Transcript of The Exorcism of Anneliese Michel (Part 2) New

Hey, weirdos. I'm Ash.

I'm Alayna.

And this is a program that you tune into called Morbid.

It sure is. And we have been— we have totally redone the pod lab today. We have cleaned—

And yesterday.

Our little freaking hearts out.

We got a dumpster.

Deb and Aiden. Real ones. Real ones throwing shit out the window. This shit is fresh. This shit is clean. Yeah.

We salted the rugs. We did. Or baking soda them.

I was gonna say we baking sodaed it, but I'll, I'll take it.

Mikey salts the rugs.

Mikey salts the rugs. So, so we've been salted.

But today we baking sodaed the rugs. Yeah.

So we've got everything. Yeah.

It's all covered.

Elena got a new lamp.

I did. She loves lamp.

I do love, I love that lamp.

It's a good lamp.

Yeah.

And Aiden's working on a cleaning drawer.

There you go. Ice machine cleaner.

Ice machine cleaner. Guys, we found our ice machine cleaner.

I knew we had some somewhere. Yeah.

Somebody said that and I wanted to throw out the ice machine.

You did.

So I am sorry.

And we said, no, I think we have cleaner.

Yeah.

But yeah. So that's exciting. We're feeling good. We're feeling fancy free. I have to get kids to after-school activities.

And I have to help.

That's all the business that I'm gonna do today.

Me too.

Uh, so whoever is timing, this was an easy one.

Quick one, Ralphie.

Ralphie, you got it.

All right. Let's go.

So we're talking about an exorcism. Yeah, we haven't got there yet. We've not gotten to the exorcism, but we've gotten to a part.

Okay.

In the story where we have gotten priests involved.

A Jesuit priest?

A Jesuit priest.

Yep.

We had a couple of priests who were like, no thank you.

Don't wanna.

We had some that were like, seems like you should call a doctor.

And then they were like, too far. And they were like, no. What was it?

Too far.

So far, too long, can't go.

So sorry. I don't remember.

I don't either.

It was funny, whatever it was.

It was pretty funny.

Things are going to get wild in this part though.

You kept mentioning a trial in part 1, so I don't— yeah, I had a feeling it would get wild.

It doesn't end well. This does not end well. It's a very upsetting ending, actually. I don't recommend you look up pictures of this case, personally.

I heard there's also a really bad recording.

Yeah, there's tapes, there's recordings. The pictures are just very jarring. I know that some people, when they hear that, they'll run to go look at them, but I recommend you not do that. It's pretty upsetting. She's like a beautiful young girl. And the pictures of during this are very scary.

Oh.

So yeah, there's that. Now, when we last left off, we had talked about how she was smelling things that no one else could smell and sometimes other people could smell. It smelled like it was coming from her at times. There were some strange physical things happening. Now, when Anneliese and her mother first made contact with Father Alt, who we talked about in part 1, that was in late 1973. And it was arranged through one of the priests in their church. A lot of times, this is what happened in this case. There was a lot of, like, one priest says to go contact this one or arranges the communication with another one. It's priest networking. Exactly. And Father Karl Roth, a young priest who was close to Father Alt, So, it was those 2 priests that got them in contact with Father Alt. So, Roth was working under Father Alt at the time and had received all the information from Anneliese's mother, which he then passed on to Father Alt. Father Alt had passed on getting involved because he thought it was worthy of medical intervention. We talked about him in the first one. He was just like, I think you should contact a doctor, actually.

Right.

But Roth's interest in the case had only grown since he heard about this. He was fascinated.

I mean, it is a fascinating story.

It is. It's just, for sure, I don't think I mean, there's absolutely no way of telling this, whether— what his intentions were with this. I do think it comes off a lot of times like a lot of it was wanting to kind of get ahead in his career and looking at it that way.

Okay. So that can be a little bit messy.

It can, and it gets messy here. Now, in the Michel exorcism case, Father Ernest Alt plays a significant role. role here. In fact, you could argue that without his involvement, a lot of this wouldn't have set in motion as it did. I'm not saying it's completely anybody's fault, but—

Yeah.

Now, according to Felisa Tas-Goodman, who we have in the show notes, in the case of Father Alt, we are dealing with an abnormal personality in the wildest sense of the term. During the multiple psychiatric examinations he underwent in the late 1970s, The evaluating psychologist noted, quote, parts of his history even suggest the presence of a psychosis of the schizophrenic type.

Oh, so he may have had schizophrenia?

Yeah. So there's other stuff going on here.

Oh, okay. That's interesting.

Now, the evaluations of Alt are a little confusing because they indicate that he both shows signs of a psychotic disorder, but is otherwise completely, like, functional and... It doesn't seem to, like, affect a lot of his daily life.

So he may have just been medicated.

Potentially, maybe.

Okay.

Now, it's possible that, you know, he is a Catholic priest. I don't know if they're like— if you're getting the full story here, or if they're treading lightly on certain things, these evaluations. I'm not positive. Because, like, instead of labeling his delusions and hallucinations as symptoms of psychosis, the doctors refer to them as pseudo-hallucinations.

Oh.

But regardless of how they were labeled, it does appear that Father Alt's interactions with the family would be influenced by those hallucinations.

Yeah.

Now—

I kind of feel like you're, like, hallucinating or you're not.

Yeah, I would think that too.

I don't know what a pseudo-hallucination is.

Not really sure how you just, like, kind of hallucinate.

Just a touch.

Like, I don't know, maybe a little.

Just a dabble, do ya?

Now, it was in the fall of 1975 that Roth finally managed to convince Father Alt to visit the family. In a letter to Bishop Josef Stangl, Alt wrote, quote, in the evening, I took a walk with my friend, Father Roth, and once more, as we talked about Anneliese Michel, we smelled the same series of stenches described by Anneliese and her mother. Finally, now I heard some of the details of the girl's affliction.

And this was while they were on a walk, talking about it.

Just talking about it.

With her.

Yeah, just talking about it.

That's weird.

This, it turned out, was not the first time that Alt had experienced hallucinations in connection with this particular case. Just a few months earlier, he saw a vision of, quote, the living Christ on the cross calling out to him.

Well, he's a priest.

You know, between the stories of Anneliese's symptoms and the hallucinations, Father Alt was convinced that this was a genuine possession. And he was like, I have to meet with this family.

Okay.

Now, in the 2 years that she had been enrolled in classes at the university, Anneliese's life had continued to spiral downward in some, like, pretty remarkable ways. At first, she was simply anxious and very exhausted all the time. She told the psychologist, in the morning, I wake up listlessly and really don't feel like getting up.

Same, sister.

Her struggles and disposition were also confirmed by her roommate, Ursula, who said, during the first few weeks at school, Anneliese was completely withdrawn and went to lectures only if we dragged her.

Oh, man.

Now, things did improve slightly in early 1974, When Anneliese met a young man named Peter at a local dance and they started dating.

Oh, nice. Yeah.

So Ursula, her roommate, said it completely revived her.

Wow.

Anneliese often went dancing and bowling with him, things she was not interested in before.

Oh, that makes me sad that there was like a little glimmer of hope.

And it seemed like after years of, like, true depression, friends and family were overjoyed to see her coming back to life in a way they hadn't seen in so many years at this point. Now, unfortunately, Anneliese's embrace of this whole new life and love, it was short-lived because just a few weeks after they started dating, she ended her relationship with Peter.

Oh.

She said, quote, I often get terribly depressed and I'm not good company for anybody.

Oh, that's so sad.

Now, not willing to let go of the relationship entirely, Peter insisted they remain friends. He sounds like a good kid.

Yeah, he does.

And he wanted to see each other socially. He was like, I don't want to just, like, not Well, it sounds like he was like, you're not too much. Yeah.

You know?

And this was despite Annalise's frequent attempts to rebuff him. She was like— 'cause she's thinking— 'cause this isn't like, I don't want to be around you. This is, I don't think I'm good enough to— like, social enough to be around you.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know? Now, um—

And he's just saying, like, let's be friends.

Yeah, exactly. And she would say, you know, I cannot feel what you feel for me. 'Cause she was basically saying, I can't feel.

Yeah, period.

Like, I'm having trouble with basic emotions.

Right.

Determined though, Peter insisted she would feel love if she let herself do so. Anneliese replied, you do not— you don't understand. I cannot feel any love at all. I am all numb, sort of. I can't feel emotions like that.

Oh my God, this is so sad.

And I think Peter was seeing— 'cause he seems like a good kid, like he was really trying to get her out of this.

Yeah.

I think he was trying to be like, I see what's happening here, and you're kind of like self-sabotaging, and I'm trying to get you out of it.

And you deserve love.

Now, in retrospect, any psychologist would identify the things Anneliese was saying and feeling as symptoms of profound chronic depression.

Yeah, like severe.

Unfortunately, in the 1970s, mental health and the issues surrounding it were not spoken of publicly, and treatment for mental health was definitely not routinely encouraged.

Nah. They were like, why don't you just do some cocaine about it? Yeah.

So, as evidenced by her parents' discussion of mental illness in, like, very hushed tones and don't let anyone find out about it, Anneliese, too, would likely, you know, have understood depression or any other mental illness as a subject that was, like, deeply covered in shame and stigma.

Yeah.

Also, after so many failed, but, like, pretty inconsistent and half-hearted attempts to treat her depression, in my opinion, Anneliese had already decided her problems were of a spiritual matter and not something that could be treated by medical doctors.

Okay.

Now, to make matters worse, where once her parents had placed their faith in science and medicine and encouraged Anneliese to see specialists, by the time she entered her second year at university, her— at least her mother's perspective on the matter had changed. Anna had said of her daughter, Anneliese was a kind, loving, sweet, and obedient girl, but when she was possessed, it was something unnatural, something that you can't explain. Every weekend, when classes would end for the week, Anneliese took the train home to see her parents and sisters in Klingenberg. And visiting home each weekend would definitely have provided, like, a sense of stability for her. But that stability did not do a whole lot to help with her erratic symptoms. By 1974, she had abandoned any attempts to hide her unusual behavior when she was around her family. According to her mother, quote, she would perform 600 genuflections a day, eventually rupturing her knee ligaments.

What is a genuflection? Praying.

Like getting down on your knees to pray. Like genuflecting is like bowing in respect, like respect and prayer.

Okay.

So getting down on your knees 6 times. That is according to her mother. That is obviously—

Wow.

Yeah. And she said she ruptured her knee ligaments. Oh.

Yeah. Ouch.

Sometimes she could also be found— this is according to her parents as well. Sometimes they said she could be found crawling around on the kitchen floor like an animal, and her parents would sometimes hear her yelling and crying alone in her bedroom. That's really sad.

A lot.

Yeah. Now, the reports from Anneliese's mother regarding her behavior at this time differ significantly from those documented by the mental health workers at the school's counseling center, where Anneliese continued to seek treatment.

Okay.

According to her psychologist, Dr. Lenner, Anneliese was, quote, a textbook case of a young girl suffering from a neurosis clearly caused by a father who had never understood her and a mother whom she hated with a fury. Since she would not let her have boyfriends and would even forbid her to go dancing.

Interesting, because it seems like her and her mom have been in this together.

It's true.

But then when she's away at school, is she confiding a bit?

And you wonder. And when she was growing up, her mother did, because she was in poor health, she said, when she was younger, younger, she did encourage her to not socialize as much, remember? Because she was worried about it happening again. So, she did kind of, you know, she wanted to go to dances, and she would be like, no, let's not do that. So, maybe that did come back around later as, like, a little bit of resentment.

Yeah.

But again, that's complete— just us looking at it from the outside in. And that's what her psychologist said.

Damn.

Now, again, we'll never know what information Dr. Lenore based this assessment of Annalise on, or whether, you know, like you just said, whether she had been particularly selective about what parts of her life she shared with whom. But she does appear to have taken a liking to Dr. Lenore.

Okay.

At least to the extent that she felt more comfortable sharing things with him than she did with her other doctors. So there's good reason to believe that this is honest.

Yeah.

Now, at the end of '74, uh, as it approached, Anneliese found her life almost unbearable.

I mean, I—

Yeah.

Can't believe that she's made it thus far.

She continued to be plagued by hallucinations of that terrible grimacing face that continued to remind her of her damnation, and her religious paranoia was growing deeper and deeper. She believed she was surrounded by evil forces all the time. Peter remained a constant presence in her life, and though she continued to refuse to see him romantically, she did come to rely on him in a way that she had previously relied on her parents.

Okay.

Now, at the same time, Father Alt, Father Roth, and Father Rodewick became— um, he became like Father Rodewick had initially said no, but came back and decided to be a part of this.

Okay.

They became a more constant presence in her life. All 3 continued to have an interest in the case, but maintained they would not be permitted by the bishop to perform an exorcism. Father Alt told Anneliese on a visit to see him in the summer of '74, what you need is to adopt a strict religious lifestyle under the guidance of a spiritual counselor.

Okay.

In September, Anneliese wrote a long letter to Father Alt in which she detailed all the negative experiences she was having at the time, ranging from her symptoms to the ongoing tensions with her mother, which seems to have cropped up.

Okay.

Um, she said, I admit that things have become somewhat better. Still, I am not all right yet. Peter no longer wants to come to our house because he cannot be alone with me, and because Mama behaves in such an impossible way.

Oh.

Like many of Anneliese's interactions with doctors and priests, the letter reflects somebody struggling with powerful depression and the symptoms that left her feeling, you know, unmoored, essentially.

Uh-huh, yeah.

From her life, from her family, from the community, from everything.

Right.

And what the letter does not depict is a girl obsessed with demons and with demonic possession.

It feels like she just has no sense of autonomy. Yeah.

She just doesn't know what's going on.

For various reasons.

Now, this, again, is an instance where the various accounts of Anneliese's life are in direct conflict with one another. In her words, via her letter to Father Alt, she appears to be struggling with poor mental health and desperately seeking help. At the church, on the other hand, It was a matter of an acute spiritual crisis. Uh, Thea Hain, uh, frequently told Anneliese's mother, the child is being hounded by demons. I know what I'm talking about. I've seen possessed people before. If you're involved with religious matters as much as I am, you would know these things.

Okay, girl, maybe chill. Yeah.

Now, just a few days after Father Alt got that letter from Anneliese, he got a call from Thea requiring— uh, inquiring as to why they had not approved an exorcism. She really wanted that exorcism done.

Apparently.

Um, Father Alt had only spoken to her on one other occasion, Thea Hein, and he said she was very excited and told me that something should be done. He remembered her as the woman who, quote, bragged about having discovered Anneliese. And by the way, I'm saying Thea or Thea. It might be Thea. I just can't find an actual thing, so I'm just saying it how my mouth decides to say it first.

Period.

Uh, but just so everybody knows. But Father Alt politely explained that they had done everything they could for Anneliese and that he was not able to bring the case to her— to his superiors, particularly since it appeared as though the problem had improved.

Yeah.

She was asking for help and she was safe at school. Yeah. As far as Thea— I'm gonna say Thea.

There you go.

Was concerned, if Anneliese was going to get meaningful help from the church, things would have to get much worse.

Oh.

Yeah.

Worse?

Yeah. 'Cause obviously they're saying things are getting better. They're not gonna do an exorcism. So she's like, gotta get some demons, I guess.

Sounds like we have demons of a sort. Yeah.

So throughout the late '60s and early '70s, Anneliese saw a variety of different doctors. We talked about, like, you know, the variety of ailments, physical and psychological. And they all more or less agreed that she suffered from epilepsy. and serious depression, but none believed she was possessed.

No.

According to Goodman, even Father Alt, a supposed authority on demonic possession, quote, was only half convinced she needed priestly help at all. Yet by the spring of '75, Anneliese was thoroughly convinced she was possessed and the only solution was an exorcism.

Okay.

That semester, Anneliese was given her own room in the dorms, which really only made the situation worse.

Yeah.

And gave her the opportunity to isolate herself from her friends. who she came to believe didn't understand her situation and didn't take her seriously.

Okay.

Ursula, her former roommate, said, we continued living on the same floor, but from that time on, it was no longer possible for us to establish close contact with her. She became very uncommunicative and literally segregated herself from us.

Yeah.

Instead, she chose to spend time— her time and attention on those who she felt were supportive of her drive for an exorcism.

Okay, and that's who?

Including Peter, her mother, and the small group of, quote, religious zealots she had befriended in recent years. Oy vey.

Yeah.

Now, by June, Anneliese's belief in her possession had started to manifest in some, like, pretty bizarre and shocking ways. She continued experiencing waves of terror related to her, you know, that face.

Yeah.

And her belief that her soul was damned and that the world was coming to an end soon. I've been there. Right? We've all been there. Anneliese told a friend that summer, I didn't know of any reason why I should be damned, but inside of me, I kept hearing a voice that was trying to convince me that I was.

Huh.

It was around that time that friends started noticing her aversion to religious icons and language suddenly.

Which her mom had seen previously. Yes.

One afternoon while visiting her friend Maria and another friend, Anneliese shouted at the women, please stop praying. It hurts. I can't stand it.

So she must have stopped praying 600 times a day at this point. Apparently.

Maria and the other women— and the other woman told Anneliese that neither of them had been praying.

Oh.

But Anneliese was unconvinced. And on that same day, Maria also witnessed Anneliese throw her rosary into the corner of the room.

Okay.

Yeah. These experiences were alarming on their own, obviously.

Yeah.

But what Maria found more concerning was that when Anneliese told her she was no longer going to church.

Okay.

She said, it's no use. I can only get as far as the door and not a step further. So she physically couldn't go to church, she said.

All right.

She had gone to church regularly for years and found great solace there for a long time.

Yeah.

So Maria couldn't fathom why she would suddenly give up her attendance and also why she was saying, I literally can't get in the front door. Yeah.

This is a lot.

Yeah. The more time passed, the more unusual and unnerving the behavior started to become. The same month she had an outburst while visiting Maria, Anneliese's mother began noticing that Anneliese appeared to be having some difficulty walking. Her legs seemed incredibly stiff, like they wouldn't bend at the knees, and she walked like she was walking on stilts.

Was that because she tore her knee ligaments?

Perhaps. Her mom said she held on to the furniture and walked that way, pulling herself along. By July, her symptoms were becoming more physical and decidedly more extreme. Speaking to an investigator a few years later, a friend recalled an incident she found very alarming.

Oh, man.

She said, I sat with her in her room, and her boyfriend Peter was also present. Suddenly, right in the middle of the conversation, her face contracted into a real frazze, like that grimacing face, a hideous grimacing countenance that I cannot describe in detail. Her body became completely stiff. Her boyfriend explained to me that her condition was due to the fact that she was possessed. So he is now—

He's convinced.

He is part of this. I too thought that it must be possession, for her grimace was so demonic that I could not think of anything else.

That's so scary. That would scare the shit out of me.

Yeah. Now, by the end of the month, things had escalated even further. According to her mother, Anneliese, quote— and this is according to her mother— Anneliese, quote, ate spiders. coal, and bit the head off a dead bird.

Oh, that's really dangerous, Mama!

She even licked her urine off the floor, and could be heard through the walls screaming for hours.

Yeah. I— I don't know. I think she needs so much help.

Yeah, she does.

Like, I feel like she should have been—

She needs a lot of medical help, and psychological help.

Yeah, like, she needs a lot of psychological help. Yeah, we don't need to be I don't think she needs an exorcism. If you're getting to the point where you're, like, eating dead birds and licking urine off the floor, that's really, really far gone.

Well, and by then she was only sleeping 1 or 2 hours a night and would often spend the rest of the night, quote, running through the house or in prayer and screaming to Jesus Christ for mercy, destroying rosaries or religious pictures hanging on the wall. Why are we not bringing her to a hospital? Yeah.

For psychiatric care.

I think that's what a lot of people asked later. Yeah.

Like, during the trial. I can't imagine, like, much— like, having a child and this is—

And not immediately taking them to get help.

But I would absolutely be, like, taking them to the hospital one way or the other.

She was still continuing to visit Father Alt regularly, and he said in a statement to the state attorney, she was in deep despair. She did want to pray because she immediately got her rosary and sat down. But after 3 Ave Marias, I could see she was unable to continue. She suddenly began screaming loudly. I could feel a terrible cold that was radiating from her.

Interesting.

It was during this meeting that Father Alt became convinced of her possession.

I mean, I guess with the cold.

Sure. I mean, poor circulation is a thing as well.

Truth.

Uh, but after tracking down Bishop Stangl at the address where he was vacationing, Alt managed to convince the bishop that Anneliese was in desperate need of an exorcism. But he was only willing to approve the small one, meaning a minor exorcism.

Not a major?

Not a major one.

Okay.

On August 3rd, Father Alt and Father Roth arrived at their house, at the family's house in Klingenberg. Roth said, in our presence, Anneliese Michel once more showed evidence that she was molested by demons, but this molestation was not as strong as my pre— during my previous visit.

Okay.

The 2 priests began reading prayers and reciting the small exorcism, quote unquote, which caused Anneliese to writhe uncomfortably. She shouted, stop, it's burning! As she tried to knock the book from Roth's hands.

Okay.

When the 2 priests left the house that evening, they were more convinced than ever that they would— they were dealing with a genuine possession. The minor exorcism appeared to have improved her condition, but If they were to perform the full rite of exorcism, they would need Bishop Stangl's permission for that.

Okay.

And they thought, we got so far, we need the full rite.

I also find it so interesting that, like, one guy just has to be like, hell yeah, that's just the vibe.

The bishop. Now, while Alt and Roth began building their case for the bishop, Anneliese's behavior worsened again. She spent most nights running through the house screaming and praying. She refused to eat, explaining that the demons would not allow it. Yet she continued consuming non-food items like coal and dead flies.

Where is she finding dead flies?

Every good exorcism movie has dead flies everywhere.

Okay.

So I don't know.

But this is real. This is for real life. Yeah, for real life.

I'm sorry.

You needed that. I needed that.

I'm uncomfortable.

That was like, these are for me.

Yeah. Now, during a visit with Father Rodewick in late August, Anneliese insisted she was infested with many demons. but the primary one was Judas Iscariot.

I'd never heard of him.

Father Rodewick said her face—

I don't know her.

I don't know her.

Rolls up windows.

Father Rodewick said her face betrays hostility, as we often see it portrayed on pictures of the Judas kiss. Judas is like—

The guy that stabbed Caesar?

We should all just—

we should totally just stab Caesar!

No, Brutus is the one who stabbed Caesar. Caesar, Judas is the one that betrayed Jesus.

Jesus, right, right. They're both betrayers.

They are, and they run. So, come on. Hello.

We should totally just stab Judas.

Never trust an— an—

Udis.

Honestly, that's like words— words for life, okay? I want you all to take those with you.

Words for life.

Words for life.

Never trust—

Where did that come from? I made it up. Never trust an Ootis.

Ootis.

I like it. Don't do it.

So the man that betrayed Jesus, Judas, was within her.

I think there's portrayals and pictures and paintings of Judas. I think there's a Judas kiss. I think he kisses Jesus before he betrays him. Like, I think that's part of the lore. I might be lying through my fucking teeth.

I'm gonna Google it while you talk.

I think there is. I'm not, I'm not.

Okay. Does Judas kiss? I, I, I did a little bit.

Wait, no, I think you're correct. I did. I dabbled when I was little.

No, no, no. You did some good dabbling. But, but yes, Judas does kiss Jesus in the New Testament.

Um, 'cause I think it's the whole idea of like, you know, gimme a kiss on the forehead before you betray me kind of thing. Like, that's like a thing.

Yeah.

So I think there are pictures, again, like that, that represent the Judas kiss before the betrayal.

And she's—

And they're saying her face had this hostility to it that she was trying to hide, like Judas had in the pictures, like a hidden agenda kind of thing. Period. Period. That's what I'm taking it as.

Okay.

As a former child of Catholicism. Wow.

That would be a good band name. Former Child of Catholicism. We are former child of Catholicism.

former child of Catholicism!

See, it works.

Yeah, I like it.

It works.

So Anneliese— and this is really rough. Bring it back to ground.

Take it back now, y'all.

Anneliese had also started to injure herself in ways that her mother interpreted as stigmata. But I think she was just injuring herself in the process of, like, doing these things.

Injuring yourself is not stigmata. No.

That fall, Father Alt recruited another influential priest, which— priest influencers, who knew?

Not me.

His name is Father Arnold Renz, and he had brought him on in an effort to, like, really get Bishop Stangl's approval for this exorcism. They were like, we gotta get some clout.

Big guns in here.

For this. Although Stangl had twice denied their request for the full rite of exorcism. He had important things to do. He said— yeah, he was like, no, I'm busy.

Said, my followers don't approve.

In late September 1975, he sent a letter that granted Renz And all permission to perform the full rites.

The bishop.

Yeah.

Okay.

Now, Anneliese's exorcism began on September 23rd, 1975.

That's today. That's literally today.

What the fuck?

Right? It's the 23rd, isn't it?

No, it is.

Bitch.

Guys, I know it seems like we do this show perfect. We don't do this.

I'm not kidding you. No, we were supposed to record this 2 days ago.

We were supposed to record this. This is the 3rd day that we have sat down to record this. I'm not kidding you.

And you, you know you should believe us, because you know how we are.

Exactly!

Like, come on.

Like, what? I'm not— Whoa!

That's weird.

That's weird!

Also, um—

Why does that happen?

I think somebody said we— her birthday was like, like, right before, um, like, when the last one came out.

I don't know what to do with this.

That's weird.

But I promise you, we didn't do it on purpose. So today was her exorcism, which is insane.

Holy shit.

Yeah.

I have like— I actually do have chills from that.

I do too. That's crazy. Well, it would unfold over the course of nearly 9 months.

What?

Oh, 9 Months.

I thought you were gonna say hours, and I was gonna be appalled at that.

No, 9 months. In that time, the 2 priests performed the Rite of Exorcism 67 times.

That, and like, I'm really gonna die on this hill, should not be legal.

No.

That should not be legal.

Because each of those Rites of Exorcism, the 67 Rites of Exorcism, lasted several hours.

That should not be legal.

And while that was happening, she's going through incredible physical exertion and, like, psychological exertion. Like, there's so much stress.

So no wonder why the bishop was like, yeah, you're not going to get my permission from this. Yeah.

Or to do this for a while. It's like, why are you doing this 67 times in 9 months? Like, are you serious?

9 months?

Many of these sessions were recorded on audiotape. Journalist Erik Hansen said, Um, Anneliese's recorded voice can still send shivers up your spine. It is the voice of a demon, growling, barking, inhuman, and surprisingly like the voice of Linda Blair in The Exorcist, which had been released in Germany 2 years earlier. Huh.

Yeah.

Now, again, scary.

Yeah.

Because it's a scary voice, and it's not one that's easy to—

Contort.

Yeah. Throughout the sessions, Anneliese can be heard screaming, praying, and shouting at the priests as they read. through, like, the rites of exorcism. The demons— now, this is wild— the demons would often identify themselves. There was 6.

Okay.

As Lucifer.

Yeah.

You know him?

I do.

I'm familiar. Judas.

Now I'm familiar.

Iscariot. Nero.

Oh, we've heard of Nero before. Satan.

Cain from the Bible.

Yep.

Adolf Hitler.

Oh.

Yep, he was there. And Valentin Fleischmann. I looked him up because I said, who's that guy? Yeah, he has a last name. I feel like he's real. He was a 16th century priest in Frankfurt who was apparently defrocked and excommunicated for alcohol consumption and was eventually charged with murder.

Fuck.

Which is like a weird one to pick. Yeah, like, like what a niche— what a niche demon.

That's niche indeed.

You know, like that one's like, what? It's, it's just 6 of them is a lot.

6 feels—

6 feels right.

Yeah.

If you're gonna have demons—

666.

Yeah, there you go.

I like—

I like that you went there. Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

I feel like 6 is like— because isn't that like the devil's number?

Yeah, I think it's something— who knows? Yeah, I think it's like a yucky number in Catholicism. Now throughout it all, Anneliese continued to refuse food, and she stopped taking her medication.

But this is 9 months?

9 months. She was surrounded by her family and several members of the church, including Thea, Thea. At one point, Altenrenz instructed Thea, or Thea, to hold Anneliese down as they read the rite. But she claimed she found her arms had become unbearably heavy and she couldn't move.

Okay.

Now, if the priests seemed unconcerned about Anneliese's physical health, it's likely because they were convinced she would not die.

They didn't think she was gonna die?

No.

Through 9 months of this shit? No.

On a visit from their local parish priest, Father Habegger, the man asked Father Rodewick, won't the demons kill her? And he replied, no, there's no record of that. The demons are allowed to torment a person, but not to kill him.

Do we feel like demons follow rules? That was my first question, was like, is there a rule book that they follow?

Like, did they sign something? Do they have a Ten Commandment thing?

Will it hold up in a court of law?

I don't think so.

How do you sue a demon? Exactly.

There's a lot— there's a lot of questions to be answered there.

Lots of loopholes.

But regardless of what demons want or are allowed to do, a human body has certain requirements in order to function.

I've heard that.

And during this period, several of Anneliese's essential needs were going completely unmet.

Such as food?

She ate very little. She barely drank water. She slept in short bursts, and when she was awake, she was often being subjected to a harsh and exhausting ritual for hours on end. During which she thrashed and twisted around like a fish out of water. She screamed herself hoarse so she would lose her voice. During these sessions, she would often sustain injuries to her face and arms, either from her own hands or the hands of those holding her down.

That's so sad.

During this period, Anneliese rarely left the house, especially towards the end. She was surrounded by people who believed unquestioningly in her possession and in the guidance of Fathers Alt and Renz. And those from outside the small social circle, uh, you know, that she really didn't have contact with were just as religious and acted on the advice of priests as well. So, like, she didn't have anyone that was stepping in to help her. For example, in December, a local doctor, Dr. Roth— there's 2 Roths, okay, a priest and a doctor, okay— he visited the house to check on Anneliese, and after spending only a few minutes with her, he sat down to talk to Father Alt. And according to those present for the conversation, Father Alt asked whether the doctor would be willing to return if there was a medical emergency. Roth indicated that he would. However, he reportedly told the priest there was little he would be able to do for the girl, saying, quote, there are no injections against the devil.

We think a doctor said that?

Also, Dr. Roth, baby, we are not asking you to inject her against the devil. We're saying if she has a medical emergency, which is a physiological emergency, that you take care of that.

Yeah, there are injections for emergencies.

No one asked you to bring an injection for the devil. Like, that was never on the table. That's not what that means.

No.

Now, the last time Father Alt saw Anneliese was June 8th, 1976.

Good day.

By that time, she weighed around £65.

£65?

And was— Looked incredibly ill.

And she's, like, in her early 20s.

I think she was 23. Yeah, 23.

Oh my God.

So she was 23.

Oh my God.

She was unable to move without assistance. She had developed pneumonia. Her parents informed him that she was refusing to eat, and whenever they tried to force her, she would spit it out. In a letter written to the bishop later that month, Father Alt recalled the extent of the self-inflicted injuries that she sustained. Her front teeth were chipped and jagged after she tried to bite a hole in the bedroom wall.

Oh my God!

She had superficial cuts from running headfirst through a glass door, and her arms were covered with bite marks.

She should have been sent to a hospital.

Yeah.

She should have been sent to a fucking hospital.

About a million times.

All of these adults, priests, and everyone else should be in prison.

Yeah. Father Alt wrote, in various conversations that I have had with her recently, she gave me to understand that things would get very bad again with her. Now, are they not bad right now? The final exorcism occurred on June 30th. Several days earlier, Anneliese had a fever, and Father Renz suggested they call the doctor, but Anneliese refused.

Well, she doesn't have to call the doctor. You guys can call the doctor.

By all accounts, the session was relatively mild, and the only remarkable moment came at the end when Anneliese reportedly sat up and said, please, absolution, at which point Father Renz absolved her of her sins.

What are her sins?

Later that night, Anneliese's mother lay with her for a while as she tried to sleep, but she was eventually forced out of the room when Anneliese began thrashing around until she was eventually too exhausted to move and fell asleep.

Okay.

The next morning, Josef, her father, went to check on Anneliese around 7:30 a.m. He said, I went to the door of her room. She lay in bed and did not move. I assumed that she was asleep. So he went to work, and just after he arrived, he got a telephone call from his wife saying that Anneliese was dead.

I'm sorry, but are you in shock?

I don't know how you survive this in any capacity.

Like, it's a wonder she survived for as long as she did.

Yeah, it really is. Now, the news of Anneliese's death came as a shock to everyone.

No, it didn't.

not just the community, but around the country and into other parts of Europe.

Okay, maybe around the country.

Erik Hansen wrote, what shocked Germany most was the fact that it could happen in a country that prides itself on being highly rational and highly secularized. Not only had the family and the priests put Anneliese through an exhausting and brutal ordeal, but they had continued to do so even when it was clearly killing her.

She got to the point where she weighed £65.

Yeah.

Those people should all be ashamed of themselves.

Her teeth were chipped. She had bruises and cuts all over her body.

Pneumonia.

According to Franz Barthel, who covered the story for the regional German press, the surprising thing was that the people connected to Michel were all completely convinced that she had really been possessed. Now, Anneliese's family and church community may have believed that they were right to prioritize her eternal soul over her physical health, but the state vehemently denied— disagreed.

I'm with the state here.

Just days after her death, authorities opened an investigation into the circumstances. According to the pathologist who conducted the postmortem exam, her death was not caused by natural causes, as the priests had suggested, but to— but by, quote, starvation and dehydration due to inadequate nutrition and fluid intake.

Yeah, there's nothing natural about this.

She had been literally starved to death.

Over a period of 9 months.

The pathologist also noted that her internal organs and brain showed no signs of damage. According to the prosecution's medical experts, her death was entirely avoidable. Wow. And they had said several times that if she had received medical attention, she could have come through this.

I would think so.

So they said that at any point, if they stepped in with medical attention, she could have probably pulled through. Yep.

Makes sense.

Despite the charges— but despite the investigation and the public outrage, Father Alt and Father Renz remained convinced that they did the right thing and were only being attacked because of anti-religious bias.

No, babe, that's not anti-religious bias.

You guys helped kill a girl.

You did.

That's good. That's a problem. Father Alt said there were articles by journalists entirely unfamiliar with the case. The anti-church press seized on it and dubbed the whole matter medieval.

It is.

Father Renz was equally self-assured. Just one month after her death, Renz appeared in a 45-minute television special on the case where he played one of the tapes as proof of her possession. When he was asked how he would justify his actions, Renz replied, The devil does not reside in a dead body.

In my opinion—

The devil does not reside in a dead body.

Yeah. In my opinion, again, opinion, this is shared religious psychosis.

Oh, absolutely.

This is bananas.

This is, like, a truly tragic case of that.

Like, this is— this girl was failed.

Yeah. Although the case was shocking to nearly everyone, there was definitely an understanding within the justice system that the prosecution of 2 priests was undesirable and highly controversial.

I mean, yeah.

The investigators on the case dragged their feet for nearly a year, conducting what the public prosecutor called, quote, a year of extremely complicated inquiries. Finally, in July '77, all 4 were charged with manslaughter through criminal neglect.

As they should be.

Stangl, the bishop, wasn't charged, even though he authorized the exorcism.

That's interesting to me.

German sources indicate an investigation concerning negligent homicide, but it was discontinued.

Hmm.

In February of 1978, a nun had a vision that Anneliese's body was lying in its grave completely intact. Her parents, who are also on trial here— they put her parents on trial.

They were charged as well.

Her parents demanded she be exhumed, and unfortunately she was.

Why?

And she was adequately decayed for the time she had been in the grave. A statement from a newspaper article about the exhumation said, The view of the parents proved itself untenable. The decay of the girl's body, which had been in the ground a year and a half, was far advanced. The trial began the following March, and the lawyers for all 4 essentially argued that Anneliese had not only consented to the exorcism, but had enthusiastically pursued and demanded it.

But you also have to take her frame of mind into reference.

So they have on trial, like, they have Alt and Renz on trial and the parents. They, they also argued that the accused had in fact tried to help Anneliese, but she refused food, medicine, and most liquids. Now, in the end, the court was unconvinced by the argument and agreed with the prosecution that Alton Renz should and must have been able to recognize that Anneliese was in danger, and there was ample time for any of the 4 defendants to prevent her death.

Yes.

All 4 were found guilty of manslaughter. After reading the verdict, Judge Elmer Bolender acknowledged that the defendants firmly believed Anneliese was demonically possessed. But, he added, this belief does not exude recognizing other facts too, like the fact that Anneliese desperately needed medical attention.

Mm-hmm.

As a result, Alt and Renz were given a 3-year suspended sentence, which was a more severe punishment than the prosecution had sought.

Oh.

Yeah. The Michels, on the other hand, were largely spared any meaningful punishment on the grounds that they had lost their daughter and therefore had suffered enough.

Okay.

Eventually, the church actually reconsidered everything about cases like this and how they should handle them. Like, this really set into motion a lot of thought into this.

I would hope so.

Even Bishop Stangl publicly said that exorcism was not supposed to take the place of medical intervention. It was supposed to go alongside. Not long after the sentences were handed down, the case receded from the public eye, and those involved just kind of returned to their lives.

That's wild.

But many years later, following the release of The Exorcism of Emily Rose, a film loosely based on this case, interest in the case was renewed, and several journalists sought to interview the few people close to the case who were still alive. To the surprise of journalists, those they were able to find turned out to have maintained their belief in Anneliese's possession and were as devout as they had been in the 1970s. A German journalist, Franz Barthel, managed to track down, um, Thea Thea Hein for an interview. And, uh, Barthel recalled, she blessed my microphone with holy water because I was working for the radio then, and it was likely that the devil was in control of the microphone.

Get a fucking grip. Get a fucking grip. I'm sorry.

When journalist Elizabeth Day interviewed, um, Anna Michel about her daughter's exorcism, Day asked whether she regretted putting Anneliese through the ritual, and she replied, God told us to exorcise my daughter's demons. I don't regret her death.

I'm gonna stay quiet on that one.

I think we all should stay quiet on that one. And that's the end. That's the— poor Anneliese was tortured to death.

That's so tragic.

Yeah.

It's so tragic. And obviously—

This really is a religious psychosis situation. Yeah.

100%.

I'm not sitting here saying that they didn't believe—

No, I don't.

That she was possessed by demons.

No, I'm sure they did.

I have no idea. Seems like they're sticking to that. So I— that's a long way to go to not actually be convinced that she was possessed by demons. But that in itself is a problem.

Yeah.

Like, that is a problem. That's a human being that needed medical attention.

was denied medical attention and not in a proper mind to say yes or no.

Exactly. It's a horrific case.

It's just so wild that so many people can get together. What is that?

However many priests. So many. I mean, there's like 4 plus priests. The cast of characters and the priests alone are so many.

And then the parents can share. Shared religious psychosis and shared psychosis of any kind is so—

Shared hysteria, all that kind of—

It's so It's so scary, but it's also so, I hate to say it, fascinating.

No, it is. It's fascinating in a deranged way. Because it's like, it's very— Yeah. The human mind is crazy, and we're very vulnerable to being under the thumb of other people's thoughts kind of thing. We're susceptible.

I have so much to say, but so much that I should probably keep to myself. It's scary.

The whole thing is scary. When you read it, you're just like, I just wanted Annalise to get The help for the thing that was clearly happening.

Real help.

She was dealing with chronic depression. Doctors believed she had epilepsy, which is highly treatable with medication.

But maybe the medication just wasn't the right dosage, wasn't the right medication.

Well, and I think the medication requires a lifestyle change as well. So it's like, I think there needed to be some real thought put into what was going on and how they needed to treat it and how she should, you know? And it's like boundaries. And she just didn't get the And it seems like she would've thrived. She sounded like she would've done an amazing job. But it sounds like she was trying to.

It's so sad that the whole way out, the whole way through, she was trying, still going to school.

And then she gave in because that's all there was. I think she was pushed so far into one way, and I think she was being surrounded by people who truly believed that. And when everybody you care about, love, and respect is telling you you're possessed by demons and It's— you need an exorcism.

Obviously you're going to question it.

Eventually you're going to be like, well, yeah, everybody I love and respect is telling me this. Obviously I'm the one who's outside.

It's tragic.

It's really, really tragic.

It's horrific.

It really is.

This segment is brought to you by State Farm. We need a fun fact.

We sure do.

Deborah, Oh, I'm obsessed with this. US coins used to say, mind your business. This is from Reader's Digest.

Mind your business.

The first US coin in circulation said, mind your business, instead of In God We Trust, which, like, we should— topical. We should go back.

Why are we not making— why do they not say that anymore? That's such a valid—

So Ben Franklin was responsible— obviously, like, not the best guy, but he was responsible for coming up with the initial motto. But wording changed to In God We Trust during the Civil War, mainly as a response to increased religious sentiment, according to Snopes.

Damn.

Bring back mind your business.

Mind your business. I like that.

It just reminds me of NeNe Leakes going, close your legs to married men!

I love that a lot. Mind your business.

I'm rewatching Atlanta right now.

That's why it's topical. Wow. I love that.

I love it a lot.

Mind your business, everybody. That honestly, the world needs that statement again.

Or as Dorinda would say, clip!

Clip! Clip!

I like that.

You fool!

Thank you again to our sponsor State Farm for sponsoring this segment. And with that, we hope you mind your business and keep listening.

And we hope you—

Keep it weird! But not so weird that you don't mind your business.

Mind your business.

I love it.