Former jail building draws couples for Halloween weddings in Ohio

DELAWARE, Ohio (AP) — Nine couples got married Friday inside a former county jail in central Ohio that was decorated for Halloween.

The vows were exchanged in Delaware County’s 18-cell jail building, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of Columbus.

These days the 1878 structure is owned by the Delaware County Historical Society, but until 1988 it served as the county lockup.

Andrea Bates and Jessica Scales decided to tie the knot about a month ago — Bates had previously determined that if she ever got married, she’d do it on Halloween.

“I feel like I just have a weird connection with Halloween. My daughter’s named Salem, so, it’s just my favorite. The spookiness, the atmosphere of the time, I just love it,” she said.

Halloween is also the favorite holiday of Nicole Bond and Jacob Beatty, who got hitched after being together for a decade.

“I think we were both kind of looking for an excuse to get married and this opportunity presented itself and we jumped on it,” Beatty said. “So it was such a cool, unique experience and kind of right up our alley.”

Bond said they had sweet plans for after the ceremony.

“Eat some lunch, take a nap and then go trick-or-treating,” she said.

Court officials in Delaware County do weddings every other Friday, and when they realized that Halloween fell on a Friday this year, they began planning for the jailhouse weddings.

Court employees wore costumes and decorated the space with pumpkins and a spider web. Couples were provided with a way to take mugshot-style photos.

Organizers capped the number of weddings at 10 and nine couples showed up. There’s no word on whether the bride and groom who didn’t show up got spooked.

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Associated Press writer Mark Scolforo in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, contributed.