With Halloween approaching, church leaders and child safety groups have issued warnings over the dangers of a new supernatural craze sweeping Britain’s youth. “It seems to be derived from the nineties horror film Candyman, where saying the eponymous character’s name five times in front of a mirror made him appear – with inevitably dire consequences,” the Reverend Harold Fibula, a Church of England exorcist, told the Daily Norks this week. “In this new version, Jimmy Savile replaces the Candyman – saying his name five times out loud will allegedly result in the deceased DJ and sex offender appearing behind you and molesting you!” Whilst Fibula dismisses the craze as nonsense, he is concerned that it might lead to young people dabbling in more serious supernatural activities. “Obviously, I don’t believe that this game will actually result in some wizened old sex offender’s ghost returning from the grave, but it does represent the invoking of evil,” he claimed in the tabloid article. “Believe me, spiritual evil of this kind is not to be trifled with – playing these games could easily lead to far worse things.” However, the Daily Norks has since reported on the experiences of several young people who claim to have been literally touched by evil after playing the Savile game.

“I had a lucky escape,” explained eighteen year old Salford student Emily Knuckle, who invoked the dead DJ during a drunken night out with friends. “We ended up in this abandoned warehouse and started daring each other to say his name five times – in the end I was the only one drunk enough to do it!” Knuckle recalled that as she spoke Savile’s name aloud the first time a deathly hush fell over the abandoned building. “This feeling of dread seemed to hang over the place, but I was determined to continue, so I said his name for a second time,” she told the paper. “This time we could all feel an icy chill fill the place, but even that didn’t stop me from saying ‘Jimmy Savile’ aloud a third time.” It was this third utterance of the dread name which was to send Knuckle and her companions screaming from the building. “I swear that his name had barely passed my lips for a third time when the smell of cigar smoke wafted from somewhere behind me,” she claimed. “I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck rising as I realised that no one in the group smoked! Despite fear knotting my stomach, I started to say his name for the fourth time: I just about forced out the word ‘Jimmy’ when we all heard the ghostly jangling of gold jewellery from somewhere in the dark behind us! I just couldn’t help myself – I screamed out loud and legged it out of there, with the others following close behind!” Knuckle is convinced that had she uttered Savile’s name a fifth time, she and her companions might not have lived to tell the tale, fearing that the spectral sex offender could have dragged them all off to his sex dungeon in Hell for an eternity of abuse.

According to the Daily Norks others haven’t been so lucky, with another teenager describing to the tabloid’s readers his terrifying experience whilst playing the Savile game. “The way I heard it, you didn’t have to say his name five times in front of a mirror, instead you had to say it five times in front of the TV,” sixteen year old Arthur Ankle, an apprentice meat packer from Dartford told the paper. “You just had to tune it so there was nothing but static, then repeat his name five times in front of the set – well, I got bored when I was on my own one evening, so decided to give it a go.” At first, he explained, he thought that nothing had happened, then he saw something happening on the TV screen. “I was amazed to see the static start to form into an image of Savile’s face,” Ankle claimed, adding that at this point he wasn’t scared, just curious. “But then I realised that something more sinister was happening: I realised that it wasn’t just an image – it was solid!” Horrified, the teenager watched as Savile began to climb out the screen and into his living room. “It was like that film The Ring,” the youngster recalled. “He even had his long peroxide blonde hair covering his face like the girl in the film, as he crawled into the room!” Ankle dived behind the sofa as the evil figure scuttled toward him, but quickly realised this was a mistake. “He had me trapped behind there,” he told the paper. “I could feel his spectral hand clawing at my behind, trying to pull my pants down!” With a terror-fuelled burst of energy, Ankle managed to pull himself away from the apparition and out from behind the sofa. “It came scuttling after me, the sound of static gurgling from its mouth,” claimed the youth. “The only thing I could think of doing was getting to the TV and pulling the plug out!” As the TV screen went dead, the ghostly wraith vanished, leaving a terrified Ankle alone in his living room.

The newspaper has uncovered several variations on the Savile game, including Ouija board seances at which Savile’s catch phrase ‘Now then, now then’ is spelt out before an ectoplasmic Jimmy Savile appears to molest the participants. Some versions substitute other celebrity celebrity sex offenders for Savile, not all of whom are dead. “I’d heard that if you said Dave Lee Travis’ name five times in front of a mirror, he’d appear in the mirror, reach out and grope your breasts,” twenty one year old Sally Elbow told the tabloid. “I thought that was bloody stupid as he isn’t dead – he isn’t even in prison! So I decided to disprove it by uttering his name whilst sat in front of the dressing table mirror in my bedroom.” Not surprisingly, the former Radio One DJ, recently convicted of groping a TV researcher, didn’t leap from the mirror to fondle Elbow’s breasts. “But just after I said his name for the last time, I felt someone or something touch my bum! I span round, but there was nobody else in the room,” she claimed. “At the same time as the touch I’m sure I felt something hairy, like a beard brush the back of my neck. I also noticed the faint odour of cheap aftershave lingering in the air after the incident.”

Top sceptic Professor Bob Mincer has been dismissive of the Daily Norks‘ Savile game stories, claiming that it is merely an urban myth. “None of these stories can be substantiated by reliable third parties,” the Senior Lecturer in Weird Shit at the Brighton School of Psychic Studies told viewers of the QVC Shopping Channel during a recent appearance to sell his new ‘ectoplasm mop’ – ideal for clearing up after seances. “Most of the alleged participants appear to be drunk or alone when the manifestations supposedly occur.” He also noted Arthur Ankle’s history of solvent abuse as a possible contributory factor to his harrowing experience. “Mind you, it’s no surprise that so many people are seizing upon Jimmy Savile as a new personification of evil – thanks to the media’s coverage of his alleged crimes, he’s become a modern day bogey man,” the academic opined. “I mean, just look at the number of Jimmy Savile Halloween costumes being sold to trick or treaters this year.”