Graphic Halloween Display Upsets Community Members

#1 Have They Crossed The Line?

Halloween is a time when many people walk on the wild side, but one family may have gone too far.

They have created controversy by placing a number of gruesome decorations in their front yard, which also happens to be a few blocks away from an elementary school in Parma, Ohio.

The yard already contains a cocooned corpse hanging from a tree, a child's body impaled on a stake and a cadaver upside down on a cross.

#2

As reported by Local 12, an Ohio couple's Halloween lawn display has led to community outrage in the wake of one child mistaking the gruesome props for real human corpses. The decorations include a crucified body and another impaled on a pole, and one mother is demanding they be taken down.

#3

The Halloween enthusiast Vicki Barrett, who did the decorating, and her husband live less than a block away from the town's Elementary School. In other words, many kids have no choice but to walk past the home on the way to/from school.

"Shock. You take a double take because it is a very realistic display," said Jackie Anselmo, mother of the 9-year-old girl who mistook the decorations for a real-life crime scene. "Almost horrified that somebody would think that it's okay to put it that close to an elementary school."

#4

Anselmo snapped a picture of the (totally awesome) display and e-mailed the city of Parma, Ohio in an attempt to get them to take action, but the city responded by saying that they really can't do anything the decorations, after all, represent good old fashioned freedom of expression.

#5

"If it's scaring some kids and we knew they're having a hard time leaving school, yeah, we may have toned it down," said Barrett, who herself has a two-year-old and a special needs teen. "We don't want to scare kids."

#6

"We don't want to scare kids. We just want to do the Halloween fun of it and but definitely no ill intent, no," explained Vicki Barrett.

However, now the entire city is in outrage over the display, and is vowing to have it removed or a law passed so others can not do the same thing in the future.

#7

Meanwhile in Detroit, a woman who has been decorating her home the same way for 25 years has created a bit of controversy of her own because of what's in her yard.

LaRethia Haddon puts a stuffed body in her front yard that attracts attention each year because it looks so lifelike, according to the Detroit News.

The body has drawn the attention of passers-by, emergency workers and even police.

#8

Haddon said: 'The corner is always full of cars.

'People running up trying to do CPR. Once they find out it's a dummy, it's so hilarious.'

She started putting out the face down body in honor of her husband's birthday on Halloween.

It has drawn so much attention that Haddon has started taking the corpse in after sundown.

Haddon said: 'If you don't bring him in at night, he won't be there in the morning.

'I learned my lesson. I have to bring him in at night.

'But on Halloween, he stays out all night. I just keep my door open until we go to bed.'