Halloween mischief just isn't as wicked as it used to be

Double, double, toil and trouble...

Wait. Hold the scary organ music. Halloween isn't as wicked as it used to be.

Pranks, once a hallmark of the holiday, seem to have gone the way of the homemade costume. Police say fewer things go bump in the night now.

"It's pretty quiet on the Halloween front these days," said Chris Amos, Norfolk's police spokesman.

Sure, there's the occasional toilet-papered landscape or jack-o'-lantern casualty, but for the most part, the annual "trick or treat" candy shakedown has lost its threat of naughtiness.

It's hard to say why, since Halloween and misbehavior have gone hand in hand for ages - a link that goes all the way back to an ancient Celtic belief that spirits were prone to hijinks that time of year.

Over the centuries, that superstition morphed into human mischief - outhouse tipping, egg throwing and other minor mayhem. We lost our sense of humor when the pranks grew more serious. Point a finger at Orson Welles, whose 1938 Halloween radio broadcast of "The War of the Worlds" convinced untold numbers of terrified listeners that Martians had invaded Earth.

We grew even less tolerant when pranks turned criminal, like the arson and vandalism that took place in Detroit in 1984, and dangerous, like when a pumpkin dropped from a Newport News overpass seriously injured a driver in 1999.

Sometimes, the prankster pays the price. Last year in Atlanta, a man became enraged when his Mercedes was egged, firing 10 shots at a 17-year-old boy, killing him.

Most cities impose curfews and age limits on trick-or-treating now, ordinances that have helped create a more peaceful Halloween. Another plus: more grown-ups on the streets.

"Parents are much more cautious about letting their kids go out alone," said Randy Gainey, chairman of the sociology and criminal justice department at Old Dominion University. "More parents means there's more supervision out there."

It also helps that there's more to do these days than just roam the dark.

Roughly 1,500 people kept busy last Halloween playing an organized game of zombie tag in Norfolk. Almost that many participated in this year's games.

"That's what we're gearing up for," Amos said last week. "This zombie thing has really exploded."

Virginia Beach police spokesman Jimmy Barnes had a word of caution for folks heading to and from costume parties. Old laws aimed at holdup men make it illegal to wear a mask in public, though the law is rarely enforced on Halloween.

"Just use some common sense," Barnes said. "Don't wear your mask into the convenience store or while you're driving. You might be having fun, but unfortunately we live in a society where robbery is real and frequent. You'll make people nervous."

There's no doubt that Halloween revelry can backfire.

In 1998 in Roanoke, an egg-throwing barrage netted four men two years in prison each, even though no one was injured.

Two years ago in Kentucky, the owner of a restaurant named the Chicken Ranch set up a fake murder scene to spook an employee. Unfortunately, when she came in and saw him lying in a pool of pretend blood, she ran out screaming and dialed 911 before he could stop her. He wound up arrested for causing a false alarm.

And then there's the opposite, when reality masquerades as a trick.

Three years ago in California, the body of a 75-year-old man remained slumped in a chair on his balcony for three days after neighbors mistook his corpse for a Halloween display.

Now you can cue that scary organ music.

Joanne Kimberlin, (757) 446-2338, joanne.kimberlin@pilotonline.com