Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Sandra Lynn Sparks on February 25, 2010 at 3:54pm

I have heard from others off the forum, but would still love to hear from members here. In looking into things and hearing from others, I'm not finding that there are any organizations for legal arbitration but am finding there are some of us teaching ethics workshops or writing ethics materials for ghost investigators or, my main concern in this case, people who say they perform exorcisms.

Because no money was exchanged, there was no contract, and the group was invited into the house, this family has no legal recourse that we can see.

When a group goes into a situation like this without any concerns about the ethics of what they are doing, it affects the reputation of everyone in this field. We have to put the ethics standards out there so people with paranormal problems can find help they can trust. So if anyone knows of some good references, of ethics workshops, of materials for groups, please post them here; Thanks!

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Permalink Reply by r. vinny morgan on March 18, 2010 at 9:28am

Hello Sandra,
I think this is a big problem. I've heard of teams coming in and breaking things and others trashing the home with muddy shoes and also scaring the client and doing as you call it rituals in the home.

The first 2 things can be avoided with proper planing and/or reparations. The other 2 things unfortunately are something that cannot be avoided the client holds some responsibility in this aspect if they don't like what they hear they should look for another team to go in and investigate.

Its like taking your car to one mechanic for replacing a fan belt and they tell you you need a tuneup and a new distributor. You take it to another shop and ask them to check it and they say all you need is a new belt and everything else is fine. This like the paranormal incident happen all too often.

Although there is not an BBB for paranormal teams the only thing we can do is to make sure our own teams don't act like that. We had a case of a negative entity we took our evidence to the local church of the clients religion and they thought we were nuts. But I kept trying and found a church that took it seriously. unfortunately the client didn't follow through and the entity came back a few months after we had a religious based team help us do a cleansing.

We advised the client to have a priest bless the home but they didn't. The other team told us it was a low level demon and advised us not to tell the client because it would only upset them more. With a pregnant woman and 3 young girls living in the home the last thing we wanted to do was to upset them even more.

I don't think there is any real answer to solve the problem on our end, because we don't know who the clients are until the damage is done. We maybe should hold as many public lectures as possible to make aware of the type of groups that potential clients should avoid. Go to your local libraries or village halls advertise in the newspaper about the lecture, have 2 or 3 like minded teams in the area go in on any cost if you can't afford it and have them all do a joint lecture on who or what to avoid. Just make sure the Who is not mentioned by name.

Maybe we should advise clients to post a review on Angie's List and/or we should post letters of thanks on our own sites or myspace or facebook pages.

Vinny, Windy City Paranormal.

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Permalink Reply by Sandra Lynn Sparks on March 19, 2010 at 6:11am

Vinny, thanks for responding. The latest update on the situation that prompted this post is that the family is following the advice I gave about taking a neutral approach on how they look at the problem, and are quietly changing the way they are dealing with this, with much less fear. The disabled child is now losing his fear about things, and recently told his Mom he has "killed the ghost." She was worried when he said that, and I told her that it sounded like he had realized he has control over how he deals with this fear, and he has shown since that this may be true.

Kudos to every team like yours that takes the care and respects the clients, the properties, and the entities. Asking for recommendations on Angie's list sounds like a great idea! Talking potential clients through the methods that a team uses might be a good idea as well. When someone comes to me for psychic tutoring, I advise them to read my articles at my psychic school on Squidoo.com to see if my methods are what they are looking for. It means, yes, sometimes I lose clients that are looking for something different, but when clients have sessions with me they have a great experience, because they know ahead of time something of what they are going to get, and they want it. Being upfront helps clients know when we are responsible.

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Permalink Reply by Luis Campos on December 20, 2011 at 4:18pm

hi sandra very nice topic people should be more aware of whose going to your home to investigate 

we always ask our customers if we can used them as references all of them said yes.that`s another way to get the right team in your home.and any way 1 out of 60 investigations are demonic entity's not many people in the Paranormal industry get to experience Demonic Haunting s .another thing is if I have a group in my house and they put there`s shoes in my bed right in the spot I will ask them to get out of my house.I think that`s not Respectful. bottom line always  look for References.can`t go wrong with that. again thank`s for bringing that topic  

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Permalink Reply by Dick Chavez on January 2, 2012 at 2:13pm

 It is unfortunate. Our group has informed a few home owners that they dodged a bullet by finding us. There are some groups around the area that are just young thrill seekers with no remorse to the client. And for older more trusting people it could be a big mistake to not do your research.

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Permalink Reply by Sharon Galloway on March 24, 2013 at 8:06am

just one of the many reasons I refuse to do these types of investigations.  One, the family should never have allowed an underage child to be there, let  alone be exposed to their fears.  This is entire on the shoulders of the family.  

Heres the legal language - the family had "actual knowledge" of the type of investigation that was to be done.  Assuming the family contacted the team and not the other way around, they "opened the door  to this investigation.

As there is no release or written contract however, the family did have an "expectation" that the team would not create harm. This would be the dance of the Plaintiffs lawyer if they take legal action.  The team promoted themselves as "experts" ( a term used too loosely by many ) by saying they had experience in this type of spiritual activity, and therefore the family had a right to rely upon their services.

However - the defendant team lawyers would say the family had the ability and choice to contact ( not contract) the family and review their web sites, ect.  It was the choice of the family and therefore they assumed the risk.

I could go on for another hundred lines, but this could all be remedied by a simple contract between the parties.  The contract would state something to the effect of " we will investigate the property owned or inhabited by ___ and such and such date from this time to that time to be able to discern if the family, group or persons unusual experience can or could be associated with what can be termed as "paranormal".  The team does this free of charge and will supply any and all evidence as per request of the owner, or inhabitant of the property to be investigated.

The type and  depth of investigation will be agreed upon by the parties, and initialed below ( list a bunch of types ) and all follow-up will be validated by another agreement.

Did I mention that I am also "occupy the law.com"?  lol     talk about DEMONS!  and scary stuff.  

OK, seriously, this is out of thin air, but I could write up a really binding contract if you like.  

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Permalink Reply by David Flash Giron FSPI on March 26, 2013 at 11:24pm

   Personally I tend to withhold information that I think may be to risky or hurtful, as in the case of an evil entity or demon they as in the investigator could and would cause a scare and panic that would do nothing but feed the entity with more fear making it stronger. Some things are better left unsaid.

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Permalink Reply by Debra Lynne Katz - Director on March 27, 2013 at 1:57pm

Thank you Sandra for initiating this very important discussion. In fact I believe it's so important, that as the Site Admin/Owner, I'd like to propose that the members of this site put together a list of ethical standard suggestions (not mandates of course but suggestions) that would both protect investigators and those they are seeking to help or investigate (which is not always the same thing IMO, although often it is).

So I'd like to hear what you all think about this Suggestion? I could see this happening two ways, one, is we form a committee and meet in the chat room to hash out the suggestions, or two, we ask members to post what they feel would be important to include on a list, and then we sort through them, compile a list and submit it for final approval of the members and then post as page of standards on this site. 

What do you all think about the above and is there anyone whod like to help Coordinate this project?

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Permalink Reply by Lonnie Walker yesterday

My group merely collects evidence and gives it to the client.  We don't do rituals in someone's house.  I have a spiritualist who will go in only if the family asks for them but my group does not have anything to do with that.  If there is something the spiritualist needs to get rid of, he goes in by himself.  The family is not present and nothing is done in front of the kids.  I do not want to be in that position so I don't put my group in that kind of jam.  The guy we refer them to, reviews the evidence we collected before he does anything.  We make it clear he does not belong to our group and anything that goes on past our investigation, we don't have anything to do with it.  We also let them know that we want to come back just to follow up afterwards.

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