Cropsey (Real Urban Legend?)

[Kat]

There was a TV show I DVR'd about this on Friday The 13th. I'm finally watching it now. I thought it was kinda crazy that they were talking about a man named Cropsey out in the woods killing kids at camp. Reminded me a lot of The Burning...

Anyhow, I'm only like 15 minutes into the 2hr show...and I didn't want to read the article to spoil it for me since I know nothing about it...but here is an article about it.

As a kid growing up on Staten Island in the late 1970s, Joshua Zeman often wandered through the woods in the center of the island. His summer camp was the destination. But the dense brush and shadowy paths held other, darker fascinations. It was notorious as the site of the Willowbrook State School.

The institution for mentally disabled children was labeled a "snake pit" in 1965 by Sen. Robert Kennedy and it was shuttered in 1987, 15 years after a young TV reporter named Geraldo Rivera broke his first big story in an exposé about it. Here also were the grounds of the abandoned Seaview Hospital and its crumbling tuberculosis wards.

And here was Cropsey.

Staten Island's own boogeyman—the escaped mental patient of lore with a hook for an arm who, after the tragic death of his son, snatched up wayward children in a vengeful rage. He was an urban legend that Mr. Zeman and his childhood friends used to scare each other.

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Staten Island Advance Photo: Tony Carannante

Andre Rand is taken into custody in the summer of 1987.
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"Our counselors would lead us through the woods, past Seaview, and we'd beg to go in there," Mr. Zeman, now 38, said. "Inevitably, one of them would come out with an ax yelling that he was Cropsey. That had a big effect on us."

Mr. Zeman never shook it. Years later, the film producer and documentarian met Barbara Brancaccio, another Staten Island native. They quickly began sharing their "Cropsey" stories. These dovetailed with the memories of multiple cases of children who had vanished on Staten Island during Cropsey's supposed rampage, including the 1987 disappearance of Jennifer Schweiger, a 12-year-old with Down syndrome. After a 35-day search involving some 5,000 volunteers, her body was found on the Willowbrook grounds near the campsite of Andre Rand, a homeless man, ex-convict and former Willowbrook employee who was later convicted of kidnapping her. Rand was serving a sentence of 25 years to life when, in 2000, he was newly indicted in the 1981 disappearance of another girl, Holly Ann Hughes. Suddenly, Mr. Zeman and Ms. Brancaccio had a real-life embodiment of the Cropsey legend—and a big story to tell.

"Cropsey," which opens next Friday at IFC Center as well as at the Staten Island Film Festival (held at the College of Staten Island, which occupies the same site that Willowbrook once did), is less an argument for or against Rand's guilt than it is a study in how a community creates a narrative to deal with tragedies that can't be explained. Through a decade of amateur sleuthing and countless interviews, the filmmakers found a pattern that linked Rand to several other abductions. But the film, which builds steadily into a forensics thriller, also explores how mysteries mushroom.

"The movie is about what everybody else thinks happened," said Ms. Brancaccio, 39, who is communications director for the New York City Department of Social Services/Human Resources. "No one's going to bring the children back. We will not know what happened."

Mr. Zeman uses old images of Rand being led away by police, appearing deranged, to illustrate a point. "The guy is drooling as they lead him out, suspected of killing a child. Central casting. It doesn't get any better than that. But it's almost too good," he said. "At times we would stand on our high horse and ask, 'Is this Boo Radley?' Other times, we wondered, 'Is this guy a full-on serial killer who's killed 15 people and we only know about four or five?'"

Former police officers who appear in the film confessed they were still haunted by the cases. "So many of them would take us off to the side and tell us this was the case," Mr. Zeman said.

Though the filmmakers had no desire to make a serial-killer flick, their footage of the woods and abandoned buildings that provided shelter for Rand and an unknown number of other homeless characters are decidedly creepy—evocative of 1970s drive-in movie shockers like "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre."

In one sequence, Mr. Zeman and Ms. Brancaccio clamber over fences and poke around with a flashlight, coming face to face with … a group of teenagers out to spook themselves. "It's called 'legend tripping,'" Ms. Brancaccio said, noting that the legend of Cropsey has taken on an even darker nature since their childhood: Stories about devil worship and human sacrifices, stories that also resonate with Staten Island's former reputation as a lost borough, a dumping ground, an island of lost souls.

Perhaps most chilling is that the movie leaves the mysteries unresolved. Even years of written correspondence with Rand haven't brought the filmmakers closer. "There's just enough weirdness in those letters to lead us to believe there was more than what was on the page," Mr. Zeman said.

Or read it here 70783660589168.html" target="_blank">http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB100014240527487042692045752 70783660589168.html

[Killer-C]

There was a TV show I DVR'd about this on Friday The 13th. I'm finally watching it now. I thought it was kinda crazy that they were talking about a man named Cropsey out in the woods killing kids at camp. Reminded me a lot of The Burning...

Anyhow, I'm only like 15 minutes into the 2hr show...and I didn't want to read the article to spoil it for me since I know nothing about it...but here is an article about it.

Or read it here 70783660589168.html" target="_blank">http://online.wsj.com/article/NA_WSJ_PUB:SB100014240527487042692045752 70783660589168.html

I also recorded the program but havent watched it yet

[Struckworld]

I think The Burning was based off the Cropsey legend

[Kat]

I think The Burning was based off the Cropsey legend

I was wondering that. But I have never looked into the background of The Burning.

[Struckworld]

I'm pretty sure it is, because the killer in The Burning is named Cropsy. They just spelt his name different.

[Jet]

I watched the Cropsey documentary, it was interesting, if dull in places. I haven't got any doubt that Andre Rand was involved in the deaths of all those kids, though I do have to admit I wonder who else was.

[ProwlerChad]

I watched that docu the night it was on. The main suspect was most likely the killer. He was fucking ILL. Never heard of the story untill the docu.

[Batty Part 2]

I was wondering that. But I have never looked into the background of The Burning.

According to IMDB, yes it is.

[Kat]

Neat.

However, i totally lost interest in the documentary by the 1/2 half of it. I think I'd rather read up on the legend and the real happenings.

[Vermn]

I watched this documentary just a few days ago. Apparently, one of the producers of The Burning had gone to camp in upstate NY, and the Cropsey story was pretty popular around the campfire.
Years later, he thought it would make a good horror movie, so we got The Burning.

[Jet]

I watched this documentary just a few days ago. Apparently, one of the producers of The Burning had gone to camp in upstate NY, and the Cropsey story was pretty popular around the campfire.
Years later, he thought it would make a good horror movie, so we got The Burning.

Then Andre Rand couldn't be the basis for "The Burning." In fact, in the documentary they even stated that they named Rand "Cropsey" after the campfire story and my dad remembered hearing stories about Cropsey when he was growing up in the South in the 1940's.

[Struckworld]

You can watch a Cropsey documentary, it's streaming on Netflix. It's called "Cropsey".

I found it disturbing in some spots.

[roypart5]

I watched this a while ago, it was pretty creepy, that guy was a weirdo.

[hesvor]

Truth IS stranger than fiction . I saw some Cropsey clips on Youtube . Very disturbing stuff from this guy .
He looked creepy too .

[JDW89]

So is The Burning about him? It's on Netflix, may have to check it out.