Tumblr was rocked to its very core last December by a situation now known as Boneghazi — the last great meme of 2015. In a screenshot circulating on the blog network, a witch named Ender Darling offered up some human bones for sale, allegedly collected from a local New Orleans cemetery. What followed was a simultaneously amused and horrified discourse about witchcraft, spells, class, and race.
We now know what happened in the aftermath. Suspected of trafficking in human remains, Darling’s home was subject to “periodic surveillances” over six days in January, according to the New Orleans Advocate. On January 28, the home was raided by investigators who, according to court records obtained by the Advocate, “recovered at least 11 bones and four teeth.”
Investigators also subpoenaed all correspondence from Darling’s Facebook profiles, a request that yielded more than 12,000 pages of information. The messages indicated the witch had been obtaining bones from a graveyard beginning on Nov. 16, “primarily acting alone, but also with a roommate,” court records state.
Two of Darling’s former roommates, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said they had nothing to do with Darling’s bone collection or related rituals. “I think she thought she had way more power than she actually had,” one of them said.
The investigation is ongoing.
Darling received tons of threats after the initial offer to send collected bone fragments to other witches, and admitted to sending “one human tooth and two human shards” to someone, asking only for enough money to cover the cost of shipping.
Darling has since moved to Florida, partially because of safety concerns.
