Watcher Letters Destroyed Westfield Family's Lives, Writer Says

WESTFIELD, NJ - The family that was the target of the menacing, threatening letters sent by the "Westfield Watcher" had their lives destroyed by the messages, but according to the reporter who told their story in New York Magazine, it wasn't their fault.

"Why would you destroy your own lives?" Reeves Wiedeman said, referring to the belief that they sent the letters to themselves.

Wiedeman, a Contributing Editor at New York Magazine, as well as a writer for The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Rolling Stone, Harper's and Men’s Journal said in a podcast recently the fallout from the letters, which contained disturbing references to the family's children, caused the Broaddus family to abandon their dream home and take on significant financial strain as well as the scorn and suspicion of surrounding residents as the investigation into the letters' origins dragged on.

According to Wiedeman, at one point one of their neighbors said the couple should be tarred and feathered.

"And this was a guy who lived, you know, three or four blocks down," Wiedeman said.

Wiedeman said he had spoken directly to critics of the Broaddus family and when asked for a motive as to why they would send letters like this to themselves, no one has come up with anything.

"This kind of destroyed their lives there. They're doing better the further they get away from this," Wiedeman said. "But it just doesn't make any sense."

The saga of The Watcher, which has since made international headlines, began in 2014 when Derek and Maria Broaddus family purchased their dream home on the highly-coveted Boulevard in Westfield. But before they were even able to move in, an anonymous letter writer began sending letters with disturbing references to their three children.

Up until Wiedeman's report was published online, only a handful of disturbing phrases from The Watcher's letters were known to the public. When the full accounting of the text was revealed, Patch assembled a list of ten things that creeped us out the most.

Wiedeman said as he researched his story he spoke to many people in Westfield and read many social media posts. Wiedeman said people that lived in the neighborhood thought this was some conspiracy.

"At one point they filed an application to try to tear the house down, which is something that has become very common in places like Westfield, tearing old homes down. They were going to build two new house sell it to developer at a loss but enough of a loss for them to manage," Wiedeman told NPR last month. "People were like 'they must be just trying to make a quick buck off of this.'"

• See Related: 'The Watcher' Home Saga Continues; Former Owners Seeking Damages
• See Related: Westfield 'Watcher' Lawsuit Won't Be Dismissed, Judge Rules
• See Related: Westfield 'Watcher' Home Is For Sale Again

Wiedeman said that all of this placed Derek Broaddus under a tremendous amount of stress and that was what prompted him to delivered anonymous letters of his own to neighbors who had been critical of his family.

"You know given the context of what happened in this neighborhood obviously kind of freaked those people out," Wiedeman told NPR. "You know maybe not the best means but you can kind of understand how you might be driven to that."

Wiedeman told NPR that as a reporter he is always looking for something "being off" but in the hours he spent with Derek and Maria he found them to be normal and to have sweet kids.

"They're not calculating people," Wiedeman said. "They're just trying to live a peaceful suburban life. So if if they've pulled this off they've they've duped me, but it seems unlikely to me."

You can listen to the full interview with Wiedeman here.

In October, the Westfield Watcher passed the Jersey Devil as the New Jersey's top urban legend, according to the website Thrillist.

According to the site the Westfield Watcher joins the ranks of New Mexico's Chupacabra, Maryland's Goat Man, the Phantom Jogger of Canyon Hill in Idaho and of course the infamous Florida Skunk Ape. Thrillist included in their rationale why each entry was creepy and where it came from. In the case of the Westfield Watcher, Thrillist said that it surpassed the Jersey Devil because there is doubt of the Devil's existence.

The story caught the attention of Hollywood and last month the streaming company Netflix purchased the feature rights to the tale, according to a report from Deadline.

Netflix won the feature rights to the deal after a "ferocious bidding battle" that involved six studios that included Universal for Jason Blum, Warner Bros for Roy Lee, Paramount for JJ Abrams' Bad Robot, Amazon for producer Michael Sugar and Fox for Peter Chernin.

(Image via realtor.com: 657 Boulevard, Westfield - known as the "Watcher" home.)

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