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Blood + Death The Secret History of Santa Muerte and the Mexican Drug Cartels

by John Lee Brook

www.worldheadpress.com

contents

Introduction: The Beginning of the Cartels.................... 1

santa muerte.............................................................. 22

the devilâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ranch........................................................ 28

el mochaorejas.......................................................... 44

the beard...................................................................... 67

the white sister and los zetas................................ 88

hecho en mexico........................................................ 105

el june......................................................................... 111

maradona.................................................................... 119

los aztecas................................................................. 126

money talks................................................................ 134

la resistencia............................................................ 150

high priest of death................................................. 162

the black kiss............................................................. 174

Appendix: Santa Muerteâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Harvest of Souls............... 210

Sources and Acknowledgements................................. 233

About this book........................................................... 234

two

The Devil’s Ranch THEY ALWAYS SCREAMED. It was the screaming that turned him on. It made him feel omnipotent. Usually, he would skin his victims alive. That’s when the screaming began. Delicious screaming. Then he would chop off their head, removing the brain from the cranium. Portions of the brain would be added to the stew hanging over the fire in a big pot. The pot was his Nganga, his sacred altar. It contained sticks, human remains, and human bones. The stew simmered just below boiling. Human blood gave the brew its red cast. Later, he would dip into it a cup and bring it to his lips. Drinking the thick liquid opened the door for the Nfumbe, the spirit of the dead. Nfumbe merged with his spirit, a mystical hypostasis. The result was power. He felt it coursing through the center of his being, like an electrical charge, and the power was the gift of his high god Zambi. But power demanded a vehicle—death. Death was the bequest of Santa Muerte, his goddess. The man’s name was Adolfo de Jesús Constanzo, and he was a product of his environment. His mother, Aurora Constanzo, emigrated from Cuba to the promised land of Miami, a place of warm beaches and money. At the tender age of fifteen, Aurora found herself living in a dingy apartment in Little Havana, a Cuban enclave of Miami, known for its criminal underworld, drugs, prostitution, and arcane religious practices. Aurora was a practicing Santera, a Santeria Priestess or witch. She was pregnant and didn’t know who the father was. Too many

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boyfriends, too much promiscuity. When Adolfo was six-months-old, Aurora paid a Haitian priest of Palo Mayombe to baptize the infant. Aurora knew in her heart of hearts that the child was ‘a chosen one, destined for great power.’ Packing up the baby and her few meager belongings, Aurora moved to San Juan, Puerto Rico. Dismissing the option to become a hooker or turning to petty crime and dealing drugs on the street corner, Aurora was in search of a husband, preferably a rich one. Still young and pretty, she didn’t have any difficulty in landing one. It was easy to tantalize his male ego and manipulate him, and while he wasn’t as wealthy as she would have liked, he was well-off. Her new husband had no clue that Aurora was a witch; she went out of her way to appear a devout member of the Catholic Church, going so far as to have Adolfo baptized into the Church. When old enough, he even served as an altar boy. Over the years, Aurora beguiled her husband. She was the perfect wife, a doting mother, a wonderful cook and eager to please in the bedroom. Through innuendo, suggestion and subtle stage management, Aurora eventually convinced her husband to relocate the family. Tired of Puerto Rico, which she considered unsophisticated and boring, Aurora longed for the hustle and buzz of Miami. At the age of ten, little Adolfo found himself back in the city of his birth. Prior to the move, Adolfo had been initiated into Santeria. To further his education in dark magic, his mother frequently took him to Haiti, where he was inculcated in Vodun. In Miami, they lived in a comfortable three-bedroom house in Little Havana. For a while, superficially, they were a normal, happy family. But underneath the façade, secrets existed. Right until his death, Adolfo’s stepfather thought the boy was attending school. But in fact he was in apprenticeship to a Haitian priest, learning the mysteries of black magic. Aurora was left happy and financially solvent, and began to practice Santeria again. Her brazenness alienated neighbors, who soon referred to her as ‘that bruja’—witch. Aurora’s response was to leave headless chickens and goats on their

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front porches, which served to increase the tension. Believing that black magic protected her, Aurora did whatever she wanted. She was arrested thirty times for trespassing, shoplifting, check fraud, grand theft and child neglect. Because of her husband’s money, she had no reason for turning to crime. She did so because she liked it. Adolfo’s ‘godfather,’ the Haitian priest, making millions smuggling drugs, introduced the boy to the subterranean world of drug running. He learned the best methods of transportation, who could be trusted and who couldn’t, along with imaginative ways to avoid the police. Adolfo absorbed the wisdom of his godfather like a sponge, in the realm of black magic as well as the more earthly pursuits. One of his godfather’s wisest proverbs was this: “Let the nonbelievers kill themselves with drugs. We will profit from their foolishness.” Adolfo was sixteen-years-old and well over six feet tall. He was arguably good looking, although a little on the soft side and what some might call a ‘pretty-boy.’ His features revolved around a strong chin and a high forehead, along with dark, dreamy eyes. The kind of eyes young women swooned over. And men. Adolfo was bisexual. He cruised the gay bars of Miami looking for victims more than liaisons. Petty theft, picking pockets, and pushing drugs formed his repertoire. Police arrested him in 1981 for shoplifting, having supposedly stolen a chainsaw from a hardware store. But there wasn’t enough evidence to make it stick. Turning twenty-one, Adolfo took Holy Orders in the Palo Mayombe religion, swearing an oath to Kadiempembe, or Satan. His godfather performed ritual scarring on his body, cutting elaborate mystical symbols into the flesh. As the blood flowed from his wounds, Adolfo said, “My soul is dead. I have no god.” Adolfo was moonlighting as a model, his classical good looks proving lucrative with a big-time modeling agency in Mexico City. They would find him work; all he had to do was show up and look handsome. Amid the modeling work, he gravitated toward Zona Rosa, the infamous gay enclave of Mexico City, where he told fortunes

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using Tarot cards and engaged in sexual trysts. He hooked up with three men who had fallen under his spell, whom Adolfo referred to as “my disciples.” Jorge Montes was a gay psychic, while Martin Quintana and Omar Orea were simply fascinated by the occult. All three wanted to benefit from Adolfo’s special powers. Adolfo’s reputation as necromancer grew in leaps and bounds. Many visited the handsome sorcerer, seeking salvation of some kind. Adolfo lived with Orea and Quintana in a small apartment, with the three of them enjoying a bizarre sex life. Adolfo would, depending on his caprice, decide whether he wanted to be a man or a woman. Based on this inclination, he would choose to have sex with Orea or Quintana. Hearing of Adolfo’s magical powers, drug dealers also sought his advice, wanting to protect their drug shipments. Rumor had it that the young wizard could shield such machinations from the eyes of the police and federal authorities. Ignorant and supremely superstitious, the drug lords were desperate for reassurance. With Adolfo’s psychic powers helping them, they organized their shipments and subsequent distribution. Adolfo predicted when and where the shipments would be safe. He also provided magic spells for the drug lords’ minions, their hit men and street dealers. The spells made the hit men and the dealers invisible, so they believed. They were hidden from sight by ghostly veils that Adolfo called forth from the netherworld. Of course, Adolfo charged an enormous fee for access to his powers and the protection they guaranteed. And he put on a good show. His magical ceremonies were right out of Hollywood. Costumes, masks, animal sacrifices, human body parts, human skulls, mysterious chants and cauldrons of bubbling blood were essential ingredients. Adolfo’s clients lapped it all up. With fame, a wider variety of people sought him out: physicians, business men, fashion models and performers, including singers and media personalities. Police, too. High-ranking officers from the Federal Judicial Police embraced Adolfo as if he were a god descended from Mt. Olympus. Most prominent was Salvador García, a short, plump man with a bristling

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mustache and eyebrows like a wire brush. García commanded the Federales’ division of narcotics investigations. Then there was Florentino Ventura, the Chief of Mexico’s Interpol. This was much more than simple corruption, where officials accepted bribes. Both men were initiated into Adolfo’s cult. They were true believers. In 1986, Florentino Ventura brought Adolfo together with the Calzada family, who were part and parcel of what would become the Guadalajara Cartel. The Calzadas worked for Rafael Caro Quintero, a clever hillbilly in cowboy boots, jeans and a huge silver belt buckle. Adolfo’s hypnotic personality impressed the Calzadas, but what hooked them was his occult prowess. Under Adolfo’s guidance, the Calzada family’s drug shipments moved without incident and their dealers really did seem invisible. Profits soared and the Calzadas were happy. So was Adolfo. The Calzadas paid him handsomely for his talents. But then he got greedy. In Adolfo’s humble opinion, he alone was the reason for the Calzadas’ success, and without him the drug lords would be nothing. The meeting that Adolfo called with the heads of the Calzada family took place at his luxury condominium, paid for with the Calzadas’ dirty money. It sat on a hillside surrounded by tall trees, with a wall of huge windows overlooking Mexico City. It was crimson and black inside, with splashes of white, and chock full of statues and expensive abstract art. Adolfo got right to the point, cocaine eyes burning bright. “Your syndicate is prosperous. The shipments arrive safely, while your dealers escape notice. This,” he said, with a flourish of his hands, “is because I have made it so, yes?” The three Calzadas were seated on a couch studded with gold buttons. They glanced at one another and nodded. Adolfo’s arrogance relished the affirmation. “Since this is truth, I want a full partnership.” Stunned silence. Guillermo Calzada was the oldest of the group and he admired Adolfo’s balls. But there was no way he was letting some brujo become a full partner in the family. “No,” said Guillermo. “The matter is not open for discussion.”

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Adolfo nodded, apparently accepting the decision. As far as he was concerned, there wasn’t anything to discuss. He had expected them to agree to his demand, to see the wisdom in acquiescing. But since they didn’t, he would pursue another direction. After the three men left, Adolfo picked up the phone. It was a few days later when Guillermo Calzada and six members of the family disappeared. The police report noted the last time anyone saw the missing men was at Adolfo’s office, attending a so-called religious ceremony. Investigators visited the office to find melted candles and a distinctive organic odor. Adolfo had no knowledge of the missing Calzadas, and explained the candles were part of a psychic reading performed for clients; most definitely not the Calzadas, he asserted. Six days later, bobbing to the surface of the Zumpango River was a body, or what was left of it. The current drove the carcass to the bank, where kids were throwing rocks at floating pop cans. They poked the body with sticks, before realizing what it was and calling the police. Over the next week, more bodies and body parts were spotted on the river. Police determined they had seven dead bodies in total, seven murders, each victim having had fingers, toes and ears sliced off while alive. Their chests had been cut open, probably with axes, and the hearts plucked out. All the bodies were male; their sexual organs had been snipped off, again, while alive. The spine of one body had been cleanly removed, like a fileted fish. Two bodies were without brains, their skulls split like coconuts, and the meat exenterated. Adolfo had taken his revenge on the Calzadas. Of course, no one knew it at the time, but the missing body parts were food for Adolfo’s bubbling cauldron, provender for Santa Muerte. The intrigue surrounding Adolfo was incredible. Salvador García hooked Adolfo up with the Gulf Cartel, specifically the drug running gang of the Hernández brothers, Elio and Ovidio, who operated out of Matamoros, across the border from Brownsville, Texas. Adolfo traveled to Matamoros for the meeting with the brothers. Here he met Sara Aldrete, the girlfriend of Gilberto Sosa, an enforcer for the Hernández brothers.

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Sara Maria Aldrete Villareal grew up in Matamoros, where her father was an electrician. Pretty in an athletic way, standing six-footone, she attended Texas Southmont College, majoring in physical education. She taught aerobics and played soccer. When Adolfo saw Sara, he instantly wanted her. Not just sexually, but more importantly, Adolfo wanted her for what she represented—the fulfillment of the image he carried in his mind, the image of his priestess. Gilberto Sosa was ousted with an anonymous phone call made by Adolfo. Informed that his partner was seeing another man, Sosa confronted Sara, demanding an explanation. She denied the accusations, but he called the whole deal off. The heartbroken Sara sought out Adolfo, who comforted her. The relationship bloomed when Adolfo told her he had seen the break-up coming in his Tarot cards. “It was foretold,” intoned Adolfo. Fascinated by this revelation, Sara wanted to know more. Adolfo was eager to share. Over time, he introduced her to Santa Muerte and she became a true believer. Adolfo began sleeping with her. But it didn’t last long; Adolfo preferred men. Thoroughly brainwashed, however, Sara passively accepted Adolfo’s decree that she wasn’t welcome in his bed. Adolfo called Sara ‘La Madrina,’ the godmother. His cult now had a High Priestess. The Hernández gang turned to Adolfo’s magic for help. They were having problems with rival drug gangs moving in on their operation, and things were getting tense. Adolfo obliged. He told them what they wanted to hear, that his magic, a mixture of Palo Mayombe and Santa Muerte, would make them invisible and protect them from their enemies. In return for his magical protection, Adolfo wanted fifty percent of the gang’s profits. Desperate, the Hernández brothers agreed. Adolfo used some of his new drug money to buy a ranch, Rancho Santa Elena, which comprised forty acres, a house and outbuildings. Adolfo didn’t really reside on the ranch, except for short periods of time. It was his “place of magic and sacrifice,” according to Serafin

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Hernández. On a hot May night, Adolfo sacrificed two victims: drug dealer Héctor de la Fuente and a nearby farmer named Moises Castillo. De la Fuente had rejected Adolfo’s sexual advances; Castillo just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The ritual was supposed to be a solemn one. But it didn’t work out that way. The victims fought viciously, refusing the black and red sacrificial gowns. Reluctantly, in the end, Adolfo pulled out a pistol and shot them in the head. His lust for screaming and blood had been spoiled; he needed release. As his minions buried the bodies, Adolfo, angry and frustrated, drove back to Mexico City and issued orders. “Find Ramón Esquivel and bring him to me,” he demanded. Esquivel was a transvestite, whom Adolfo disliked. Esquivel was dragged into Adolfo’s office, the floor covered for the occasion in black plastic. Black candles burned in devotion to Santa Muerte, and the air was rich with the smell of wax. Esquivel, screaming hysterically, was nailed to a wooden cross on the floor, made of four by fours. Adolfo commenced dismembering Esquivel with a butcher knife, first slicing his arms off and then his legs. Esquivel died from blood loss. Still, Adolfo continued. Finished, Adolfo told his minions to collect the pieces, find a street corner and dump them there. “And make sure it’s a busy street corner,” he added. “I want everyone to behold and know my power.” Adolfo rolled up the blood covered plastic and let the black candles burn down. Three months later, Ovidio Hernández and his infant son were kidnapped by La Familia. Adolfo performed a human sacrifice to Santa Muerte (the victim in this instance remaining a mystery). Miraculously, Ovidio and his son were released the next day. To Ovido Hernández and his gang, Adolfo was nothing short of a god. Then things went to Hell. At Rancho Santa Elena, Adolfo sacrificed another victim. When the victim refused to scream or beg for mercy, Adolfo went berserk and sought a new victim. “Santa Muerte demands the blood of a white man,” he told his disciples.

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Spring break. Matamoros was alive with partying college students from north of the border. Mark Kilroy was tall and good looking, a student from the University of Texas. He came from money and a family well-connected. He was drinking his way from bar to bar, on the lookout for likely female students when Adolfo’s disciples targeted him. Kilroy was kidnapped and taken to Rancho Santa Elena, where he was skinned alive and dismembered. Mark Kilroy was reported missing. His family applied pressure via the media and Texas politicians in their search for answers. The US government contacted the Mexican government and the investigation into the boy’s disappearance intensified. Police in Matamoros went through the motions, not really expecting to really find anything. But then they got lucky with Serafín Hernández. A transporter of drugs for Adolfo and the Hernández gang, Serafín Hernández blew through a roadblock in the belief he was invisible and the police wouldn’t see him. It proved not to be the case, and he was followed back to Rancho Santa Elena, where police found hundreds of pounds of marijuana neatly packaged, along with a caretaker and four of Adolfo’s disciples. They arrested everybody and confiscated the drugs. While in custody, the caretaker, an old farmer who maintained the property when Adolfo was away, noticed a photo of Mark Kilroy on a desk. “I know that guy!” he said, pointing at the smiling face in the photo. One of the officers inched closer. “Whattaya mean you know him?” “Some of those guys brought him to the ranch. They had him in the back of a 4 x 4. I gave him some water and bread to eat. The next day they killed him and buried him out there.” The police drove out to the ranch with Serafín Hernández, who showed them the spot where the body was buried. Serafín acted unusually nonchalant about the entire thing, as if pointing out the location of watermelon seeds. The police got all excited: if the body was actually that of Mark Kilroy, they might get part of the reward money. Grabbing picks and shovels, they began digging furiously.

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Hernández watched for a minute or two, and then gestured to several different areas. “I don’t know why you’re making such a big deal out of it,” he said. “There’s another body buried over there, and another over there, and one there.” Pretty soon, the police were digging up bodies all over the place, toiling away in the hot sun with Hernández chained beneath the shade of the tree, sipping a coke. He wore a white shirt and jeans. He could move around but not very far. One of the policemen was keeping track of which body was found where, making notes on a clipboard. Taking a sip of his coke, Hernández looked over at at him. “You’ll never convict us,” he said with a shrug. “We’re protected.” The body of Mark Kilroy was found with its skull hacked apart and the brain removed. The legs were chopped off, his heart cut out and his spinal cord removed. In a nearby shack, police found an altar and a large copper pot, stinking to high heaven. One officer recognized the pot for what it was. “Nganga,” he said. He’d heard about such things from his grandmother. “Nganga,” he explained to the lieutenant, “a pot used for ceremonies. Black magic, that kind of shit.” The soup in the pot contained blood, pieces of small animals, scorpions and spiders. It also contained chunks of brain, later determined to belong to Mark Kilroy. When Serafín Hernández was questioned, he answered openly and without hesitation that he had taken part in Mark Kilroy’s kidnapping and murder. He told his interrogators about his role in other murders that took place at Rancho Santa Elena. “It’s been going on for the last two years,” he boasted. “It’s our religion. Our voodoo. The human sacrifices make us invisible and keep us safe.” The interrogators looked at each other in disbelief. “And you’re a priest in this religion,” asked one of them. Hernández laughed. “Of course not. El Padrino is the High Priest. He’s a living god. He plans everything. The rituals, the magic spells, the torture, the murders.” He paused momentarily, collecting his words. “Santa Muerte watches over him. He is her favorite.”

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“This El Padrino, does he have another name?” “Yes. Adolfo de Jesús Costanzo.” “And where would we find El Padrino?” Hernández shrugged. “That is a mystery. He vanished. But you’ll never find him. It’s like I told you. He’s invisible.” Adolfo wasn’t invisible, but on the lam in Mexico City. The publicity garnered by the disappearance of Mark Kilroy had taken him by surprise and forced him into hiding, along with his High Priestess, Sara Aldrete, and gay lovers Martin Quintana and Omar Orea. There was a fifth person, too, Alvaro de León Valdez aka El Duby, an enforcer for the Hernández gang, and 800 kilos of marijuana. The marijuana was promised to a distributor in Texas. It just needed to be delivered and the payment picked up. Adolfo sent his ‘mules’—four men from the Hernández gang—to make the delivery. The delivery itself went without incident, with the weed being exchanged for a paper bag containing $300,000. But the mules transferring the money failed to make it back to Adolfo; they were arrested, and the money confiscated by the police. Adolfo was in deep shit. Not only were the local police looking for him, but now the Mexican Federales and the DEA were, too. He and his entourage began staying in the homes of disciples, moving from one house to another every few days. Miami was probably the best place to go, decided Adolfo. But this plan was vetoed when he got word informers had squealed to the DEA about the possibility of him running home to mother. Law enforcement was checking every rumor concerning Adolfo’s whereabouts. One reported sighting put him in Chicago. Another in Acapulco, where he was planning to kidnap ten children. In reality, Adolfo was holed up in a cheap apartment in Mexico City, with his Tarot cards before him, speaking of betrayal. He didn’t know what it meant. He didn’t know that Serafín Hernández had escaped police custody in Matamoros, only to be arrested a few weeks later in Houston, Texas. As usual in such instances, stoolpigeons had told officials where he was located. In this case, a house in suburbia

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loaded with guns and cash. But the cards never lied. Adolfo knew nothing of Hernández’s predicament, and his paranoia went into overdrive. He confronted his entourage. “Remember,” he announced, “they cannot kill you. But I can.” In the grim apartment the following day, Adolfo and his entourage were transfixed by the small black and white television. Camera crews, reporters, and police officers were standing in front of Rancho Santa Elena, which was on fire. Flames leaped high into the air. According to the report, arsonists had torched the place. Later, when the fire was burned out, the cameras caught police officials exorcizing the area with Holy Water. An enraged Adolfo wailed and screamed as he thundered through the apartment, smashing and upending furniture. Watching the madness play out, Sara Aldrete realized in that moment she needed to get away. She might otherwise end up dead herself, hacked to pieces floating in a new Nganga. Arsonists had not torched the ranch. The police did. The whole thing was a police set-up to trick Adolfo into revealing his location. The police even invited the cameras and reporters to the site, telling them it would be quite a show. As one Jorge Montes, a disciple of Adolfo, was spilling his guts to the police, telling them everything he knew about the cult of psychopaths, Adolfo was on the move again. The Tarot cards had spoken, he decreed. That’s how his entourage ended up in a squalid apartment on Río Sena in Mexico City. Sara made her move. She wrote a note and tossed it out the bathroom window, watching it flutter three floors to the sidewalk below. The note read: “Please call the Judicial Police and tell them that in this building are those they are seeking. Tell them that a woman is being held hostage. I beg for this, because what I want most is to talk—or they are going to kill the girl.” The passer-by who picked up the note stuffed it into his pocket and walked on. “Sara!” yelled Adolfo from the kitchen. “Get in here!”

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Believing she had been rumbled, trembling with fear, Sara made her way to the kitchen, joining the others. Adolfo told her to sit down. “We need to make our plans to get out of Mexico,” he said. “We’ll go someplace new and start over.” He glanced around. “They’ll never take me. Not now, not ever. My magic is too powerful.” Sara gave a sigh of relief, hardly listening as Adolfo droned on. Adolfo’s paranoia was eating away at him, snapping what remained of his sanity. Three days later, certain the police were surrounding the building, he began tossing hundred dollar bills out the window. When passers-by stopped to pick them up, he raised a pistol and shot at them. Waiting a few minutes, he repeated the process. Soon enough police arrived at Río Sena, acting on complaints of a madman with a gun. Adolfo’s response was to pick up a Uzi. Racing back to his place at the window, he blazed away at the cops. One officer went down, and was pulled to safety. Minutes later, 180 officers had surrounded the building. For forty-five minutes a gun battle raged between those in the apartment and the cops. Adolfo shouted out from the bedroom to El Duby in the kitchen. Adolfo was standing wide-eyed and covered in sweat. He thrust the Uzi at El Duby and said, “Kill me! Then kill the others.” When El Duby refused, Adolfo punched him in the face, knocking him to the floor. “Do it. If you don’t, even Hell won’t want you.” El Duby picked up the Uzi. He hesitated a moment, staring into Adolfo’s eyes, and then pulled the trigger. Adolfo was on the floor with a wet thud. The commotion brought Martin Quintana into the room. Seeing the Uzi, he instinctively put up his hands, as if trying to block the bullets. El Duby was following instructions. Martin crumpled to the floor. El Duby dragged Martin’s body into the closet. Then he dragged Adolfo’s body over, positioning it next to Martin. The closet was small, and the legs of the corpses stuck out of the door. El Duby had no idea what he was doing. But, minutes later, when police stormed the apartment, he had the foresight to drop to his knees with his

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hands on his head. El Duby and Sara Aldrete were taken into custody. The two bodies half-in and half-out of the closet were hauled away in an ambulance. That’s the way it happened, according to El Duby Valdez, who confessed to shooting Adolfo and Martin. District Attorney Investigator George Gavito didn’t quite believe him. El Duby shot the two magicians, he was sure. But he doubted that Adolfo had instructed him to do it. “I don’t think Constanzo wanted to die,” said Gavito. “The people he had been cleansing in Mexico City were some powerful people and they didn’t want their names coming out if he got caught.” Gavito believed that El Duby’s job was to make sure Adolfo wasn’t captured alive. El Duby was an insurance policy. Fourteen members of Adolfo’s cult were quickly rounded up. George Gavito questioned Sara Aldrete within hours of her arrest, facing him in handcuffs and shackles. “Coffee?” asked Gavito. Sara just stared. “You’re charged with multiple murders at Rancho Santa Elena, and with criminal association, and with criminal conspiracy to commit murder,” stated Gavito. “And probably a bunch of other things, when the prosecutors get through with you.” He paused. “Anything to say?” “Fuck you.” Gavito smiled. “One of the bodies discovered at Rancho Santa Elena was that of Mark Kilroy. He was tortured, then murdered, then dismembered.” “So? What’s your point?” sneered Aldrete. “Did you participate in or have any knowledge of the murder of Mark Kilroy?” Aldrete looked around the room, defiance in her eyes. “Yeah, we did it. So what? This makes us powerful. You guys killed Constanzo and now I’m the High Priestess. So you’d better fear ME!” Gavito continued asking questions, but Aldrete refused to say anything more. Interviewed a few days later, Aldrete presented a

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different picture. No more was she omnipotent, like a god, now she was a victim, who had been held hostage by Adolfo and his crew. Adolfo had brainwashed her, she said, compelling her to commit horrific acts against her nature. George Gavito understood her antics. What’s more, he had video evidence of his interview with her, showing she had backed off from the High Priestess stuff real fast. Sara Aldrete wanted everyone to believe she was the victim of an evil monster. But, said Gavito, “I’ve got her on video saying she had inherited the powers of Constanzo because she was his successor.” The justice system in Mexico is different to the United States. In Mexico, defendants provide a written statement. No witnesses are called and no formal evidence is presented. Presiding judges hand down their verdict on the back of this. Cleared of Adolfo Constanzo’s murder, Sara Aldrete was convicted of criminal association and sentenced to six years in prison. Four years later, though, her name came up again in the trials of Elio and Serafín Hernández. In her written testimony, Sara asserted that she had never practiced any religion other than Christian Santeria. The judges were not inclined to believe her and sentenced Sara Aldrete to sixty-two years for murders committed at Rancho Santa Elena. “The final number of murders we suspected them of being involved in was seventy-four,” George Gavito told a reporter. “But there’s no way of knowing for sure.” He thought Aldrete “had a genuine split personality. One minute she was the good-girl from Brownsville. The next she was the wicked witch. She didn’t seem to know who she was.” In a recent press interview in prison, Sara Aldrete has the look of someone encountered at the local mall in San Diego. Long bleached blonde hair, brand name acid-washed hip-hugger jeans and two-tone Converse tennis shoes. Asked how she spends her time, she replied, “I teach English to the other prisoners. I play on the prison volleyball team, and for money I run a hamburger stand out of my cell.” She gave a wan smile. “Not very glamorous.” She pulled up her pant legs to exhibit scars, which she claimed

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she received when tortured by the Federales. “I was stripped naked, blindfolded and hung upside down,” she said. “Then they beat me mercilessly. My toenails were ripped out with pliers. Finally, whitehot irons were applied to my flesh, inside and out. I was burnt so badly one of the doctors told me I’ll never be able to have children.” Aldrete continued her story. “At the morgue, where they took me to see Constanzo’s body, which was sliced open for the autopsy, they shoved my hands into the exposed chest cavity. Then they told me to grab his heart in both hands and rip it out.” She gave an involuntary shudder. “They screamed at me: ‘There is your devil. There is your prince. Kiss him. Kiss him.’” Then she was asked, “Did you commit the murders?” “No,” she said flatly. “I am clean. In my heart, I know I am clean.” She glanced around. “I’d like to get out of here.” A small smile graced her lips. “Maybe a miracle will occur and I’ll walk away from here.” Aldrete is eligible for parole in 2019.

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