On April 29, 2002, in the small town of Pataskala, Ohio, a social worker sat on the floor with a two-year-old girl. The little girl's mother had been murdered in their kitchen the night before, and police thought she might have witnessed the crime. The girl clutched a stuffed animal to her chest while the social worker asked her if anyone else had been in her house the night before. The girl nodded – and uttered a name that would turn her family's lives upside down.

Today’s podcast features 4 stories that involve people who were trapped – with “no way out.” The audio from all four stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast.

Around 3:00 AM on September 5th, 1981, a woman drove through a housing development in Lakeland, Florida. She was with two of her friends, who had agreed to spend the night at her duplex. And this was a huge relief to the woman, because yesterday there’d been a violent murder in their neighborhood. So the woman was terrified at the thought of sleeping alone, and was really grateful that her friends were going to keep her company. As soon as she parked in front of her home, though – she froze. The front curtains were open, and through the window she could see a figure moving around inside her home. But before she could say or do anything – that figure yanked the curtains shut.

Today’s podcast will feature 3 horror stories that are just pure nightmare fuel. The audio from all three stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast.

With a killer on the loose terrorizing her neighborhood, a New Mexico woman scours her home's surveillance footage for clues. Just as she's about to give up her frame-by-frame search, a dark figure suddenly appears in the corner of the screen.

Joining me is a man you've probably seen all over the internet, the great Oz "The Mentalist" Pearlman. WATCH the full video here: https://youtu.be/Qx6A6rCZNKU?si=l7BaWymzcCv0kabi

Today’s podcast will feature 2 stories that reveal we may not be alone in this universe. The audio from both of these stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast.

In February 2007, a nervous man facing a drug charge was escorted into an Indiana police station. He hoped to trade bombshell information about a four-year-old murder case for his freedom.

You think you’re safe at home, but today’s 2 stories prove you’re not. The audio from both of these stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast.

On a blustery February 2008 night, a six-year-old Nevada girl was awakened by creaking sounds and a vanishing shadow outside her bedroom.

Today’s podcast will feature 3 spooky stories about messages from beyond. The audio from all three stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast.

In September 2016, a Bucks County, Pennsylvania resident – holding a worn detective's business card – decided to reveal long-held information about a murder, despite their fear of the life-altering consequences.

This story is a fan favorite from MrBallen's Medical Mysteries. When a woman gets sick with a mystery illness during the height of the COVID pandemic, she fears her holiday season will be ruined. But as her entire family starts getting sick one by one, a lousy Christmas is the least of her worries. For 100s more stories like this one, check out my YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @MrBallen

On a September afternoon in 2000, an FBI forensics analyst stood in her lab in Quantico, Virginia, staring into a microscope in confusion.  She was looking at two strands of hair that were evidence in a murder investigation. And something wasn’t right.  She checked the label on the evidence bag the sample came from, then looked back into the microscope. She definitely wasn’t imagining it. The label was wrong, which meant that the detective who had packaged the hairs and sent them over for analysis – had not understood what he was looking at. And this wasn’t a small mistake. Because if the analyst was right about what the hairs really were – then the whole investigation she was working on was about to change.  For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen

This story is about a 3-year period in France where people were going missing at an alarming rate and no one knew why. Eventually it was discovered, and let me tell you, it is absolute nightmare fuel. Story name, preview & link to original YouTube video:#1 -- "The Beast of Gévaudan" -- A small village in France is terrorized by a beast (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4Mm1tJm_Z0) For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen

On the morning of July 11th, 2009, an elderly woman grabbed a coffee and sat down at her kitchen table in Pensacola, Florida, to read the local paper. The news was a big part of her day – she had lived in her neighborhood for 60 years, and liked keeping tabs on everything that was going on in her community. Which was usually a lot – Pensacola and the surrounding county had some of the highest crime rates in Florida. So she wasn’t surprised when she opened the paper that morning and saw a police bulletin about a homicide in the area. The message asked residents of Pensacola to be on the lookout for a red van. But when she saw the grainy photo of the vehicle, she gasped and almost knocked over her coffee. Because she’d seen that van. And she knew exactly who it belonged to.  For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen

Today’s podcast will feature 3 stories about mysterious disappearances. The audio from all three stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast. Story names, previews & links to original YouTube videos:#3 -- "Lava Tubes" -- 1100+ miles of underground lava tubes in this park... (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNpctf6WJx8)#2 -- "Stay in the Car" -- Two people go missing after a car crash (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=shared&v=eOxeX1MkcWo)#1 -- "What Just Happened?" -- Woman repeatedly calls 911 then vanishes... (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vARuVoqbQL0) For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen

One afternoon in January of 1998, a prosecutor for the state of Georgia sat in the very back row of seats in a courtroom where a divorce trial was unfolding. The prosecutor was not involved in the divorce case – he handled murder trials. But he had come here today, because he had gotten a very surprising phone call about an unsolved case he had worked on a year and a half earlier. The caller had told him that the testimony in this divorce – could solve that murder. Now, in the courtroom, the prosecutor felt his heart rate pick up, as the witness he had been waiting for took the stand. And as soon as the witness started talking – the prosecutor knew: he had solved the murder. For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen

Today’s podcast will feature 4 stories about adventures… that go wrong. The audio from all four stories has been pulled from our main YouTube channel, which is just called "MrBallen," and has been remastered for today's podcast. Story names, previews & links to original YouTube videos:#4 -- "Bungee" -- A couple decides to go bungee jumping, but someone panics and the result is caught on video... (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfnbgIkT_jk)#3 -- "Geocaching" -- 4 young people explore an underground tunnel (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtDAo7jS8Z4)#2 -- "127 Hours" -- Man is forced to make a horrifying decision (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kODsF75lAJY)#1 -- "Head Count" -- A group of boys go for a hike. They’re having a great time, until one of them takes a picture... (Original YouTube link -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaSQ4ou05dc) For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen

On the morning of May 17th, 2014, a detective wrote furiously as she sat next to the hospital bed of a mortally-injured 77-year-old woman. The woman had been in a coma for the last ten days, and the detective had been desperately working to figure out who had tried to kill her. Now that the woman had woken up, the detective was finally getting the chance she’d been waiting for – to ask her victim directly. But the woman was afraid. She told the detective she had a lot to say, but she couldn’t say it here, at the hospital – because she was still in danger.  For 100s more stories like these, check out our main YouTube channel just called "MrBallen" -- https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen