cease. How wrong they were.
“Shame how things work out. But better you than me. The sheriff says: you did it. But we know better don’t we,” said a letter received by Paul while in prison. In fact, Paul had been in solitary confinement and was unable to send mail. Nevertheless, the sinister letters continued to arrive; both to Paul and to the concerned citizens on Circleville. Prison guards quickly changed their opinion on Paul’s guilt. They knew he wasn’t sending the letters because it was impossible for him to do so yet the letters with the same handwriting style continued. Paul was finally released after 10 years and staunchly denied any involvement until his death in 2012.
Who was the “Circleville Writer”? Was Paul involved? Was Ron murdered? What was their vendetta against Mary in particular? To this day, the answers to these questions still remain a mystery.
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