S9E4: Inglewood Horror Stories (Inglewood Park Cemetery, Airport Park View Hotel, and Centinela Park)
Listen to S9E4: Inglewood Horror Stories (Inglewood Park Cemetery, Airport Park View Hotel, and Centinela Park) on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
On this episode of The Scarecast, we’re diving deep into the haunted heart of Inglewood, California - a city where the past lingers in the shadows and every landmark seems to have a story to tell. In this episode, we’ll unravel chilling tales from three of Inglewood’s most infamous sites: Inglewood Park Cemetery, the old Airport Park View Hotel (now The Lum Hotel), and Centinela Park, now known as Edward Vincent Jr. Park.
Inglewood Park Cemetery is more than just a final resting place for Hollywood legends-it’s a hotspot for ghostly encounters. Listeners have shared stories of vanishing hitchhikers, mysterious figures in mariachi suits, and the laughter of unseen children echoing through the night. But the cemetery isn’t the only place where the supernatural seeps through the city’s surface. The Airport Park View Hotel, now The Lum Hotel, sits on land with a reputation for restless spirits. Across town, Centinela Park-renamed Edward Vincent Jr. Park-holds its own dark secrets. Beyond the ghost stories and eerie feelings, the park was the site of one of Inglewood’s most tragic crimes: the 1937 abduction and murder of three young girls, an event that cast a shadow over the community for generations.
Whether you’re a lifelong local or just passing through, Inglewood’s haunted history is impossible to ignore. So turn down the lights, lock your doors, and join us as we explore the true horror stories that make Inglewood one of Southern California’s most haunted cities. This is The Scarecast, Season 9, Episode 4: Inglewood Horror Stories.
Inglewood Park Cemetery
1983, Dillions in Westwood. It was a place with 3 levels of dancing , first floor country music second floor r&B third floor rock and roll. A young lady came up to me. Caucasian her name was Helen asked me if I would dance with her And told me that her friend left with someone else. I said yes. We danced for a couple of hours and we even had a nice romantic slow dance since she was alone. She asked if I could take her home. I said sure. She said she didn't live far. She said she lived near the Inglewood cemetery. As we left Dillon's it started to rain so I offered my jacket to cover her from the rain. On the way to her house she said let's do a drive-by first and said if the light is on on the porch that mad her parents were still awake. We drove by and the light was still on so she said can we keep driving around until the light goes on? I said sure. All of a sudden it began to rain tremendously hard as we pull up between the cemetery and the forum on Manchester boulevard .
We are at the stoplight and it began to rain so hard. We cannot see out the windshield. She asked. Is it okay if we pull over and wait for the hard rain to pass through? I said sure. 20 minutes or so the rain lets up and she gets out of the car and says I'll be right back. She suddenly goes to the Inglewood cemetery gate and climbs the gate and jumps into the cemetery and begins to run into the dark beyond my visibility. I waited for about 30 minutes. She never came back. I drove around to see if she had came out from another part of the cemetery and had seen her from another gate entrance and said hey. All I want is my Jacket bag. She looked back at me And walked back into the dark. Not knowing what to do at this time, I decided to drive back by her house to see if the light was off and it was. Being respectful. I did not knock on the door. I waited till the next morning. I knock on the door and a gentleman that opens the door. Who appears to be her father says. Can I help you?
I said yes. I was with Helen last night. I let her borrow my jacket because of the torrential downpour last night. He says oh. That was very kind of you. However Helen is not here. Yesterday was her birthday but Helen passed away 7 years ago. Unfortunately, the man at the door said that this was a recurring situation on Helen's birthday. I told the gentleman at the door that she ran off into the cemetery with my jacket. He acted as he was not surprised. He just apologized to me for the experience I had. He suggested that I go back to the cemetery and get my jacket and look for a section g-14. The gentleman at the door said that's where she was buried and that she likes to reappear on her birthday and go out dancing. He said that she loved to dance the night away. As I go back to the cemetery I parked my car and I get a nab of the area and I go look for her section g-14 as I start to get closer. I look up from a distance .
And I see my jacket hanging on her tombstone, I nervously reached over and grabbed my jacket and respectively did the sign of the cross and said thank you Helen, it was a night to remember.
I was sent this story by a guy named Tony Galvan. But do you think this story is true?
Some people in my comments of the video version of the story I released on instagram last week have claimed that this could be a story based on a song… an old song that came out in the 1960s called Laurie (Strange Things Happen) by Dickey Lee that tells the story of a young man who meets a girl named Laurie at a dance, walks her home, and lends her his sweater because she is cold. After leaving, he returns to retrieve his sweater, only to be told by her father that Laurie died a year ago on her birthday. The young man is then drawn to the graveyard, where he finds his sweater draped over Laurie’s grave.
However, its important to note that this song, "Laurie (Strange Things Happen)" was actually inspired by a real-life ghost story published in a Memphis newspaper in 1964. The tale was written by a teenage girl named Cathie Harmon, and songwriter Mitt Addington was so taken by the story that he composed the song based on it, even sharing his royalties with Harmon. The story itself follows the classic "vanishing hitchhiker" motif-a young man meets a mysterious girl, shares a romantic evening, only to realize the love interest was not a real person.
Although this story may be fictional, I love that its based on where I live over in Inglewood, and features a cemetery I grew up knowing back from my childhood.
However, thats not the only scary story that I have told recently about, another listener @king0fmexic0 had commented:
Back when I worked concerts at the Forum, I had a friend who lived on the far side of the cemetery. If he could make it to the door in time, I’d sneak him into the shows. To get there, he’d hop the cemetery fence and sprint across the grounds like his life depended on it. He’d arrive breathless at the door, just in time for me to let him in. But when he’d arrive he’s always claim to hear children laughing and playing inside the cemetery, which made his run through the cemetery even more unnerving.
This makes me want to roll my window down when driving past Inglewood Park Cemetery to see if I might actually capture something there. Funny that I say that… someone else did the exact same thing and they actually did see something…
User themysteriousone_v commented this story:
I’ll never forget the night my mom and I were driving home after attending a concert for a metal band called Ghost, about a year ago. It was around 1:30 in the morning, and as we made our way down Manchester Blvd., our route took us right alongside the cemetery walls. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of a man standing by the sidewalk, close to the call box on that long, lonely stretch of road. He looked to be about sixty, dressed head-to-toe in a crisp white mariachi suit and a cowboy hat. He had a white beard and a noticeable beer belly-almost as if he’d stepped out of another era. The man seemed to be waiting for someone, just standing there in the quiet darkness. But as another car passed us, he vanished-gone in an instant, as if he’d never been there at all. I pointed him out to my mom, but she hadn’t seen a thing. Even now, I find myself wondering: who was that mysterious figure waiting by the cemetery in the dead of night? And who, or what, was he waiting for?
Another strange experience at the cemetery happened when a lady claimed kids followed her and her cousin out of the cemetery. In her words, “The kids will follow you after visiting the cemetery. My cousin and I would come out to the car to find child sized hand prints on the car windshield. She would drop me off at home and come in to visit. When we would walk out to her car as she was leaving, there would be more little hand prints. Little handprints would also end up on mirrors in my house. There were other things over the years as well, but the little kids were definitely one of the most prominent.”
Another user commented that she experienced something strange in the cemetery when visiting about 15 years ago:
It was around 2008, and my sister in law had passed three years prior in 2005. I went to go visit her by myself and it was around 4pm in the afternoon. When I got there I did not notice anyone around me and not even 5 minutes in and I heard the loudest cry of my life. It sounded like someone was crying into a mic. The cry was so loud & sentimental it scared the shit out of me. I looked around and there was absolutely no one around. I jumped into my car and sped off. Till this day I wonder WTH that was!
I was somewhat nostalgic when I arrived as I was still mourning her death because she was someone I was very close to. She was like a sister to me. She left a son whom at the time was 8. Till this day it is something that freaks me out and I’ve never visited alone since then.
And would you believe this was not the only terrifying story encountered at this cemetery in the middle of the day? Another anonymous user sent me this story:
Many of my loved ones lay resting there...I went there one day and it was about 1:00 p.m....sunny day. As we were leaving I saw small female child running around a tree… she had a white dress and I kept my eyes on her…. as I realized she was by herself I started to approach but realized her feet were not present . I knew to run my ass out of there...me and my boss both agreed it was the spirit of a child... definitely haunted.
This user claimed to have grown up in South Central not very far from Inglewood, and she worked around the corner from this specific cemetery.
Another spooky story I received, which had me skeptical, was the following story:
When I was a teenager back in the 1970s, I dated a girl who was obsessed with all things spooky. One evening, she dared me to join her for a walk through Inglewood Park Cemetery, hoping we’d stumble across something eerie among the headstones. I told her I wasn’t really into that kind of thing, but she started teasing me, saying I was just scared. Before I knew it, I was following her through the cemetery gates as dusk settled in.
As we wandered deeper among the graves, the sky grew darker and the air felt heavy. Suddenly, a strange, rhythmic tapping echoed through the stillness. Crystal grabbed my arm and whispered, “What is that?” I could only shrug, just as unsettled as she was.
Curiosity got the better of us, so we crept toward the source of the sound. With every step, the tapping grew louder and more distinct. Finally, we spotted an old man dressed in a black suit, kneeling in front of a headstone. He was intently chiseling away at the stone, his hammer and chisel creating that haunting, repetitive noise.
Crystal let out a nervous laugh. “My God, you scared the crap out of us!” she called out. “We thought you were a ghost!”
The man didn’t even glance our way-he just kept working, completely ignoring us. We exchanged uneasy glances, unsure what to make of it. I finally mustered up the courage to ask, “Sir, what are you doing out here so late?”
He stopped, turned slowly toward us, and I’ll never forget how pale he looked in the fading light. In a low voice, he said, “They misspelled my name, so I’m fixing it.”
We didn’t stick around to see if he finished.
Now before I move on to surrounding areas, I was told a very grim story about a graphic image that circulated of a man who was found hanging from a tree.
On August 30, 1991, a tragic and disturbing event occurred at the Inglewood Park Cemetery in Inglewood, California. Early that morning, as commuters passed by, a 36-year-old man was discovered hanging from a tree in the northwest corner of the cemetery. The incident was witnessed by several people, who were reportedly horrified by the scene. When police arrived, they pronounced the man dead at the scene. His name was not released to the public at the time.
Authorities found a suicide note, but they declined to disclose its contents or specify exactly where it was found. The circumstances led police to rule the death a suicide.
Just in 2018, a similar case of a man found hanging at the park re-emerged. In August 2018, a graphic image began circulating on social media depicting a man hanging from a tree within the cemetery grounds. Mayor James Butts publicly confirmed the authenticity of the image but labeled the incident a suicide. This official stance was met with skepticism by many residents, who questioned the lack of visible evidence supporting suicide and raised concerns about the possibility of foul play. The Inglewood Police Department (IPD) did not provide detailed public information about the investigation, and the incident did not appear in local news coverage or official crime reports, further fueling suspicions among community members. Observers noted inconsistencies in the official narrative, such as the absence of a ladder or device that could have been used to facilitate a hanging, and the body language of first responders, who appeared to be conversing casually at the scene rather than attempting a rescue.
The incident occurred during a period of heightened scrutiny of public safety in Inglewood, following a separate homicide at the "Taste of Inglewood" event just a week prior.
I was reading an article from 2Urbangirls.com and they detailed another event I never knew about that happened at Taste of Inglewood.
Levester Brian Peterson, a 39-year-old Black man, was stabbed to death on Sunday, August 5, 2018, in the 100 block of East Kelso Street in Inglewood. Inglewood Police officers responded to a call about a person down at approximately 3:19 p.m. and found Peterson lying on the sidewalk with multiple stab wounds. He was transported to UCLA Westwood Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 4:28 p.m. According to police and coroner’s records, Peterson was a native of Inglewood and residing in Long Beach at the time of his death.
There has been some controversy regarding the exact location of the homicide, with the LA Times Homicide Report listing it at 100 E. Kelso (which intersects Grevillea), while Inglewood Police Department statements have cited LaBrea and Kelso as the site This discrepancy has fueled public suspicion and criticism of city officials' handling of the case, especially given the proximity to a major public event and concerns about police presence and transparency.
According to the website, 2Urbangirls, attendees reported minimal visible Inglewood Police Department presence, with officers appearing to be "passing thru" rather than actively on duty.
There is significant skepticism among Inglewood residents regarding the official narratives provided by city leadership and the police department about recent deaths near the Taste of Inglewood event. Discrepancies in location reporting, the classification of a hanging as a suicide without clear evidence, and the casual response of first responders have fueled suspicions of a cover-up. These concerns are heightened by the city's recent destruction of police records and the perception that city officials are prioritizing Inglewood’s public image over transparency and accountability just to save the city’s reputation given all the gentrification the city has been going through including the addition of billion dollar sport franchises in Inglewood.
Airport Park View Hotel (The Lum Hotel)
Not far down Century Boulevard in Inglewood, CA, the old Airport Park View Hotel-now the Lum Hotel-had a reputation for being extremely haunted. Someone sent me this story:
I lost touch with my former coworker Ricardo, but we both worked at Papa John’s in the early 2000s. One night, Ricardo needed a ride back to the Park View Hotel. During the drive, I mentioned that I grew up on 104th Street, not far from the hotel, and that I always felt an unsettling energy whenever I passed by on my bike. Ricardo then shared some disturbing experiences he’d had just days after checking in. He described seeing shadowy figures and hearing unexplained banging and knocking sounds in his room. Several times, he woke to find the bathroom faucet running by itself. Most unsettling, he repeatedly saw the apparition of a man in a suit and hat wandering the halls between 1 and 2 a.m.-a detail hotel staff later confirmed to him. He also heard humming and the voice of an elderly woman in his room. The most chilling incident occurred when he opened his room’s entrance door and saw a woman standing motionless beside the bathroom. Ricardo had prepaid for a couple of months, so he was stuck staying there and eventually got used to the strange occurrences. Is the Lum Hotel, which currently sits where Park View Hotel used to be haunted?
Who would have ever knew Inglewood had so many haunted places…
Centinela Park (Edward Vincent Jr. Park)
Another user said they experienced weird things at Centinela Park, now known as Edward Vincent Jr. Park:
I had my gender reveal party at Centinela Park just across the street, and I couldn’t help but notice something strange, my husband’s niece, who had been playing with other kids at the party, kept chatting with the air near a particular tree. It happened several times, always the same tree. I was too scared to ask her what was going on. She didn’t seem frightened at all-she kept going back to that spot like it was the most normal thing in the world. It wasn’t until later that my husband told me the unsettling history: they used to make caskets in that abandoned-looking area right next to the tree, where she was talking to noting.
We live in Arizona now, but every time we visit, we make a point to stop by the park. Nothing strange has happened so far, but with our own little one now, I’m on high alert. Honestly, I’d be terrified if he started talking to a tree too!
Even though the park has changed its name, the dark history attached to the park will never fade away. We are about to dive into a grim case, which involves very sensitive details involving violence and the sexual assault of little children, so you have been warned…
On June 26, 1937, three young girls-Melba Marie Everett (9), her sister Madeline Everett (7), and their friend Jeanette Stephens (8)-vanished while playing together in Centinela Park, a familiar and favored spot for local children in Inglewood, CA.. a park where the three girls often played many times before. That day, the girls had brought with them a thermos of milk, a cherished Mickey Mouse book, and a blanket to lay out beneath their favorite pepper tree in Centinela Park. Their plans were simple and innocent: to share stories, enjoy their snacks, and bask in the warmth of a carefree summer afternoon. For Melba, Madeline, and Jeanette, it was meant to be just another day of childhood adventure and friendship, surrounded by the familiar sights and sounds of their neighborhood park-a place where they felt safe, happy, and free. No one could have imagined that such an ordinary outing would end in tragedy, forever altering the lives of their families and casting a shadow over the community for generations to come.
The girls were last seen interacting with a park regular known as “Eddie the Sailor,” a familiar figure to many local children. Eddie was known for his playful demeanor, entertaining kids with rope tricks and odd feats-like bending his wrists backward in a way that always drew gasps and laughter. He was a fixture in Centinela Park, someone the children trusted and often gravitated toward for a bit of fun or a story. On that fateful afternoon, Eddie reportedly invited the girls to join him on a rabbit hunt in the nearby Baldwin Hills, promising each of them a bunny to take home. Excited by the prospect, the girls eagerly shared their plans with others before leaving the safety of their pepper tree.
When they failed to return home for dinner and their usual radio programs, their families grew alarmed. After fruitless searches by siblings and neighbors, the families of the girls notified the police, setting into motion a massive search effort that quickly grew to involve the entire community. Initially, Inglewood police officers responded by canvassing the area and speaking with people in and around Centinela Park, but as the hours passed with no sign of the girls, the urgency escalated.
By late evening, the disappearance was broadcast over the Los Angeles police network, and by Sunday morning, a statewide alert had been issued. Inglewood’s police chief, Oscar Campbell, ordered every available officer into the field, and the search rapidly expanded to include Los Angeles police, county sheriff’s deputies, American Legionnaires, and hundreds of citizen volunteers. The Boy Scouts played a significant role, with as many as 500 Scouts joining the search parties, scouring vacant lots, sheds, weed patches, and every conceivable hiding place throughout the city and surrounding countryside. The effort continued through the night, illuminated by an almost full moon, as searchers worked tirelessly and anxiously, hoping for any sign of the missing girls.
Despite the scale and intensity of the search, no trace was found that first night. The next day, as the search widened to neighboring cities and the surrounding hills, the community’s anxiety deepened.
Early Monday afternoon, after nearly two days of desperate searching, four Boy Scouts volunteering in the massive community effort made a grim discovery in the rugged Baldwin Hills. As they scoured a deep gully about two miles from the nearest road, they came upon a heartbreaking scene: three little pairs of shoes neatly lined up in the weeds, and, nearby, the bodies of Melba Marie Everett, Madeline Everett, and Jeanette Stephens. Each girl had been strangled with a cord and sexually assaulted, their bodies hidden among the tall, wild grass and brush. The condition and positioning of the girls, as described in later accounts, underscored the brutality and tragedy of the crime-one girl was found lying as if in sleep, another concealed beneath thick bushes, and the third with her dress disturbed and a finger caught in the rope that had ended her life.
The investigation into the murders quickly focused on individuals seen around Centinela Park in the days leading up to the girls’ disappearance. As stated earlier, Eddie the Sailor, whose real name was Othel Leroy Strong, was identified by several witnesses-including the girls’ older sister Olive-as “Eddie the Sailor” as the man who proposed to take the girls on a bunny hunt.
Strong had a prior conviction for contributing to the delinquency of a minor after accosting a 14-year-old girl in Inglewood, which heightened police interest in him. However, there was no conclusive evidence linking Strong to the murders, and he was not charged in the case.
As the investigation progressed, suspicion shifted to Albert Dyer, a 32-year-old Works Progress Administration (WPA) crossing guard who was well known to the children in the neighborhood and had an unusual reputation in the community. Dyer had worked as a traffic guard near Centinela Grammar School, where the victims attended, and was present at the scene when the girls’ bodies were discovered, even urging others not to smoke out of respect for the dead.
A young teenager’s testimony and Dyer’s proximity to the children led police to focus on him. On July 4, 1937, after a series of odd behaviors and mounting suspicion, Dyer was taken into custody. During intense police interrogations, Dyer confessed to being the actual person who lured the girls into the Baldwin Hills under the pretense of a rabbit hunt, then strangling each of them in succession. He described how he separated the girls, killed them one by one, and later arranged their shoes neatly before praying over their bodies.
Despite his confessions, Dyer’s statements were inconsistent-he confessed, recanted, and confessed again-and there were ongoing concerns about his mental capacity and the circumstances under which his confessions were obtained. Nevertheless, the pressure to resolve the case was immense. Dyer was put on trial, found guilty after a brief jury deliberation, and sentenced to death. On September 16, 1938, he was executed by hanging at San Quentin Prison, one of the last individuals to be hanged in California.
In the years following Albert Dyer’s conviction and execution for the 1937 Inglewood child murders, significant doubts have emerged regarding his guilt-many of them raised by family members of the victims and independent researchers.
Pamela Everett, a lawyer and journalist who is the niece of two of the murdered girls, Melba Marie and Madeline Everett, became a leading voice questioning the case against Dyer. In her investigation, detailed in her book *Little Shoes*, Everett uncovered inconsistencies in Dyer’s confessions, concerns about the intense and lengthy police interrogations he endured, and a lack of direct evidence tying him to the crime scene.
Everett and others have pointed out that Dyer’s confessions were obtained after hours of unrecorded questioning, and his statements often changed or contradicted known facts. The defense at trial emphasized that Dyer, who had cognitive challenges and was considered easily influenced, may have been coerced into confessing. There was also no conclusive proof placing Dyer with the girls when they left the park, and alternative suspects-such as “Eddie the Sailor”-were never fully ruled out.
If so many eye witnesses saw Eddie the Sailor being the person who promised a bunny hunt to the girls, how did the actual person end up being Dyer? Were the two men somehow linked? Or was Dyer simply the fall guy because he simply confessed to doing something he truly didnt do under pressure.
Public outrage and fear at the time put immense pressure on authorities to solve the case quickly, which may have contributed to a rush to judgment. To this day, the question of whether Albert Dyer was truly guilty remains unresolved, with researchers and descendants of the victims continuing to seek answers and justice for the three girls.
The three young victims of the 1937 Inglewood child murders-Melba Marie Everett, her sister Madeline Everett, and their friend Jeanette Marjorie Stephens-were laid to rest in local cemeteries their graves standing as somber reminders of one of Inglewood’s darkest chapters.
I wonder if the area around the tree the woman’s niece was talking to could have been the same area the little girls held their picnic under the pepper tree prior to their disappearance?
Closing
Well, that is all for today’s episode. If you enjoyed this episode, please rate and review this podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to let others know how you feel about the podcast, and please share to your friends. If you want to view more of my content, follow me on Instagram and TikTok, Youtube and Facebook, so you can watch the video versions of my content which is not available through podcast. If you have a story you want to share, please send to mike@thescarecast.com and as always, be safe out there and until next time.
