If you've ever seen the movie Gremlins, you probably remember the random, disturbing scene where, among the chaos of those psychotic puppet monsters destroying everything on Christmas Eve, Billy's friend, Kate, takes a moment to explain why she already hates Christmas. She tells Billy that when she was a child her dad went missing one Christmas Eve and no one could find him for over a week. Then one night she went to light a fire in the fireplace and a bad smell hit her. Her mother called in the fire department, expecting it to be some sort of dead animal who had gotten itself stuck, but instead it ended up being her father, dressed in a Santa suit with a sack full of presents. He had been trying to surprise his wife and daughter by climbing down the chimney like Santa, but instead he wound up slipping and breaking his neck, dying instantly with his body remaining stuck in the chimney.
It's a completely unnerving story that adds a layer of darkness in an already dark comedy, only there's nothing funny about it which is what makes it stand out so much. No matter how poorly thought out you might think her father's plan was, it's still a scary story and a moment a lot of people remember most about the film.
Unfortunately, discovering human bodies trapped in chimneys is not exclusive to the world of cinema, and quite often the aftermath is a horrifying scene left for some unfortunate person to discover later on. Just to name a few examples, in 2010, a woman by the name of Dr. Jacquelyn Kotarac was found decomposing in a chimney after she attempted to slide down it to gain access to her on-again, off-again boyfriend's house. In 2018, a Bolivian man in Argentina attempted to escape police, while being pursued over a robbery, and wound up climbing through a chimney, only to get stuck and forced to wait for police to rescue him. While he was lucky to survive the incident, he was still arrested once he was freed.
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| Just looking at this makes me feel claustrophobic. |
In May of 2008, Colorado teen, Joshua Maddux, walked away from his home and never came back. Joshua was known to be something of a free spirit, talking often about how he planned to go on an adventure someday and possibly not be heard from again for a while. When he went missing, his father, Mike Maddux, searched diligently, determined to find his son all while holding on to hope that he was still alive and well. Even after he and his wife divorced, Mike remained in the family home, hoping it would mean Joshua still had a home to return to, if he ever did.
But in 2015, Mike's worst fears were confirmed when the remains of his son were uncovered inside the chimney of an old historic cabin just a quarter of a mile away from the family home. The cabin was in the process of being demolished when an earth mover made the discovery while peeling away a steel fireplace insert within the chimney. Joshua's death was essentially ruled as "accidental by unknown causes," but there some alarming details to the scene that only added to the mystery as to what exactly happened.
The first question was how and why he wound up inside the chimney? Chuck Murphy, who owned the property in which the cabin stood, claimed there was no way Joshua could have climbed inside from the roof. According to him, there was steel rebar webbing installed at the top of the chimney specifically to keep animals from climbing inside. This raised the question of whether or not Joshua was somehow pushed inside the chimney by someone else. On top of that, it was discovered that a large wooden breakfast bar had been torn from the kitchen wall and moved to block the bottom of the chimney.
Another detail that only raised more questions was the manner of which his body was found. Joshua's feet were down and he was in a fetal position. He was wearing only a thermal shirt, naked from the waist down, and the rest of his clothes were uncovered, neatly folded, inside the cabin. However, there were no signs of stab wounds, bullet holes, or even trauma on the remaining hard tissue.
Despite the coroner's report on Joshua's cause of death, there has been reasonable speculation that his death was not accidental and that he was in fact murdered. And in a turn that is not entirely surprising for those familiar with Reddit, a user came forward in 2016, offering a potential theory as to who may have done this.
In an AskReddit thread, asking about what it was like to discover someone you knew was a serial killer, the user "gentamangina" replied with a lengthy comment, detailing how he had not only known Joshua when he was still alive, but he may have also known the killer. In the comment, he describes how they had a mutual acquaintance named Andy (later identified as Andrew Newman), who was already a little off. Joshua had become friends with Andy just before disappearing, and after the disappearance, Andy later went on to be arrested for two different murders in which the victims had been stabbed to death. Despite Andy supposedly bragging about the murders, he was released due to lack of evidence. Once the Reddit user had been made aware of these events, they immediately went to the police with several other people, trying to get them to further investigate Andy as he was likely the cause of Joshua's disappearance and later death. Unfortunately nothing ever became of it, the cabin was later demolished and Joshua's remains were cremated.
While the true cause of Joshua's death may never be uncovered, it remains an unsettling mystery with many who were close to the situation sincerely doubting there was anything accidental about it.
Sources:
- Chimney discovery ends mystery over young man's disappearance, but questions remain: https://www.denverpost.com/2015/10/19/chimney-discovery-ends-mystery-over-young-mans-disappearance-but-questions-remain/
- Joshua Maddox: The Boy in the Chimney: http://www.darkhistories.com/josh-maddux-the-boy-in-the-chimney/
- gentamangina's original Reddit comment: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/3qqy8t/people_who_have_known_murderers_serial_killers/cwhya9w/?st=jh5slp81&sh=3f06743b
- New Mexico Murder Suspect Captured in Texas County: http://crimesceneinvestigations.blogspot.com/2009/06/new-mexico-murder-suspect-captured-in.html
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