CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- If we lived in a neighborhood that attracted more than a half-dozen trick-or-treaters, I expect I'd be one of those who spend the evening pretending to be a porch scarecrow with a bowl of candy on its lap.

I love clever costumes and Halloween pranks, and it was while searching for inspiration online that I found my new hero, Kurt Roedeger, 29, of Douglassville, Pa.

After reading about Kurt's prizewinning Halloween prank on Zug.com, I contacted Kurt to find out how his story ended and to ask permission to share a condensed version of his inspiring hoax.

Kurt said his family members generally make up his front line of prank victims, but they're also the first he stands up to protect when he feels they've been wronged. "I believe in the escalation of war," says Kurt. "You shoot one of my soldiers, I level one of your cities."

And so, when Kurt's younger brother, who is now 26, began working for an obnoxious and self-absorbed man we'll call Bob, it wasn't long before Bob's mistreatment was bad enough that Kurt decided it was time for some creative brotherly intervention.

To Kurt's advantage, his brother's boss lived a fairly short distance away, on the other side of some woods. Also to Kurt's advantage was that their local newspaper had a recurring feature about haunted houses and businesses in the area.

Kurt decided it would be fun to convince Bob that his house had been built on Indian burial grounds. To plant that seed, he called Bob, claiming to be from the newspaper, saying he was working on a story about local haunted places and asking if he could stop by.

"I went to his house with aerial maps of his property, beat-up copies of USGS maps (they're online for the entire country), and forged copies of an old survey showing a settlement with the area near his house marked as 'ceremonial,'" wrote Kurt, who gave Bob a brief history of a made-up Indian tribe called the Picardatee, a name inspired by "Star Trek."

Kurt used the name of a person who had recently left the paper, in case Bob called to ask about the story ("Sorry, Tom doesn't work here anymore"), and then left things alone for a while, allowing the seed to germinate in Bob's head.

And then spring rolled around, and Boss Bob started making Kurt's brother mow his yard.

Armed with a squirt bottle filled with white vinegar, they sprayed three grave-sized rectangles on Bob's grass. (Vinegar doesn't quite kill the grass, but turns it nice and yellow.). And from time to time, upon these fake graves, they'd leave neatly stacked branches.

There were late-night trips to the edge of the woods, where they'd blow a dog whistle, causing Bob's yappy little dog to bark crazily even though nothing appeared to be there. There were muddy boot prints left on Bob's patio, even when there'd been no rain to make mud. And there were (I love this) gobs of birdseed spread all over the fake graves, which attracted large numbers of birds to congregate.

Now twitchy, yet still obnoxious, Bob installed motion detectors and an infrared camera.

Kurt countered by giving his brother deer estrus (doe heat urine) to discreetly spray on the trees near the graves while he was cutting Bob's grass. Because Bob's property backed up against state game lands, there were soon hordes of young bucks lolling about Bob's back yard.

This next part is so over the top that some might think it borders on demented. I prefer to view it as genius.

Kurt had two cats that would spend their nights hunting, and they would often leave their spare mice and moles outside, near the door. Rather than disposing of the carcasses, Kurt began saving them in a trash bag in his spare freezer. And then, when the time seemed right, Bob's patio was covered with tiny thawing corpses.

Bob checked into a hotel. He now lives with his parents.

In Tennessee.

Reach Karin Fuller at karinful...@gmail.com.