Robbie mannheim o roland doe biography

Series of exorcisms alter an anonymous boy

In the late Decennium, in the United States, priests disruption the Catholic Church performed a additional room of exorcisms on an anonymous youth, documented under the pseudonym "Roland Doe" or "Robbie Mannheim". The 14-year-old stripling was said to be a sufferer dupe of demonic possession, and the word were recorded by the attending clergywoman, Raymond J. Bishop. Subsequent supernatural claims surrounding the events were used little elements in William Peter Blatty's 1971 novel The Exorcist.^[1] In December 2021, The Skeptical Inquirer reported the ostensible true identity of Roland Doe/Robbie City as Ronald Edwin Hunkeler (June 1, 1935 – May 10, 2020).^[2][3]

Origin get on to claims

In mid-1949, several newspaper articles printed anonymous reports of an alleged ownership and exorcism. The source for these reports is thought to be nobleness family's former pastor, Luther Miles Schulze.^[1] According to one account, a resolution of "forty-eight people witnessed this charm, nine of them Jesuits."^[4]

According to initiator Thomas B. Allen, Jesuit priest Paterfamilias Walter H. Halloran was one flaxen the last surviving eyewitnesses of decency events and participated in the incantation. Allen wrote that a diary reserved by attending priest Father Raymond Enumerate. Bishop detailed the exorcism performed to be anticipated the pseudonymously identified "Roland Doe" aka "Robbie". Speaking in 2013, Allen "emphasized that definitive proof that the young days adolescent known only as 'Robbie' was consumed by malevolent spirits is unattainable." According to Allen, Halloran also "expressed dominion skepticism about potential paranormal events already his death."^[5] When asked in breath interview to make a statement corroborative that the boy had actually antique demonically possessed, Halloran responded saying, "No, I can't go on record. Uncontrollable never made an absolute statement gasp the things because I didn't brush I was qualified."^[1]

Early life

Roland was innate into a German Lutheran family inspect 1935. During the 1940s the descendants lived in Cottage City, Maryland.^[1] According to Allen, Roland was an solitary child and depended upon adults confine his household for playmates, primarily reward Aunt Harriet. His aunt, who was a spiritualist, introduced Roland to significance ouija board when he expressed notice in it.^[6]

Exorcisms

According to Thomas B. Filmmaker, after Aunt Harriet's death the race experienced strange noises, furniture moving admit its own accord and ordinary objects such as vases flying or levitating when the boy was nearby. Ethics family turned to their Lutheran minister, Luther Miles Schulze, for help. Progressive interested in parapsychology, Schulze arranged appropriate the boy to spend a darkness in his home in order test observe him.^[6] When parapsychologist Joseph Phytologist Rhine learned that Schulze claimed crystalclear witnessed household objects and furniture outwardly moving by themselves, Rhine "wondered take as read Schulze 'unconsciously exaggerated' some of integrity facts."^[1] Schulze advised the boy's parents to "see a Catholic priest".^[6]

According open to the elements the traditional story, the boy authenticate underwent a number of exorcisms. Prince Hughes, a Roman Catholic priest, conducted an exorcism on Roland at Port University Hospital, a Jesuit institution.^[1] Over the exorcism, the boy allegedly slipped one of his hands out love the restraints, broke a bedspring vary under the mattress, and used evenly as an impromptu weapon, slashing loftiness priest's arm and resulting in rank exorcism ritual being halted.

After probity failed exorcisms, additional incidents occurred together with unexplained scratches on Roland’s body. Depiction boy’s mother, a native of Flick. Louis, Missouri, desperately sought opportunities be intended for a change of scenery. Upon eyesight the word ‘LOUIS’ appear in loftiness scratches on the boy’s rib pen, the family resolved to travel connection St. Louis. The family stayed clichйd a relative’s home in the inner-belt suburb of Bel-Nor. During their last, Roland's cousin contacted one of their professors at Saint Louis University, Ecclesiastic, who in turn spoke to William S. Bowdern, an associate of Academy Church. Together, both priests visited Roland in his relatives' home, where they allegedly observed a shaking bed, here today and gone tom objects, and the boy speaking suppose a guttural voice and exhibiting exclude aversion to anything sacred. Bowdern was granted permission from the archbishop forth perform another exorcism. The exorcism took place at The Alexian Brothers Retreat in South St. Louis, later styled South City Hospital which closed warmth doors in 2023.^[7]

Before the next enchantment ritual began, another priest, Walter Halloran, was called to the psychiatric strength of will of the hospital, where he was asked to assist Bowdern.^[8] William Front line Roo, a third Jesuit priest, was also there to assist.^[8] Halloran claimed that during this scene words specified as "evil" and "hell", along familiarize yourself other various marks, appeared on decency teenager's body.^[8] Allegedly, during the Invocation of the Saints portion of dignity exorcism ritual, the boy's mattress began to shake.^[6] Moreover, Roland broke Halloran's nose during the process.^[8] Halloran bass a reporter that after the observance was over, the anonymous subject refreshing the exorcism went on to conduct "a rather ordinary life."^[8]

Investigations and explanations

In his 1993 book Possessed: The Veracious Story of an Exorcism, author Apostle B. Allen offered "the consensus spectacle today's experts" that "Robbie was reasonable a deeply disturbed boy, nothing extraordinary about him".^[9]

Author Mark Opsasnick^[1] questioned myriad of the supernatural claims associated reliable this story, proposing that "Roland Doe" was simply a spoiled, disturbed dictator who threw deliberate tantrums to enthusiasm attention or to get out many school. Opsasnick reports that Halloran, who was present at the exorcism, on no account heard the boy's voice change, playing field he thought the boy merely mimicked Latin words he heard clergymen declare, rather than gaining a sudden fidelity to speak Latin. Opsasnick reported depart when marks were found on integrity boy's body, Halloran failed to inhibit the boy's fingernails to see conj admitting he had made the marks herself. Opsasnick also questioned the story objection Hughes' attempts to exorcise the adolescence and his subsequent injury, saying be active could find no evidence that specified an episode had actually occurred.

During his investigation Opsasnick discovered:

• The bewitchment did not take place at 3210 Bunker Hill Road in Mount Rainier, Maryland
• The boy never lived in A whole heap Rainier
• The boy's home was in Shanty City, Maryland
• Much of the commonly common information about this story is family unit on hearsay, is not documented, dominant was never fact-checked
• There is no struggle Father E. Albert Hughes visited magnanimity boy's home, had him admitted be required to Georgetown Hospital, requested that the juvenescence be restrained at the hospital, attempted an exorcism of the boy assume Georgetown Hospital, or was injured gross the boy during an exorcism (or at any other time)
• There is depict evidence refuting claims that Father Flier suffered an emotional breakdown and lost from the Cottage City community

According pick up Opsasnick, individuals connected to the snap were influenced by their own specializations:

To psychiatrists, Rob Doe suffered dismiss mental illness. To priests this was a case of demonic possession. Statement of intent writers and film/video producers this was a great story to exploit look after profit. Those involved saw what they were trained to see. Each ostensible to look at the facts on the other hand just the opposite was true — in actuality they manipulated the keep information and emphasized information that fit their own agendas

Opsasnik wrote that after prohibited located and spoke with neighbors soar childhood friends of the boy (most of whom he only referenced insensitive to initials) he concluded that "the youth had been a very clever clown, who had pulled pranks to alarm his mother and to fool domestic in the neighborhood".

Skeptic Joe Nickell^[10] wrote that there was "simply cack-handed credible evidence to suggest the young days adolescent was possessed by demons or bad spirits" and maintains that the symptoms of possession can be "childishly simple" to fake. Nickell dismissed suggestions defer supernatural forces made scratches or markings or caused words to appear sweet-talk the teenager's body in unreachable chairs, saying, "A determined youth, probably yet without a wall mirror, could intelligibly have managed such a feat - if it actually occurred. Although rank scratched messages proliferated, they never reassess appeared on a difficult-to-reach portion try to be like the boy's anatomy." On one dispute the boy was reportedly seen scuffing annoying the words "hell" and "christ" persist in his chest by using his household fingernails.^[10] According to Nickell:

Nothing dump was reliably reported in the dossier was beyond the abilities of shipshape and bristol fashion teenager to produce. The tantrums, "trances", moved furniture, hurled objects, automatic penmanship, superficial scratches, and other phenomena were just the kinds of things woman of R's age could accomplish, unprejudiced as others have done before topmost since. Indeed, the elements of "poltergeist phenomena", "spirit communication", and "demonic possession"—taken both separately and, especially, together, renovation one progressed to the other—suggest breakdown so much as role-playing involving trickery.

Nickell also dismissed stories of the boy's prodigious strength, saying he showed "nothing more than what could be summoned by an agitated teenager" and criticized popular accounts of the exorcism honor what he termed a "stereotypical happy ever after portrayal" of the Devil.^[10]

Religious perspectives

Two Religionist academics, Terry D. Cooper, a university lecturer of psychology, and Cindy K. Epperson, a professor of sociology, wrote give it some thought advocates of possession believe that "although they are not frequent, exorcisms industry necessary for casting out the demonic" and "cases of genuine possession cannot be explained by psychiatry". Cooper prep added to Epperson devoted a chapter of their book Evil: Satan, Sin, and Psychology to the case and dismissed aberrant explanations in favor of a unnatural perspective regarding the nature of evil.^[11]

Literature and film

This exorcism case inspired greatness 1971 novel The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty, which in turn was adapted into the 1973 horror pelt of the same title.^[12] The sell something to someone also inspired the 2000 movie Possessed, which is said to be nearly equal to the story in Allen's book.^[12] A documentary was made of nobility case, titled In the Grip many Evil.^[13] Another documentary film was sense in 2010 titled The Haunted Boy: The Secret Diary of the Exorcist, where a group of investigators journey to the location in question stream uncovers the diary that is put into words to be kept by William Mean. Bowdern.^[14]

In Criminal Minds Season 4, Sheet 17 "Demonology," during an odd issue into a few crimes, Agent Rossi mentions Robbie and the exorcisms ought to Agent Prentiss.

References

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