TV Review: Ghost Hunters 5.10 – “I Am Not Guilty”

REVIEW: Ghost Hunters 5.10 – “I am Not Guilty”
Original Air Date: August 26, 2009
Rating: TV: PG (Parental guidance suggested)

Two houses are visited in this episode, and both have some kind of historical value to them. They also get the strangest thermal image I’ve ever seen on this show. Other than that, not much happened. Steve didn’t even freak out over a bug this time around! I don’t know about you guys, but I think I like it better when TAPS is helping people (like the family from last episode). I mean, I’m all for the historic places because I’m a big history buff, but there’s something more satisfying to watch when they’re trying to help people in tough situations.

First up is the Samuel Mudd House, in Waldorf, MD. It’s the house of the doctor, Samuel Mudd, the man convicted of conspiring with John Wilkes Booth in the assassination of President Lincoln. On April 15, 1865, Booth made his way to Mudd’s house at 4am, looking for a doctor to set his broken leg. Lots of different kinds of activity is claimed to happen in the house and on the grounds.

Jason and Grant start off the night in the children’s room. Right after they start the EVP session, the digital camera turns off on its own. Then they find an area in the room that feels like it has a static charge to it. They walk around a little, checking things out, when Grant gets his hand slapped/touched.

Steve and Tango check out the parlor where Booth was laid out when he got to Mudd’s house. They check the EMF levels and do some EVP work, but nothing happens.

Amy and Kris work the attic, and the clothes horse (Amy) sort of debunks the clothing rack falling over on its own. Too many clothes on a flimsy rack, and it’s not really rocket surgery. It doesn’t explain how it could have flopped around on the floor by itself. Kris again tries to use that snarky, irreverent style of EVP to get a response, and once again it doesn’t produce any results.

Before wrapping up, Jason and Grant head outside to walk around the grounds a bit. Right away, they get a seriously weird hit on the thermal (see above cap). Okay. The skeptic in me says that this could have easily been faked by having someone walk in front of the FLIR camera, then match it up with the footage of the guys walking outside. However, I’m all for giving them the benefit of the doubt and thinking this is some crazy footage. This, plus an EVP that they all think sounds like “I am not guilty” was all the evidence they had to present to the client. They make sure to tell her they can’t say for sure the EVP is saying that, nor can they claim it’s actually the voice of Dr. Mudd, but she seemed to have convinced herself of that before they leave.

The second case was Edgewood Plantation in Charles City, VA. It was built around 1849, was originally connected to a neighboring plantation that two former US presidents lived on, and was used to spy on the Union army during the American Civil War. Most of the claims are seeing a woman named “Lizzie”, who had been waiting for her mister to come back from the war.

Not much happened here. Jason and Grant get a high EMF reading, but only in one spot. All of the sudden, it disappears. Then, out of nowhere, it shows back up again around an old-timey metal tricycle. Steve and Tango debunk the “secret” hatch door opening and closing on its own, and Amy and Kris get nothing.

One of the claims was from a woman who stayed the night in the guest house with her husband. They stayed one night, then left the next day because the woman claimed she’d spent the entire morning talking to a Confederate soldier named Aaron Young III. So they send Kris out to do some research and see if she can find anyone by that name being alive back in the day. She finds out that there was an “Aaron Young” that served in the Confederate army, and that he probably died in a pretty nasty battle that was fought in that area.

They don’t have any evidence to give the homeowner, but tell her to be open to others researching the area and house to get better/more evidence than they did. She just seemed pleased as punch that they could verify the Aaron Young story a little for her (or she was just being polite because she had that nice Southern way about her).