Episode 187 - Ghosts of Edgewater - The Chilling Story of Teresita Basa
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Hey everyone, before I start the show, I just wanted to tell you a little bit about the week I just had, and why we dubbed this script the Cursed Script. It took four days to record, and that's never happened before. First it starts with our dog getting sick, but she's doing better now. And then every time I try to get into the studio to record, I'm contending with all kinds of craziness. The house next door is being re-roofed,

The computer crashes and I lose four pages of recorded audio. Giant windstorms and pouring rain, making all kinds of noise in the studio, trying to record on garbage day. A phone scammer used my number as their caller ID and I'm getting all kinds of people calling me back saying, hey, you called me, what do you want? It was just a crazy week. Every time I tried to record, there was something. And now we call it the curse script. Seems kind of appropriate for a Halloween episode.

And it's kind of got us wondering, maybe Teresita was sending us a message. And did she have a hand in the week I just had? So anyways, hope you enjoy the curse script. And with that, on with the show. The opinions expressed in the following episode do not necessarily reflect those of the Minds of Madness podcast. Listener discretion is advised. ♪♪

The Anderson Point Apartments, 155 luxury rentals situated in one of Chicago's most desirable neighborhoods. Completed in 2021, the community was relieved to finally get rid of an ominous eyesore that plagued the area for decades before.

The abandoned Edgewater Hospital, a crumbling nine-story skeleton that had towered over the neighborhood like a specter, reminded them of the past. But no matter how many coats of paint or lavish renovations, beneath the new veneer lay a darkness that refused to be erased.

Even before the hospital was officially abandoned in 2001, there were already rumors of tormented souls and vengeful spirits haunting its corridors. Patients, nurses, and doctors had all reported seeing mysterious apparitions over the years. But once the hospital's doors were finally closed for good, ghosts had their free reign over the place.

Over the years, no one had become more convinced the place was haunted than the security officers assigned to guard the shuttered building. During that time, the Edgewater Hospital had become an eerie magnet for urban explorers, ghost hunters, and other paranormal enthusiasts looking for conclusive signs that wayward souls were still wandering its halls.

But the chilling story we're about to tell you isn't about a person finding the ghost they were looking for. Instead, it's a story of a ghost from Edgewater Hospital finding the person it was looking for.

Join me now as we delve into the haunting tale of an Edgewater Hospital employee who met a gruesome end at the hands of a killer who left no trace behind. You'll hear about the perplexing case that left Chicago police stumped with months of dead-end leads until they received a chilling message from beyond the grave.

A message from the ghostly presence of Teresita Basa.

Back in the 1970s, the Edgewater Medical Center on the north side of Chicago was already a world-renowned hospital. Built in the 1920s by its founder, Dr. Maurice Mazel, Edgewater became known as one of the finest hospitals in America. They'd successfully pioneered the way toward cutting-edge technology, paving the way through breakthrough research in the fields of cardiology and respiratory medicine.

But it wasn't just the state-of-the-art medical treatments that made the hospital so legendary. It was the unprecedented level of hospitality that truly set it apart. Despite being a world-class cardiac physician himself, Dr. Mazel ran the hospital more like a hotelier. The lobby itself was fashionable and ornate, with marbled walls.

The patients were treated like guests, with an army of bellhops to carry patients' bags to the rooms. Employees who wore white gloves and raced around the place, catering to all the patients' whims and wishes. A solarium was even added on the top floor so guests could relax in the sunlight whenever they felt too cooped up in their rooms.

The hospital also offered a number of large hotel-like suites for its wealthier clients, complete with couches, minibars, and a view of Lake Michigan. It's said that the Edgewater Hospital became a favorite among celebrities, including members of the Rat Pack like Frank Sinatra. You could say it was like the Grand Budapest Hotel of hospitals.

But it wasn't just the patients who enjoyed the luxurious comforts. It was the staff as well. Hospital employees enjoyed a bevy of perks, including free meals at the cafeteria, operating more like a restaurant, serving steaks and high-class cuisine. Parking was always free, with nurses given access to employee housing at only $150 per month.

But it wasn't just the cut-rate housing that added an extra sense of appeal. The apartments were stylish, with enviable views, including a rooftop pool where everyone could socialize. All this fostered a unique sense of camaraderie amongst the staff, and even decades later, employees still tell tales of how wonderful it had been to work during its heyday.

In 1977, Mrs. Remi Chua was a 39-year-old respiratory therapist working the night shift. Originally from the Philippines, Remi had been a licensed pharmacist in her home country.

In fact, she'd only taken the job at Edgewater while she waited for her pharmacy license to transfer to the state of Illinois. Her husband, Dr. Jose Chua, who'd also immigrated from the Philippines with Remy, was already a respected physician at Edgewater. In the two years Remy had worked the night shift, the rest of the hospital staff had grown to know her well.

They knew her mannerisms, her habits, her voice, what she liked to talk about, and how she acted. But mysteriously, that all started to change in July 1977.

One day, out of the blue, Remy was sitting in the hospital break room when suddenly a look of terror came across her face, as if she'd seen a ghost. And without a word, Remy leapt out of her chair and sprinted out of the room at full speed, fleeing in abject horror.

She clocked out early from her shift, claiming she was sick, and went home. After this moment, Remy just wasn't quite the same anymore, and people started to notice. The first thing they noticed was the very next night, Remy just was a bit more chattier than usual. Not exactly strange, but definitely out of character.

However, it wasn't her excessive talking that raised eyebrows. It was what she was talking about. Partying, classical music, and playing the piano.

These weren't things she'd typically talked about. They also noticed her accent seemed different. Yes, her English was still accented by her Filipino heritage, but that night, it seemed strange. A bit more Spanish-influenced, perhaps. Later, when Remy sat down in the cafeteria, she didn't go to her usual spot.

Instead, she chose a different seat and was overheard humming songs to herself. And that's when the other staff members became concerned, even frightened. Everybody knew that that seat in the cafeteria had belonged to a former employee.

Another Filipino respiratory therapist who'd always sat there humming softly to herself, who played classical piano, loved to socialize, and whose Filipino accent had a distinct Spanish flavor.

Five months earlier, she'd been horrifically murdered. Her name was Teresita Basa. Over the next week, Remi's demeanor at work almost completely morphed into a carbon copy of Teresita. Same accent, same mannerisms, same conversations, and same seat in the cafeteria.

The other employees became deeply unsettled by what they were seeing. Some were scared, and others thought it was some kind of sick joke. But the strangest thing of it all was that Remy had barely known Teresita at all. The two women had worked completely opposite shifts. Briefly passing each other in the hallways during shift changes was about the only interaction they'd ever had.

After a week of this, staff members told management that Remi's behavior was upsetting everyone. The next day, Remi was fired for gross insubordination after getting into a nasty argument with her boss. He'd never seen Remi act like that before, again, completely out of character for her. And then, things got really strange.

That very night, after her dismissal, while Remy and Dr. Chua were sitting together at home, Remy suddenly stood up from her seat and walked into the bedroom. Dr. Chua noticed a funny look on her face.

After waiting a while, Dr. Chua went into the bedroom to check in on her and found his wife laying sprawled out face up in the bed. Her eyes were open, looking straight up at the ceiling. And then he heard a voice coming from his wife that certainly was not her own, even speaking a different Filipino dialect than the one they usually spoke at home.

At first, he wondered if she was having some sort of medical emergency, but the reality was even more terrifying. To check whether she was coherent or not, Dr. Chua simply asked Remy if she knew her own name. But Remy didn't reply. Instead, it was another voice inside of her.

It was as if his wife had been completely possessed by someone or something. The voice replied, "I'm Teresita Basa." The voice then told Dr. Chua, "I need your help to stop the person who killed me." It was a moment forever etched into Dr. Chua's mind.

Suddenly, Remy returned and asked her husband what on earth she was doing lying in bed. She claimed she had zero recollection of anything that had happened at all. And then, as if right on cue, the phone rang. Remy grabbed the receiver and heard something truly terrifying. A threatening voice on the other end simply telling her that she was next. And then it hung up.

They wondered if this meant that whoever killed Teresita Bassa was now planning to murder Remy as well. And although Remy and Dr. Chua were highly educated with backgrounds in science, they both believed that somehow Teresita had reached out from beyond the grave to avenge her murder by finding her killer.

Could they find him before he found them? In the coming days, Teresita's spirit would speak through Remy several more times, setting off a chain reaction that would make Remy, Dr. Chua, and the Chicago police question everything they believed was possible. Teresita Basa was born in the Philippines in 1929, the same year Edgewater Hospital was founded.

Raised in the southern islands where they speak a Spanish-influenced dialect, Teresita lived a fairly charmed life with a very wealthy family. Her mother was a pharmacist and her father was a lawyer, but much of the family's money came from their grandfather, who was a successful plantation owner.

Teresita grew up in a large home, surrounded by her loving family. And as a child, she picked up her mother's passion for music and classical piano, receiving formal training by the age of seven. But the Bazzas weren't just wealthy. They were well-connected as well, being close friends with influential Filipinos, including politicians and ambassadors.

As an adult, Teresita was given the opportunity to study piano at the Royal College of Music in London, which even today is still ranked the number one school in the entire world for performing arts. While in London, she lived at the Filipino embassy with her godparents as her godfather was a diplomat.

Now, if this all sounds like some Disney fairy tale, where the girl gets invited to a ball at a palace in a magical carriage, there's good reason for that, because it's not far off from what actually happened. At age 24, Teresita was invited as a guest of the diplomat to a reception at Buckingham Palace, driven by limousine right up to the front door.

During the reception, Teresita was introduced to the 28-year-old Queen of England herself, Queen Elizabeth II. The Queen told her she had a beautiful name and shook her hand.

After Teresita's graduation from the Royal College, she traveled with her godparents all around Europe. And this tour of the continent would be one of the highlights of her life, getting to see the birthplaces of various European composers like Beethoven and Mozart. Along the way, she met scores of wonderful people, and one of them would have a profound impact on the rest of her life.

While in Paris, Teresita met Russian composer Alexander Trypnan and developed a small crush on him. Through speaking with him, Teresita learned that Alexander now lived in Chicago and only visited his second home in Paris for the holidays. Teresita's mother also made a special trip just to see her daughter in Paris.

After a long trip, Teresita returned to her home in the Philippines to be with her mother and father.

But not long after, she received a letter from Alexander encouraging her to continue her musical education at Indiana University just a few hours south of Chicago. Not only was she receiving encouragement from a world-class composer to further her studies in America, but the advice came from someone she'd been a tad starstruck and lovestruck by.

In 1957, at the age of 28, Teresita enrolled at Indiana University, taking a leap of faith to follow her dreams. For many people who uproot themselves and travel alone to a new place, their single biggest fear is making new friends. But for Teresita, her approachable and social personality made it a breeze, and she fit right in almost immediately.

During her time in America, Teresita met a man she thought she could marry. But this relationship ended rather abruptly during a trip to the Philippines when the man was caught using the surfaces of a local brothel. Not long after this, Teresita's father passed away at the age of 70.

And now, realizing that her widowed mother would have to foot the bill for her education, Teresita decided to earn her own money when she went back to the States to continue her studies. Taking a two-year course at a community college in Chicago, Teresita became a qualified respiratory therapist.

and started working at Edgewater Medical in 1974. Continuing her social butterfly ways, Teresita quickly established a new group of friends from the hospital, hosting all sorts of parties and taking every opportunity to go out for dinner with her colleagues.

But throughout it all, her passion for music continued to blossom. She taught private lessons on a piano in her apartment and joined a six-piece band who played shows around the Windy City.

Some of the band members were cousins who'd also immigrated to Chicago over the years. In the summer of 1976, Teresita's aging mother came to Chicago for the first time to visit her. And in true Teresita fashion, she threw her mother a wonderful and lavish party, complete with festive decorations and Filipino music. Almost all of Teresita's friends from the hospital showed up to meet her mom.

At the end of her mother's trip, she knew it might be the last time she'd ever see her daughter. So before she left, she gave Teresita two very special pieces of jewelry. A pearl cocktail ring she'd bought all those years ago while they were in Paris together, and a jade pendant with a Filipino etching gifted from Teresita's father. And now she was passing it on to her.

Tragically, her mother's intuition turned out to be correct. It was the last time she ever got to see her daughter.

Monday, February 21, 1977, around 8:30 in the evening, one of Teresita's neighbors in her apartment building noticed a strange smell. Something was burning. She checked the stove to make sure it was off but couldn't find the source of the smell. But when her husband opened the door to the apartment corridor, he saw that it was filled with smoke.

Running through the hallway, he pounded on the neighbor's doors. They were on the 15th floor and needed to get out quickly. At the same time, a neighbor on the floor above looked out his balcony to see smoke billowing up from the apartment directly below him, 15B. Luckily, the fire department arrived at the scene within minutes and raced up to the 15th floor apartment.

Once inside, the firefighters located the fire in the bedroom and immediately doused the flames with extinguishers. To them, it appeared the fire had been started on a mattress that was halfway pulled off the bed. Beneath the mattress was a large pile of clothing and rags. As firefighters began removing the charred debris, they uncovered a gruesome sight.

Beneath the smoldering pile lay the lifeless body of a woman, completely unclothed. But because she'd been beneath all the rags, her body remained almost entirely unscathed by the flames. After clearing everything away, they also discovered that a knife had been plunged right into the middle of her chest, piercing her heart and lung. There was no question about it.

This had been murder. But who was this woman? Investigators would soon find out.

When investigators arrived at the scene, they found that the bedroom appeared to have been ransacked. Jewelry boxes were opened, and every item of clothing from the woman's closet had been taken out and strewn around the floor. A suitcase had also been opened and rummaged through. Clearly someone had been looking for something, but whether anything had been taken at all, police had no idea.

The woman was on her back, her legs parted in a way that indicated sexual assault had occurred. Hoping to preserve every piece of potential evidence, bags were placed over the woman's hands so they could later examine any materials that might be underneath her fingernails. When the janitor was asked who lived in apartment 15B, he answered...

It's the Bassa lady. They call her Teresita. As investigators scoured the 15th floor apartment, looking for any apparent clues, they came across a small brown box, which appeared to be Teresita's personal papers. It was among those papers they found a note she'd written that would become a pivotal piece of evidence later in the case.

A note in Teresita's writing that simply read, "Get tickets for A.S." Whether this was a clue or irrelevant, police were unsure at the time. A.S. could be the initials for a number of things. A musician, a band, a theater performance. Just what exactly had Teresita been trying to get tickets for?

One more important piece of information detectives noticed was that Teresita appeared to have been a person who'd taken her security seriously. Her door was equipped with multiple deadbolts and a chain lock as well. They would later find out that her apartment had been broken into previously, which required the building manager to completely replace her locks.

To the investigators, they found it unlikely that Teresita had forgotten to lock her door, and their instincts told them that her murderer had most likely been someone she'd been willing to let in, which probably meant her killer was someone she knew. With almost nothing to go on, officers began canvassing the apartment building, as well as speaking with friends and co-workers, hoping to learn more about Teresita.

her habits, or if anyone had seen a person going into her apartment that day. The initial canvassing led to several promising leads. There was a middle-aged man some residents had witnessed Teresita arguing with in the past. And just that very day, another man had been spotted by the janitor knocking on Teresita's door around 4:00 PM.

However, after identifying the men and thoroughly investigating them, police were able to cross each initial suspect off their list. A few friends of Teresita were able to provide a glimpse into the timeline of her final day because they'd spoken to her on the phone shortly before her murder. One of the hospital doctors had called Teresita that night around 7:00 PM.

It hadn't been a work-related call though. Instead, it was about Teresita's favorite subject: music. The doctor was moonlighting as a musician in a band with Teresita and they had an upcoming show at a local venue. And Teresita and the other band members were doing their best to fill the house by selling tickets to people they knew. During the phone call, Teresita had briefly excused herself to answer the door.

When she got back on the phone, she told the doctor she had a visitor. Later on, around 8pm, Teresita received another call from a friend. This friend remembered hearing a man's voice in the background during their conversation. But Teresita's voice gave no indications of danger whatsoever. From time to time, she even recalled Teresita laughing at things the man was saying.

Minutes later, she would be dead. The autopsy of Teresita Bassa revealed much more than the detectives at the scene had been able to gather, with the coroner reporting bruising around her neck, suggesting she may have been strangled or choked.

Her larynx had been completely crushed. Still, there was no doubt that Teresita's cause of death had indeed been the knife wound to her chest. One of the biggest questions investigators needed to know was whether Teresita had been sexually assaulted during her murder. But both the coroner and the detectives were shocked to learn the answer.

Not only had Teresita not been sexually assaulted or raped that night, the coroner's examination revealed that the 47-year-old victim had still been a virgin. This led detectives to believe that whoever killed Teresita had staged the crime scene to look like a rape, and they theorized the reason a killer might want to do that was to get police looking in the wrong direction. They also realized that

If this were true, Teresita's killer must have been unaware that she was even a virgin. So their logical conclusion became that they were looking for someone who'd known Teresita well enough that she'd willingly let them into her apartment, but not so well enough that the person had known the more intimate details of her personal life.

For investigators, some pieces of the puzzle were starting to come together, but it wasn't nearly enough. They chased down a few more leads that went nowhere, and ultimately the case went cold, with little hope of bringing her killer to justice. Inside police headquarters, Teresita's case file was all but closed. But

But what they didn't know was that her case would come back to haunt them. And we're not talking metaphorically.

In August 1977, Chicago detective Joseph Stahula was sent out to make a simple house call, investigating the claims of two residents who were reporting they received a threatening phone call. On the surface, there wasn't exactly anything particularly unusual about someone receiving a harassing phone call, but there was one small detail that piqued Stahula's interest.

The couple making the report had worked at Edgewater Hospital and they believed the person harassing them was also an employee.

Months earlier, Stahula had been one of the detectives assigned to work Teresita's homicide case. Was it possible there might be some sort of connection? When Stahula arrived at the address, he was greeted by Mrs. Remy Chua and her husband Dr. Chua. They started off by telling him about the terrifying anonymous phone call that Remy had received, the one where a man's voice told her she'd be next.

Both Remy and Dr. Chua told the detective they thought they knew who made the call, an orderly who worked at the hospital named Alan Showery. While the detective continued speaking with the Chua's, he brought up Teresita Basa and wanted to know how well the Chua's might have known her.

But once they began talking about Teresita, he noticed something was severely agitating Dr. Chua. He was on the edge of his seat, fidgeting uncontrollably, and so finally Stahula straight up asked him if there was something he needed to say. The doctor responded, ''Tell me, Mr. Detective, do you believe in the occult?''

Or an exorcism? Keeping a cool head, Stuhula answered. As a policeman, I've experienced many strange things, Doctor. Not much surprises me anymore, I can assure you. But what Doctor Chua said next...

would surprise anyone. It was about five months after Teresita's murder when Remy began acting so strangely at the Edgewater Hospital, taking on Teresita's persona bit by bit until it seemed she'd become completely possessed.

But the possessions Dr. Chua had then witnessed in their home were on a different level entirely. He prefaced his story by telling Stahula, "'What I'm going to tell you now is bizarre, so different, so strange, that you will understand why I kept silent until now.'"

Over the course of four days in July 1977, Dr. Chua stated he witnessed his wife becoming possessed by Teresita's spirit on three separate occasions.

And whenever Teresita spoke through Remy, the voice coming from inside her clearly didn't sound like her own. The voice had a different accent and even a different Filipino dialect. During the first possession, the voice told Dr. Chua she needed his help to find her killer. During the second possession, the voice begged the doctor to call the police and promised to reveal all the evidence police would need to find her killer.

And during the third possession, the voice claiming to be Teresita Basa gave him the name of her killer. And the name was Alan Chowry.

Naturally, Detective Stahula was highly skeptical of these supernatural claims, but listened to every word of Dr. Chua's story. And the more he listened, the more he realized that Teresita's ghost seemed to know specific details of the case no one could possibly know. First, Dr. Chua said the ghost had told him that police were no longer investigating Teresita's case.

Stihula knew this to be true, but only a handful of people could have possibly known that. Then Dr. Chua told the detective something even he hadn't been aware of. According to the doctor, Teresita's ghost revealed to him that Alan Showery had stolen some of her jewelry after killing her.

Specifically, a pearl cocktail ring and a Filipino jade pendant, both of which the ghost claimed her family members would be able to identify. But the most shocking revelation came when Stahula asked whether the ghost had indicated if Teresita had been raped during her attack. Dr. Chua told the detective that the ghost only revealed she'd been stabbed, not raped.

A detailed Detective Stahula knew it had been verified by an autopsy report. Not really sure what to believe, Stahula finished his interview with the Chuhas, haunted by the nagging feeling that some of what he'd just heard was completely inexplicable. On the one hand, he didn't believe in ghosts or the supernatural, but he also had learned that Dr. Chua was also a man of science and reason.

Moreover, his detective instincts told him that the doctor had been completely sincere. Now Stahula was faced with a conundrum. He knew he needed to investigate Alan Showery, but he couldn't exactly come out and admit the reason for doing so was because a ghost had told him to.

When the detective returned to police headquarters, he went directly to Teresita's file and opened it for the first time in months. As he read through it, he came across one small and seemingly forgotten piece of evidence that had been discovered in her apartment. The handwritten note they'd found amongst her paperwork. Get tickets for A.S.,

Suddenly, things clicked into place. Perhaps A.S. wasn't something Teresita had been getting tickets to, but was someone she'd been getting tickets for. Could A.S. stand for Alan Showery? And the Morstahula looked into Alan Showery.

the more convinced he became that is what the initials stood for. As it turned out, Alan Showery, the 31-year-old orderly who worked at the hospital, had quite the rap sheet.

which included burglary in New York City, as well as two rapes right there in Chicago. He also learned that at the time of the murder, Alan Showery had been living just a short walk away from Teresita's apartment building. In fact, Teresita and Alan often rode the bus home together after finishing their shifts at Edgewater. This fit well within the profile they'd developed of the killer. A personality

a person to whom Teresita was friendly, but not too friendly with. Born in New York City in 1964, Alan Showery was an NYU college dropout who'd spent the better part of his 20s living and working around the country with the U.S. Job Corps, a government program that offers free vocational training. At some point, Alan moved into a trailer park in Alabama with his wife and a one-year-old baby, but a baby...

abandon them both one day, taking off for Chicago. In 1971, Allen was arrested for theft and charged twice with rape in 1972. However, it doesn't appear he was convicted for these offenses. By the mid-1970s, it seems Allen had started to get his life in order.

He'd found a good job working at Edgewater and was in a new relationship with a German-born common-law wife named Janka. But despite having seemingly turned over a new leaf, Alan was still up to his old tricks at the hospital. According to coworkers, his favorite scam was to steal jewelry from patients and sell the items to colleagues at a discounted price.

Interestingly, Remi Chua was also known to have a similar side hustle selling jewelry at the hospital. But as far as we know, no one has ever accused her of acquiring the jewelry through illegal means.

After looking into Alan's background, Detective Stahula decided to pay Alan a visit and ask him some routine questions about Teresita. Upon arriving at Alan's apartment, Stahula knocked on the door and introduced himself. Without prompting, Alan asked if they were there to talk about Teresita's murder.

Inside Alan's home, detectives were introduced to Alan's wife Yanka, who was eight months pregnant at the time. She was a beautiful woman with striking blonde hair, and when they arrived, she was sitting on the floor surrounded by books about psychic phenomena. Detectives then asked Alan if he'd be willing to go down to the station with them for an interview. He agreed.

According to Alan, he and Teresita had been good friends at the hospital, but emphasized their relationship had been completely platonic. When asked the last time he'd actually been to Teresita's apartment, Alan told them it had been months, but the detectives bluffed him by saying they'd found his fingerprints in her apartment.

And then, Alan's story started to change. Pretending he'd simply forgotten, Alan admitted he'd gone over to Teresita's apartment around 6.30 on the night of her murder in order to fix her TV for her. But when he checked it out, realized he needed to grab some more things at home before he could do the job properly. According to Alan, once he'd gone home, he got distracted and never went back.

Instead, he claimed to have spent the whole evening working on his own apartment's electrical wiring and even told detectives that Yanka would verify his alibi. Perhaps telling the police to talk to Yanka had been Alan's own attempt at bluffing, but detectives called him on it.

After leaving him in the interview room abruptly and alone, the detectives headed back over to Alan's place to speak with Yanka. According to her, Alan hadn't returned home until 8pm on the night Teresita was murdered, which detectives knew was right around the same time as Teresita's murder. Furthermore, she told police they hadn't been having any electrical problems as Alan had indicated. Alan's alibi had just fallen completely apart.

But that wasn't the most shocking thing they'd learn from Yanka. Acting on a tip they'd received from Teresita's ghost, they asked Yanka if she'd show them her jewelry. She complied by bringing them her jewelry box. Because detectives had no idea what Teresita's jewelry looked like, they convinced Yanka to bring her entire collection down to the station for Teresita's cousins and a few close friends to take a look.

Sure enough, they identified two pieces belonging to Teresita. In fact, Yanka was actually wearing the cocktail ring Teresita's mother gave her on her finger, and the jade pendant was in the jewelry box. The exact two pieces of evidence Dr. Chua claimed would solve the entire case.

The detectives asked Yanka if she remembered how she'd acquired the jewelry, and she said it had been a gift from Alan in February 1977, right after Teresita's murder.

Meanwhile, Alan was still inside the interrogation room, waiting for the detectives to return. And when they did, they confronted him with the overwhelming amount of evidence they'd discovered. At that moment, Alan decided to confess. According to Alan, on the day of the murder, he'd ridden the bus home from work with Teresita. On the way there, she told Alan her TV was broken, and he offered to come over and fix it for her.

While he was there taking a look, he said he suddenly had an idea. Alan was short on rent, but he knew Teresita always seemed to have cash on her, so he decided to rob her. As detectives had already assumed, Alan said Teresita had willingly opened the door for him. At some point, while her back was turned, he admitted to attacking her from behind, putting her in a sleeper hold until she lost consciousness.

Then Alan ransacked her apartment, looking for cash, valuables, and jewelry. But he only managed to find $30 and some jewelry. After pocketing what he could find, Alan then carried Teresita into the bedroom, took off her clothes as to make it appear as though she'd been raped, and then fatally stabbed her through the chest.

but before leaving the apartment, decided to set the place on fire, hoping to destroy any evidence he may have left behind. After telling all this to detectives, Alan was asked to sign a written confession. He was then arrested for murder, felony murder, armed robbery and arson.

After Alan's arrest, Chicago police did everything they could to hide the fact that a ghost had been involved in the investigation. But the question they could never seem to answer to anyone's complete satisfaction was how they'd turned on to Alan Showery in the first place.

Since they couldn't tell the press that they'd learned the information from a possessed wife of a Filipino doctor, they instead claimed they'd figured it out by the note Teresita had written to herself with the letters A.S. For now, the police department's chilling secret was safe, but as soon as the case went before a judge, everything would have to be revealed.

Allen's public defender attempted to get the charges dismissed outright, claiming the police never had probable cause to interrogate Allen in the first place. In his opinion, this made Allen's oral and written confessions completely inadmissible, and without this confession, there wouldn't be enough evidence to secure any kind of conviction. This legal challenge forced police to admit why they'd become suspicious of Allen to begin with.

Both Detectives Tuhula and Dr. Chua were called to a special hearing to give testimony. After placing each of their hands on the Bible and swearing to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, the court then heard what must have been one of the strangest stories ever heard in a courtroom.

Dr. Chua gave his full account of his wife's ghostly possession by the spirit of Teresita Basa, while Stahula testified for a full five hours, explaining how a detective followed clues that had been given to him from somewhere beyond the grave. When it was all said and done, the judge ruled that Alan's confession was both legal and admissible.

The murder trial of Alan Showery began on January 10th, 1979. Coincidentally, this was the same exact time serial killer John Wayne Gacy was being arraigned on another floor in the same building. And another interesting note, Gacy was also born at Edgewater Medical. Although Alan's lawyer had been defeated in his pretrial motion to get the confession thrown out...

It seemed this had only made Alan's attorney more determined than ever to win the battle in court, and his client, Alan Showery, came to court extraordinarily well prepared.

The prosecution laid out its entire case before the jury, but despite all the sensational and ghostly details, the only rock-solid proof of murder they had was Alan's confession. But when Alan took the stand in his own defense, he told a very different story to the jurors than he'd given to police. He now had a different alibi, saying he'd never been at Teresita's apartment that night.

Yanka would also testify and repeat the same claim. Alan then accused the cops of coercing a confession out of him by threatening to throw his eight-month pregnant wife into prison if he didn't tell them what they wanted to hear. The defense went through painstaking effort to show the jury that police had zero evidence to prove Alan had been in Teresita's apartment that day, let alone murder her.

There were no fingerprints in the apartment or the murder weapon, no witnesses, and no physical evidence of any kind. In fact, they discovered evidence indicating that someone else had been in the apartment that evening. A forensic analyst would testify to the discovery of five strands of long blonde hair treated with bleach or dye found on Teresita's body.

This was certainly not the hair of Alan Showery, an African-American male. And to address the matter of the jewelry, the defense claimed that Alan Showery had purchased the jewelry from another colleague at the hospital, who just happened to be Mrs. Remy Chua. Although Remy admitted at trial she'd sold Alan jewelry in the past, she adamantly denied selling him Teresita's pendant and cocktail ring.

The defense's closing arguments implored the jury, telling them they either believe in ghosts or they believe in Alan Showery. For the next 14 hours, the jurors tried making sense of the sensational trial they'd just witnessed. The question was, would they be willing to accept that a voice from the grave had tipped police off to the correct suspect?

And make no mistake about it, the ghost story was central to this entire case. Because this was the only explanation given for how Mr. and Mrs. Chua had known about the pendant and cocktail ring, as well as Alan Showery's name. If a ghost hadn't told them, how else could they have known? After 14 hours, the jury declared itself deadlocked,

Seven jurors were in favor for acquittal, four in favor of conviction, and one undecided. So the judge was forced to declare a mistrial. If the state wanted to continue prosecuting Allen, they would have to go through a whole new trial.

After the mistrial, Allen's lawyer believed his client was just one step away from becoming a free man. He was confident that if the state tried him again, the result would be the same, but then

But then, less than a month after the mistrial, Alan called his lawyer and now told him he wanted to plead guilty. Ironically, it was on the anniversary of Teresita's murder two years later. Had Teresita spoken to Alan from the grave as well?

Believing Allen's plea to be a true sign of remorse, the judge sentenced him to the bare minimum required by state law, 14 years imprisonment. But shockingly, Allen only had to serve a little over four years of the sentence before he was granted parole. By the summer of 1983, Allen was a free man.

Now, you know, I couldn't tell you a story that involves the paranormal without asking two of my favorite all-time podcast hosts from Astonishing Legends to weigh in and share some of their insights. I've been a fan of this show since the year they launched, and one of the things I like most about it is that deep dive and incredible information they give, not to mention they're a whole lot of fun to listen to.

And I gotta tell you, I'm excited for you to hear what they got to say. Hey folks, I'm Scott Philbrook. And I'm Forrest Burgess, and we're from the Astonishing Legends podcast. Our show, if you haven't heard it, covers paranormal and historical mysteries with deep research, interviews, and conversation. We just passed nine years old. We're just under 100 million downloads since we started back in 2014.

Yeah, and we're big fans of Tyler and the Minds of Madness show. So we were really excited to be asked for our thoughts on this fascinating case. Yeah, of course, you know, Tyler may be the one guy in the podcast biz that can give your voice a run for the money. Well, he does have those buttery dulcet tones indeed. All right, man, so what do you think about this case? Well, it has a lot of elements that we've discussed on the show over the years, nine years now, and we've talked about some of these things that come up and...

have to be addressed by authoritative bodies. Like I've always been fascinated with instances of the paranormal forcing a reaction from, well, it could be governments, corporations, institutions, somebody that has to make rules for the public and it has to be taken seriously in a way.

you know, some kind of official way. Yeah, it is pretty shocking. It's no wonder it was on Unsolved Mysteries. And for me, one of the scariest parts of it is when Remy had her first vision of Teresita, apparently she was just standing there staring at her while she napped in a break room. She felt something was there and she turned around and opened her eyes and saw this apparition and her mouth was moving, but Remy couldn't hear anything.

or figure out what this thing wanted, but she did recognize it as being Teresita, who was an acquaintance of hers, not a super close friend, but she knew that they both worked at the same facility, same hospital. Yeah, I think that fact makes it even more disconcerting when it's somebody you know. I mean, we just got a story sent to us for Halloween about somebody seeing a head and neck of...

of this old farmer guy appearing above a closet door out of the wall and blood was dripping down where his neck was attached in a spirit manner. And that's somebody you don't know. The other scary part of that is that the open mouth, the angry eyes starts off with a moan and groan, an angry one, and then turns into a scream. So maybe thankfully she didn't say anything. Yeah. It all adds to the shock and the horror of this.

But there's really nothing like seeing a ghost that is trying to communicate with you, but you can't hear it or understand what it wants. That's the frustrating part. But very common. We hear a lot of stories where this kind of thing takes place. Well, the other thing that's fascinating here are the connections between Remy and Teresita, which are not that they were close because they really weren't. They just knew each other in passing. They're more like co-workers.

But it was more the connections, I think, that made this all work. They really just knew each other in passing. They worked opposite shifts at the hospital, so they knew of each other more. And I think it was more like the connections that made this all work, which were related to the idea that they were both from the Philippines, they both spoke English and Tagalog,

and both knew the perpetrator. And we actually heard on Jim Harold's episode about this story that Remy was also scared of showery. Yeah, I mean, the whole experience must have been terrifying for her. She didn't even remember the trances she was going into. And because she was so terrified of everything that was happening, she actually had her husband make the report to the police. She felt like something had to be done about it, but she didn't want to go to the police herself. And

So here we are trying to figure out how the paranormal might intersect with the legal system. And I think about the German girl Anneliese Michel, whom we covered a while back. She was the inspiration for the movie The Exorcism of Emily Rose. And you had this case where the victim died, Michel died, in the course of an exorcism. And the legal system had to weigh in on whether or not that exorcism amounted to murder. Yeah, thankfully that's pretty rare, but it has happened. I think there's even a new movie coming out about that.

But it's clear when you look at this case that was prosecuted and defended, all the parties involved worked to try and keep the spirit communication part of it on the sidelines, of course. People just don't want to deal with that, especially in a court of law. The public defender was like, you know, this is absurd. You can't arrest a person because someone just had a vision.

but in the end, the suspect did confess, and there was other evidence that pointed to the fact that he had done it. That's right. I mean, the bottom line is Remy Chua's vision, the ghost encounter, whatever you want to call it, was just the impetus to bring this murderer to the foreground. But I mean, it's almost a trope. A restless spirit comes back from the grave, searching for peace and trying to point a finger at their killer from, I mean, it's exactly the plot of the movie Ghost, which was a long time after this. So maybe this inspired Ghost, I don't know.

That's true. Well, you know, as they say, life imitates art and I think vice versa. It's just so connected. So that's why we're always mentioning movie references because it mirrors life and the other way around as well. But the real thing here that's so fascinating is the conveyance of information to Remy that there's just no way she could have had.

like the name of her murderer. Also, that the apparent sexual assault had been staged. That was not a publicly known fact. I actually remember Jim's coverage of this saying that she had given out names of Teresita's own family members, extended family members, who could verify some of her stolen jewelry on site. Yeah.

And Remy and Teresita, as we said, they barely knew each other. There was no way Remy could have had that information, could have known about the sexual assault being staged or the names of extended family members of this co-worker who worked in opposite shift to her. Right. Well, then if you don't believe in a spirit world, you have to wonder, how did she get that information? Two things here that quickly pop into my mind. One is that we've heard many stories, and I believe this to be true if you talked a lot of psychic mediums,

Sometimes spirits on the other side, you know, not all of us have the same psychic ability. I believe we all do have a little bit of it, but it has to be developed. Sometimes it's natural ability, but they look for somebody they can communicate with. And sometimes messages will come from a second or third or fourth party to the intended target that can receive it, but they need to find someone they can use to channel that message.

And once they do, then sometimes it's too much because they got a lot to say. And that's also the other trope is that somebody from the other side who was wronged needs to make it right. They need to find justice. They won't stop until it's happened. That's another common theme you hear a lot about. The other thing it reminds me of is the case that we covered of the Watsika Wonder, where Lurancy Venom, if you remember, like she knew things about this other girl and her family that she could not possibly have known.

So the authorities at the time, and that would be some psychologists, William James, I believe, weighed in on this. The theory is that, okay, well, if it's not spirits, how is she getting that information? And their conclusion was maybe it was more like psychic ability, which is also woo-woo and way out there, even then. But it was more of an accepted solution than she is inhabiting the body of this deceased girl. And that's how she gets their information. Somehow she's picking up on the info from the living relatives, which is also fascinating to me.

Well, yeah. And in this case, I'm not sure who Remy would have been picking up on unless it was Showery, who she was scared of and knew of. Could have been. Maybe she knew what had happened because she was reading into that. But for me, I lean more towards this is proof of life after death, at least for a little bit, for a little time period. Yeah. These messages that came forward, they had information she couldn't have had. It was later verified. He was convicted of this crime. So-

It's fascinating that that's how the data came. And I can see the public defender being so frustrated and be like, really, this is how this case is starting. But it didn't matter that it started that way because in the end, the evidence pointed to Showery. So it doesn't matter. That is what I believe the conclusion that you have to land on, because I also personally believe in life after death and that there are sometimes messages because I'm very close to some people where that's happened to them and I believe them.

But here, let's just say, forget about all that stuff. As the public defender, it doesn't matter how they tripped onto your client. He did it. And so, as I always say, it doesn't matter what the mechanics are or what you believe or not. It's really hard to argue with success. And I think that's what makes this a really fascinating story. So thank you so much, Tyler, for asking us to weigh in on it. Yes, sir. Thank you. It was an honor to be on your show. Happy Halloween, everyone. And come check out Astonishing Legends if you haven't heard us before. We'd love to have you over there.

Also joining us to share her thoughts on this highly debated case is Amy Sadler from the popular paranormal YouTube channel, The Paranormal Couple. We've recently become friends and it was talking to her that we decided to cover this case.

The case of Teresita Bossa, if I'm being honest, is as intriguing as it is a senseless, gruesome murder. Let's talk about why this could be a paranormal case of Teresita solving her own murder from beyond the grave, and why I believe there is a chance Teresita did just that.

Now, I believe sometimes when a person passes in such a horrific way as Teresita did, it's hard for their spirit to move on. I know that if it was me, I'd be trying every way possible to solve my murder and take my killer down. Now, with a drive like this and me suspecting Remy possibly could have had abilities makes for the perfect paranormal storm. It also doesn't hurt Remy, Teresita, and Alan were familiar with each other. Teresita and Remy both came from the Philippines to the U.S.,

both spoke the same languages and were both respiratory therapists at the same hospital. Now, I also believe that we all have gifts and abilities. Some of us are just a little more in tune with ours than others. And I think it's a possibility that Remy may have just had abilities and just didn't know it. The claim of Remy seeing Teresita in the hospital lounge and not knowing how to help her, I believe just opened that door for Teresita to show her how. Remy wanted to help because she knew that she wasn't at rest.

Now, while in sleep, it's said that we are at our most vulnerable state, which to me makes perfect sense.

During our rest, it's believed visits from spirit is easiest for them. Spirit communication and being able to appear as a full-bodied apparition takes a lot of energy. And to me, it makes perfect sense for Teresita to reach out to someone familiar, like Remy, using a said easier way, using less energy. And while we're talking about energy, that could also be why Remy had some time in between these occurrences.

Now, if we really want to go out on a limb here, look at the change of heart that Alan Showery had when he changed his plea in court to guilty. Now, that makes me wonder if Teresita didn't pay him a visit as well. It's a plot twist nobody expected. He's about to get out. Alan knows that. Then all of a sudden, he's guilty. He did it.

I'm sure everybody there was questioning, why in the world did Alan change his plea? Now, in the end, did Teresita really reach out to Remy? Or possibly, my thoughts, did she reach out to Alan Showery? I think it's a possibility. But the most important question I'm going to ask you today is, did Teresita finally find the peace she needed to be at rest? And I'm going to say, with her murder being solved, I believe so. I believe she did.

After Teresita's death, her body was returned to the Philippines, where she was buried in her original hometown, her life's journey finally coming full circle. In her 47 years on Earth, Teresita's life was filled with astounding adventure, culture, world travel, and a family who encouraged her to follow her dreams, nothing short of a real-life fairytale.

This coming February will mark the 47th anniversary of her tragic death, and in those years, Teresita Bassa has become one of the most famous and enduring ghost stories in modern times. The voice from the grave, the ghost who solved her own murder...

Teresita Bassa's remarkable life and her supernatural legacy remind us that the line between the living and the departed is often blurred by the simple power of human stories. And because of this, her story leaves us with a chilling reminder that some mysteries are destined to remain unknown.

And now I want to introduce you to a podcast from our friends over at Astonishing Legends, Scared All the Time. We in? Is it going? I don't, I think so. I think that, I don't know how long this feed is going to hold, but I think we're in. We hacked the feed. It turns out. Okay, great. We should get started then.

Scared All The Time is a podcast about things that scare us. Whoa, what are you doing? I'm making a trailer. They asked for a trailer. Like, got my trailer music, doing my trailer voice. No, yeah, that's false advertising. We're just a couple of idiots talking about things that scare us. This kind of seems like overkill. Maybe you should go for something spookier, like something scary. Okay, fine. Scared All The Time is a podcast about things that scare us. No, that's too scary. Okay, well, I only have one more piece of music.

This will have to do. I'm Chris Colari. And I'm Ed Vercola. And every week, we're going to take a look at something new that scares us and why. Like this trailer going over a minute. Yeah, they said we definitely should not do that. Join us for season one of Scared All the Time. A brand new show from Astonishing Legends. Available anywhere you listen to podcasts.

Follow the Minds of Madness on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. To support the show and get access to ad-free episodes, extra content, and Patreon-exclusive episodes, go to patreon.com slash madnesspod. To find us on Instagram and Facebook, search The Minds of Madness, and on Twitter using the handle

at MadnessPod. And also, by checking out our sponsors and using our promo codes, you're also helping support the show. We've got all the links in our episode notes. So until next week, thanks for listening.