Urban Legends

Mary Cherry Chua

Mary Cherry Chua (commonly known Mary Chua) was a high school student of a popular all-girls school in Quezon City, Metro Manila. She was in second year when she was raped and killed by the janitor of the school, killed by strangling her with her necktie. The year when she was killed was in 1972. Some sources depicting her life and death mentions that the school was St. Mary's College, but I am not certain if it was really the school where she studied. Her story became popular because of the book True Philippine Ghosts Story of PSICOM Publishing Corp. The year when the story first circulated was 1992, but still it was uncertain.

According to some stories, Mary Chua was a simple, beautiful, kind, intelligent, young girl popular in her school. They also described her with long black hair, creamy white skin and chinky black eyes.

Her story found its way to urban legend because of the rumors and stories that whoever sits on the bench, which was standing in the very same place where she was killed and was near St. Joseph Building, will be possessed by her, putting the possessed person (usually a girl) in her shoe and letting that individual feel and experience her pain and struggle while being raped by the said janitor. But according to some people, it was not a bench but a drinking fountain water which in some time, instead of water it was blood coming out from the fountain.

Story

[Taken from Internet:]

One day, Mary Cherry had to stay late in school because of an activity. It was near dusk already when she said goodbye to her classmates. Later that night, the frantic parents of Mary Cherry called her classmates one by one asking if they had seen their daughter, since the girl has not arrived home yet and this was very unusual since Mary Cherry diligently goes home after school. However, not one of Mary Cherry's classmates were able to say where she was.

The following morning, Mary Cherry's body was found behind a shrubbery in the school's spacious yard. She was strangled to death with her own necktie, her skirt all the way up to her chest and her panty was found below her ankles: clear indication that she was raped. Her mouth was still open, evidently she struggled for breath as her assailant choked her. Her grieving, outraged parents of course cried justice for their daughter. It was a huge scandal at that time. The school had to do damage control because what happened would not only put a black mark on the name of the school, if they wanted to keep their students (which I mentioned were all girls), they have to catch the culprit and they have to do it fast.

It was the school's good luck that the rapist went forward on his own accord. It turned out to be the school janitor who was recently fired because of being caught sleeping on the job. He decided to rape a student because he knew that it will reflect negatively on the school and he just chose Mary Cherry because she was the one of the most popular girls there. He felt really guilty after doing his crime and since his conscience continued to plagued him, he decided to surrender. The janitor was put into prison and to serve as a token to Mary Cherry's memory, the school administration erected a stone bench on the exact spot where she her body was found with the words "In Memory of Mary Cherry Chua" engraved on it.

However, the story doesn't end there. According to the students of that school, those who dared to sit on that bench will be possessed by Mary Cherry Chua. She will be made to feel how Mary Cherry felt during her last minutes in the world. Some of those who happens to pass that stone bench during dusk sometimes sees a figure of a young girl, crying nearby, perhaps crying because her bright future was taken away from her...

For whole real-life story of Mary Cherry Chua in series, pa search nalang po dito sa wattpad. =)

I found her friendster profile in a forum website which scares some of the people. But some speculated that this account was created by some people who just wanted to make use of her scary story.

There was another rumor that she actually did not die of being raped and murdered by the janitor but because of her illness. Well, no one want to believe on that datum because they assume that those who spread the said information just want to hide the true story of Mary Chua.