Imagine waking in the middle of the night, unable to move. Aside from your own breathing, the world is silent. Your eyes are open, and you’re fully aware of your surroundings, but for some reason, you can’t turn over, sit up, or even lift your head. You feel intense pressure on your chest as if someone is sitting on you. Then you feel something start to choke you, and you see a dark shadow that seems to be sitting on your chest. You begin to panic, and you try to scream or call out, but the sound doesn’t escape your throat. Just when you think the end is near, whatever is holding you lets go. You jump up, turn on the light, and look around your room, but you don’t see anything out of the ordinary.
Found in different cultures around the world, beliefs about the “choking ghost” or “pressing ghost” share similar descriptions. Almost all of these beliefs explain the terrifying experience as a supernatural attack. Some cultures believe the cause is a witch or a demon sitting on one’s chest to steal one’s breath, while others say a dark entity or spirit means to immobilize or suffocate its victim.
Scientifically, reports of choking ghosts can often be explained by a phenomenon known as sleep paralysis. According to well-documented studies, the brain releases two chemicals that suppress most muscle activity during normal sleep. This is meant to keep us from acting out our dreams. Generally, these chemicals wear off by the time we wake up. However, in some people, sleep paralysis typically occurs when the body remains temporarily paralyzed while the person partially wakes. When this happens, the person may find themselves unable to move, speak, or call for help.
Many people who have experienced the choking ghost have also reported difficulty breathing or feelings of pressure on the chest as if someone is sitting on them. As their brain is still transitioning between dreaming and waking, vivid hallucinations are common and include seeing shadowy figures, hearing voices, sensing a presence in the room, or feeling as though someone is choking them.
While the sensations can feel intensely real and frightening, sleep paralysis is generally harmless and usually lasts only a few seconds to a few minutes.
Whether the experience is attributed to sleep paralysis or something more mysterious, tales of a choking presence have persisted in Hawai‘i as well. Some of the most chilling reports emerge from the O‘ahu Community Correctional Center.
Completed in 1918, the Territorial Penitentiary was a 9-acre facility and consisted of an X-shaped building with a watchtower in the center, surrounded by 20-foot-high walls. The administration offices, laundry, and toilets were housed in separate buildings, along with the “incorrigible ward” that was added later. The buildings were completely demolished, and the prison site was expanded to 16 acres in the 1970s, replacing the large buildings with multiple smaller ones.
Today, the O‘ahu Community Correctional Center is famous for its notorious choking ghost. According to a 1984 newspaper column, guards at the prison recall the haunted guard’s squad room next to the execution chamber, where they were unable to sleep due to encounters (and fear of encounters) with the reported choking ghost. I’m sure it offered little relief to know that the choking ghost was not biased and reportedly affected the prisoners as well.
When we posted a video about OCCC on our social media pages, a number of followers commented and messaged us about having experienced the choking sensation personally while either employed or incarcerated at the facility.
We know that science has studied this phenomenon and has explained sleep paralysis. Maybe the occurrence is common enough that it seems to happen more often in a place where so many people live and sleep in close proximity. But does it happen as often in school dormitories, or military barracks, or hospitals?
Aside from the choking ghost, OCCC seems to be home to other hauntings as well. One former Sargent there said that when he was working in the tower, he would hear someone coming up the steps, but when he looked, there was no one there. And a few times, when he leaned back and put his legs up to rest, something would unceremoniously knock them down. He quickly learned to remain vigilant.
My own brother-in-law, who was a guard there, repeated the story about the tower stairs and said some guards have actually seen an apparition in the stairwell. He also shared that guards and prisoners would hear the trap door of the hanging room snap open, although they knew the door had been welded shut since capital punishment in Hawai‘i was officially abolished in 1957.
One man stated that when he was employed at OCCC years ago, he often heard the trap door slam open, even though he knew no one was there. Once, he was assigned to the isolation cells, which were said to be painted all black inside. One night, he was curious to know what it looked like, so he decided to peek into an empty cell.
He slowly opened the door and leaned in, and saw an empty room. But as he began to back away and close the door, something caught his eye. He looked again, and there, in the back of the room, were several faces looking back at him. He slammed the door shut and continued his shift, avoiding that room as much as possible.
“I am no longer curious,” he said.
While modern science points to sleep paralysis as the likely cause of a choking ghost in a place where it often occurs, it still can’t explain other ghostly phenomena reported in the same facility.
The authors can be reached at hawaii.mysteries@gmail.com
For the latest news of Hawai‘i, sign up here for our free Daily Edition newsletter.
