The World’s Scariest Doll Is Now Welcoming Visitors — Medium Urges Tourists to Pray Before Meeting Annabelle

Fans of the paranormal who are flocking to see Annabelle, the famous “most possessed” doll in the world, have received a chilling warning: visiting Matt Rife’s new museum could open a portal to “dark energy,” the Daily Mail reports.

Last year, 31-year-old comedian Matt Rife announced that he had purchased the home and Occult Museum of renowned paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren in Monroe, Connecticut. Along with the museum, he effectively became the new custodian of the infamous “demonic” doll Annabelle.

When the Warrens acquired Annabelle, they placed her inside a specially made glass case to contain what they claimed was an “evil entity” and warned that the doll should never be moved.

Annabelle is now on display at the recently opened Haunted Warren Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, which has been attracting large numbers of visitors every day. The decision has raised serious concerns among paranormal enthusiasts and prominent medium Matt Fraser.

Rife recently posted a video showing off $100 flashlight tours before dramatically revealing Annabelle to viewers. Some fans noticed that the comedian himself appeared reluctant even to look at the doll inside her glass case, prompting questions about why he had decided to put her on public display in the first place.

“This is much bigger and scarier than I think any of us could have imagined,” Rife said.

According to Rife, the museum has already amassed more than 1,000 objects with alleged paranormal histories, adding them to the Warrens’ famous collection.

“If you can make it through the entire museum without crapping your pants from fear or throwing up everywhere — and that’s already happened several times, to people who didn’t even leave crying — you still have Annabelle waiting for you. Good luck!” he said.

However, medium Matt Fraser takes the idea of visitors interacting with Annabelle extremely seriously.

He fears that the doll’s power, in his view, could grow now that she is surrounded by dozens of other objects also believed to be possessed or connected to paranormal activity.

“What concerns me is that evil energy loves attention. Dark energy wants to be noticed. It wants people to talk about it, challenge it, fear it and feed it with their attention,” Fraser said.

“That’s why Annabelle concerns me. She is no longer forgotten in a locked room. She is becoming a celebrity.

“People are traveling to see her, taking pictures, talking about her, challenging her and wondering whether something might happen to them. In my experience as a medium, that kind of attention does not weaken negative energy. It feeds it.”

Fraser also considers it troubling that Annabelle is now housed under the same roof as an entire collection of other objects believed to have their own history and energy, while thousands of people pass through the museum.

“Every visitor brings their own energy with them — whether it’s fear, grief, curiosity, skepticism or even the desire to provoke whatever might be there,” he explained.

Fraser urged paranormal enthusiasts not to give in to curiosity and not to visit the museum specifically to encounter Annabelle.

“People sometimes think they can come to places like this, challenge whatever is there, laugh at it and then simply walk away. I would never recommend doing that,” the medium said.

According to Fraser, Ed and Lorraine Warren took such objects seriously and kept them under control for a reason.

“When you turn something that was once isolated into a tourist attraction, you completely change the way people interact with that object,” Fraser said.

Tickets to the paranormal attraction are reportedly selling rapidly ahead of Halloween, and the medium has offered visitors some particularly ominous advice.

“Before going inside, I would pray and make a very clear intention that nothing negative is allowed to make contact with you, attach itself to you or follow you home. If your faith involves carrying a cross, religious medal, holy water or another blessed object that makes you feel spiritually protected, definitely bring it with you,” he said.

“Do not challenge Annabelle. Do not ask her to give you a sign. Do not address these entities directly. Do not touch anything you are not supposed to touch and, most importantly, do not say anything that could be interpreted as an invitation,” the medium urged.

The story of Annabelle dates back to 1970. According to Gerald Brittle’s book The Demonologist: The Extraordinary Career of Ed and Lorraine Warren, the investigators first encountered the doll after receiving a call from a priest who asked them for help.

Two young nurses claimed that a human spirit had taken possession of their doll and were desperately looking for a way to get rid of it.

During their meeting with the Warrens, one of the women, Deirdre, said she had received the doll as a birthday gift from her mother when she turned 28. Soon afterward, she claimed, the doll began moving around the apartment on its own and later started leaving frightening handwritten notes saying “Help Me.” It was also alleged that the doll attacked one of the people in the home.

The women consulted a medium, who told them that a little girl named Annabelle had died on the property many years earlier. They concluded that her spirit had entered the doll.

However, after conducting his own investigation, Ed Warren said the women had been “deceived.” According to his version, there had never been a human spirit named Annabelle. Instead, the doll had allegedly become the vessel for something “inhuman” and “demonic.”

The Warrens performed an exorcism on the doll and then took her home with them. They claimed that their car’s brakes failed on the way and that they had to sprinkle the doll with holy water in order to make it home safely.

According to the Warrens, a priest once nearly died after failing to take Annabelle seriously enough.

In the Warrens’ biography, he allegedly picked up the doll and said, “You’re just a rag doll, Annabelle. You can’t hurt anyone,” before throwing her back onto a chair.

That same night, he reportedly called Lorraine and told her: “The brakes failed [in the car on the way home]. I nearly died in an accident. The car is wrecked.”

Another tragic story involves a museum visitor who, according to the Warrens’ son-in-law Tony Spera, failed to show the doll the proper respect.

According to one version of the story, the man knocked on the glass case and began mocking Annabelle, after which he was thrown out of the museum. On his way home, he was reportedly killed in a motorcycle crash.

Annabelle became widely known following the release of the 2013 horror film The Conjuring, followed by Annabelle in 2014. Two more films centered on the famous doll were released later.

Paranormal fans recently raised the alarm again when visitors claimed that Annabelle had allegedly disappeared from her glass case. The theory was soon debunked, however, when it was confirmed that the doll was still inside.

Another tragic incident occurred in July 2025, when 54-year-old ghost hunter Dan Rivera died during a tour featuring Annabelle. His death sparked a wave of speculation that the doll might somehow have been involved in the tragedy.

Authorities later said Rivera had died of natural causes and that nothing unusual or suspicious had been found at the scene. That, however, has done little to stop paranormal enthusiasts from wondering whether there was something far more mysterious behind the story.