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“As soon as we got home, I dumped everything out and was checking (the candy),” Magyar said. “It poked me. I gave it to my boyfriend, he was feeling it, and it poked him, too.”

Photo by Angela Magyar / Special to the Star

Magyar said closer inspection revealed that a steel sewing needle had been shoved into the chocolate bar length-wise. The spike was long enough to pierce someone pressing the wrapper, but not long enough to be obvious.

Hernandez pulled the needle all the way out of the candy. Magyar said it looked like a sewing needle with its eye loop broken — so that it would be sharp on both ends.

The couple posted information about their disturbing find on Facebook. At the urging of commenters, they contacted Windsor police about it on Tuesday.

Patrol officers arranged to visit Magyar’s household and have a look at the needle and chocolate.

Magyar said she was so unsettled by her discovery that she threw out the rest of Ava’s Halloween candy, and she doubts they’ll be going trick-or-treating next year.

“I don’t want to take chances with anything now,” Magyar said. “I can’t even imagine (what would have happened) if I didn’t find that.”

Photo by Jason Kryk / Windsor Star

As for those who may doubt Magyar’s story, she said: “Maybe they’ve never had it happen to them. You read these stories, and they just seem crazy. To think that that could happen. You don’t believe it until you actually go through it.”

For Magyar, the spiked chocolate is further confirmation to her that “the world is getting worse. It’s getting more messed up.”

Magyar said she hopes her story encourages other moms to be extra careful about trick-or-treating and to double-check their children’s Halloween hauls. “I’m telling all my friends and family. I honestly thought this was a safe neighbourhood.”

“I never thought someone could be so sick to put something like this in candy, knowing it could kill a child.”

Photo by Jason Kryk / Windsor Star

dchen@postmedia.com