Satanic Panic or A Cult Hidden In Town? Very Peculiar Unsolved Mystery
24:16 Share

Nice to meet you. Or maybe we've met before. I'm the COVID-19 virus. I use disguises to fool your immune system. My buddy the flu virus and I make thousands of people sick every year. But updated vaccines make it a lot harder.

Don't make it easy for these viruses. Stay up to date on your COVID-19 and flu vaccinations this fall. Sponsored by Champions for Vaccine Education, Equity, and Progress. CVEEP.org. NetCredit is here to say yes. Because you're more than a credit score. Apply in minutes and get a decision as soon as the same day. Loans offered by NetCredit are lending partner banks and serviced by NetCredit. Applications subject to review and approval. Learn more at netcredit.com slash partners. NetCredit. Credit to the people.

It's me again. I showed up. How are you? I hope you're all having a great day. My name is Bailey Sarian and today is Monday, which means it's Murder, Mystery, and Makeup Monday. Thank you. Thank you. Every Monday I sit down and I talk about a true crime story that's been heavy on my...

Knockin'. And I do my makeup at the same time. If you're interested in true crime and you like makeup, then I would highly suggest you hit that subscribe button 'cause I'm here for you every Monday. Today I wanted to talk about a story that I came across that's just wild. This is a weird, this is a weird story and I know so many of you are gonna be like, "There's no way this is true." 'Cause I didn't think it was true either, but it is. And let's jump right into it. The year is 1988 and we're in a small town called Childress.

Childress, Texas. Childress was small enough that it's hard to like do anything that somebody else doesn't happen to hear about. Everyone knows your business. Everybody knows each other. And everyone in town at this time, 1988, knew a 15 year old boy named Tate Rowland. He was a pretty popular young man. He was good looking, but he had kind of

of a wild streak in him. You know, teenager, teenage boy in a small town who's bored, wild streak. Tate was known to have a little bit of a reputation by the sheriff's department. Tate liked cars and he liked beer. Tate also had a girlfriend at this time and her name was Karen. Karen actually came from a pretty well-off family.

They were farmers and they made a good amount of money. And again, everyone kind of knew her too. Their relationship was pretty rocky. So it was said, and it was also said that they were constantly getting into fights. They were always bickering. They were very jealous people. So if Karen was talking to a guy, Tate would get all jealous. They'd fight, they'd break up, but then they'd kiss, make up, get back together and then just repeat. You know, it was one of those relationships.

And just a little side note, if you're in one of those relationships, just get out now. They don't ever work out. Sorry. Save yourself. Once again, the couple had gotten into a fight. Now this time the fight took place at Karen's work. Tate allegedly jumped over the counter to get to Karen and then he choked her. He wasn't aggressive at all in the past, but this obviously like,

upset Karen a lot. She ended up pressing charges. Tate did end up getting arrested and they went all the way to court, but then the charges got dropped and the two of them, Tate and Karen, they made up. But this time, once everything was done and over with, Tate ended up leaving Texas and he moved to Louisiana to live with a family member.

So then spring time came and Tate ended up moving back home to Texas. Once Tate got back into town, he had heard a little rumor swirling around that Karen, his ex-girlfriend, she ended up getting married while he was away in Louisiana. Tate didn't let that get him down. You know, he obviously is sad, upset, heartbroken, but he still would hang out with his friends and he tried to just kind of carry on with his life.

His friend said that, yeah, he was heartbroken and stuff, but he pretty much like bounced back pretty quickly. So they break up, that sucks. Like they break up officially, you know? Karen got married, so there's no getting back together. So then July 26th, 1988.

Around 5:00 PM that afternoon, Tate had been seen around the United supermarket parking lot. Tate had made plans to drop by the city park that evening to coach a women's league softball game. And he had his friend Chad with him. And the two of them are gonna hang out and drink some beer after the game. Chad,

was 15 at the time and he would be considered to be more of a quiet guy, he was introvert, he wasn't very popular in school and he liked hanging out with Tate because Tate was cool and that would help him be cool. So at 6:00 PM that same evening, Chad, the friend, he came running through the front door of Tate's family home to tell the family that Tate had hanged himself, make up.

Now Tate's mom said that Chad, when he came in running to tell them that Tate had hanged himself, that he was like super calm, eyes were dry, like it wasn't like he was crying, he didn't look worried at all and she thought it was really weird. Tate's mom, dad and Chad, they all go to the location where Tate hanged himself.

Once they got there, poor Tate's dad is the one who cuts Tate down from the tree 'cause he's still hanging from the tree. Why did Chad come home and not get Tate down from the tree? I don't know. But Chad takes them to the location where Tate had hanged himself and that's where Tate's father cuts his son down from the tree and comes to realize that Tate is dead. Now, of course, police come out and everything, all that jazz. They question Chad, what are you up to?

Chad first told the sheriff that he and Tate had driven out to like a small grass area to listen to music and then they were gonna drink a few beers. Chad then went on to say that Tate strung a rope over the limb of a tree and announced that he was going to hang himself. Chad said that he thought Tate was kidding. Chad then told police that he walked behind the car to throw a beer can into the bushes.

I don't know why that's funny. I'm really sorry. And when he came back, that's when he saw Tate was hanging from the tree and he was dead. Now the story didn't make any sense to police because Tate had two rope burns visible on his neck. One above the Adam's apple and one below the Adam's apple.

When someone is hanged, the body weight pulls the chin toward the rope so that the rope mark is always above the Adam's apple. So the story just wasn't making sense. Why did he have two lines on his neck? So police are thinking, well, could Tate have been strangled first and then hung up in the tree?

Two days later, Chad was brought in to be questioned again. This time though, he changed his story. His story is flip-flopping, like a fish out of water. Chad said the first time Tate tried to kill himself, the rope broke. Then they went back to Tate's house, which was five, a five minute drive away. The goal was to go back to Tate's house to get another rope. And then once they got another rope, Chad said that's when they came back to the tree. And then that's when...

Chad said that he told two different stories because he was afraid that he would get into trouble for not trying to stop Tate in the first place. When you think about it, 'cause sometimes you have to step back and look at the bigger picture here, Chad is only 15 years old.

That may be the case, maybe he was afraid. The sheriff's department ended up listing Tate's death as a suicide. The county judge saw no reason to order an autopsy and Tate's body was just prepared for burial. You think the two rope burns would be enough, but...

I don't know, man. So the funeral goes on for Tate and many friends and family come out to say their goodbyes. Some freaky shit goes down at the funeral. Tate's aunt, I say aunt, but aunt, she's sitting like towards the front and she notices like a woman, she's dressed in all black and wearing a black veil that's covering her face. This woman comes in and she kind of sits towards the back.

Tate's aunt was like, "Hey, who's this lady? Do you guys know who that is?" Like asking the people in her row, just asking like, "Do you guys recognize that girl?" "No, who is she?" It was just more out of curiosity is what the aunt said. It was just like, "Hey, who is that? Does anyone know? I don't know."

nobody knew who she was. Tate's aunt was like, "I'm gonna go up to her and introduce myself, you know, once the service is over, I wanna see who this lady is." But unfortunately, this mysterious woman, she had left before anybody could talk to her. So nobody got to talk to her, but many people saw her, so they knew she was there. So the funeral carries on, and in the middle of the service, this young man who was sitting in the front row starts mumbling something.

Nobody can really make out what he's saying, but he's getting louder and louder because he's saying something over and over again and people are like, "What the fuck is going on over there?" This young man, he was chanting the word "suicide" over and over again. He could have just had some like problems actually, now that I'm thinking about it. I was thinking like, he sounded like he was possessed

Look, Tate's family members were like, what the fuck is going on? You know, like this woman sneaks in and then she leaves. Nobody knows who she was. And then this kid is kind of chanting suicide over and over and over again. Like, what the fuck?

Anywho, on another night there was an officer who was driving around, you know, patrolling at night and he happened to drive by the cemetery. He saw a figure standing by Tate's grave. It was late at night, he just saw a figure, he didn't like see a face or anything. So he goes and he checks it out. When he gets there, he doesn't see a figure or anything, it's gone, but he does notice that all over Tate's grave there's a bunch of spit from

chewing tobacco, just spit all over his grave or his tombstone. This officer also sees a wooden cross, like it was placed there by somebody, you know? So it's a little wooden cross, but it was all burned up, like it was set on fire. Weird things are happening in this small town, right? But people were talking.

Again, this is a small town, everyone gossips, okay? Everyone knows everyone's business. So people are hearing that there's possibly like an altar going on, like someone set up an altar, which then leads to people thinking some satanic shit. So when school had started that next fall, all the students had their own rumors about what happened to Tate. I mean, they all knew what happened. They heard that Tate had died. They were all at the funeral.

but the rumors were starting, not even, they were just getting passed around that Tate was a member of a cult. He had been killed by a fellow cult member because he would not bring them a blonde haired, blue eyed child to be sacrificed. But the word cult,

just kept entering the chat. Many believe that Tate was indeed part of some kind of cult. And to make things even weirder, when school was back in session, the school staff had noticed that there was a bunch of like strangers in their cars waiting for kids or their kids in the school parking lot. They didn't recognize them.

And you're probably thinking like, "Yeah, so what?" They didn't recognize them. But again, this is a small ass town. These people like knew who came to pick up their, they just knew.

They just fucking knew, why can't you believe me? They just knew, okay. So they see these cars and stuff and these strangers just waiting in them. So instantly these staff members knew that something was not right. Now this part wasn't rumors, this part happened. People were in their cars trying to kidnap kids. There was one car or one man who tried to snatch a kid, kid got away. No arrests were made for these attempted kidnappings but

It was fitting the story that, you know, something weird is going on and everyone was on just high alert. The police, they receive a bizarre phone call from the police department in central Texas. It's a town called Lockhart and a girl had gone to the police department down there or over there, wherever it is, she went there. She said she used to live in Childress but she was visiting Lockhart and while she was out there visiting, she had a dream.

She had a vision! Visions are always in the story, what did I tell you? A vision! She said in her dream, a cult had met at an abandoned house with a red porch light in a tiny town nearby. This girl said that her parents were involved in the cult and that they had used a car to run down a boy a few years earlier. The police department, they actually ended up doing some fact checking, so they drive out to this

town that she had talked about where there was like this little house with the red porch light and guess what? They drive out there and just like this girl mentioned, they see that this house in the town that Skrull had mentioned, this house had just recently burned to the ground and then when police did a little bit more research, they find out, I'm not laughing because it's funny, I'm laughing because I don't know,

Okay, look, so get this, a couple years earlier, a 15 year old boy had been hit by a car and killed while walking home. Nobody found the killer. And this girl was on point, right? The house, the porch, the light. And she also ratted out her parents at the same time. So police were like, okay, maybe there is a cult.

So again, word got out, people were like, "Oh my God, have you heard about this house that burned down? There was a cult meeting there and this boy got hit by a car." People are just losing their minds. They're like, "There is a cult in town, everybody. Be on high alert, they're snatching kids." Not long after that whole situation, a confession was made. A confession, somebody came forward. Somebody finally confessed.

Confessed to what? I don't know because did Tate kill himself? I don't even know. A confession was made to the police by a boy named Ray. Now Ray was a pretty rough kid. He was 15 at the time and he was arrested for stealing a car, driving drunk, and then he crashed into a utility pole, wrecked the car, was arrested, and that's when he confessed. According to officers, when Ray was booked, he said that he was a member of a satanic group

and he said that he had been there at the tree when Tate was hanged. Ray was being arrested and put in jail for another thing for driving drunk and crashing that car, so that's what he was there for. The next day, he recanted saying that he didn't remember saying anything because he was so drunk. But Ray's family, they were no strangers to police. Ray's brother and father had various felonies. Word got out about Ray and like what he said that he confessed.

People in town, they would drive by his home to see if they could see any like satanic shit going on. So people are doing like little drive-bys, like trying to, with their binoculars, like...

People noted that there was graffiti on like the back of the house. It was poorly painted over. Some people were trying to make out what it said because it looked like it could be a clue. Now some people swore it said, quote, devil house. It was written in like spray paint in the back. Others thought it said, quote, devil den. And then some people swore it said, I love the devil. Police asked Robyn

"Ray, what's up with that painting on your house?" You know, the painting everyone's saying like, it says "Devil House" or "Devil Den" or something. According to Ray, it actually said, "I love Elle." And then Ray said he painted over it 'cause his dad got mad at him. Ray actually had an alibi for the night that take,

that Tate died or the evening that Tate died, but nobody really cared or believed that. Now this whole cult thing was getting out of hand. People were accusing one another of being in a cult and it was a literal witch hunt, but that didn't stop anyone, okay? Now remember Tate's old girlfriend, her name was Karen. She was going through it. People were just,

Rumors were that she had many witchcraft books, she had a Ouija board in her bedroom, and according to town gossip, it was Karen who had lured Tate into the cult, because Karen was the cult's queen bee. So now all the people in town are,

just treating Karen so differently, but Karen, she was questioned by police and she was actually cleared, she was obviously frustrated from the harassment she was receiving. Now as the days passed and time went on, all this cult talk was still happening, but it was definitely dying down, you know, it was becoming kind of past news, things were becoming a little bit more normal, they would say. You will never guess in a million years what happens next,

Oh no, Tate had an older sister and this older sister's name was Terry. Terry is found dead. Oh yes, not only was she dead, but she was found in the infamous Devil House where the guy Ray had lived.

Huh? When residents heard about this, oh baby, you want to talk about losing their shit? They are connecting the dots. Any of us would be. I'd be losing my shit too. Teri had been going through some hard times. She had separated from her husband, she gave up custody of her four kids, and then she happened to like start hanging out with the wrong people, and she ended up getting into drugs. Teri was seeing a guy who was friends with Ray's brother.

So they're all hanging out one night, they're partying, they're just having fun, and at the end of the night, they all go back to their own rooms to go to sleep. Well the next morning at 9:30 a.m., one of them went to go wake up Terri, and she wouldn't wake up. She was cold to the touch. So they call police and all that stuff. An autopsy determined that Terri had more than twice the legal blood alcohol limit, and she had died by choking on her own vomit. Now to investigators, there was no evidence of foul play,

Case closed. Nay nay, of course not. A lot of people are putting pieces together. Rumors are swirling around and people are thinking Terry's death was somehow linked to Tate's, right? Brother, sister, they're both dead. Like what are the odds of that?

It's not funny, it's just like, anyways. People were thinking like it had to be linked because Terry never once believed that Tate took his own life and she wanted to find out who killed him. And she was set on this and she kept talking about it. So people were thinking that's why she died because she kept talking about it. She kept telling people that Tate didn't want to kill himself. And the next thing you know, she dies. So, Terry.

Terry had recently told a friend that Tate had warned her to keep her daughters in the house because this cult was going to sacrifice one of them in a satanic ritual. The family demanded an investigation at that time, but the county sheriff refused to look into it or to further look into Tate's case as well. He insisted that it was a suicide. Now, luckily, luckily, the county sheriff, the guy who was blocking the investigation, well,

He was sent to jail for dealing drugs. This guy was dealing drugs, like what a mess, right? Sheriff is dealing drugs. He gets caught, he goes to jail. Yay! So now they have a new sheriff and this new sheriff, he reopens Terry and Tate's case. So now they're going through and they're re-interviewing witnesses and they came across yet another super suspish.

Ray, remember Ray? Okay, well Ray's brother attempted to kill himself by swallowing 25 to 30 tablets of Elavil, a mild antidepressant that has tranquilizing effects to it. It essentially makes you go to sleep. Ray's brother left a suicide note that said, quote, "I know something that the cops don't know. I know who killed Terry. I can't live anymore." End quote.

he ended up surviving his suicide attempt. Investigators are like, awesome. And when he was questioned about what this note meant, he said that he didn't remember writing it and had no idea who killed Terry.

I'm calling BS, but okay, I'm glad he's alive. Now on July 27th, 1991, this is three years after his death, Tate's body was exhumed from the cemetery. Tate's casket was not airtight, so because of this, his body decomposed pretty badly. They couldn't get any evidence to prove that it wasn't a suicide. Unfortunately though, they were unable to get anything, but

An autopsy test did find traces of a drug in his system. A drug called Elavil.

Now ain't that some weird shit? It wasn't noted before because they didn't do an autopsy on Tate's body originally, remember? Okay, it was the same drug used for the attempted suicide of Ray's brother. Now this drug is not considered a party drug, it's a drug that you take when you want to go to bed. Ellaville could have been the very thing a cult would use to sedate someone when they wanted to kill them. This is what a lot of people are thinking. Terry's body, she was exhumed next.

They examined Terry's body and after the doctor had studied the previous autopsy of her death, he said it was unlikely that she could have choked to death on her own vomit, 'cause she was sleeping or lying face down. What in the coverup is happening?

So it's almost Halloween 1991 and this new autopsy for Terry had been done and it comes back with the results. Now it was said that Terry most likely died of asphyxiation, most likely smothering. She had bruises in her mouth that indicated blunt trauma, likely happened during some kind of assault. But that wasn't all, there was another thing found in Terry's body.

Can you guess what that was? Use your noggin. What do you think was found in Terry's body? Well, it was a drug. It was a drug called Elavil. Well, shit on my tits. What the? So you're telling me there are three people who had this drug in their system. Two of them are related, brother and sister. This other guy, Ray's brother, it was a suicide attempt. And how did Tate die? A suicide.

Isn't that a little, like what is going on, right? At this point, it was hard to find anybody in Childress who did not believe there was a cult on the loose. Rumors were going around about who may have done this, but nobody would confess. There have been tons of allegations, especially against Ray and his family, and they have been in and out of jail for just petty crimes. There have been many allegations, but the police have

found that most witnesses were unreliable. As time went on, there was still strange things happening. There would be house pets found cut with their hearts taken out in the middle of the road. An investigator, his house mysteriously burned to the ground.

A few weeks after that, a middle-aged couple was found in possession of strange artwork. Some of this artwork was very pornographic. Others were seeming to be more satanic. One of them was a goat. Well, actually it was like a painting of a person and it had a goat's head over the human body.

Nothing came from this. This is the end, I'm sorry. Tate's death, it makes me feel like I'm in a cult. I don't know what's going on. I don't know what's going on. I don't know what's going on.

It may have been a suicide, maybe it wasn't. And as far as his sister, Terry, her death was a possible murder. Honestly, it seems like it was a murder, but the witness reports didn't help find any answers. What do you believe? A town full of social gossiping butterflies? Or was something really fishy going on? Maybe one day we will find an answer, but for now, this mystery remains unsolved.

So when I heard this story, I was just like, "Oh, what a wild story." If anything, I think maybe the town made it more intense because they were gossiping just out of control and they truly believed there was a cult there, okay? Now, I don't know. Well, maybe. I don't know. I don't know what I think. Because what are the odds that all three of those who have died or almost died had that same drug in their system? It's not a party drug. Somebody was up to this, you know? I think it...

may have been Ray's family, maybe not necessarily a cult, but 'cause it seems like the drugs were all coming from that house. But then how did Tate get it? Satanic cult or people gossiping too much? Anyways, thank you guys so much for hanging out with me today. I hope you have a wonderful day ahead. Please, please, please be safe out there, make good choices. But other than that, I hope you have a wonderful day. I will be seeing you guys later. Bye.