‘Torture Chamber’ Haunted House Should Be Shut Down: Petition

SUMMERTOWN, TN — Haunted houses are supposed to offer scary Halloween fun, but tens of thousands of people think McKamey Manor, which advertises an “extreme haunt,” goes too far. They’ve signed a petition started by Frankie Towery, a North Carolina woman who described the Summertown, Tennessee, attraction as a “kidnapping and torture house” that shouldn't be allowed to operate.

Towery called the attraction is “a torture chamber under disguise” in her Change.org petition, and wrote that “one man was tortured so badly he passed out multiple times [and] workers only stopped because they thought they had killed him.”

Among Towery's claims: Those participating have been waterboarded and forced under water, forced to eat things, and had duct tape wrapped around their heads.”

By mid-day Wednesday, the Change.org petition had surpassed 62,000 signatures. It demands state officials in Tennessee shut down the Summertown location, and called on Alabama officials to close a sister site in Huntsville.

Russ McKamey, the attraction’s owner, did not immediately return Patch’s request for comment. But he told news station WFLA that his attraction is not a torture chamber, but a “crazy haunted house.”

“I’m a very straight-laced conservative guy, but here I run this crazy haunted house that people think is this torture factory, fetish factory,” he said. “All of these things that it’s not.”

McKamey Manor warns the attraction isn’t for those who are easily frightened. The attraction “is not your standard (boo) haunted house,” the website says. “This is an audience participation event in which (you) will live your own horror movie. This is a rough, intense and truly frightening experience.”

The operators have a long list of prerequisites before entering, including completion of a “sports physical,” a letter from a doctor clearing the participant both physically and mentally, and proof of medical insurance. Those attending must also sign a 40-page waiver.

Every experience is different, according to the website, and could last up to 10 hours. McKamey offers $20,000 to participants if they can complete the experience, but he told WFLA he’s never had to pay up because no one has made it the entire way through.

Before they enter, participants watch a two-hour video that shows people trying to get through the entire attraction during the 2017 and 2018 Halloween seasons. “You really don’t want to do this,” the video compilation suggests.

The haunted house website says people can leave any time, but Towery disputes that.

“Previously no safe word was allowed, (McKamey) changed that but there's been reports that the torture continues even when people repeat their safe word for several minutes,” she wrote.

The attraction has been featured on Netflix’s “Haunters: Art of the Scare,” and on an episode of “Dark Tourist.”

David Farrier, the host of “Dark Tourist,” told Newsweek “everything about that place is built to trigger intrigue” and McKamey used his “media savviness” to bring more people to the haunted house.

“It’s a house of mirrors, in that it is not all as it seems, and it’s about his ‘sell,’” Farrier said. “The myth he's built up behind it— payment in dog food (as an admission price), the thousands on the waiting list — it's all part of the myth. The waiver, too. And the waiver is part of the haunt in that it's built to shock.”

He said calls for closure of the haunted house have helped McKamey market his attraction.

“There are Facebook pages set up around ending the manor and stopping Russ,” Farrier said. “And that just plays into Russ' myth building.”