A look at the claims, predictions and behavior of a media "psychic".
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A look at the claims, predictions and behavior of a media "psychic".
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| Follow-up to "Montel: Shawn Hornbeck Reading"More about Browne's most famously wrong reading to date.  Pam and Craig Akers BackgroundOn January 12 2007, fifteen-year-old Shawn Hornbeck was found alive after having been missing for four years. Three years before Shawn was found, his parents - Pam and Craig Akers - appeared on the Montel Williams show to ask Sylvia Browne's help in locating their missing son. She told them Shawn was dead. On the day Shawn was found (very much alive), I placed an article on this site about the Shawn Hornbeck reading, but at that time I did not have the video footage, and relied on newspaper articles to describe what had happened on the Montel Williams show that day. Here now is the promised follow-up article, containing the video and a transcript of the reading. The ReadingThe episode of the Montel Williams show in which the Akers appeared was first broadcast on February 26 2003. The Akers' segment in the show started with a pre-taped video showing details of Shawn's disappearance, and footage of some of the search efforts. After the video, Montel Williams introduced the Akers, seated in the audience.
 Sylvia Browne telling the Akers that their son is dead
Anderson Cooper Interview Anderson Cooper interviewing the Akers In the surge of unwelcome publicity Browne received for her part in the Shawn Hornbeck case, Browne herself granted no interviews of which I am aware. Twice she was asked to appear on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360 show, and declined both times. The first time, her staff sent a statement from Browne's business manager. The second, Browne again declined, sending the business manager (Linda Rossi) to speak for her. On January 22 2007, the first of these two AC360 episodes was broadcast, containing a lengthy story about Sylvia Browne and her connection to the Shawn Hornbeck case. The story's title: Dead Wrong. Towards the beginning of the story, a clip of Browne telling the Akers that their son is dead is played, after which the following tape of Cooper interviewing the Akers was shown:
Analysis Michael J. Devlin, accused of kidnapping Shawn Hornbeck (AP photo) Here is a breakdown of Browne's predictions in the reading, comparing them with reality.
This gives Browne a score of one prediction known to be correct out of thirteen, giving her a score of less than eight percent correct. This is far lower than the eighty-seven percent accuracy rating she claims for herself. And she only scored eight percent because I broke down her statement about the abductor into its individual pieces. Had I instead put them together as "The abductor was a dreadlocked, tall, thin Hispanic man named Michael," her score would have been zero percent. Also, this analysis of Browne's reading assumes that Michael J. Devlin was indeed the abductor, although that has yet to be proven in a court of law. If we drop that assumption, then all her predictions relating to the abductor go into the "Unknown" category, leaving her once again with a score of zero percentage correct. It should also be noted that according to the U.S. Social Security Administration, "Michael" is the most popular name for male babies born in the United States over the past fifty years. ConclusionAs was mentioned in the original article, Browne's "psychic visions" once again added anguish and horrible mental images to the burden already being carried by the parents of a missing child, as well as wasted man-hours for search teams as they tried to follow up on her worthless leads. The Akers being told Browne would help find Shawn's body for $700 an hour is also very distressing. Browne and her people insist she would never do such a thing, but they also insist she has never charged law enforcement for help, a claim which will be disproved in an upcoming article on this site. The statement from Browne's staff that "She cannot possibly be 100 percent correct in each and every one of her predictions" was certainly true. From what I have seen, her percentage of correct predictions is extremely low, around that you'd get with simple educated guesses. But even were her accuracy as high as she claims (87%), it seems beyond cruel to tell the parents of a missing child that their child is dead, when you do not know that for a 100% fact. As soon as any of the predictions currently categorized as "unknown" become known, I will update the article to reflect them. Related LinksClicking on any of these links will load a separate browser window for viewing the linked page. StopSylviaBrowne.com is not responsible for the content of any of these linked pages.
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