By Ash Ellis
The image below was allegedly taken by one Melissa Braham, who was out walking her dog in Victoria Park, St Helens on the afternoon of Friday 26th February 2021. She had recently got a new mobile phone and was testing out the camera taking a number of random photographs and videos during the walk. It wasn’t until she was reviewing the photos afterwards, that she noticed something strange in this particular photo below:
In the middle-left of the photograph, just below the lamppost, we can see an odd looking object, and upon zooming in, it strikingly appears to show a small humanoid-like creature seemingly walking across the pathway.
Did this innocent dog walker capture a photo of a real alien? Is this finally the proof we’ve been waiting for???
Let’s find out!
The author of this article lives not too far from the location of this photo, and using my legally allowed exercise time during the national lockdown, visited the site of this potentially world-changing sighting on Sunday 7th March, 2021.
I discovered a couple of unusual and interesting things during my visit and subsequent investigation, but first, let’s discuss the actual photo itself.
Let’s be honest, it looks fake. It doesn’t appear to have any depth to the body, it screams 2D and if you look closely around the edges, it has a dark shadow around the side, like a cardboard cutout would have.
Secondly, the shadows. Looking at the original image, most of the shadows are in the North-East direction, however the shadow from the creature is in the North direction, so you could say the shadow is fake, it’s a photoshopped image. However, note the shadow of the photographer, also heading North. In my opinion, the shadow is real, so the creature/object/whatever it is, is physically there, and the photo itself is real and not edited.
Next, lets take a look at the feet of the alleged creature, it seems to be perfectly poised on top of a branch/stick that’s on the floor. Could it be a cardboard cutout stuck to a stick and placed there in a hoax attempt?
I’m 99.99% sure this is a cardboard cutout, and I know many of you are in agreement, that was my first thought when looking at the photo.
However – what if it isn’t? If there was the slightest chance, no matter how small (and we’re talking very small), that there is more to this, that this is a genuine sighting of an unknown humanoid, possibly alien, creature – right on your doorstep, wouldn’t you want to check it out, just in case? When you’re investigating something, you don’t just go with the first option, no matter how likely, without at least considering other explanations. Similar to a certain leaked photograph which some UFO researchers immediately written of as a batman balloon, without even looking into it. That’s just lazy.
So I grabbed my cameras and other equipment (that I always take with me on my daily allowed exercise…) and headed to the location, which is in fact Balker Drive, at the edge of Victoria Park, St Helens UK. The road, no longer accessible by vehicle, leads to a now-demolished NHS Healthcare Centre, the signage for which are still present at the site.
I took some photos of the area, using both a digital SLR and a full spectrum action camera, concentrating mainly on the area where the creature is seen and potentially walking from/to. All the pictures can be found at the bottom of this report. You can clearly see the branches that are to the left of the creature and thus the exact area where it was stood. Interestingly, there is a small pile of sticks right where it appears the creature was, and they caught my eye as to be possibly unnatural and seemingly placed atop each other purposefully. Were these used to prop up the cardboard cutout? I used an EMF meter to measure around the area which yielded no results.
Something probably not related, but which did pique my interest, was upon looking at Google Maps at the location. Directly by the entrance to the pathway we are stood on, is a business called Detective Private Investigator Cowley Hill. Cowley Hill Lane is the road that Balker Drive leads on to. The website linked leads to a company called I-Spy Liverpool. A search on companies house for these business names (and Mellisa Braham) came back empty. Further searches only brought back one Facebook page for I-Spy Liverpool which looked to be set-up in 2019, but was never used. If this is an organization that is active, it’s likely to be a small, possibly one-man operation and isn’t registered as a Limited Company. Again, this is probably not related to this incident but I just found it interesting considering the location and what I was doing there.
Now onto the witness who reported the photograph to a number of different researchers and UFO websites (Including BUFORA – read their response HERE).
Mellisa Braham is reported to be the witness, however searches only come back to articles talking about this photograph. Searches for the more commonly spelled Melissa Braham results in more hits, however none appear to match the lady in the image provided and are located in the USA. It’s not impossible that these are her as she could have relocated to the UK but as we have no more information on the witness, we cannot do anything more. A reverse image search of that photograph also doesn’t register any specific matches. Searches on social media for both versions of the name come back again to mainly American residents, and with none matching the image. I believe the photo of the “witness” to have come from the TheydoNotExist website, which randomises computer generated images of non-existent people, and therefore of the opinion that this is likely to be a fake name as well as image, and taking into account the photograph itself as well as items found visiting the location, I come back to confirm my original thoughts that this is a hoax most likely using a cardboard cutout and a story orchestrated by someone using a fake name and photo. It intrigues me as to why they would even send a photograph of themselves to UFO researchers, I have investigated dozens of sightings reported directly to me / this website and not one has had the inclination to include a selfie!
If more information comes to light, I am open to looking at this case again, but for now, enjoy this cardboard cutout, and some of the photographs of the location below:
