Original subtitles

A lot of headlines come across my desk,

but some stop me in my tracks like this one

about an abandoned house that is so haunted,

the new owner is planning to demolish it.

And it reminds me a lot of the Demon House in Gary, Indiana.

I had to know more, so I started digging,

and in a small town in Nova Scotia, Canada,

there's an abandoned roadhouse that dates back to the early 1900s.

And locals, they're afraid of this place, and so is the new owner.

Its history is dark.

Has something evil inside driven two people to take their own lives?

And now the owner is too frightened to go inside.

Is something demonic lurking in this building?

I'm sending my crew to this small town to learn what the locals know,

to find out the history of this disturbing building,

and to see if a renowned Canadian psychic medium

can get inside, make contact,

and possibly clear the dangerous entities

plaguing a place the locals call

"The Devil's Roadhouse."

[thunder rumbling]

Across every ocean.

[man] It is not too secure and safe to get there.

Lurking deep within the darkness,

evil forces are preying upon the living.

[man] Exorcisms are on the rise in Mexico.

[Zak] I am sending a camera crew across the globe to document these events.

I am Zak Bagans,

and this is Destinations Of The Damned.

[woman] This is your final destination.

[Zak] Mapleton, Nova Scotia

is a tiny town within Cumberland County.

The region is the gateway to Nova Scotia

from New Brunswick and Mainland Canada.

And like many communities,

it needed a lodging house and stagecoach stop.

Because of the severity of this case and people taking their lives

inside this abandoned structure,

said to be inhabited by the devil himself,

it's important to first try and dig into the history.

[Darryl] To understand that particular property,

we've got to understand what was happening at the time

throughout the region.

If you think about a carriage at that time,

they could go about 20 miles

before the horses were really tired.

So from Amherst to Mapleton was 20 miles.

From Oxford to Mapleton was 20 miles.

And then the next day, going down to Parrsboro was another 20 miles.

This place would be a roadhouse at that time,

because what people were doing was they were coming to that area,

spending the night, and people would be able to rest

before taking on the mountain.

[Zak] After serving many years as a respite for weary travelers,

the roadhouse shut down and the land was transformed into a farm.

That is, until 1947,

when the Manuge family bought the property.

It wasn't long before some in the community began wondering

if the house was having a negative effect on the family.

After all, it wasn't uncommon for locals to practice spirit conjuring.

One thing that we know about this particular area,

there were people that were part

of the International Association of Good Templars,

and they used, as part of their ritual,

the idea of knocking.

To invoke the spirit...

...three times, you would knock.

You would ask a yes or no question of the spirit.

[Zak] In all of my paranormal investigations,

I know that any form of spiritual knocking in a series of threes,

indicates the mocking of the Holy Trinity,

and is demonic in nature.

Could these past rituals have summoned

the very devil said to be residing within this forbidden structure?

My film crew heads to Mapleton to meet with Barry Smith,

who knew the Manuge family.

He has agreed to speak with us about his peculiar experiences with them.

Jack, the old fellow, he drove mail for a year or so.

That's how I knew him.

He delivered our mail all around the community.

I'm not gonna say they were private people,

but kept the blinds drawn.

The house was always in dark.

You never knew if they were home or not.

Years passed and the Manuge children grew up, moved out,

and left Jack and his wife, Annie, alone in the house.

[Barry] Well, I know I broke down one day there.

I had to beat on the door for quite a little while

and let him know who I was before he even unlocked the doors.

You know, he'd help you out no matter what.

But it's never... never in the house.

[Zak] Why wouldn't Jack allow anyone inside his home?

Was he protecting people who might attempt to visit?

In 2004, he passed away at the age of 88.

His spouse, Annie, moved into a nursing facility,

and his son, Kevin, and his wife moved back into his childhood home.

But the mysterious circumstances associated

with the roadhouse were far from over.

In fact, death and sorrow were soon to follow.

[Barry] I think that's when Kevin came down, stayed at the house.

He was more withdrawn. He didn't socialize with people.

I know one day I was going up by,

that's when I learned that his wife passed away.

She passed in the house.

[Zak] Kevin's wife had been diagnosed with cancer,

and chose to take her own life inside the house in 2012 at the age of 59.

[Barry] Then after that, he was on his own.

So, pretty sad.

[Zak] Kevin would also end up taking his own life

in the upstairs bathroom a few years later.

A few people were, uh, scared to go by 'cause it's spooky-looking

if you happen to walk by there at night or something.

[Zak] Is there something about this house that makes its inhabitants

close themselves off from the outside world

to the point where they ended their own lives?

[baby crying]

[Zak] Kevin died in 2019.

The house sat empty until it was purchased by Trevor Brennaman,

who bought the home during the COVID-19 pandemic

as a remote place he could escape to.

He bought it sight unseen.

When he arrived for the first time,

he felt there was something following him in the house.

It wasn't long before locals began telling Trevor

the building was cursed by the devil.

[Zak] As my team starts heading to the roadhouse,

they receive a tip that a neighbor wants to speak to them

about her disturbing encounters with the house itself.

The Manuge family and my memories of them,

are basically the house itself.

We were never, and to my knowledge,

nobody was ever allowed in that house.

Any time that there was any visitors,

they were always met outside by Jack Manuge.

There's spots that as a child,

when I was down there, that I... I wouldn't go near.

Something didn't feel right.

So I... I knew I needed to avoid that area.

My memories of Kevin are more recent.

He was going through some things

and his mental health was up and down.

They were great collectors and did not want to get rid of anything.

So I believe there was some hoarding issues that went on.

Um, and then the next thing I heard was he was gone.

The odd time when I'm driving by at night, um,

there's an upstairs window that I usually see a glare of something

coming through the window.

[Zak] As the team is loading up to head to the roadhouse,

Shawna approaches with an unexpected request.

Are you guys going to the house tonight?

[man] Yeah, we're gonna head there right now.

Can I go with you?

I guess so.

I mean, I'm not gonna lie, it could be dangerous.

I am confident that, uh, I can protect myself,

and I can put myself in a... in a safe place.

[Zak] The owner of the roadhouse, Trevor Brennaman,

is too frightened to step foot inside his own building.

And although he's granting us access,

he is not even willing to join us on the property.

Shawna informs my producers that Annie, Kevin's former girlfriend,

has unexpectedly pulled up.

She and Kevin began dating after his wife passed.

She heard we were filming and has come to tell her side of the story.

I was never inside his home.

-[man] Never? -Never, until after his passing.

He was very private, but he would never allow it.

[Zak] Annie and Kevin were still a couple when Kevin ended his life.

-[man] Do you wanna bring us in? -Sure.

[Zak] As they enter for the first time,

they are filled with a sense of anticipation,

along with a feeling of dread.

I have to wonder, why did Kevin not allow Annie to enter into his home?

Is there something dark residing here?

Kevin was a very quiet and private guy,

and I met him many years ago.

That was back when we were just teenagers.

And then we met back up many years later.

He did talk some about his wife that had passed,

and these rooms up here, he never used.

They were... They hadn't used them in years.

I really don't know who had been in the house in many, many years

besides his wife when she was living.

[sniffles]

[crying]

[sniffles]

This was where they found him.

It was right here in the bathroom doorway.

[sighs] Very upsetting.

[Zak] Annie can't shake the feeling that perhaps she could have

done something more to save Kevin.

I blamed myself for a long time

'cause I thought I should have seen it coming.

I should have been able to pick up on things,

and then when you think back,

I would have never guessed that he would have done it.

I looked out my window. I could see his house.

I go to my mailbox. I could see his house.

I go to work. I had to drive by to go to work.

I come by every once in a while.

I'll sit across the road or I'll sit out front and cry, and,

talk to him for a while and then go home.

I feel almost like he doesn't want me in here.

Was that that?

[Zak] Suddenly, my crew hears the sound of footsteps in the stairwell.

[Annie] What was that?

Did you see... I mean, my God, did you...

-[Annie] What was that? -[man] I don't know.

-Where was it? -[man] The sound was here.

It sounds like somebody was walking.

[Zak] The spirit's oppressive atmosphere

is as if the walls themselves hoard the secrets,

whispering tales of the unknown.

Every shadow seems to conceal something malevolent

and is telling the team it's time to get out.

I've invited psychic Jim Hunt to help determine if something dark

is actually inside this home.

He immediately senses something is already attached to one of my camera operators.

So he has something on him that I don't want in the house.

-What's your name? Hi, Nick. -Nick.

-What I'm gonna do is just my hand is gonna get warm. -Mmm-hmm.

[Jim] Hand warm now?

-[Nick] Mmm-hmm. -[Jim chuckles]

It'll go now.

[Nick] That's actually really eerie

how it's like, kind of a lightness has occurred.

-[Jim] It does feel different. -[chuckles] Yes.

[Zak] We have intentionally made certain

Jim has no knowledge of the Manuge family history...

[Jim] Holy [bleep].

[Zak] ...or the reports of paranormal activity in this home.

[Jim] There's a whole bunch of shuffling going inside the house right now.

All on the top floor.

Definitely something in the bathroom.

[Jim] I'm coming in peace. We're gonna talk, okay?

We're just coming in for a visit.

[bleep]

[Zak] A visibly anxious Shawna

is about to enter the Manuge home for the first time.

[Jim sighs] I'm picking up like death in here.

A darker entity, something that doesn't belong.

And it was provoked.

So these people weren't completely healthy.

Uh, there's something in the basement.

"Where's all my stuff?"

That's what I keep on hearing. "Where's all my effin' stuff?

[Zak] Jim says that Kevin's spirit is present,

and we are all blown away by how he is picking up that Kevin was a hoarder.

There was more stuff in this house than you can imagine.

There rooms were filled with garbage. Filled.

[Shawna] It's freezing right here.

[Jim] Right here?

I can smell death.

[Zak] Suddenly Shawna becomes affected

and is having trouble breathing.

-[Shawna groans] -Are you okay?

[Shawna] I'm sorry. My throat's just closing up a little bit.

[Jim] Don't let it take control.

-Could I? -[Shawna] Yes.

-I know. -And your mum's right beside you.

Yes, she is.

They'll be fine now. Okay?

Sorry. You won't cough again.

We're just being yelled to "Get out! Get out! Get out!"

He is a strong piece of work.

[Zak] It makes sense that if Kevin didn't allow visitors in his home

when he was alive,

his spirit would still harbor the same protective feelings about his home.

And he knows that I don't take a [bleep].

You talk to me civilly.

-There's no one upstairs, right? -[man] No.

[Zak] Jim begins using the form of paranormal communication

with wooden knocking that we've learned is popular in this region.

They used knocking to invoke the spirit.

[Jim] Go away now. I'm in charge.

You don't do [bleep] all to me.

I've had enough.

Everyone's had enough.

Yes.

[Jim] Enough!

What's wrong? What do you mean?

Thanks, guys.

I didn't walk towards the hole. I was pushed.

[Zak] I believe it is no coincidence

that my producer experiences blurred vision

at the exact same time Jim claims to be forcefully pushed into a hole.

[Jim] Griffin, how's your eye?

[Griffin] It's... It's good, but I'm gonna... I'm gonna go outside.

[Jim] He died right here.

Oh. Holy [bleep].

[chuckles]

And I'm laughing out of a little bit afraid.

I just got pushed back.

It's like they slashed it.

Something very sad.

[exhales]

Sorry,

[bleep]

[sighs]

[Jim] I'm coming up. Go [bleep] yourself.

Nothing wins with me.

I wonder why I don't do this anymore sometimes.

[bleep]

[bleep]

Jesus.

Okay. We were not moving.

Something threw that at us.

Oh, my God.

[exhales]

Holy [bleep].

Something was really bad upstairs,

and I can't make heads or tails out of it.

They just wanted to scare the [bleep] out of us, that's all.

[bleep]

Does anybody wanna say anything?

-[light knock] -What was that?

-That was a knock. -That was a total knock.

-[light knock] -What was that?

[Jim] It's okay. Come in this room and join us, even with the camera, please.

I can't protect all of us unless we're in the same room.

-What's the battery? -The battery's reading perfectly fine.

-You guys have had enough? -[man] Yeah.

Because you've had way too much.

-Your guys are like, are... -Yeah.

You're depleting, and I can't keep you

safe anymore.

Okay, so let's go. Okay.

[Zak] Seeing how severely Jim and some of my crew were affected,

I respect his decision to immediately vacate the property,

as to not put any of my team in severe danger with an attachment,

or attack, which they don't know how to protect themselves from.

We work in the dark.

Today was prolific.

At any moment that you get something that you can't identify,

that's telling you to hurt yourself,

jump, fall, jump.

That place has to go.

[Zak] Next, we travel to an abandoned asylum

built on ancient burial grounds in Italy,

where a mysterious patient may have channeled supernatural forces

to see into the future.

Volterra Asylum in Tuscany, Italy,

has been called "The place of no return,"

because thousands of patients sent there for treatment were never allowed to leave.

People with mild psychiatric issues

were mixed in with the criminally insane

under brutal and barbaric conditions.

But this site's history goes back further

than the asylum's founding 135 years ago.

For millennia, this hilltop has served as an inescapable destination

with ancient burial sites, executions,

and the town's history as the legendary birthplace of witchcraft.

Is it possible that thousands of years

of gruesome history cursed this land

before the asylum was even constructed?

The asylum's most mysterious patient,

a man who went by the name N of "NOF4,"

may have found a way to channel this dark energy.

I'm sending my crew to Volterra, Italy,

to find out.

My crew travels to the Tuscany region of Italy.

to the walled mountaintop city of Volterra.

They will rely on their guide and interpreter, Matteo,

to help them navigate this investigation.

[Matteo] Yeah.

I think it's something that's really ingrained

-into Italian society and Italian culture... -Mmm-hmm.

...because we have, like, deep folklore

everywhere around Italy.

And actually, like,

[Zak] In order to better understand the impact

this region's ancient history had on the asylum,

my crew meets with an archaeologist named Dario.

Shockingly, he tells us the asylum complex was erected

directly over a 3000-year-old ancient necropolis called Poggio Alla Croce,

which means "Hills with the Crosses."

[Speaking Italian]

The tombs underneath the asylum aren't accessible.

[Zak] Dario tells us that recently

the 3000-year-old tomb of a warrior

was found near the building at the asylum.

[Matteo] We do know that the tombs weren't sealed,

but sometimes they were also used for some rituals.

We don't know what kind of rituals.

[Zak] So the ground the asylum sits on was used for occult rituals

and ancient tombs.

Then in the Middle Ages, the hill became an execution site.

The prisoners from Volterra's prison,

uh, who were sentenced to death,

usually were executed on the Hill of the Crosses,

probably by hanging.

[Zak] The executions continued until the Volterra asylum was built in 1888,

sealing up or destroying most of the ancient tombs.

During the 1950s and 60s, the facility expanded

to become one of Italy's largest,

accommodating a staggering 6000 patients.

Like many asylums from this era,

in its earlier years, patients at the Volterra Psychiatric Hospital

were subjected to horrible experimental treatments.

The most infamous doctor at Volterra was Klaus Schilling.

He later conducted malaria experiments

on prisoners at the Dachau concentration camp during World War II.

After the war, he was tried and condemned to death by hanging for his actions.

Today, the asylum is being retaken by the forces of nature.

However, the memory of the hospital lives on,

thanks largely to its most mysterious patient.

To learn more about this fascinating figure,

we meet with Andrea, whose father dedicated 30 years of his life

as a nurse at the institution.

He is an expert on the facility's most famous resident,

Fernando Oreste Nannetti,

also known as NOF4.

and, so it's basically his name with the addition of Orestes,

which was a name that Fernando liked,

[chuckles] but it wasn't his name.

[Zak] Nannetti was born in Rome in 1927,

and was abandoned by his mother at the age of seven.

And from that point on, he spent most of his life institutionalized.

[speaking Italian]

[Zak] He was first sent to a psychiatric hospital in Rome,

then transferred to Volterra in 1958.

It was there that NOF4's behavior changed in ways

some would describe as supernatural.

When Nannetti was transferred to Volterra,

he didn't speak to anyone, so he stopped talking.

But he started scratching the walls

of the courtyard with this belt.

[Zak] Incredibly, NOF4 carved words, symbols and drawings

into the outside wall of his building using just a metal buckle,

eventually covering a span the length of two football fields,

nearly 600 feet.

He chronicled emotions, life stories and firsthand accounts

of both observed and endured struggles

during his extended stay at the hospital.

[speaking Italian]

[Zak] Angelo Lippi formerly worked

as a social worker at the asylum.

[Angelo speaking in Italian]

[speaking English]

[Zak] Art brut, or outsider art,

is a term that describes works created by individuals isolated from society.

But NOF4 is much too complicated

to simply categorize as an artist.

This enigmatic creature seemed to possess the ability to see into the future.

He predicted the invention of cell phones, as well as the moon landing.

[Andrea speaking in Italian]

And also, uh, five years prior to the moon landing,

he wrote about the moon landing.

[indistinct speaking on static radio]

He just approximated the date, and he was mistaken by only a few days.

[Zak] Is it possible NOF4 was communicating with supernatural beings?

[Neil Armstrong on radio] The Eagle has landed.

[Zak] After 135 years,

the Volterra asylum is finally revealing its secrets.

But some remain,

like who or what was communicating telepathically with NOF4?

[speaking in Italian]

[Zak] But the question still remains,

who or what was Nannetti communicating with for so many years of his life?

And does this entity still remain at the asylum?

My film crew prepares to enter the facility for the first time.

As the sun sets, they journey to the front gates to meet a local historian

who will guide them through the massive grounds to NOF4's famous graffiti.

Were his writings the work of a madman?

Or was he really communicating telepathically with supernatural beings?

-Nice to meet you. -Hi, nice to meet you.

I'm Alice. Nice to meet you.

I'm from Volterra.

This is a place where usually we cannot go because it's closed.

But as I live near here, I know it very well,

and also because my grandfather and my grand grandfather

and grandmother, they used to work here.

[Zak] Alice's grandparents were nurses at Volterra up until the 1980s,

and with Alessandro, she maintains a huge online collection of documents

and personal stories of former patients.

Alice leads my crew to the only surviving section

of NOF4's graffiti at the asylum.

Only about a quarter of his writing has survived time and the elements.

Uh, as you can see, the pages are different.

Some are smaller, some are bigger.

And it depended simply on what he wanted to write.

It all seems like a bunch of gibberish, basically.

It is actually all understandable,

and it was translated and put into a book.

[speaking in Italian]

And so he didn't have space to right the full world.

And so he had to go on another line.

[Zak] He also wrote, "I am an astronautical mining engineer

in the mental system, and the ghosts are repellent.

After its second appearance, it takes on material features, the shadows.

They are alive under the cosmos, so the drawing imagines them."

Was he trying to tell us he was seeing ghosts

and shadow figures on the asylum grounds?

This mural is the last surviving artifact

of Nannetti's cryptic art at the asylum.

The remaining walls were either destroyed by the weather

or ended up being moved to a local museum.

because his graffiti is now considered

a masterpiece in the outsider art world, also known as Art brut.

What was he trying to convey with his messages?

Are these writings a creation of the unstable mind?

Or is it possible he tapped into the energies

of this town's history of witchcraft

dating back to the 14th century?

Amazingly, the town of Volterra

is considered to be the birthplace

of the world's very first witch.

Her name was Aradia.

She was born on August 13th, 1313 to the Moon goddess, Diana.

She is described as a messiah-like figure sent to Earth

to share witchcraft with humans.

Although her intentions were to spread witchcraft

as a means of overcoming war and famine,

Aradia was arrested by Catholic authorities

and sentenced to death for heresy.

But on the day of her execution,

her cell was empty.

With Volterra's powerful bond to witchcraft,

could it be Aradia that made contact with NOF4?

Alice Guarente is a local witch.

She has offered to take us to the outskirts of Volterra

to what is believed to be the birthplace of all witchcraft,

The Rock of Mandringa,

also known as "Witches Rock."

According to one of the legends,

Aradia, the daughter of the goddess, Diana,

and Lucifer was born here in Volterra,

and under this rock.

So it is said that all the witches of Italy

and also Europe, gathered around this rock

to dance and to honor their goddess.

[Zak] Here, Alice will perform a ritual in tribute to Aradia.

[speaking in Italian]

[man] We also have a red moon.

[Alice speaking in Italian]

[Zak] Was Aradia teaching NOF4 his writings,

his predictions, while also infusing him with dark powers?

[Zak] Asylums are often rumored to be possessed by ghosts.

Their abandoned corridors echoing with haunting whispers from a bygone era.

Because of the mysterious and highly powerful forces

that have been residing within the dormant Volterra asylum,

paranormal investigations are forbidden here,

but in 2018, a team of investigators

say they encountered something here that left them traumatized.

[screaming]

[speaking in Italian]

And this is where they arrived.

[speaking in Italian]

[Debora speaking]

Okay. Yeah.

[Zak] The fear that Paolo and Debora experienced her is very noticeable.

Back then, Paolo decided that each of them

should separate and experience various areas of the building alone.

[speaking in Italian]

[Zak] While Debora was enclosed in a room alone,

she heard a growl and her camera went black.

[speaking in Italian]

[speaking anxiously]

[Zak] Overwhelmed by fear, Debora screamed and ran out of the building.

[speaking in Italian]

[Zak] Paolo has a recording which was captured

with Deborah's camera right before it shut down.

[Debora speaking]

[screams]

[screams]

[Debora screams]

[screams]

[Zak] Since Paolo believes the voice belongs to a man,

he suspects the contact might have been made by NOF4.

They haven't been back to the asylum since,

but the place has changed dramatically since then.

[speaking in Italian]

[Zak] With marks of vandalism and numerous strange altars set up randomly,

satanic markings, decapitated effigies.

[speaking in Italian]

Okay. So obviously, the choice of a red wire is... is on purpose,

don't you think?

[speaking in Italian]

Abandoned places, especially if they are like "energy,"

-energetically powerful, are often used... -[Debora] Yes.

...to have various kinds of rituals.

[Zak] The team heads to NOF4's wall

in hopes of determining if it was he

who made himself known to Debora in 2018.

[speaking in Italian]

[Debora speaking]

Wow.

[speaking in Italian]

[Zak] While attempting to get a response from the spirit of NOF4,

something shocking and extraordinary happens.

[speaking in Italian]

[man] Mmm-hmm.

Okay.

[Zak] After Paolo hears a humming noise above him,

it appears a piece of the building or roof

hits the metal awning, and immediately after that,

he starts receiving readings of electromagnetic energy.

[speaking in Italian]

[Debora speaking]

[Zak] This paranormal team concludes that the spirit of NOF4

is protective of his writings.

[speaking in Italian]

[speaking in English]

[Debora] Thank you.

[man] Thank you. Thank you.