FATE Magazine
Feb 2, 20217 min
While meditating at the end of a yoga class in 1975, a vision appeared before my tightly- closed eyes. As I strained to focus, it slowly took the shape of a prone female body, sus-
pended in mid-air above me.
“Good Lord, it’s a corpse,” I mumbled.
As I glanced toward her feet, I saw two words scrawled across a street sign. This was one of the scariest moments of my life. I sat up, questions flooding my mind: Why would I see a dead body? Who is she? Has this person been murdered? Lying next to me, my secretary June
softly whispered, “Are you all right?” I nodded and laid back down, still in
disbelief at what had just occurred.
As soon as the class was over both June and the yoga teacher wanted to know what happened. When I told them my frightening experience, they exclaimed in uni- son, “Annette, you have to go down to the sheriff ’s office and tell them what you
saw!”
“Are you kidding?” I replied. “They are going to think I am crazy, even though I am a professional psychic.”
After 15 minutes of convincing from June and the yoga teacher and a call to my husband, we made our way down to the Marin County sheriff ’s office. Little did I realize this would be the beginning of a new and exciting chapter in my life. I certainly never anticipated becoming a psychic detective, assisting police agencies across the world, including the FBI, in finding criminals and locating missing persons.
Getting Started
Every week, I receive emails, phone calls, and letters from folks asking me what to do with information they picked up about a missing person or a feeling they have about a murder case. Helping to bring closure to a family whose loved one is missing or has been murdered is a wonderful thing, and many psychics wish to put their gifts to such beneficial use.
Over the past 35 years, I have been instrumental in helping many loved ones return to their families. It’s the unknowingness that drives families into great depression, stress and remorse. Words cannot express what a wonderful feeling it is to be a tool, and a tool is just what we are, helping the police solve the crime and bring final closure to the family.
There can be a down side, however. Sometimes I see that a missing person is actually dead. This is always sad, and I have to adjust my emotions as to not get involved in the sorrow. By not allowing my
emotions to get in the way I can go deeper into the situation in order to extract more information.
When I’m working on a police case, the top of my head hurts and throbs by the time we are finished. We generally work two and a half hours at a time. After two or three hours of work, my energy has been drained and I am ready to stop and have some protein and a little sugar. On some cases we might do three separate sessions, depending on the information that I am picking up or whether the agency wants more details.
I have learned not to work on a case after I have left my office. You will burn yourself out if you keep trying to see more on a missing person or assailant.
About half of the calls or emails that we receive are from families that have a missing person or their loved one has been murdered. In answering their inquiries, it’s necessary to keep things professional from the very first contact. The family is often upset and angry. It is very important for me not to become emotionally in- volved, even though my heart wants to cry out loud in their grief.
Remember to keep your ego out of it, too. Make notes and write down any im- mediate hits you get when talking to the family, but don’t tell them something that could ruin the case for the police.
A Big No-No
Never contact the police with your psychic impressions about a high-profile case. Police receive thousands of unsolicited tips from psychics. It’s overwhelm- ing, and almost all of this information is discarded. It is much better to volunteer to work on cold cases with an agency in your home town. Begin to build a reputation so that when something new comes along, they will call you.
Earn Their Trust
The moment I become involved in a case, I am bound to confidentiality. It is extremely important for investigators to know that you will not tell the media what you picked up. If you do this, your reputation will be ruined and you will also put the prosecution of the case in jeopardy.
When I started working with the Marin County sheriff ’s office 35 years ago, I promised I would not divulge any information I had come up with. Only in the past five years have they given me permis- sion to talk about the cases I worked on for them, long after they were solved. Now I only speak to the media about murder cases that have gone to trial and resulted in a conviction.
The Process
Our process has been to work directly with the police on missing persons, murder, fraud, robbery, and rape cases, with the family’s permission. We ask the family to send an original photo of the missing person, maps showing where the person went missing, and small articles belonging to the missing person. We ask that they sign and return our letter with
this material.
The next step is meeting with the detective,
either on the phone or in person. All sessions are doubly recorded so that we each have a copy of what has been said.
Generally, the detective then plays the recording to his lieutenant and captain, and we go from there if a second session is needed.
Doing the Reading
When I work, I always start with White Light for protection. White light is pure, positive energy. It is full-spectrum light; when all colors merge together in the physical world you get White Light. Put the White Light into your aura and keep it there all the time.
Holding a photograph of the victim or missing person, I close my eyes and take three deep breaths in through my nose and exhale through my mouth, all the while bringing in the White Light. Within a few moments I can move into the energy of the missing person or victim.
Next, I travel psychically to where the victim was last seen. I see the person, feel their emotions, and know what is happening at that moment. It’s like stepping into a movie. At some point I usually see the perpetrator come into the scene, and I begin to feel his or her emotions, too. Voices become audible and I can hear conversations between the victim and the assailant. I describe all of this out loud as I witness it so the detective knows what I am experiencing and can also ask questions as we move along. Sometimes I be- come an observer, especially when it is getting near the actual murder. It’s like I’m taking a step back in time to see what happened.
30-Year-Old Case in Point
After the session, it is up to the detective whether or not to let the family hear the tapes. Generally the police withhold the information while they investigate what has come through.
It is dangerous to do readings directly for a family, because it’s possible that a friend or family member is involved in the case. There are times when the perpetrator is a family member, and you certainly do not want the family to know that in- formation. You do not want someone in the family going out with a gun to accuse that relative of kidnapping or killing their child or loved one.
The following case is one I worked on over 30 years ago. A report on this case will air on the Biography Channel’s Psychic Investigator sometime in 2009.
A woman came into my Los Altos office and said she needed to talk to me. My secretary convinced me to see her immediately. When the woman sat down, she told me that her daughter was missing and I had to help her. I explained that I could- n’t help her unless the police were involved. She became extremely agitated and started screaming and crying. Needless to say, I gave in; this was the one and only time in my career that I ever did this.
During the reading, I saw where her daughter was and who killed her. I made her promise she would take the recording of our session to the police, and not let her husband go after this person. She agreed, but I had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, so I called the police myself. I made a tape for the detective, which they picked up. The police didn’t do anything with my information for at least two weeks, and it was a year before they found the girl’s body.
Twenty-six years later I got a call from an inspector with the Santa Clara police department who had been assigned to this cold case. He asked if I had any notes or tapes, as he had been told that I had seen the mother years before.
I was stunned at his request and said, “Believe it or not, I have a copy of the tape.” He asked if I could copy it. I told him I would also transcribe it for him. I was ex- cited they were working on this cold case.
I found out years later that the father did accuse the perpetrator of taking his daughter, which resulted in the perpetrator moving the body. It took 26 years be- fore this person was brought to justice.
Needless to say, I would never want to have that situation repeated. The victim’s parents had passed away, but 30 years later the case was finally solved. Ω
Annette Martin has helped over 60 law enforcement agencies, including the FBI, solve heinous crimes. She has been featured on many television and radio shows.