Amy Stamatis’ Real Exorcism
KATV/YouTubeCindy Lawson with Amy Stamatis.
In November 2006, Amy Stamatis jumped out of her second-story window in Searcy, Arkansas. Paralyzed below the waist and recovering in the hospital, she was visited by Pentecostal evangelist Cindy Lawson. Lawson, who claimed to have performed 10 real-life exorcisms before, told her that she knew demons possessed Stamatis.
“The Lord spoke to me and told me to go to the hospital to cast the demons out of her,” said Lawson. “I could feel something churning.”
Stamatis’ trouble began after a shift at Baptist Health Medical Center in Little Rock. The 49-year-old nurse had just finished writing a report and inexplicably forgot how to do her job. Her skills were gone entirely, leading her to quit. A lifelong runner, she was suddenly unable to do even that. Psychiatrists prescribed antidepressants.
KATV/YouTubeThe second-story window that Stamatis jumped from.
Stamatis worsened over time, randomly taking her clothes off in public, screaming at friends, and once climbing a seven-story parking ramp to jump from. While the police managed to talk her down, she ultimately tried again in November from her own home and succeeded. Paralyzed and with voices still haunting her, she put her trust in Lawson.
Stamatis had suffered through hearing voices whisper suggestions to kill herself for seven months before she jumped out the window and was unable to find help anywhere she turned. Ultimately she agreed to let Lawson perform an exorcism.
“In the medical world, they need to put a name to it,” said Stamatis. “They don’t understand because they have never dealt with these types of demons. So how are they going to fight against something that you don’t know how to fight, that you don’t understand?”
Lawson performed her first real-life exorcism on a nine-year-old boy and said that he levitated during the ritual. She claimed to have seen subjects change their eye color mid-exorcism, foam at the mouth, or speak in guttural, demonic voices. She said her vocation was initially “terrifying,” but that God had called her to it.
While Stamatis doesn’t remember her real-life exorcism, the family members who attended all agreed that there had been an instantaneous change when it finished. While the former nurse remained paralyzed, her exorcist is convinced that God will eventually even heal her of that, too.
Kristy Bamu’s Fatal Exorcism
London Metropolitan PoliceKristy Bamu had 130 separate injuries on his body when he died.
Not every exorcism ends with a success story. In fact, many real-life exorcisms are fatal after suffering. And that is especially true in cases of unsanctioned exorcisms. For 15-year-old Parisian Kristy Bamu, the suffering was at the hands of none other than his own sister and her boyfriend.
In 2010, Bamu traveled from Paris to London with his two sisters and a brother for Christmas to visit their 27-year-old sister, Magalie, and her boyfriend, Eric Bikubi.
Suddenly, he found himself a target of their fanatic religious beliefs. Magalie and Eric were obsessed with the evils of witchcraft and not only deemed the teenager possessed but accused him of casting spells.
Determined to cast the spirits out, Magalie and Eric deprived Kristy of food and water for three days. They stabbed him with knives, beat him with metal bars and a hammer, and eventually drowned him in the bathtub of their east London flat. When the authorities found his body, they noted his teeth had been knocked out.
London Metropolitan PoliceEric Bikubi and Magalie Bamu believed 15-year-old Kristy Bamu was a real-life witch.
“Kristy died in unimaginable circumstances at the hands of people he loved and trusted — people we all loved and trusted,” said the teen’s father, Pierre. “I feel betrayed. To know that Kristy’s own sister, Magalie, did nothing to save him makes that pain much worse.”
Charged with murder, Bikubi and Magalie claimed at trial that the teenager had “begged to die” before he slipped in the bathtub he was kept in and drowned. Bikubi’s defense lawyer argued he was mentally impaired, while Magalie’s lawyer argued Bikubi had forced her to help him torture the boy.
Together, they also forced Kristy’s younger siblings to help in the “ritual cleansing.” Kristy Bamu had been beaten until he confessed to witchcraft and asked for forgiveness. At that point, however, he had suffered 130 injuries.
Eric Bikubi was sentenced to 30 years in prison, while Magalie Bamu receive a minimum of 25 years.
