Has the Annabelle doll escaped its museum? Fact Check

Rumours spreading online claim that the real-life Annabelle doll – famous for inspiring a number of Hollywood horror movies – had escaped from the museum where it is on display.

FALSE

Despite the claims online, the Warren Museum where the doll is currently kept have denied the rumour, which appears to have originally derived from a combination of hearsay and a mistranslated article in China.

The Annabelle doll is an allegedly possessed Raggedy Anne doll that was examined by real life paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren back in the 1970s. The doll itself – like many of Ed and Lorraine Warren’s investigations – inspired a number of horror movies by the same name.

Both Ed and Lorraine have since passed away, and their museum, the Warren Occult Museum in Connecticut, which houses a number of items related to the Warren’s investigations, is currently closed. However it is still the home to the famous Annabelle doll which inspired all of those movies.

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And in 2020, rumours online claimed the doll had escaped the museum and was on the loose.

The rumours appear to have started in China, and that is likely because of how an interview with actress Annabelle Wallis by the Hollywood Reporter had been transcribed into Mandarin (Wallis had starred in one of the Annabelle movies.) According to various Chinese speakers, while Wallis was talking about running alongside Tom Cruise for the filming of The Mummy, a Chinese mistranslation claimed that “Annabelle escaped”.

This in turn fuelled a series of Chinese Whispers that claimed the famous doll had escaped its museum and was on the loose.

However, according to Tony Spera, the Warren’s son-in-law who operates the currently closed museum, the rumours are false and Annabelle is still very much at the museum.

I’m here to tell you something, I don’t know if you want to hear this or not, but Annabelle did not escape.

In the video statement (above) Spera shows himself with the doll as he dismisses the viral rumours.

As such, we rank the claim that the Annabelle doll has escaped the Warren Occult Museum as false.