Investigators: Ghosts haunt Mullan Pavilion
<p>Kika Morelan, an investigator with Spokane Paranormal Investigation Group, takes readings in the boys shower area of a locker room just a few feet from where medium Jennifer Von Behren saw the ghost figure of a young male Thursday at the Mullan Athletic Pavillion.</p>
<p>Scott Mercer, paranormal investigator, uses a specialized video camera in an attempt to record spirit energies in the boiler room of the Mullan Athletic Pavillion.</p>
<p>Local medium, Jennifer Von Behren walks through the boiler room searching for signs spirits.</p>
<p>Paranormal investigators Scott Mercer, left, and Kika Morelan prepare their gear before searching the pavilion for ghostly activity.</p>
MULLAN - Cornered by two paranormal investigators in the cramped basement boiler room of the Mullan Athletic Pavilion, a ghost darted toward a concrete wall and was gone.
Kika Morelan, lead investigator for the Spokane Paranormal Investigation Group, said she saw it flash by in front of her. Clear. As. Day.
"It went straight into the wall," she said.
What Morelan couldn't figure out was why the ghost was only visible from the waist down. Just legs pumping and then, poof.
"There is a boy in this place, about 10, 12 years old, dirty, looks like a street kid," Morelan said. There are other children, too, who haunt the pavilion, she was able to confirm Thursday.
The brick building, opened in 1967, has long been rumored to be haunted. It's also a popular place for ball games, swimming, weight-lifting and community events.
"I've heard it (is haunted) so many times," said Dawn McKinnon, the facility's pool supervisor. "It's never gone to the extreme of someone saying it's terrifying."
She has been creeped out by unexplained sounds late at night when she is the only one inside. The clanking of weights above the gym, for example. Nothing, however, has ever scared her from the building.
Morelan and fellow investigator Scott Mercer joined Coeur d'Alene "medium" Jennifer Von Behren on Thursday to find out exactly how haunted the building is and by whom.
Von Behren hadn't been downstairs in the empty girls locker room long before she felt fingertips lightly touch her hair.
"So I tried talking to him and I said, 'Who are you, do you want to show me who you are?'" said Von Behren, who was born with the ability to see and communicate with spirits. "And the next thing you know..."
"The lights flickered off, and then on again," said Press photographer Shawn Gust, who had been following Von Behren through the building to document her discoveries. Gust said nobody was there who could have triggered the motion sensor which controls the lights.
"After finding the sensor, my motion turned on a completely different set of lights," Gust said.
After entering the dark, empty boys locker room, Gust, who doesn't necessarily believe in ghosts or spirits, froze. There was a presence. And it wasn't Von Behren.
"There was a very real, creepy energy that I felt at the threshold of the boys shower room," Gust said. "Just seconds after feeling this energy, Jennifer stopped in her tracks and said she saw a ghost in that very room."
The paranormal investigators, meanwhile, had found a narrow ladder well which connected the boiler room and an electrical room up one floor.
"This is the part of investigation I love - going into the deep, dark bowels of a building," Mercer said.
Inside the electrical room, behind the concession area, they called to any present ghosts.
"Did something happen to you here? Is that why you're here?" Morelan called out. The lights from her and Mercer's exotic instruments produced the only light in the room. The instruments, however, were rendered useless in that electrical room because of the pavilion's own electrical systems.
"Are you in pain right now?" Morelan called out. "Are you a male spirit? You want to make a noise for me? I can't see you, sorry."
For two hours, high-definition video cameras - set by Morelan and Mercer - rolled in the empty, quiet swimming pool area. (Those recordings were still processing at press time and the results were unavailable.)
There was one very odd coincidence Thursday: A ghost Von Behren saw in the darkened and empty boys locker room was also only visible from the waist down.
"The top was blurry," Von Behren said.
Neither she nor the paranormal investigators knew exactly why only the legs of two ghosts were visible.
"It could be due to something that happened to them," Morelan said.
Though their analysis of the pool is incomplete, all agreed that the boys locker room and the boiler room were the most haunted parts of the facility.
Utilizing the best technology available today, Morelan and Mercer got a "spiked" reading on their electromagnetic field (EMF) meter when they initially entered the boys locker room. The meter picked up nothing on subsequent sweeps of the locker room, suggesting the spirit had moved on and that the building's electrical equipment wasn't responsible for the initial spike.
"We always err on the side of trying to disprove what we see, but that's definitely how you would know if there is a spirit there or not," Mercer said.
Morelan said another ghost they detected with an EMF meter was a teenage boy.
"I asked him to come next to me to set my (EMF) meter off and he did," Morelan said.
To do a complete investigation, Morelan and Mercer would need to return to the pavilion on multiple occasions, though that won't be an option in this case, unfortunately.
"The entities, they will give you what they want to give you, and what they can give you," Morelan said. "That's the thing with this line of work. You have to be there at the right time."
Thursday, however, was a prime time for an investigation.
During Halloween season, she said, "The veil - between this world and the other in which they exist - is thinner."