Reddit user BubblegumCrocodile asked:
"What’s the creepiest unsolved mystery?"
Teteteke Gqontsi
"There was a man named Teteteke Gqontsi who was at the Stellenbosch Hospital in the town of Stellenbosch, South Africa for abdominal surgery, so he could barely move."
"One day a nurse came in to change the linens and when she came back inside from being right outside his room he had disappeared."
"He wasn't anywhere in the room. The hospital searched for a week until some men had to perform maintenance on the ceiling, when they opened the ceiling up, there found Teteteke inside the ceiling in the fetal position and he was deceased."
"The autopsy showed that his death wasn't of natural causes and someone put him in the ceiling."
"A few months later, a man named Sandile Sibaya was admitted to a different hospital to have his broken femur treated."
"After a few days there he was about to be transferred to a different hospital to see an orthopedist, but when they went to get him, he was gone."
"They looked for him and only found him when a bad smell permeated the hospital, so the staff opened up the ceiling and found Sandile dead in the exact same position as Teteteke, and they said Sandile also didn't die a natural death and was placed in the ceiling by something."
"I think that's creepy."
~ ResponsibleTaro1759
Baby Crystal
"On Thursday, December 12, 1985, a toddler was spotted wandering unaccompanied around a Kmart department store in Spanaway, Washington with no parent or guardian in sight."
"When authorities tried to coax information out of her to help locate her parents, the only piece of information she was able to give was, 'Mommy is in the trees'."
"A photo was placed in the local newspaper, and the toddler was soon recognised as Crystal by her maternal grandmother Louise Conrad, who took her into her care, later saying that Crystal appeared shaken and disturbed, perhaps by something she had seen."
"So where was mommy?"
"About two months later, the body of Diana Robertson, Crystal's mommy, was discovered deep in the forest around Elbe, Washington with 17 stab wounds and a tube sock tied around her neck."
"Nearby an abandoned 1982 Plymouth pickup truck was discovered covered in blood stains, and with a handwritten note on the dashboard simply saying 'I love you, Diana'."
"This truck belonged to her partner, Mike Riemer, a outdoorsman and trapper, who often spent time in these woods. Mike, however, was nowhere to be found."
"Initially, the police believed him to be responsible for Diana's murder; just two months prior, on October 19, 1985, Mike had been arrested and cited for domestic assault and malicious damage after allegedly kicking in a door at her apartment, throwing her to the floor, and rubbing her face in the carpet."
"They also connected her murder to a double murder that had occurred in the same woods four months earlier."
"A man named Stephen Harkins was found shot to death in his sleeping bag, while his companion, Ruth Cooper, was found strangled two months later."
"Both had a tube sock tied around their neck."
"So was Mike a serial killer? He had apparently been in the woods at the very time that Harkins and Cooper were murdered, and certainly knew how to navigate the tricky terrain."
"But with no trace of him, there was no way to tell for certain."
"Over 20 years later, on March 26, 2011, a hiker discovered a partial human skull in the woods off of State Route 7 in Lewis County near Mineral, Washington, about a mile from where Diana's body had been found. Subsequent analysis revealed that it was indeed Mike, and that he was a likely homicide victim himself."
"So four murders in the same woods by an unknown assailant."
"The question remains: how did Crystal find herself wandering around the Kmart over 30 miles away? She must have been driven there and dropped off, presumably by the serial killer. Crystal must have spent a silent 45-minute drive in the car with the very person who killed her mother, with no memory of the event."
~ UppruniTegundanna
Turn the Page
"Went to a good-sized college party with several friends. The location for the party was out in the woods in the middle of nowhere."
"The road leading to the party was fairly straight with one major feature. The road was flat for the entire length, but it had a hill that was 30ish feet tall halfway down it. A pretty good bump in the road, you might say."
"I was driving, and when I slowly topped the hill, I met a car heading in the opposite direction. That car slowed down to a stop. It was several of my friends temporarily leaving the party to make a beer run to the store."
"They knew who I was by my vehicle and flagged me down to ask if I needed anything from town, and we proceeded to chat for a minute about how the party was unfolding they left."
"When we both backed up to talk, we just happened to stop on top of the hill. Mind you, this was not a busy road and located, as we say, out in the sticks."
"As we were parked talking for a brief minute, we all noticed there was a song coming from the surrounding woods. We figured it was someone having a private party in a parked car nearby in the woods if you get my drift."
"The odd thing was it was 'Turn the Page' by Bob Seagar, but it was on repeat."
"We all went on to meet back up and attend the party and thought nothing more of our chat on the hill."
"A few days later, I got a visit from several police officers about an investigation. They learned there was a party that night down the road with the hill in question."
"They were tracking down all attendees. That is how they found me. A hunter the day after the party found something at the base of the hill off the road."
"Someone driving another car that night heading in the same direction down the road I was on had wrecked their vehicle. The driver took the hill at insane speed and killed themselves in a wreck that had ran way way off the road."
"Unsolved mystery that is still ongoing. The police said that they believed the driver they found was not the driver. There were 2 people in the car who wrecked."
"They found 1 set of bloody foot prints that led to the top of the hill. It looked like someone moved the body behind the steering wheel and fled on foot. They found extra sets of bloody hand prints in the car."
"The wild thing was that they found a cd with Bob Segar 'Turn the Page' in the cd player."
"Everyone that was on top of the hill that night volunteered to give fingerprints."
"Every so often, every few years, one of us gets a phone call to ask us to recount what we saw that night on top of that hill."
~ ApprehensiveVirus125
Kyron Horman
"Kyron Horman."
"Stepmom took him to school, walked around the 'Science Fair' in the gym then he went to class... has not been seen since."
"He was IN the school. C'mon now. It's been over a decade now. I have a 'Google Alert' on his name for updates."
~ sluggernate
Alonzo Brooks
"Alonzo Brooks."
"Not necessarily creepy in the traditional sense, though it has a long history and is literally close to home."
"The reboot of ‘Unsolved Mysteries’ featured an episode about his disappearance. Because of it—after his death initially being ruled undetermined—he was exhumed and changed cause of death to murder."
"Which was always pretty obvious."
"He went to a party in a small Kansas town, LaCygne, with a few friends. Alonzo had some words with partygoers. His friends bailed. Alonzo doesn’t come home."
"The next day, his shoes are found down the road, separately. Police search the area, including along a creek near the party house—nothing."
"A few weeks later, the police let the family do a search—after not letting them be involved earlier. His body is almost immediately found along that same creek."
"Of note, though, is that his body didn’t show any signs of deterioration or decomposition that would be expected of having been there for weeks."
"It’s presumed he was in a fight at the party, dragged down the road, and possibly inadvertently killed in a shed near the party house (that was torn down shortly after)."
"The (other) f**ked up part is that it’s suggested his body was kept in a meat locker and covered up by the cops, and when the family tried to get more involved in the search, his body was dumped along the creek, thereby explaining the lack of decomposition."
"The party had some 100 people there. Someone knows something and no one is saying anything."
~ TommyRockbottom
Frauke Liebs
"Frauke Liebs."
"Was last seen leaving a bar to go home, then at some point during her walk home, went missing."
"She was able to make several texts and calls to loved ones over the next few days, but was very vague and refused to give information on her whereabouts."
"The details of her last phone call, to her sister, are pretty chilling. During this conversation, she is said to have answered the question of whether she was being held captive with a faint 'yes', immediately followed by a loud 'no'. Contact broke off after this phone call."
"Her body was found several months later in a wooded area, most likely dumped from somewhere else. No further details were found about the killer, motive for her death or disappearance."
~ Anxiouslytotingababy
Austin Froyo Murders
"Maybe not the all-time creepiest but certainly in the top 20 and also one of the saddest is the one of who murdered those four girls in that frozen yogurt shop in Austin, Texas back in November of 1991."
"Several teen guys were arrested, tried and convicted then later had the convictions overturned."
"Also, the DNA on one of the victims didn't match up with any of these guys."
"In addition, a married couple who left the shop shortly before closing time noted a pair of older and rather sinister looking guys sitting in a booth next to the counter as they left."
~ NoodlesrTuff1256
Andrew Gosden
"What happened to 14-year-old Andrew Gosden."
"He got a train to King’s Cross, London by himself and hasn’t been seen since."
~ bluebellfob
"Disappearance of Andrew Gosden is another super weird UK one."
A 14-year-old leaves his home in Doncaster in 2007, withdraws £200 out of his bank account, buys a one-way ticket to London even though a return ticket was only £1 more, is seen on CCTV leaving King's Cross station and then is never seen again."
"There have been a few weird potential leads in the case in the 17 years since but not a single solid or confirmed lead or sighting."
~ -JensonButton-
Ursula and Sabina Eriksson
"The Eriksson twin sisters that ran across a motorway in England, were hit several times by lorries and cars, and just kept moving somehow."
"Even the backstory and aftermath get weirder the more you find out, the stranger it gets."
~ section20sniper84
"What fascinates me about this one is the leadup to it."
"Like, one day one of them is a family woman living in Ireland and the other one is going for a nice visit to her sister, and the next day they're acting weird on a bus in England and from there it all goes batsh*t nuts."
"What happened between A and B?!"
~ zaffiro_in_giro
Skye Budnick
"The Skye Budnick case. Shy, socially awkward 21-year-old college student buys a one-way ticket to Japan without telling anybody."
"She takes no phone. Just 800 dollars, a laptop and a Nintendo DS. She leaves an unfinished, unsent, unclear, note in her email drafts on a home computer."
"She was studying Japanese but failing out of school and couldn't get into her exchange program, she was not fluent. She flew to Tokyo and then to Sapporo."
"She's reported to have gotten off the plane in Sapporo and maybe checking into her hotel (?) but after that she vanished without a trace."
"This happened over a decade ago and still not one shred of evidence or leads as to what could have happened, who she could have met, what her motives were. She left her car at the airport in the United states."
"No keys were ever recovered. The laptop was never recovered, nor the DS or the cash. Her family are left wondering forever."
"Her sister has a really good podcast called 'Surviving Skye'."
~ Igotyourexcominnext
Larry Bader/John "Fritz" Johnson
"Larry Bader. Not necessarily creepy, but bizarre for sure."
"Larry Bader was married with three kids. In March 1957, he went fishing on Lake Erie by himself, even though he knew a storm was coming. The next day, they found his crashed boat, but Larry himself was nowhere to be seen."
"Almost 10 years later, in 1965, he was found by his niece doing an archery demonstration in Nebraska, when he was originally from Ohio."
When confronted, he swore he didn’t know anyone named Larry Bader, as he identified as John 'Fritz' Johnson. He claimed to have lived in Nebraska all his life, having memories as a child named Fritz."
"He also got married and had another kid."
"His niece, convinced Fritz was her uncle, requested that he go to the police and be identified. He was, in fact, Larry Bader, but he had no recollection whatsoever of his previous life."
"Bader/Johnson died in 1966, not long after being found by his niece."
~ whereisthefrog
Bryce Laspisa
"Missing person Bryce Laspisa. While away in college, he started exhibiting some troubling behavior and his parents were worried about him."
"He said he would drive home from college and that he had a lot he needed to talk about. On the way home he pulled over like 3 separate times and just sat there for hours."
"At some point about halfway home he ran out of gas and a roadside assistance employee delivered gas to him at 9 am. By noon when he still hadn't arrived home, his mom called the insurance company and was able to contact the roadside assistance employee and have him check on Bryce."
"He found Bryce in the exact same spot where he had delivered gas to him, hours earlier. He had Bryce call his mom, and Bryce said he would be home by 3pm."
"At 6pm, he is still not home and his parents report him missing. The police find Bryce just 8 miles away from where he was previously sitting. He seems fine....they leave...he still just sits there."
"Again the roadside assistance employee checks on Bryce and finds him in the same spot the cops left him hours earlier."
"Anyway, after a lot of that, when he does finally start heading home, he crashes the car off a cliff. It was found he accelerated while descending the hill, so they think he crashed on purpose."
"Police find the damaged vehicle, no Bryce, and he is never seen again."
~ sallyjosieholly
Alistair Wilson
"The murder of Alistair Wilson in Nairn, Scotland in 2004."
"A 30-year-old banker living in a quiet neighbourhood has the doorbell of his home rang. His wife answers the door and a man in a baseball cap asks for Alistair by name and so he went to speak to him."
"He returned after a few minutes to his wife with an empty blue envelope that had 'Paul' written on it. Confused about this, he went back to his front door, at which point his wife heard three gunshots and then found him executed."
"The murder investigation was one of the biggest in the history of Scotland and to this day remains unsolved."
"In 2022 the Scottish Police announced they believe a planning dispute with a local hotel may have been a motive and then earlier this year that they believe the shooting was carried out by two people, one of them a local suspect whom was arrested on drug charges."
"However, while they now finally have a potential motive and suspect nearly 20 years later, it still has not been solved."
~ -JensonButton-
Sukumara Kurup
"Sukumara Kurup. Time period: mid 80s. This guy visits his hometown, a sleepy village in Kerala, India with wife and son, from Dubai."
"He goes out drinking with some buddies and on the way back picks up a random stranger and kills him. Burns the car they drove in with the body in it.
"Making it look like an accident. People think it’s Kurup’s body in the car until police investigated and find that it’s not Kurup. His buddies are caught but he’s missing."
"Police suspect he tried to fake his death to get insurance money of about 10,000 USD which is a pretty big amount back then. The man they murdered was supposed to be the body to fool the insurance agents to make the claim."
"Been decades now and he’s still missing. He’s currently one of the most wanted criminals in India who still hasn’t been caught."
"Growing up we heard stories of him being spotted all over the country. Recently they made a movie on him as well."
~ astro_not_yet
There are a lot of interesting cases here.
What unsolved mystery would you add to the list?
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