Newton police dismantled what some described as a satanic shrine Friday. The skulls and bones were discovered on Newton city property off N.C. 10.
Michael Poovey works as a caretaker on property near the clearing where he found the shrine.
It's near the police firing range and about 200 yards from where Poovey had discovered a starved horse and horse skeletons in and around a leased pasture in mid-February.
"I guess I'm the only one around here who finds anything," he said.
Poovey said he discovered the shrine when he was walking around trails in the woods looking for evidence after thieves broke into outbuildings on the land he cares for.
He said the trees surrounding the 16-foot wide clearing had a patch of bark cut off their trunks and what looked like a small grave with stones piled on it was near the shrine.
"It was the damndest thing I'd ever laid my eyes on," Poovey said. "It had cat skulls, horse skulls, a turtle shell and I think one of them was a deer skull."
Pentagrams and arcane symbols were painted on a skull along with the words "Startown Mafia."
"I always thought you only hear or read about things like this," Poovey said.
He contacted the Newton Police Department and took two officers to the site this week to show them what he'd found.
On Friday, investigators photographed the scene and dismantled the shrine.
Newton police investigators spoke to a man who admitted he built the shrine.
"He said it was a joke to put it out there," said Newton Chief of Police Don Brown. "There's no significance to it as far as he's concerned."
Poovey disagrees and said he thinks two men built the shrine were the men behind the break-ins.
"It looked like more than a joke," he said. "They were pretty serious about what they were doing."
There was no flesh found on the bones.
"We have determined that these are the bones that this man found," Brown said. "He had no mali-cious intent that we know of."
Empty cans were connected to a fishing line tripwire. It was a crude alarm designed to alert the shrine's builder to people approaching, not to cause harm, Brown said.
Brown said the man who built the shrine will not be criminally charged.
Brown said a similar grouping of skulls and bones was found in on the north side of Newton about 15 years ago, but there was nothing to that one either.
Poovey said he's glad the police removed the skulls and bones but he doesn't like the idea that he lives near people who would build something like that.
"It struck me as about as crazy and screwy as anything could be," Poovey said. "Hell, they even vote, probably. They're bound to be Obama supporters."
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