You must have seen in movies how a spirit of a dead person helps in solving a crime that was hard to crack. What if I say that there was a Greenbrier Ghost, Zona Heaster, who solved her own murder mystery?
This is the first and only case in human history where a ghost’s testimony helped in solving a murder mystery and sent the culprit behind bars.
The Love Story
In a quiet rural town of Greenbrier County in West Virginia, nestled at the foot of a mountain, a tale of the paranormal was about to unfold.
The year was 1897, and the blacksmith, Erasmus Shue, was working late into the evening in his small shop. His mind, however, was not on the horseshoes he was crafting, but on his wife, Zona.
Zona, a free-spirited woman with dark hair and eyes, was pregnant. The couple had fallen in love quickly, marrying only a few months after they first met.
Zona’s mother, Mary Jane, had disapproved of the union due to the significant age difference between the two, but Zona’s stubborn nature prevailed.
Now, with the news of the pregnancy, the couple was overjoyed, but Zona’s health was a cause for concern. She was frequently unwell, and the local doctor suspected it was due to complications with her pregnancy.
The Death of Zona Heaster
On this particular evening, Erasmus sent his 11-year-old helper to check on Zona at their home. The boy found the house eerily quiet and dark. As he ventured further into the house, he discovered Zona’s lifeless body at the base of the stairs.
Panic-stricken, he ran back to his own house to inform his mother, who then sent him to fetch Erasmus while she called for the doctor. The doctor arrived to find a grief-stricken Erasmus cradling Zona’s body, stroking her hair and sobbing.
The doctor, who had been treating Zona for her pregnancy complications, felt a pit of sadness. He gently asked Erasmus to step aside so he could examine Zona.
The doctor concluded that Zona had likely passed away due to complications from her pregnancy. The following day, Zona was laid to rest in the local cemetery.
The mourners were moved by Erasmus’s profound grief, but what stood out to them was their action toward Zona’s mother, Mary Jane. Throughout the funeral, she glared at Erasmus with a look of pure hatred and disgust.
The Mother’s Pain
After the funeral, she promptly left without speaking to anyone. In the days that followed, Mary Jane’s behavior became increasingly bizarre. She refused to leave her house or speak to anyone.
She was often seen pacing in her room at all hours of the night, muttering under her breath, and constantly looking over her shoulder.
It was as if she was consumed by a fear that something was terribly wrong, and she believed that the only person who could provide answers was her deceased daughter, Zona.
And so, Mary Jane began to pray. Not for peace or strength, but for her daughter’s ghost to appear and reveal what was wrong. She was convinced that Zona’s spirit would give her the answers she desperately sought.
Little did she know, her prayers were about to be answered in the most chilling way possible. One month after Zona’s death, Mary Jane’s prayers were finally answered.
The Ghost of Zona Heaster
Late one night, a bright light appeared as she was praying in her room. The room grew cold, and from the light, Zona’s ghost emerged. Mary Jane was terrified, but she knew she had to be strong. She had to find out what was wrong. With a trembling voice, Mary Jane asked the ghost, “How did you die?”
The ghost of Zona began to tell a chilling tale. She revealed that Erasmus, the man who was perceived as a pillar of the community, was a monster behind closed doors.
He was abusive, and on the night of January 22nd, he had become enraged over a trivial matter – the dinner Zona had prepared. In his fury, Erasmus had throttled Zona, lifting her off the ground by her neck.
As Zona’s ghost recounted this horrifying tale, she suddenly levitated off the ground. Her head violently whipped around 180 degrees, a gruesome reenactment of her final moments.
The ghost then dropped back to the ground, her body facing one way, her head the other. With a smile on her face, she asked her mother, “Now do you see what he did to me?”
And with that, Zona Heaster ghost, a.k.a. the Greenbrier Ghost vanished, leaving a shocked and grieving Mary Jane behind with a testimony of her murder mystery.
The Investigation
The following morning, Mary Jane, looking more coherent and purposeful than she had in weeks, stormed into the local prosecutor’s office.
She recounted the story of her encounter with Zona’s ghost and the chilling revelation of Erasmus’s guilt. At first, the prosecutor was skeptical, but as Mary Jane’s story unfolded, he began to suspect that there might be some truth to her claims.
The prosecutor rushed to the local doctor, the same one who had examined Zona’s body after her death. He relayed Mary Jane’s story and suggested that they exhume Zona’s body to look for signs of strangulation.
The doctor agreed, and the next day, a team of men, along with the prosecutor and the doctor, headed to the cemetery to dig up Zona’s grave. Zona’s body was exhumed and brought to the local schoolhouse for examination.
Within moments of the re-examination, both the doctor and the prosecutor saw the undeniable evidence. There were marks on Zona’s neck that looked like fingerprints, and her neck was dislocated.
Her windpipe had been crushed. The evidence was clear: Zona had been strangled to death. Erasmus was arrested for the murder of his wife just minutes after the discovery of the marks on Zona’s neck.
The Greenbrier Ghost Testimony
During his trial, Mary Jane took the stand and recounted the story of her encounter with Zona’s ghost. Her testimony was so compelling that the jury found Erasmus guilty, even though there was no other motive or evidence.
Erasmus was sentenced to life in prison but died just three years later from a mysterious illness. The Greenbrier Ghost, as Zona came to be known, remains the only known case in which testimony from a ghost helped convict a murderer.
However, Mary Jane would live out the rest of her days in relative solitude, her heart heavy with the loss of her daughter. She often visited Zona’s grave, whispering words of love and comfort, hoping they would reach her daughter in the afterlife.
The house where Zona was found dead still exists today, as it has become a site of pilgrimage for those intrigued by the tale. However, some claimed to have seen Zona’s ghost wandering the property, forever tied to the place of her untimely death.
The murder mystery solved by the Greenbrier Ghost, Zona Heaster, remains one of the most fascinating trials in the human history.
