The doll Annabelle is displayed inside a box at San Antonio’s Psychic & Spirit Fest. Credit: Erik Gustafson
Online rumors have circulated that the Annabelle doll displayed earlier this month at the Psychic & Spirit Fest at Victoria’s Black Swan Inn in San Antonio went missing while on tour.

The purportedly possessed toy had been instilling fear across the country as part of the New England Society for Psychic Research’s traveling show Devils on the Run. The doll was reportedly the inspiration for the 2014 supernatural horror film Annabelle.

Rumors of Annabelle’s escape grew so loud on social media that the society’s lead paranormal investigator, Dan Rivera, had to quash them with a TikTok video showing the doll safely in her case at the Warren Occult Museum in New England.

@annabelle_tour #annabelleis not missing. #supernatural ♬ Carry On Wayward Son – Kansas

The New England Society for Psychic Research also felt compelled to chime in via Facebook and say the toy hadn’t been stolen from the tour.

When rumors spread online of Annabelle’s escape, they placed her in Chicago — something museum officials also refuted.

Annabelle and the rest of the Devils on the Run tour made a stop in New Orleans before making its way to the Alamo City the weekend of May 17-18. Some online fans of the occult attributed the Nottoway Plantation fire and the escape of 10 inmates from the Orleans Parish Justice Center to the demonic doll’s brief presence in Louisiana.

More than 1,200 people attended San Antonio’s sold-out Psychic and Spirit Fest, with many paying almost $100 to meet the doll in person. Saturday’s line to enter the museum didn’t subside during the event’s day-long duration. Once inside, some had an on-hand priest pray over them to ensure Annabelle’s curse wouldn’t follow them home.

The only remaining Devils on the Run tour dates this year are a sold-out event in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, July 11-13; Rock Island, Illinois, Oct. 4; and Lexington, Kentucky, Oct. 17-19.

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This article appears in May 14-27, 2025.

Stephanie Koithan is the Digital Content Editor of the San Antonio Current. In her role, she writes about politics, music, art, culture and food. Send her a tip at skoithan@sacurrent.com.