Background: My informant is a 19 year old girl from Calfornia with Mexican heritage and a large family that often share stories together.
Me: Who is this story about?
S: My mom’s best friend’s father. He worked at the Saticoy water plant in California during the night shift. He was tasked to make sure different machines used during all hours of the day were working properly. He would drive his truck around the property to get to different areas of the plant to check different piping systems. He claimed that he would often hear drunk teenagers running into the orchids to hide from cops or explore the property. One night as he was getting back into his truck after checking a pipe that had recently been malfunctioning, he heard the sounds of rowdy kids. He was so used to this that he ignored it and just got into his truck and began driving away. As he was driving he looked into his rearview mirror and noticed a young girl sitting in the back of his truck. He stopped the car and got out to yell at her, but when he went out no girl was there. He blamed this on being tired and got back into the car, but he saw the girl in the rearview mirror again, this time much closer to his back window. He tried closing his eyes and opening them again, thinking he was hallucinating from lack of sleep, but the figure was still there. He moved the rearview window completely upwards and drove home without once looking back again, and he quit the night shift that same night.
My thoughts: I like this story because I know about this particular waterplant in my area and have heard a few strange things about it but this is the most concrete account of anything paranormal happening at this particular place. A similar place with a haunted reputation also in Ventura county is the Scary Dairy, which has an entry which can be found here http://uscfolklorearc.wpenginepowered.com/tag/mental-hospital/