One of the most famous urban legends related to Halloween is that of the poisoned candies while kids go out trick or treating.
But is there any truth behibd this story?
On Halloween night 1974, perhaps the worst Halloween crime in living memory occurred. Father-of-two Ronald O'Bryan laced candy with cyanide and poisoned his son earning him the name The Candyman.
But is there any truth behibd this story?
On Halloween night 1974, perhaps the worst Halloween crime in living memory occurred. Father-of-two Ronald O'Bryan laced candy with cyanide and poisoned his son earning him the name The Candyman.
That night,
Ronald O'Bryan, a father from suburban Deer Park, Texas, who had volunteered to
take his son and friends trick-or-treating in nearby Pasadena, fatally poisoned
his 8-year-old son Timothy with a Pixy Stix laced with cyanide. At trial,
it was found that O'Bryan had opened the Stix, added the cyanide and stapled it
back shut.
Four other
friends were also given the poisoned Stix, which O'Bryan claimed had been given
to the boys while trick-or-treating at a darkened home.
None of the
other boys ingested the candy, though one was found asleep that night with the
candy in his hand; he had been unable to remove O'Bryan's staple.
Prosecutors said O'Bryan pushed his son into eating the candy before going to bed Halloween night. After complaining of the bitter taste, the boy went to bed, but moments later he began vomiting. By the time he was taken to a nearby hospital, Timothy had died.
Two days
after the boy's burial, an insurance agent discovered that O'Bryan had taken
out a $40,000 life insurance policy on each of his children prior to Timothy's
death, unbeknownst to their mother.
A jury
convicted O'Bryan of murder in less than an hour. He was executed in 1984 by
lethal injection.
His fellow
prisoners had named him the "Candy Man." Many
longtime people still remember him as the man who
killed Halloween.
