Lori Evans had suspicions that Stocky’s Pizza in Haughton may have a ghost.

Since the restaurant opened in late January, she’s been hit in the back with a flying bottle of Tabasco sauce, heard a broom and dust pan that were anchored to the wall crash to the floor and felt like she was being watched.

Despite other employees also witnessing the events, Evans said her managers just laughed about the incidents.

“I knew something was going on,” she said.

Security tapes from the morning of July 14 confirmed her suspicions. When Evans arrived at the restaurant that morning, she found the two stainless steel ice scoops that had been on a nonskid tray on a nonskid pad on top of the ice machine in the middle of the floor — eight feet from where she had placed them the night before.

The tape showed the store all quiet until 6:08 a.m. when the two ice scoops raised up and flew across the room.

“I was in (the office) shaking when I saw the video,” Evans said. “All of the experiences I’ve had — it validated it for me.”

In reviewing that footage, Evans also saw a bleach spray bottle that without provocation fell from atop the same shelf where the Tabasco bottles sit — and fall.
She has tried to find a logical explanation for the falling objects.

“I’ve tried to make them fall,” she said. “If one fell, I’d give it that.”

The building was home previously to Walker Bros. convenience store. Annette Walker said in the five years her family owned the business, they never experienced anything out of the ordinary. There was a car crash into the building, but no one was injured.

John Combs, director of research with Louisiana Spirits, said it is possible for a place that has never had activity to become active.

“The statement somebody had to have died here to have paranormal activity is urban legend,” he said.

Since Evans put the security footage on YouTube, the restaurant has gotten daily calls from ghost hunters from across the country wanting to investigate.

“I’d be more than sure they would find something,” she said.

Combs said in conducting such an investigation, the first step is eliminating natural possibilities.

“In order to make the statement ‘this is not natural,’ you have to establish what is natural,” he said. “Once you’ve eliminated everything that is not to be, then whatever is left must be.”

For peace of mind, Evans believes whatever is in the kitchen with her is friendly, even possibly the spirit of her brother who died in February 2007.

“He would definitely do something like that,” she said. “I feel like it’s just being playful, wanting to be known and acknowledged.”