"Scientific" proof for the existence of PSI

[thaiboxerken]

The Murder of Teresita Basa. On February 21, 1977, a woman by the name of Teresita Basa was found brutally murdered and partially burned in her Chicago high-rise apartment...
There were no clues and no suspects.
Dr. Jose Chua and his wife worked at the same hospital as Teresita, but they barely knew her. Nevertheless, one evening Mrs. Chua suddenly went into a trance and announced in perfectly fluent Tagalog, a Phillipine dialect--
"I am Teresita Basa."
She then proceeded to tell the Chuas that she was murdered by an orderly, Allen Showery, who had stolen her jewelry and given her pearl cocktail ring to his wife...
Terrified, the Chuas reported the information to the Chicago police. Two veteran detectives assigned to the case were highly skeptical of the information, but having no other leads, they decided to investigate. When they searched Showery's apartment, they found Teresita's jewels--and his wife had the pearl cocktail ring!
When Allen Showery was confronted with this evidence he immediately confessed to the murder of Teresita Basa, but at trial his attorney moved to dismiss the case on the grounds that evidence provided by a ghost is inadmissible in a court of law.
The judge disagreed. Allen Showery was convicted of murder and sent to prison for fourteen years...
The decision created quite a stir in legal circles because it was the first case on record in which the chief witness for the prosecution was a ghost.


I haven't been able to find a good skeptical take on this particular case, however I could surmise a guess. I speculate that this lady probably witnessed the event and was guilt-ridden into disclosing the information in a weird way.

Google didn't turn up any good debunking of this case.

 

[Loss Leader]

The decision created quite a stir in legal circles because it was the first case on record in which the chief witness for the prosecution was a ghost.

Well, let me try to debunk this from a legal perspective:

Such a decision would create much more than "quite a stir." It would completely upend the entire concept of trial evidence including competency and hearsay. It would be the legal equivalent, if you'll pardon the analogy, to proving that the twin towers fell faster than gravity.

It is not too far-fetched to suggest that the case would be cited by every single criminal defendant in the US for every single crime. Do you not think Scott Peterson wouldn't have happily produced fifty psychics all claiming that Laci told them (in her native language of Tagalog) that she was killed by OJ?

In fact, hearsay evidence is excluded in courtrooms. Witnesses must have personal knowledge or they will not be allowed to testify.

I have searched the case law of the State of New York back to the early 1800s and I have found not one case in which any evidence was even offered by a psychic, let alone accepted. I have found no references to Teresita Basa or Allen Showery. I have found a Texas case called People v. Showery but it had to do with an entirely unrelated double jeopardy issue.

I have not searched Illinois cases for People v. Showery because I don't have access to an Illinois database. But no one who has ever written an article for any New York law journal, encyclopedea or practice book has ever mentioned such a case or, for that matter, how to get your psychic testimony into evidence. In fact, there is law that evidence which is patently impossible should be ignored by the court.

Now, the Chicago Tribune lists a series of articles about the trial, mistrial and eventual guilty plea (not verdict) of Allen Showery. In that case, it appears that police did claim to get important tips from the ghost of Ms. Basa, speaking through Ms. Chua. I have not seen the complete articles because that costs money. It does appear: 1) they were primarily written by one reporter who went on to write a book about the case; and 2) the defense was not successful in attempting to call the Chuas to the stand.

I don't know if this debunks the paranormal but I can think of at least one very normal explanation: You see, here in the US, we have a thing called the Fourth Amendment which protects people from warrantless searches and seizures and even (in some cases) unwarranted police attention. Police generally dislike the Fourth Amendment because it gets in the way of them catching bad guys. So, frequently, they just ignore it. But when they come upon a piece of evidence during an unwarranted search or phone tap, they need to use that evidence to get a real search or arrest warrant. This is when they tell the judge all about their "confidential informant." If pressed, it's possible their story might get even loopier. But it's all for the greater good, so the cops don't mind and the people, protected from a murderer, don't really mind much, either.

That's my best guess about Allen Showery. The police got some information illegally and attributed it in a very, very strange manner to secure their warrant.

 

[Anacoluthon64]

I found this reference, which may prove useful:

Beyerstein, B.L. (2001) Does the Teresita Basa case provide believable evidence for spiritual possession? The Skeptic's Toolbox, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR. Aug. 17, 2001.​

The author, Barry Lane Beyerstein, is a Ph.D. at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, BC, Canada. More details available here.

'Luthon64

 

[Soapy Sam]

What nationality was Mrs. Chua? The implication in the OP quote is that Mrs. Chua did not speak Tagalog, but are we sure of that?

Hospitals are like villages- everyone knows a lot about everyone else's business:- What if there was a rumour about who killed Basa? Passing it on to the police, maybe Mrs. Chua added the "trance" story to distance herself somewhat from the fact she was accusing someone of murder by making it seem the story came from the victim herself?

 

[Luke T.]

No link in the OP.

Was it from here?

 

[Luke T.]

What nationality was Mrs. Chua? The implication in the OP quote is that Mrs. Chua did not speak Tagalog, but are we sure of that?

Dr Chua was a Philippino physician whose wife had worked at Edgewater Hospital at the time of the murder. He was surprised one evening when his wife inexplicably entered a trance-like condition while they were home together in nearby Skokie, walked to the bedroom, laid down, and began speaking in her native tongue 'She spoke in Tagalong [a Philippine dialect] but with a strange Spanish accent', he later testified.

http://www.survivalafterdeath.org/articles/rogo/spontaneous.htm

 

[Luke T.]

It's convenient this is an anecdote about an event that took place 29 years ago, isn't it?

 

[Luke T.]

That first link I put in post #5 is http://godsciencemanifesto.com/pages/scientific_proof_afterlife.html

Here is how it reads:

The Murder of Teresita Basa. On February 21, 1977, a woman by the name of Teresita Basa was found brutally murdered and partially burned in her Chicago high-rise apartment...
There were no clues and no suspects.
Dr. Jose Chua and his wife worked at the same hospital as Teresita, but they barely knew her. Nevertheless, one evening Mrs. Chua suddenly went into a trance and announced in perfectly fluent Tagalog, a Phillipine dialect--
"I am Teresita Basa."
She then proceeded to tell the Chuas that she was murdered by an orderly, Allen Showery, who had stolen her jewelry and given her pearl cocktail ring to his wife...
Terrified, the Chuas reported the information to the Chicago police. Two veteran detectives assigned to the case were highly skeptical of the information, but having no other leads, they decided to investigate. When they searched Showery's apartment, they found Teresita's jewels--and his wife had the pearl cocktail ring!
When Allen Showery was confronted with this evidence he immediately confessed to the murder of Teresita Basa, but at trial his attorney moved to dismiss the case on the grounds that evidence provided by a ghost is inadmissible in a court of law.
The judge disagreed. Allen Showery was convicted of murder and sent to prison for fourteen years...
The decision created quite a stir in legal circles because it was the first case on record in which the chief witness for the prosecution was a ghost.

From the same site, but on a different page: http://godsciencemanifesto.com/pages/ghosts.html

"In 1977 a Filipino nurse, Teresita Basa, was brutally murdered in her apartment in Chicago, Illinois. Investigators found no clues and had no leads. Months later an acquaintance of the dead woman, Remy Chua, walked into the police station and told investigators that for several nights she had been possessed by the ghost of Teresita Basa, who told her husband that the murderer was Allen Showery, and his girlfriend still had her jewelry. The police knew Showery had a bad rap sheet, called him in for questioning and showed him Teresita Basa's pearl ring that they'd recovered from his girlfriend. Stunned, Showery broke down and confessed to the murder, but during the trial changed his plea to not guilty on the grounds that the testimony of a ghost was inadmissible evidence. Both the judge and jury disagreed. He was sentenced him to fourteen years in prison. The decision created quite a stir in legal circles because it was the first case on record in which the chief witness for the prosecution was a ghost."

—United States vs. Allen Showery, 1979

Notice some differences?

 

[Luke T.]

I can find no legal case United States vs. Allen Showery on the net. I've tried every variation. "United States v. Showery", "United States vs. Showery", etc., etc.

 

[Loss Leader]

I can find no legal case United States vs. Allen Showery on the net. I've tried every variation. "United States v. Showery", "United States vs. Showery", etc., etc.

Yeah, it wouldn't be there. It would be People v. Showery in the State of Illinois district courts. Apparantly, the case exists but I don't think there was a written or reported opinion. The case ended in a guilty plea, making it even less likely that there is a report of the case.

 

[Senor_Pointy]

I don't know what's wrong with you people, but you may be a little behind the times: everyone knows psi was discovered in the '70s!

 

[Senor_Pointy]

Wow, nobody appreciates a freakin' pun anymore!

 

[thaiboxerken]

Your puns only make me psi.

 

[fuelair]

This was done as a tv movie some years back (with minor personnell changes - hospital persons the three involved as I recall. Do not remember name of movie - was tangenitally watching while computing - my wife actually watched but it was almost certainly Hallmark or Lifetime and shown in the last six months (but made several years ago).

 

[RayG]

I have to ask, what was it about this tale that provides scientific proof of psi?

RayG

 

[NobbyNobbs]

The murderer was an orderly. The channeler and her husband work in a hospital. Wanna bet they all work in the same hospital? My guess is that the woman or her husband either saw some piece of evidence on the orderly or overheard him saying something suspicious and decided to embellish the source of their evidence.

 

[lolurigeller]

The murderer was an orderly. The channeler and her husband work in a hospital. Wanna bet they all work in the same hospital? My guess is that the woman or her husband either saw some piece of evidence on the orderly or overheard him saying something suspicious and decided to embellish the source of their evidence.

Instead of speculating, it is better to reach a more objective conclusion, there is simply not enough evidence, or enough information tangible enough to get convincing proof. no other witness, testimonials and the fact the case is 29 years old, a few years older than me for cripes sake

 

[thaiboxerken]

I have to ask, what was it about this tale that provides scientific proof of psi?

RayG

It doesn't. However, believers point to those anecdotes as scientific evidence. Thus giving further evidence that believers have no clue what scientific evidence is.

 

[Mojo]

I don't know if this debunks the paranormal but I can think of at least one very normal explanation: You see, here in the US, we have a thing called the Fourth Amendment which protects people from warrantless searches and seizures and even (in some cases) unwarranted police attention. Police generally dislike the Fourth Amendment because it gets in the way of them catching bad guys. So, frequently, they just ignore it. But when they come upon a piece of evidence during an unwarranted search or phone tap, they need to use that evidence to get a real search or arrest warrant. This is when they tell the judge all about their "confidential informant." If pressed, it's possible their story might get even loopier. But it's all for the greater good, so the cops don't mind and the people, protected from a murderer, don't really mind much, either.

That's my best guess about Allen Showery. The police got some information illegally and attributed it in a very, very strange manner to secure their warrant.

This could be an explanation as to why the police might call in a psychic*: they have a pretty good idea who the culprit is, but don't have enough energy for a warrant, so they call in a psychic and let them cold-read the investigating detectives for some information about the suspect. They're not expecting the psychic to provide them with any information they don't already have.




*Although, of course, there seems to be little or no evidence to back up psychics' claims about helping the police. When asked, Police forces seem to fairly consistently deny having worked with psychics: see here for the responses of UK police forces, for example. I don't know whether any similar research has been carried out in the US, but, for example, as far as Allison Dubious is concerned,

The show's Web site claims that "Dubois has consulted on a variety of murders or missing persons cases while working with various law enforcement agencies including the Glendale Arizona Police Department, the Texas Rangers, and a County Attorney's Office in the Homicide Bureau." Unfortunately for Dubois, the Glendale police and the Texas Rangers tell a different story. "The Texas Rangers have not worked with Allison Dubois or any other psychics," spokesman Tom Vinger stated flatly. Glendale police spokesman Michael Pena stated that the detective who handles missing persons cases "does not recall using Dubois at all in [one specific] case, or in any other cases."

 

[zorro99]

a second look

I have searched the case law of the State of New York back to the early 1800s and I have found not one case in which any evidence was even offered by a psychic, let alone accepted. I have found no references to Teresita Basa or Allen Showery. I have found a Texas case called People v. Showery but it had to do with an entirely unrelated double jeopardy issue.

I have not searched Illinois cases for People v. Showery because I don't have access to an Illinois database. But no one who has ever written an article for any New York law journal, encyclopedea or practice book has ever mentioned such a case or, for that matter, how to get your psychic testimony into evidence. In fact, there is law that evidence which is patently impossible should be ignored by the court.

t.

I thought this thread was worth a second look. This is a tough one. And I've come across some more information that may be useful:

http://books.google.com/books?id=Mf...ig=7gIqgqoplqe_UAe2cLPVyicP3Uw&hl=en#PPA55,M1

According to the above article by Colin Wilson, the police officer who investigated the case was named Joseph Stachula. The trial was held in Illinois on Jan. 21, 1979, and the name of the Judge was Frank W. Barbero.

The defense argued, naturally, that a ghost's testimony was inadmissable; nevertheless, the jury could not acquit the defendent, Allen Showery, because the victim's jewelry was found in the defendent's girlfriend's house.
The case ended in a mistrial five days after it began.

On Feb 23, 1979, as the authorities were preparing to retry him, Showery confessed and was given a fourteen year sentence. He could conceivably still be alive, as well as the detective, the judge, jurors and even (as far as I know) Remy Chua, the woman who was reportedly possessed.

The murder took place on Feb 21, 1977 in Chicago.

Hope this helps. If you can debunk this one, I would be impressed.

 

[blutoski]

It doesn't. However, believers point to those anecdotes as scientific evidence. Thus giving further evidence that believers have no clue what scientific evidence is.

This is a bit of a problem for skeptics, because there's a real disconnect with psi advocates in this regard. The conflation of unexplained because there's not enough information versus unexplained despite sufficient information.

The advocate considers these to be 'mounting evidence' whereas the skeptics consider these to be nice stories, maybe true, maybe not, who knows, can't tell at this point, it's all after the fact.

If there's one thing we *do* know for a fact it's that people make things up, remember poorly, get dates reversed, add details, &c, and if/when we can actually get to the original actors involved (rare), the circulated version appears to only superficially resemble the original event.

Ray Hyman wrote about this problem in the 1970s. He suggests that skeptics push back a bit on the challenge of debunking these, as debunking the current best case just means they replace it with another story. There's a conveyor belt of these stories feeding from the rumour mill, so as a strategy it's pretty fruitless. Just as one example, it took 20 years, 3 skeptics, and the advent of computers to prove that Soal fudged his psi data. It took him five seconds to cheat, and it was a very mundane method.

The skeptical explanations are all mundane (see above) and we can put a stake in the ground and say that the burden of proof is on the claimant, and that retrospective third hand stories do not come anywhere close, due to these demonstrated problems.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

I don't know what's wrong with you people, but you may be a little behind the times: everyone knows psi was discovered in the '70s!

Yeah but it was among Japanese New Agers.

You'd always hear them saying, "psi an aura"--which I used to think was "sigh an aura". ....

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

There was also that sorority of psychics: Psi Nu Beta (Psi Knew Better???)

 

[Beerina]

IIRC, there was a case where some guy went to the police with violent visions of murdering someone who had been murdered. The visions started to check out with what actually happened, so they just presumed he had done the crime and arrested him.




If any "psychics" like Sylvia Brown actually started having success, all that would do would be to attract attention by police to their own involvement.