Their names are not Stantz or Venkman and there will not be a popular song asking Who ya gonna call?

But when America’s Top Ghost Catchers appear at 8 tonight to the SIUC Student Center Ballrooms, there will be plenty of stories about not only ghosts, but tales of demons, exorcisms, reincarnations, witches and curses as well.

Ed and Lorraine Warren have been investigating the realm of the supernatural throughout North America, Europe and Australia for more than 45 years. The Warrens have delved into intensive research on more than 5,000 cases of reported phenomena. So their pictures, video presentation and slide lecture presentation may make any skeptic believe.

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Lorraine is recognized as one of the country’s leading light trance mediums with the ability to pick-up thought impressions present in the environment.

Lorraine said she discovered her clairvoyance when she was still young and attending a Catholic boarding school. The powers were so alien to her that she was unaware of what to do about them.

I started seeing lights around people when I was 9 years old, she said. I was quite naive, and I thought everyone could see these. When I realized they couldn’t, I knew it would be frowned on by the nuns and my parents, so I repressed it.

Lorraine said that after she and Ed married she hesitated to tell him about her abilities.

Then Ed began talking about a haunted house he grew up in as a child and eventually he started to research houses with reported hauntings.

Ed began researching haunted houses out of his curiosity from growing up in one, she said. When he realized he wasn’t the only one who grew up in a haunted house, he started documenting his findings.

When she was 21, Lorraine said that she was accompanying Ed on one of his research expeditions when she realized how her power could expand within houses containing paranormal activity.

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Ed was doing an interview with the man who was living in the house and I actually projected from my body, she said. I could see (the man and my husband) as if I were on the second floor looking down.

Lorraine and Ed also were involved in the only documented case of lycanthropy (turning into a werewolf). Lorraine said she and Ed took part in the exorcism in 1989 to remove the foreign animal’s spirit from the man.

A werewolf is actually someone possessed by a wolf’s spirit, she said. During the exorcism, I watched his hands claw, and I watched his lips curl up over his teeth. He never grew hair but he exhibited super human strength. We had many body guards there to restrain him with stun guns.

It is stories like these that have attracted director Ridley Scott (Alien and Blade Runner) to buy the rights for a future movie about some of the Warren’s cases called The Demonologists.

ABC is even piloting a show this year, The Warren Files, based on the couple’s experiences over the years.

The couple has appeared on 20/20, Phil Donahue, Entertainment Tonight and Good Morning America.

The Warrens have told their ghoulish tales of the paranormal at more than 1,000 colleges in 29 years of lecturing on the college circuit.

Lorraine said that even after thousands of experiences in the paranormal, her job is no less frightening.

We get more scared than other people, she said. because we know what can happen and they don’t.

Admission for the Warrens’ presentation is $2. For more information call 536-3393.