By
Robin M. Strom-Mackey
“’Ackley
is estopped to deny their existence and, as a matter of law, the house is
haunted (The Honorable Israel Rubin, N.Y. Sup. Ct. App. Div. 1991)(Trull,
Kachuba).’”
When George and Helen Ackley
purchased a rambling 18 room Victorian on the end of a dead-end street in
Nyack, New York, they undoubtedly knew that they would have a challenge on
their hands. The ramshackle mansion
measuring some 5000 square feet, not including full attic and basement, which
afforded a view of the Hudson River, had been standing vacant for seven
years. The old house, which sits 20
miles north of New York City, must have seemed like a wonderful place to bring
up the family’s several children. Granted, pesky neighborhood children warned
the family as they were moving in that their house was reputedly haunted. That didn’t stop the family from taking up
residence. And it was soon after moving
in, according to Helen Ackley, that the family realized the house was inhabited
by a host of rambunctious spirits whose acquaintance the Ackley’s were soon to
make.
During her tenure there, Helen
Ackley made no secret that she believed the house to be haunted by
“poltergeists.” She even went so far as
to write and submit her own article to Readers’ Digest describing the haunting
experiences. Unfortunately, the 1977
article by Helen Ackley entitled “My Haunted House on the Hudson” is difficult
to locate, as the library system in Delaware only retained magazines starting
from the 1980’s.. However, an article by
Helen Ackley’s son-in-law is still available online.
The second husband of the Ackley’s
daughter, Cynthia, recounts second-hand sources and describes his own
experiences in the house in the article entitled, “The Ghost of Nyack.” Mark Kavanagh, makes no excuses for the
area’s haunted history noting that Tarrytown is directly across the river. Just outside of Tarrytown is the famous
Sleepy Hollow, the area made famous by the Washington Irving story, “The Legend
of Sleepy Hollow.” Kavanagh notes that many of Irving’s stories were based on
legends originating around the lower Hudson Valley, an area of reputed
paranormal activity.
The
Ackley’s Unseen Guests
Even before the family moved in,
according to Ackley, a plumber working in the basement reported hearing
footsteps on the floor above him when no one else was in the house. On windless
days light cords would swing for no apparent reason, and then stop in mid-swing,
defying gravity. Apparently a set of
French doors was also known to burst open for no apparent reason. Guests of the
family were often surprised when windows would slide up on their own. And, of course, the ubiquitous voices and
ghostly footsteps were reported. Helen Ackley enjoyed telling the story about
seeing a ghost who looked on with approval, as she painted the living room. The
spirit, she felt, approved of the color choice.
Cynthia Ackley, Kavanagh’s wife,
reported that her bed would often shake on school days seconds before the
bedside alarm was set to go off. When
spring break arrived, Cynthia informed the ghost before going to bed that
tomorrow was spring break and she did not have to get up early. Reportedly, the bed did not shake that
morning, allowing the young student to sleep in.
Helen Ackley told stories of
“gifts” that appeared and then disappeared. Cynthia Ackley apparently received
a pair of silver sugar tongs. The
grandchildren received baby rings. An older brother’s wife received coins.
Ackley went on the say that three
ghosts had from time to time been observed about the house. The trio included a woman in a red cloak who
was often witnessed descending the stairs, a sailor in a powdered wig and an
elderly man who was often seen levitating four feet off the floor in the living
room. Ackley believed all three spirits were from the Revolutionary War era. She
went on to describe one of the ghosts as being, “cheerful” and “apple cheeked,”
noting he reminded her of Santa Claus.
The
family took their houseguests in stride.
Ackley is quoted in the Reader’s Digest Story as saying, the ghosts have
always been, “’gracious, thoughtful – only occasionally frightening – and
thoroughly entertaining…Our ghosts have continued to delight us (Perkins,
2003).’”
Apparently
the sprawling structure became somewhat of a family compound, with adult
children moving in with their spouses and children. Kavanagh reports that he moved into the house
with his fiancé several months before their marriage. Supposedly the spirits were concerned with
Kavanagh’s fitness for marriage to Cynthia, and decided to check him out. He recounts the first instance on Christmas
Eve. He had been left alone in the house to put together toys for the younger
children. According to Kavanagh, “…I
kept hearing muffled conversation coming from the dining room,” which was
around the wall from the living room. He reports that he got up and inspected
the dining room several times, finding no one.
Beyond the muffled conversation he also felt a compelling sensation that
he was being watched. In response he turned
on every available light, but to no effect. The low sound of talking continued,
unnerving the poor man, until his future brother-in-law started pounding on the
front door; a resounding sound that nearly sent young Kavanagh out of his skin
in alarm (Kavanagh, 2010).
The
second encounter for Kavanagh occurred in the bedroom he shared with his fiancé
Cynthia. Apparently Cynthia was already
asleep. Kavanagh, who was drifting, was lying on his side with his back to the
door. He recounts hearing the door creek as if opening and then hearing the
floor boards squeaking as if someone was approaching the bed. Rather abruptly
he felt the bed depress near his trunk as if someone had suddenly sat down; and
then a pressure as if that same someone was leaning against his torso. He tried
to turn his head around to see who had come in. He reports seeing, “a womanly
figure in a soft dress through the moonlight of the bay windows. I felt she was
looking straight at me. After about a minute the presence got up and walked
back out of the room (Kavanagh, 2010).” Not being acquainted with such
nocturnal visitors, he reports then shaking his fiancé awake and acting like a
toddler who, “just had a nightmare (Kavanagh).”
Taxes, Spooks and New York
City Buyers
According
to Kavanagh’s article, in the late 1980’s property taxes rose in Rockland
County egregiously, making keeping the family home on a fixed income
inconceivable. George Ackley had passed
away several years before and the widow, Helen, began to dream of warm winters
spent in Florida. Ackley put up the old
estate on the market at an asking price of $650,000 and a New York City buyer
decided to nibble. Jeffrey and Patrice
Stambovsky put in an accepted offer, and paid Helen Ackley $32,500 as a down
payment. Unfortunately, the Stambovsky’s
were from New York City where Jeffrey was a bond trader. Not being up on local lore, they had no prior
knowledge of the property’s haunted reputation.
A local architect was the “nosy neighbor” in this case, telling the Stambovsky’s that they were buying the “haunted house.” According to later court documents, Jeffrey Stambovsky told the court that he himself didn’t believe in such things, but felt his pregnant wife would not be comfortable in the home. The Stambovsky’s did not appear at the house closing making the agreement null and void. However, that also meant that Helen Ackley would retain the earnest money. Ackley refused to return the money and the Stambovsky’s took her to court.
A local architect was the “nosy neighbor” in this case, telling the Stambovsky’s that they were buying the “haunted house.” According to later court documents, Jeffrey Stambovsky told the court that he himself didn’t believe in such things, but felt his pregnant wife would not be comfortable in the home. The Stambovsky’s did not appear at the house closing making the agreement null and void. However, that also meant that Helen Ackley would retain the earnest money. Ackley refused to return the money and the Stambovsky’s took her to court.
Historic Courtroom Decision: Stambovsky
vs. Ackley
The
first court decision sided with Ackley citing caveat emptor (or buyer beware)
as just cause for not returning the deposit.
Stambovsky then appealed the case to the Appellate Division of State
Supreme Court where a panel of five judges heard the case.
Stambovsky
told the justices "My feeling is that Mrs. Ackley is a very neat old
lady who likes to spin tales. But if my wife is influenced enough by that stuff
to feel uncomfortable, that's a good enough reason not to sink our life savings
into the place." He concluded that
they had been the victims of “ectoplasmic fraud (Maull, 1991).”
A
narrow 3 to 2 decision sided with the Stambovsky’s. Justice Israel Rubin who
wrote the majority decision whimsically declared that Helen Ackley had promised
the Stambovsky’s that the property would be vacant when they took possession,
which was obviously not true. Caveat Emptor did not apply, reasoned Rubin, as
he speculated that all potential buyers would have to call in the Ghostbusters
along with home inspectors before buying a property.
"’[A] very practical problem arises with
respect to the discovery of paranormal phenomenon: 'who you gonna call?' as a
title song to the movie Ghostbusters asks. Applying the strict rule of caveat
emptor to a contract involving a house possessed by poltergeists conjures up
visions of a psychic or medium routinely accompanying the structural engineers
and Terminix man on an inspection of every home subject to a contract of sale.
In the interest of avoiding such untenable consequences, the notion that a
haunting is a condition which can and should be ascertained upon reasonable
inspection of the premises is a hobgoblin which should be exorcised from the
body of legal precedent and laid quietly to rest.’”
He
reasoned that Helen Ackley had gone out of her way to promote the house’s
haunted reputation. The house had been
featured in two articles in the local paper, Nyack News and Views, and in the Reader’s Digest article already mentioned. It had even been featured in the Haunted
Nyack walking tour. Apparently Ackley
had told everyone that the house was haunted, except the Stambovsky’s. Rubin
concluded, “Whether the source of the spectral apparitions seen by Ackley are
parapsychic or psychogenic, having reported their presence in both a national
publication (Reader's Digest) and the local press (in 1977 and 1982,
respectively), Ackley is estopped to deny their existence and, as a matter of
law, the house is haunted (Trull, Kachuba).”
He concluded that he was moved, “by the spirit of equity,” into deciding
with the Stambovskys. (Rubin apparently
has a spirited sense of humor.)
The
Stambovsky’s eventually got most of their deposit, although different sources
give differing amounts. According to
Kavanagh, Helen Ackley retained $5000 of the original amount, while another
source noted Ackley retained $15,000. Helen
Ackley eventually found another buyer and moved to Florida. Cynthia Ackley
Kavanagh and husband Mark relocated to Oregon.
Two owners have owned and inhabited the property at 1 LaVeta Street in
Nyack, New York since Helen left, and neither report ghostly activity.
Helen Ackley has the Last
Word
Helen eventually found a buyer
for the home and moved to Florida in 1991.
Ackley must have felt life in Florida somewhat dull without her unseen
houseguests, or perhaps she missed the notoriety of being the woman who owned
the haunted house. Around 1993 Ackley
was contacted by Portland, Oregon paranormal researcher, Bill Merrill, who was
interested in meeting her regarding her Nyack friends. Merrill indicated that
he worked with a medium, Glenn Johnson, who had purportedly already made contact
with her spirits, and asked Ackley to meet with them. Ackley was more than willing as she could
visit with Cynthia and Mark at the same time.
Apparently the material produced
at these meetings was extensive enough
for Johnson and Merrill to
publish a book in 1995 entitled, Sir
George, The Ghost of Nyack (Deer Publishing, Beaverton, Oregon) – still
available on Amazon. Johnson was
purportedly able to make contact with two of the spirits who identified themselves
as Sir George and his wife the Lady Margaret who had lived in the region prior
to the Revolutionary War. According to
Mark Kavanagh Sir George and Margaret divulged many otherwise obscure facts
about the area along Rockland County between Nyack and a region called Upper
Nyack and Hook Mountain. Unspecified
Rockland County local historians were asked to confirm the presented
information. And again, according to Kavanagh, much of the historical
information was determined accurate; and other obscure facts deemed highly
possible.
The spirits complained to Ackley
that they were not as fond of the new owners, and indeed they were rather bored
with the whole arrangement and thinking of moving on. Ackley herself moved on in 2003, and her
former son-in-law speculates she is probably back at 1 LaVeta Place in Nyack
with her friends.
The
True Significance of Stambovsky vs. Ackley
The enduring significance of the
Ackley story is the landmark decision for the Stambovsky’s that would
thereafter be on every property law student’s freshman syllabus. What lost Ackley the case was that she
consciously and repeatedly promoted the house’s reputation, sometimes for
monetary gain, to everyone but the buyers.
Rubin determined that Ackley could not say it was haunted and then deny
the haunting to the buyers, thereby Ackley was estopped from denying that the
house was haunted. He further
speculated that promoting the house’s haunted reputation would attract every
thrill seeker and would-be ghost hunter to invade the Stambovsky’s privacy, and
decrease the house’s value overall.
A shallow interpretation of the court decision
would be that those selling haunted houses need to make full disclosure
(reporting) of such reputed haunts to prospective buyers. But that couldn’t be further from the truth.
In a surprising twist of fate, the
haunted house case, as well as other landmark court decisions in the late 80’s
and early 90’s prompted many states to reconsider their state laws in regards
to stigmatized property – properties with a dark past. While the courts tended to side with the
buyers of such properties, lawmakers came out solidly on the side of the sellers
and especially the sellers’ agents.
Shortly
after the Stambovsky vs. Ackley court decision the state of New York passed
what came to be known as the “Haunted House” statute. It was the lawmakers’ attempt to clarify what
information should be disclosed (presented) to a prospective buyer. While the law was called the “Haunted House’
statute, it actually never mentioned haunted houses. Rather New York, as did the majority of
states that also passed statutes on stigmatized property (property that has a
dark history for one reason or another), determined that information about a
house’s ghastly past need not be
disclosed to potential buyers, and that sellers and their agents were under
no obligation to do so, nor could have causes of action (law suits) brought
against them for non-disclosure. The only provision New York property law made
to possibly worried buyers was that they could make a inquiry in writing which
asked the seller about a property’s history.
Sellers could choose to respond or not to such an inquiry..(Interested
in reading more about the history and writing of stigmatized property laws? See
The Shore’s article entitled “3 bedrooms,
2.5 Baths and 1 Ghost) (N.Y. REAL PROP. LAW § 443-a (1)(a)).)
Resources
Kavanagh,
Mark (2010). The Ghost of Nyack. Kavanagh Transit System. Retrieved July 28,
2015 from http://www.ktransit.com/Kavanagh/Ghost/ghost-background.htm
Kachuba,
John B. (2007) Ghosthunters: On the Trail of Mediums, Dousers, Spirit Seekers
and Other Investigators of America’s Paranormal. Pg. 128.
Maull,
Samuel (1991). “Spirit of Law Recognizes 'Haunted House”
Los Angeles Times. Associated Press. Retrieved July 14, 2015 from
Rubin,
Israel (1991) Stambovsky v. Ackley 572 N.Y.S.2d 672 (N.Y. Sup. Ct. App. Div.
1991) as appears at MHeducation.com Retrieved July 28, 2015 from
http://highered.mheducation.com/sites/dl/free/0072933992/336388/ch13_Stambovsky_vs_Ackley.html
Tull,
D. Enigma Editor “Ex Ghost Facto.” dtrull@parascope.com. Reprinted without permission by Kavanagh,
Mark at www.ktransit.com.
