In 1976, several Circleville, Ohio residents began receiving strange letters detailing personal information about their lives. The writer of these letters would come to be known as the Circleville Writer. He used blocked letters, and knew extremely personal information about those he targeted.
One of the people he targeted was Mary Gillespie. Mary was a bus driver who had been accused of a supposedly non-existent affair with the superintendent of schools (though later both Mary and the Superintendent confirmed the affair). The writer told Mary that he/she had been observing her house and knew she had children. It was postmarked Columbus, Ohio, but had no return address.
1st letter (pictured top left) : “Don’t lie when questioned about knowing him. I know where you live. I’ve been observing your house and know you have children. This is no joke. Please take it serious. Everyone concerned has been notified and everything will be over soon.”
Mary received multiple letters but kept them to herself until her husband, Ron, received one as well. The letter stated that if Ron did not stop his wife’s affair, his life would be in danger. The writer threatened to go public with the affair. He threatened to take out billboards and radio ads. Ron and Mary had only told 3 other people about the letters so they decided to write back claiming to know who the person was. Ron did so and the letters stopped coming for a while.
On August 19, 1977 Ron got a phone call from the alleged writer. He grabbed his shotgun and left in his pickup. His behavior hinted at the idea that Ron had found out the identity of the Circleville writer. A few minutes later, Ron was found dead in his pickup truck, crashed into a tree. Investigators later learned that Ron had fired at least one shot from his gun before crashing. Sheriff Dwight Radcliffe ruled Ron’s death an accident and chalked it up to drunk driving.
Later on in February of 1983, Mary began receiving harassment via posters and signs on the side of the road on her everyday bus route. Becoming fed up, she went to rip down one of the signs before noticing that the sign itself was hooked to a device; a trap which had a box with a gun inside, pointed at her. Had she pulled the sign down in a specific way, the gun would have gone off.
Even though the serial number was somewhat rubbed off, the police traced the gun back to a man named Paul Freshour. Paul claimed the gun was stolen and he was at work on the day of the incident. His boss backed up his alibi. Ultimately Paul was arrested on murder charges. He was also subjected to handwriting tests, in which he was asked to write in the same block lettering. Handwriting experts testified that Paul was responsible for the letters and Paul was sentenced to 7-24 years in prison.
While in prison, Paul received his own letter from the writers.
2nd letter (pictured top right): Freshour, now when are you going to believe you aren’t getting out of there? I told you two years ago; when you set ‘em up, they stay set up. Don’t you listen at all? No one wants you out. No one. The joke is on you. Ha Ha! Tell no one of this letter. I saw the paper. Great news, great! The Sheriff loved it. Ha Ha! Do you believe it now? Do you?”
Paul was given parole in 1994 when authorities confirmed that he could not have written the letter to himself or the other letters residents continued to receive from the Circleville writer. Paul maintained his innocence until he died in 2012. The true identity of the writer remains unknown to this day.
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