Frantic fans beg for cancelation of haunted Annabelle doll tour after man leading expedition dies unexpectedly

Daily Mail​

15-07-2025

Frantic fans have begged for the cancelation of the haunted Annabelle doll tour following the news that man leading it had died unexpectedly.
Dan Rivera passed away at age 54 on Sunday, July 13, the New England Society for Psychic Research - the organization behind the Devils on the Run Tour - confirmed.
The Annabelle doll was made famous back in the 1970s when paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren looked into alleged attacks made by the infamous toy.
While they put her in a specially built glass case and warned that she should never be moved, Annabelle is now currently touring the US alongside other items from the Warrens Occult Museum collection as part of the exhibition called Devils on the Run.
It's been reported that Dan was overseeing the tour and was the one who has been bringing the creepy children's toy across the country.
Most recently, he had traveled to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, for the latest tour stop, which was completely sold out and spanned across three days at the Soldiers National Orphanage over the weekend.
According to the Evening Sun, firefighters and medical personnel were called to a hotel in Gettysburg on Sunday for a report of CPR in progress on a male patient of Dan's age.
The news of Dan's unexpected passing sparked frenzied fear all across the web, as many urged the creators of the tour to 'put her back in her box.'
Dan Rivera passed away at age 54 on Sunday, July 13, the New England Society for Psychic Research - the organization behind the Devils on the Run Tour - has confirmed
'Y'all need to leave this doll alone,' one fan wrote.
'The curse is real,' someone else penned, while a fourth person begged, 'Put her back in the box!'
'This is some scary s**t,' a fifth tweet read.
Another said, 'So sad! Best to leave Annabelle locked up.'
'It was that damn doll,' announced a different user.
'Please for the love of God, stop f**king with that doll,' urged someone else.
The cause of Dan's death remains unknown.
It's been said that famous paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine came into possession of the Raggedy Anne doll in the 1970s after two young nurses reached out begging for help.
The nurses allegedly claimed the doll, which had been a birthday gift, was wreaking havoc on their lives, placing handwritten eerie messages around their home, moving on its own, and even leaving horrific scratch marks on one of their boyfriends.
The Warrens took it off their hands, and upon investigating, the couple became convinced that a 'demonic' force was possessing the doll.
They claimed that their car continuously 'stalled' and the steering and breaks 'failed' on the drive home, per Gerald Brittle's book The Demonologist: The Extraordinary Career of Ed and Lorraine Warren.
They said they had to throw 'holy water' onto the doll in order to get home safely.
They also alleged that they called in a man named Father Daniel to help, but that he nearly lost his life after he didn't take the doll seriously.
He reportedly 'picked up the doll' and said, 'You're just a rag doll, Annabelle, you can't hurt anything,' before he 'tossed it back on the chair,' according to the Warrens' biography.
That night, he is said to have called Lorraine and told her, 'The brake system failed [on my car on the way home]. I was almost killed in a traffic accident. My car is a wreck.'
Ed also claimed the doll levitated in front of him and constantly moved around their home before they decided to lock it up indefinitely.
In the years since then, it has sat behind glass in the Warrens museum, but some horror fans who traveled just to get a glimpse of the infamous doll have claimed that weird stuff started to happen to them afterwards.
The news of Dan's unexpected passing sparked frenzied fear all across the web, as many urged the creators of the tour to 'put her back in her box'
And according to a family member of the Warrens, tragedy struck when one visitor didn't treat the doll with respect.
It's been said that the guest knocked on the glass case and taunted the doll before he was thrown out of the museum.
But on his way home, he got into a fatal motorcycle accident, per the Warrens' son-in-law Tony Spera.
'It's probably the most dangerous artifact we have here in the museum. It's responsible for we believe the death of a young man who came on a motorcycle and challenged that doll to do its worst and it did,' Tony told WTNH in 2016.
The name of the alleged crash victim was never shared so the Daily Mail was not able to verify Tony's claims.
The Annabelle doll gained worldwide popularity after it was featured in the 2013 flick The Conjuring as well as the spinoff Annabelle series that contained three more films.
The Devils on the Run tour kicked off back in May, but things to a dark turn later that month when visitors at one stop on the tour claimed the three-foot-tall doll wasn't anywhere to be found, sparking a panic and fear online.
However, after countless rumors that she had gone 'missing' and hoards of terrified fans, Dan came forward at the time to debunk the theories via TikTok.
'I'm here at the museum right now, and I just wanna show you guys that Annabelle is in the Warrens' Occult Museum. Let's go inside and let's check,' he began the video.
As he weaved his way through he exhibits, he approached the doll sitting in her secured wooden case.
'Annabelle is not missing. She is not in Chicago. She has never been missing,' he added.
The tour is still underway and horror fans will get the chance to see the 'possessed' toy at the Rock Island Roadhouse Esoteric Expo in Illinois on October 4.