Magdalena Solís (1947 – date of death unknown), known as The High Priestess of Blood, allegedly was a Mexican serial killer and cult leader responsible for orchestrating several murders which involved the drinking of the victims' blood. The murders were committed in Yerba Buena, San Luis Potosí, during the early 1960s.^[1]

Solís was convicted of two of the murders and sentenced to 50 years in prison; authorities ascribed eight murders to Solís and suspected she was involved in as many as 15. She is regarded as one of the few documented instances of a sexually-motivated female serial killer, showing organized, visionary, and hedonistic characteristics.^[2]

Psychiatric profile

Magdalena Solís came from a poor and most likely dysfunctional family in Tamaulipas, where she was supposedly born in 1947.^[2] She is believed to have been working as a prostitute since an early age under her brother, a local pimp named Eleazar, before joining the Hernández Brothers' sect in 1963.^[3] After this, Solís developed a serious theological psychosis, causing her to experience major religiously-oriented delusions of grandeur, coupled with a myriad of sexual perversions expressed in consuming the blood of her victims, sadomasochistic tendencies, fetishistic practices and pedophilia.^[1]

The Hernández Brothers' sect

In late 1962 or early 1963, brothers and petty scammers Santos and Cayetano Hernández, devised a ploy to help them acquire wealth quick. They travelled to the isolated community of Yerba Buena, an impoverished and mostly illiterate village of about 50 inhabitants, to whom they proclaimed themselves as prophets and high priests of "the powerful and exiled Inca gods".^[1] They proclaimed that "the Inca gods, in exchange for worship and tributes, would grant them hidden treasures in the caves of the mountains surrounding the town (a place where they also performed their rites); and that they would soon come to claim authority over their ancient kingdom, and punish the non-believers."^[2]

Despite the brothers' ignorance of both Inca mythology and pre-Hispanic history, which shows that the Incas inhabited Peru and not Mexico, they managed to convince the inhabitants of Yerba Buena of their absurdities. The Hernándezes then founded a relatively large sect, demanding economic and sexual tributes from adult members (both male and female); ingesting drugs during orgies and even selling some of their subordinates into sexual slavery.^[1]

The cult was run without issues for some time, but at one point the believers began to grow skeptical when the "high priests" failed to have their promises fulfilled.^[3] To remedy this, the Hernándezes went to Monterrey in search of prostitutes who wanted in on the farce, eventually coming into contact with Magdalena and her brother, who agreed to participate.^[2] In a later ritual, Solís was presented as the reincarnation of the goddess Cōātlīcue through a flashy smoke screen trick, which convinced the sect's followers of her authenticity. Perhaps to the two brothers' detriment, Solís eventually came to believe that she truly was a reincarnated goddess, and took command of the entire cult.^[2]

Crimes

By the time Solís took control, two of her followers, fed up with the sexual abuse, expressed their desire to leave.^[2] Fearing the repercussions, other members informed Solís and the Hernández brothers of this, with the former decreeing that the "heretics" be sacrificed. In response, the two unfortunates were lynched by fellow members.^[1]

Apprehension and conviction

Dismayed by the disappearance of both Guerrero and their colleague, the police started to take the case seriously, and contacted the army for assistance. On May 31, 1963, both police officers and soldiers conducted a joint crackdown in Yerba Buena, arresting Magdalena and Eleazar Solís at a farm in the town, where they were under the influence of marijuana.^[2] Santos Hernández would later be killed while resisting arrest, while his brother, Cayetano, had already been killed by a delusional cult member, Jesús Rubio, who later claimed that he had wanted to take a part of the high priest's body to protect himself. Many of the cult members, who had barricaded themselves inside the cave, were killed in shootouts as well.^[1]

In subsequent investigations, the dismembered corpses of Sebastián Guerrero and Luis Martínez were found near the farm where the Solís siblings were residing, with Martínez's heart having been removed. In later searches, investigators found the mutilated corpses of six more people while examining the caves.^[2] For these two killings, both Magdalena and Eleazar were sentenced to 50 years imprisonment. Their guilt couldn't be proven in the other murders, since the surviving cult members refused to testify against them.^[3] As for the rest of the cult members, taking into account mitigating factors such as their illiteracy and impoverished circumstances, each was given a 30-year prison term. Years later, some of the former members began giving interviews about the horrors they had experienced while in the sect.^[1]

In popular culture

• A Belgian rock band named itself after Magdalena Solís.

See also

• List of serial killers by country

Bibliography

• Western Folklore. Western States Folklore Society. April 1964. p. 124.
• Bill G. Cox (1991). Crimes of the 20th Century: A Chronology. Crescent Books. ISBN 0517052466.
• Brian Lane and Wilfred Gregg (January 1, 1994). The Encyclopedia of Serial Killers. Diamondis Communications. ISBN 1557739749.
• Brad Steiger (September 1, 2009). Real Vampires, Night Stalkers and Creatures from the Darkside. Visible Ink Press. ISBN 978-1578592869.
• Richard Glyn Jones (September 1, 2011). The Mammoth Book of Women Who Kill. Hachette UK. ISBN 978-1780333670.
• Don Rauf (December 15, 2015). Female Serial Killers. Enslow Publishing, LLC. ISBN 978-0766072886.
• Ricardo Ham (2016). Asesinos seriales mexicanos: Las entrañas de una realidad siniestra [Mexican Serial Killers: The Bowels of a Sinister Reality] (in Spanish). Penguin Random House. ISBN 978-6074809565.

References