17 Hometown Scandals And Tragedies That Will Haunt Residents Forever
We recently covered a Reddit thread where folks shared the wildest and most tragic scandals that rattled their small towns. BuzzFeed Community members then submitted their own stories of the infamous incidents from their hometowns. Here's what they revealed:
Note: Disturbing and graphic content ahead, including stories of murder, suicide, and domestic violence.
1. "When I first moved to this small town in Arkansas, there was a man who was fooling around with several married women in the area. One of the women was married to a local sheriff. The man was warned off by the sheriff and several of the husbands, but he continued the affairs. He was found in the front yard of his house with his hands tied behind his back, his manhood had been removed in the bathroom of the house, and the back of his head was gone from a shotgun blast. The shotgun was over 20 feet away from the body. No one was ever charged, and it was called the most determined case of suicide anyone had ever seen!"
—Anonymous
2. "In my first year of high school (1995 to 1996), a friend asked me to homecoming. He was a nice kid, and I didn't have a date, thanks to my brother, who scared off most guys, so I said sure. We had fun and stayed friends all through high school. In 2013, he was arrested, tried, and found guilty of bludgeoning his parents to death. My brother is a retired detective. While the trial was going on, he told me about the possibility of this guy being acquitted due to a technicality. When he was convicted, I breathed a sigh of relief."
— shannonm49e341999
3. "Back in 2019, a six-year-old boy went missing in my town. It was horrible, and everyone rallied around the parents and younger brother, including creating GoFundMes, building little shrines outside their home, and hosting candlelit vigils. It wasn't a HUGE story, but it made some national news networks. This went on for about two weeks before everything came crashing down. It came out that Child Protective Services had visited their house over a dozen times before the little boy's disappearance. Then, the parents stopped cooperating with the police and quickly became the main suspects."
"His body was found a few days after these developments. I won't get into the details because they're sickening, but the parents did it. They were eventually found guilty and given lengthy sentences (although, in my opinion, the mom's isn't long enough). The little boy is still honored regularly, but no one talks about those two weeks before the truth came out."
—Anonymous
4. "One summer, several mysterious fires broke out in the hills around town. Always buildings, always unoccupied. Fires are normal here during the summer, but investigators were having trouble finding a cause. Usually, it's lightning or accidental human causes, like a spark from a car. One day, a house occupied by an older couple was lit on fire, and they died. This time, however, someone had been caught on a few trail cams around the property, starting the fire. Turns out one of the property owners was trying to commit insurance fraud by burning down a house he owned and rented out in the hills, and to cover it up, he was burning other homes, too. He thought the old couple's house was vacant. He got charged with murder and arson and is still in prison, as far as I know."
—Anonymous
5. "In the small town where I went to high school, a local pastor abducted a 15-year-old girl in my class and took her across several state lines. Her parents found a note that said she was going off to get married. Anyway, the authorities found her, brought her back to her parents, and put the pastor in prison. The whole thing was instantly swept under the rug. It's like I'm the only one who remembers it. In the same small town, some 20-odd years later, a man and his wife were found dead in a murder-suicide. A week later, the local paper had a joint obituary for the murderer and his victim. They had a joint funeral and were buried side-by-side."
— certified_drapetomaniac
6. "All the kids of the people involved went to the same small school and lived in the same neighborhoods. First, one mother passed away, and all of the other (mostly married) mothers mysteriously started getting close to the recently widowed father. They took food to the family and stayed over to care for the kids. The recently widowed guy had about seven girlfriends — all mothers of his children's friends. And that is not all. A couple of years went by, and a bunch of parents started divorcing. They were horrible divorces that took a toll on everyone. We found out (I was about 13) that there was a group of swinger parents and a group of people who were cheating on their partners with another neighbor. The town started to become famous because it was where everyone was sleeping with each other.' Again, all the children of the involved parents went to the same small school and were around the same age."
—Anonymous
7. "In eighth grade, one of my classmates died of a 'hunting accident,' but no one in school believed it was an accident. The way the other person described how it happened sounded too made up. Apparently, he was walking by a gun on a table, and his jacket zipper somehow caught the trigger and just happened to pull with enough force to shoot the other guy in the head the exact moment he bent over to pick up a shell. The kid who died was very popular and genuinely a nice guy. The guy who shot him was very much not. There were never any charges, but that kid didn't stay at school much longer, and I don't think it was just because he was a bit ostracized. He always had a bad vibe about him, and I'd honestly be surprised if he didn't end up in prison for at least a bit."
— sisterhavoc
8. "I live in a tiny Kansas town. The police chief was caught so many times breaking into businesses and stealing. The local Dollar General staff had to follow him around whenever he was in the store. One night, our local pharmacy was broken into, and the story was whoever did it never really had time to steal the drugs, or so the police stated. Shortly after that, our grocery store was broken into, and a good-sized amount of cash was taken. When he was caught, he told the deputies that he was checking the security in the building. This man also sold several items online. I found out through a friend of mine who worked in the sheriff's office in the next town over. He was being investigated for missing items from the evidence room. They were able to prove he had sold them. Charges were never filed because our prosecutor's son was a big drug dealer in town, and guess where the missing drugs went? The chief was allowed to retire quietly and receive all his benefits."
—Anonymous
9. "I went to college in a small town. It was a conservative, Christian college. There was this one professor who always gave me the creeps. One spring semester, he was suddenly not there, even though he was supposed to be. Turns out he inappropriately touched a first-year girl, and as 'punishment,' instead of jail time, he had to go to in-house therapy at a Christian counseling rehab place. Fast-forward a few years years. My college roommate and I went to the small-town carnival. There were some police officers there doing PSAs, and McGruff the Crime Dog (a local costumed character who worked with the police force) was there, being all handsy with the little kids. I saw him on break later with his costume head removed, and it was that same sketchy professor we had in college!"
—Anonymous
10. "A fairly newly licensed RN who came from an old family in our town a few years ago was busted for 'checking up' on post-op patients in their homes and stealing their pain meds. He went through a felony diversion program and had his license suspended. During that time, he was promoted to a leadership administrative position and now is mayor. He had someone fired from their position due to a 'lack of transparency.' There was a news article about it online, but it was deleted from the site within a couple of hours."
—Anonymous
11. "In the town where I grew up, the local newspaper was owned by a family. There was an incident in 1987 where one member of that family was kidnapped and buried alive in a box with air tubes to keep him alive for ransom. Apparently, the tubing was not large enough for adequate airflow, and the person died of suffocation. They brought the kidnappers to trial, and they were sentenced to death, but one of our governors (who also was from the same town and went to prison on other charges) commuted their sentence to life in prison. It was a huge deal at the time."
—Anonymous
12. "A guy I went to high school with…his father put out a hit on his mother. He was a chiropractor and was soliciting people in his office. The first person took the money and skipped town. The next guy hid outside their house and shot this woman in the hand. The woman was a substitute teacher at my school. She was someone everyone loved — me personally because her son was a good friend of mine. Many people didn't like my friend or his brother, but they were always good to me. The father, though, used to drive us to Eagles games chain-smoking the entire time, leaving the window maybe an inch cracked. Everyone, including his children, hated him. He got like 25 years. He might be out now, actually. This happened in 2004."
— kylemcgee
13. "I grew up in the 1990s in a SUPER Catholic, Midwest town. Two of our best basketball players/most popular girls were inseparable sisters. Apparently, they were in a throuple with the young, single girls' basketball coach. One of the sisters started to feel guilty and confessed to the priest. The priest decided to tell their parents for the girls' safety. The coach was asked to resign, but then he went on to coach a few towns over. The girls were both forced to quit basketball. The oldest lost her scholarship and the ability to go out of state for college, and the younger left to go to a boarding school. Finally, the priest was relocated for breaking confession rules or something. It was a major scandal that many people thought was made up. When I was older, however, my dad, the local police chief, confirmed it was true."
—Anonymous
14. "This happened a few years ago. It was a normal night until suddenly, we got the news that multiple people had been stabbed in a house in my town. We learned that the mom, grandmother, a 5-year-old girl, and I believe her older brother were in the home at the time. The mom's ex-boyfriend (the little girl's father) had either negotiated his way in or forced his way into the house and stabbed everyone. The grandmother and the brother survived, but the little girl and her mother died. Someone I knew lived two houses down from the family, and she said a helicopter was on the street. This was only a few roads away from my home. I knew the teacher whose class the child was in. I can't imagine the trauma and pain the teacher and students, as well as family and friends, went through."
—Anonymous
15. "My brother was the nicest guy, a great teacher, a union representative, and a hardworking village trustee in a suburb of Buffalo, NY. On the night of June 21, he killed himself. His ex-girlfriend was present at the time at their shared residence, and that night either assisted in his demise by pushing him to the brink or stood idly by while he spiraled out of control and ended his life. She did not call the authorities or any family members to help; she did not try to stop him or try to get him out of the house. She told a friend she told him to do it. The day after, she stole his cellphone (that the police did not secure) and deleted all her texts. She then held his possessions hostage, demanding money from my parents until lawyers got involved. She had his personal safe, which she did not have the combination to, opened by a locksmith and took god only knows what out of it."
"He had broken up with her months prior, and they were working on selling the residence they co-owned. With a clause on the deed of 'right to survivorship,' she figured it better to have a dead ex and whole ownership of the house than a living ex and only 50% of the sale of the house."
—Anonymous
16. "The daughter of the police chief got arrested for abusing a child at the daycare she worked at. Coincidentally, that was the week her police chief father suddenly realized that being able to go to the county jail website and look up the mugshot of anyone booked into the jail was 'wrong' and shut it down."
— ambam8813
17. And: "Our DA is currently on the hook for felony gun charges and is no longer allowed to prosecute the big murder case in our county because, for some reason, he was in the neighboring county with the police department in 'law enforcement capacity' when they went to arrest the suspect and bring him to our county. There were Homeland Security officers there, so there was no need for him to be present, and there was especially no need for him to shoot a gun in the middle of a neighborhood. He shot into an apartment that was occupied by a woman and her three young children, one of whom was less than a few feet away from being shot."
— t4ec93f6f1
Can you think of a particular scandal or incident that rocked your hometown? What happened? Tell us in the comments or share anonymously using this form.
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
Dial 988 in the United States to reach the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. The 988 Lifeline is available 24/7/365. Your conversations are free and confidential. Other international suicide helplines can be found at befrienders.org. The Trevor Project, which provides help and suicide-prevention resources for LGBTQ youth, is 1-866-488-7386.
If you or someone you know is in immediate danger as a result of domestic violence, call 911. For anonymous, confidential help, you can call the 24/7 National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 (SAFE) or chat with an advocate via the website.
The National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline is 1-800-950-6264 (NAMI) and provides information and referral services; GoodTherapy.org is an association of mental health professionals from more than 25 countries who support efforts to reduce harm in therapy.
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