Yankton Sioux Tribe (Ihanktonwan Nation) - South Dakota - 2007: I was a police officer on a Rez. One night I get a call for a man found in another person's garage, which was separate from the house. When I arrived there was an elder man standing with a younger 20-something year old. The young man, who I will call "John," had his head down. I asked the elder what was going on? He told me he found this stranger in his garage running the chain saw. While he was sitting in his house he heard a chain saw running outside. He went out and found this guy running it in the garage. I questioned the younger man but nothing really made sense. He told me he came there to protect them. I asked from who. He responded, from the man coming to hurt them. He appeared to be a little disoriented but did not smell of alcohol. I thought maybe he was on some drugs. I recognized him as a young man I grew up with.
I put him in the police car and began transporting him to the jail. I didn't cuff him, but I did search him. On the way to the jail he starts pounding on the plastic shield between him and I with his fingers spread wide open. He yells at me "I have five fingers! I have five fingers! See this? I have five fingers! I wasn't going to hurt them! I was there to protect them!" I asked from who? He said "from the flying man with stripes with hooves for feet." "What flying man with stripes and hooves for feet," I asked. "He was there to kill them!" "Where is he," I responded. "He's at their house!" He was scaring the crap out of me, so while he was yelling I managed to find a phone number to his house from a friend. I called his house. They said he went to chop wood early in the morning. He took a 6 pack of beer but that was it. They haven't seen him since and it was already in the early morning hours of the following day.
John continued talking about this flying man with wings. He was going to kill John's family if he didn't go over to this man's house with the chain saw. Now he was really creeping me out, so I called the jail before taking him there. I wasn't sure they would take him in a mentally unstable state. It turned out I was right. They didn't want him. I had to take him to the hospital first. I decided to call my uncle, a spiritual leader. It was about 2 A.M. I left a message after he didn't answer. He called right back. I told him what was going on. He told me the man he was talking about is the 'spirit of death.' John was threatened by him because he was drunk. While at the house of the elder man he was going to kill the family with the chain saw, but didn't for whatever reason. I took John to the hospital. They cleared him of everything. They didn't find any drugs in his system. I managed to calm him down after talking to him during that 2-hour long round trip on the Rez to the hospital.
I saw him a week later after that and he was walking down the street like nothing had ever happened, normal as normal can be. Some time after that we had a ceremony because a lot of stories were floating around the Rez about a tall shadow man being seen. It turned out to be the same ghost I dealt with that night through John. We chased him away from the people that night through our ceremonies. However, he's as old as time itself and afraid of nothing. He respects one thing, bravery, because he is afraid of nothing. Someone must stand up to him, preferably, a veteran who's seen death and is brave. Love and prayer will keep him away. He has no face, but can dawn three faces like masks. He has an emotionless face for death; a smiley face for partying with the party life; and an angry face when he causes people to kill each other. He can take the form and wear the clothes of any time period he is in. His influence is powerful unless you can do the things above to make him leave.
Source: Anonymous post, Indigenous Ghost Stories, 2/2014
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