A magnet fishing catch (Photo: YouTube)
If the fish aren't biting, maybe the "spell jars" will be.
A knife found with eight others in a "spell jar" submerged in the Detroit River (Photo: YouTube)
We normally don't aggregate feature stories behind a paywall, but today's Detroit News piece on "magnet fishers," i.e. two guys who retrieve stuff from the Detroit River using magnets, was so amusing that we'll give you at least a gloss.
The Motor City Magnet Fishers are two guys who've built a substantial YouTube and TikTok following with videos of them throwing magnets into the Detroit River and pulling them back with guns, knives and voodoo spells attached.
The News reports in a subscribers-only story:
Tanner Torrez, known online as the Michigan Magnet Man from Caro, in Tuscola County, has found 18 firearms ditched in waterways around the state over the last year.
"The last gun I found was newer, the slide was still moving and it still worked," said Torrez, a 29-year-old film student at Michigan State University. "I would assume that was connected to a crime, homicide or something in the area. We find a lot of older ones, too, that you wouldn't be able to track back to anything, but depending on how long the new ones are in the water, you can still pull prints off."
The two said they turn in weapons to local police and noticed when they do, a patrol vehicle will become more visible in the area, especially when they are prospecting around Detroit's Del Ray area and the Belle Isle Bridge.
"For the last 100 years, people have been dumping their evidence in the river because nobody ever thought somebody would come along with a magnet and pull it out," Torrez said.
Torrez and Jason Vanderwal also commonly find "spell jars," i.e. bottles sunk with steak knives inside, sometimes with intentions written on the blades. On one recent video, he reads a knife-written request to "remove evil spirits" blocking the spell-caster from getting "all six MegaMillions numbers." The bottles often have "hot sauce, menstrual blood, urine" or other liquids inside.
The News is having a $22-for-two-years subscription sale right now, and you could do worse.
