It’s not being kept off anything; it’s just a 40-year-old murder that wouldn’t interest people who don’t believe in Satanic conspiracies.
Well at least now we know now that OP has at least some basis in reality. No doubt the local Vineland community was ablaze in rumors in 1971 after the newspapers reported this. You’d think that 40 years later, it might be time to give up on the conspiracy theories, though.
Actually I’m not sure you could even call it a murder. Let’s say homicide.
There were other newspaper articles months after his death which displayed photographs of the Menantico sandwash and how officers discovered dead animals and were investigating further. Over 90 kids were de-programmed by pastor Snook and witnesses were brought in for questioning. People who witnessed the murder and not the 2 boys who committed the act. It was hard not to notice when it all happened during my years in junior high.
If they found dead animals months later, there’s no proof their deaths had anything to do with Newell. And even if they did, that doesn’t prove anyone else was involved aside from Newell and the two idiots or that there was a cult. You’re extrapolating a ton of stuff from very few facts.
That’s classic Satanic Panic stuff, though. People say (usually after publicity and goading) that they saw and experienced things that nobody can prove happened or which definitely did not happen. Pastor Snook, however, is a name worthy of Charles Dickens, and if I ever have cause to steal it for use in a work of fiction, I will absolutely do that.
Actually, I googled Pastor Snook and he was a real preacher in Vineland (and died about 20 years ago). Of course the deprogramming claim is bullshit. No doubt that 90 youths with long sideburns and Rolling Stones LPs at home were “saved” at a revival.
It’s not surprising the OP was an impressionable teenager when all this went down.
Harry Snook’s obituary: Inquirer.com: Philadelphia local news, sports, jobs, cars, homes
Surprisingly, no mention of his extensive Satanic deprogramming work. 
Actually, their insatiable desire to sensationalize everything is what makes your story so implausible.
Imagine two news stories that a liar who wants to sensationalize everything could cover:
- The Vineland School Board is considering a merger with the county school board.
- A satanic conspiracy is murdering people in Vineland.
Which of these stories is gonna get more coverage?
Blood leads. If there’s the slightest whiff of scandal, it leads. Anything even a teensy bit Satanic leads. The “liars who sensationalize the topic” would keel over with joy if they got the chance to write an article about a series of murders committed by Satanists.
The lack of articles is quite telling.
So we think you’re a liar? Honestly, that seems like a pretty good likelihood, but it’s not the only possibility.
This is classic strange loop territory.
Snook was able to get 90 kids to change their stories. Which is likelier:
- He was able to browbeat impressionable teens into confessing to things they didn’t do, as has happened innumerable times in history, or
- The Satanic conspiracy, able to pull off a series of murders with a conspiracy reaching into the hundreds (assuming that it didn’t consist entirely of these 90 kids, that is), was nonetheless helpless against this one preacherman?
Why on earth would you believe Snook instead of believing the total lack of decent evidence or coherent logic?
You’ve been snookered.
It’s mostly fringe touching the surface of the case anyway. My interviews with the police officers were never published and so the hinting of evidence leading to what they defined as a sect was never strong enough to hold up in a debate. Some of the newspapers contained articles mentioning the investigation, but not too informative regarding the procedures of it.
The procedures had to do with detectives tracking down members of a sect. Somewhere Pangburn had information or an idea that they all wrapped chains around the victim and dumped him overboard. This is information I obtained from the mayor of Vineland back in 1987. I only knew Michael from seeing him walk his sister to the bus stop. I do know that my friends were programmed and I was depressed over the end results for years. I can’t bring the case forward with real conviction and convince people because I researched it on foot, taking notes, making tapes, and never published the material. I was an outlander whose friends became involved and years later I researched, interviewed victims, a few dangerous individuals who threatened me, police officers, lawyers, the mayor etc. I wanted to address the case because it was part of my youth and felt pain over the loss of my friends. I don’t understand why that is so difficult for a person to believe? ..but I suppose there are individuals on the net who play attention games. I accept that no one believes me. They have the right and logically what I state as real life experiences through honesty causes me to sound like an extremist.
But I don’t know who I believe 100 percent. Why did Pangburn spend 2 years investigating a ritual killing that the public blamed on LSD consumption? Did he want to be a “Rock Star?” or was he sincere and on a mission to solve a mystery? What was contained in the literature that was confiscated out of the victim’s room which led police to believe a Satan worshipper’s sect were directly tied into the victim’s death?
I have my doubts about this case regardless of which side I observe. 3 boys on a mission of their own..which is what the newspapers had people believing or 3 boys programmed by so called higher ups..which is what the police told me and I can’t prove it to you. I’ve been quoting statements from newspaper articles all along, but suspect the existence of a large cult based on personal experiences of my own..which again, I have no proof. Sorry everyone finds the story a waste of time. The case is not closed. I recall the cousin of a witness stating that it was murder and not by any means suicide. Apparently he had reason to believe that his cousin was involved. It’s quite ridiculous to sort from that many scattered references only to somehow conclude.. who is being honest and who is not.
Local autonomy or economies of scale?! The controversy rages! Tempers flare! The streets will run with blood! Details at 11!
It’s true that it wasn’t until September of '71 when an article/photograph was released to establish new evidence of an existing cult or as they put it..sect. The victim’s body was found in the month of June, but a investigation began shortly after. I interviewed the police officers who investigated the murder and they expressed their frustrations over the failure to convict this so called large cult..WHICH…they defined as a secret society. I asked what was contained in the literature they found in the victim’s room and they refused to tell me. As I said before..they claimed what was contained in that literature led them to another group of people who were in question. Why were they doing this? They insisted proving otherwise and it baffles me as to what kind of edge did they think they had with this case to convict a so called sect and why a 2 year investigation? without
And who are you that people, both civilian and civil servant, talk to you and spill secrets that they won’t tell others? Why do they talk to you?
Yeah, and I can remember a small clearing with a small firepit and some logs as seating being claimed as a ‘satanic ritual area’ despite the fact that myself, my brother and several of our friends built the damned thing so we could hang out and get the hell away from adults so we could cook hot dogs and make s’mores, tell ‘The Claw’ urban legend fireside stories and chill on weekends.
Kids do some funky shit, including crap like painting ‘satanic signs’ all over highway underpasses, building odd stone cairnes over salvaged road kill and leaving odd stuff carven on trees, rocks and in the dirt. They get bored and do stupid shit, it is part of being a kid.
And by the way, snakes will nest in pits to winter over, and occasionally die in mass from cold or water so ‘snake pits’ are not at all uncommon all over the north east.
I don’t know why they were willing to talk to me. I was researching the case because I had doubts about the newspaper articles and they expressed having doubts themselves.
I agree. I can’t convince you of my personal experiences in Vineland because I have nothing other than my word. No doubt in my mind I had experienced listening to a cult ritual in the woods. What is considered evidence is very questionable regarding your points mentioned and I respect your insight. I can’t prove it and it is pointless to continue when no one on this site knows me personally and can defend my position. I arrive to the conclusion that a majority of people on this thread disbelieve so called evidence of this nature because it can clearly also be observed as part of being a kiD or something other than proof. In Vineland during the 70’s there was a redneck mentality in the social environment. People getting drunk and acting foolish. Macho rednecks drinking, beating up their wives and kids, destroying property..so on the surface it appeared to be a place of low-life degenerates..where underneath police claimed it was something else.
I would hope that you would have noticed by now that we don’t put much stock in fantastic tales for which there is no evidence and which have been debunked many times before, and yet you seem to think that telling even more tall tales that defy logic and embellishing past stories that are already over the top is the thing to do. This is neither Weird N.J. magazine nor Fate Magazine or any of those other woo sites where people either believe or pretend to believe all manners of silliness that spew out-we actually have some standards here(such as they are.)
The Times article says his hands and feet were bound with tape. There’s nothing about chains in there.
No, they were not.
That’d be enough if you actually had convincing evidence, but you clearly don’t.
I believe you were depressed about it, and that’s to be expected. I believe you grieved for them and that it probably affected you more than you realize. I don’t believe this has anything to do with a Satanic conspiracy because that’s a ridiculous notion.
Who knows? Prosecutors are just wrong sometimes. Jim Garrison spent ages peddling a bunch of crap about the JFK assassination. As you say, it could be genuine conviction or self-aggrandizement or other things, but it doesn’t make much difference.
Again- nobody here can say, and I don’t think it matters. They were convinced of something they could’ve prove for whatever reason, perhaps just because they hadn’t encountered a teenager with these kinds of interests and a murder scene like this before. They never proved anything, and you’re asking people to swallow a great deal.
No, they were not.
You lie.
A foolish and moronic statement. I guess in your book evidence comes from an old man with a beard up in the puffy white clouds or somebody’s rear end? I guess police work doesn’t produce evidence? ookay.
In life it is common for 2 sides of a story to exist. In your book that labels it a conspiracy. That’s just stupied. Who in there right mind cares about a flippin’ conspiracy? You make that sound like an excuse to not believe that the truth has been covered up. No one sets rules here. If the story that the newspapers printed is wrong are we suppose to believe it because if we don’t..poor little babies might get offended that we are creating a conspiracy? garbage! I only care about the truth.
Then don’t swallow anything. Stick to your guns and keep thinking that 2 sides to every crime related event is a conspiracy with hype until the whole world thinks that way and as a result..no crimes will ever be solved.