instructor and a secretary in the college’s athletic department. She was so busy that she only went home for weekends and holidays. When she did go home, she spent time with her boyfriend, the drug-dealer Gilberto Sosa, who had close links with the notorious Hernandez family.
The relationship with Sosa brought Sara swiftly to the attention of Adolfo de Jesus Constanzo who had been carefully monitoring Sosa’s movements in order to assess his position on the Mexican drug scene, and to evaluate his possible connections. When he spied the tall, athletic and very beautiful Sara, he engineered a meeting.
Adolfo swung his Mercedes into Sara’s car as she drove through Matamoros one afternoon in July 1987, choreographing the accident to ensure that he just missed her. He got out of the car, and apologised profusely to Sara. Instantly she was attracted by his good looks and charming manner, and there was clearly a very obvious attraction between them. They became friends, and slowly Adolfo set about destroying her relationship with Sosa. He achieved this by planting doubt in Sosa’s mind about Sara’s fidelity. Finally, he made an anonymous phone-call to Sosa and informed him that Sara was cheating on him. Despite her protestations of innocence, the jealous Sosa finished with Sara and she turned to Adolfo for comfort.
The pair did embark on a sexual relationship, but Adolfo’s homosexuality could not be suppressed, and the physical side of their relationship soon petered out. By the time this happened though, it mattered little to Sara who had, in quite a short time, become completely brainwashed by Adolfo’s beliefs and practices. She became fascinated by the occult and discarded her passion for her physical education at college to pursue a deeper interest in magic and witchcraft. To Adolfo she became ‘La Madrina’, the godmother.
THE HERNANDEZ FAMILY
Sara had retained her links, originally established via Sosa, with the Hernandez family, and Adolfo was keen to exploit them. He predicted that the family would consult Sara over a problem, and that when they did, she was to introduce them to him. It all came to pass.
Adolfo’s plan couldn’t have been orchestrated at a better time. There was much discontent in the Hernandez family and their position on the drug scene was threatened by heavy competition. Adolfo walked in with the answers to all their problems – magic. For the nominal fee of 50 per cent of their wealth, and their complete compliance with his instructions, Adolfo promised to rid them of their enemies. He would not only dispose of the rival drug dealers, but would do so by sacrificing them to the spirits. This way the spirits would offer safety and protection to the family. He also claimed that by trusting him implicitly, he could make the family members and their employees invisible to the police and resistant to their bullets.
And so the killing began, becoming more bloodthirsty and sadistic with every sacrifice. According to Adolfo, excruciating suffering was fundamental to the beliefs of Palo Mayombe and the more agonising the death, the more pleased the spirits were. When two members of the Hernandez family were abducted by a rival drug gang, and subsequently released unharmed, Adolfo claimed that they had been saved purely by a ghastly torture and sacrifice that he had conducted, and by the family’s faith in him and in Palo Mayombe.
Adolfo increased the slaughter, and drug dealers were sacrificed indiscriminately. Adolfo even murdered a 14 -year-old member of the Hernandez family, realising too late who the young boy was. There were however, no consequences. Adolfo stole contraband from all the dealers he murdered, and by early 1989 had accumulated 800 kilos of marijuana. He decided to smuggle it into the US, but realising that it was such a big job, knew that he would need a very special sacrifice to ensure a safe journey. Having struggled with a previous sacrifice whom he ended up simply having to shoot, he instructed his followers to go out and bring back someone who would not fight, but who would really scream. They returned with Mark Kilroy.
AFTERMATH OF THE KILROY KILLING
Adolfo did not expect the reaction which the Kilroy murder triggered.
Perhaps society had turned a blind eye to the dark and sinister dealings of the drugs world, and allowed the dealers and henchmen to operate within their own rules. Maybe they felt that those who had suffered such gruesome deaths deserved their fate. But when an innocent college student met with such a violent end, there was silence no longer.
Kilroy’s family, with the support of the US and their political connections behind them, demanded that Mark’s killer be found. The Mexican police were forced to take action, recognising that by killing an American – and a wealthy, white one at that – Adolfo had this time gone too far. They were going to have to bring him to justice to avoid a disastrously damaging international outcry.
In spite of the fervour building up around him, Adolfo still had to complete his deal on the 800kg of marijuana. He decided that Gilberto Sosa, Sara’s former boyfriend, would make the necessary sacrifice. The deed done, he successfully smuggled the drugs across the border.
ADOLFO ON THE RUN
But the net was closing in on Adolfo. Serafin Hernandez Garcia had been arrested by police and had led them to his ranch, where evidence of his sinister and sadistic rituals, and the mutilated corpses of the victims themselves, had been discovered. Showing less faith in the protection of the spirits than his disciple Garcia, Adolfo fled, taking Sara, two male lovers, and a hit man from the Hernandez family with him.
His first thought was to run to Miami, but the authorities knew that this was where his mother lived, and were already looking for him there. So he remained in Mexico City, relying on his followers to hide him for short periods each.
Media attention was on the increase and shocking television shows were aired which detailed the events in Matamoros. These were broadcast internationally. Nationwide sightings of Adolfo and Sara were repeatedly reported but none of them confirmed. The police presence at border controls swelled and everyone was on the look-out for the fugitives, but they were nowhere to be found.
PARANOIA
Adolfo turned to his tarot cards, and in them read betrayal. He became more and more paranoid that his close friends were going to turn him in. He hardly slept, threatened everyone with the power of the spirits, and kept a submachine gun with him at all times. When he saw on the television news of April 22, 1989, that arsonists had burnt his ranch to ashes, and witnessed priests exorcising the remains with holy water, Adolfo flew into a blind fury and destroyed the apartment in which he was hiding.
Two days later, another of Adolfo’s disciples was arrested. He, like Garcia, held nothing back when questioned by police and confirmed all the statements they had already received detailing the occult practices at the ranch, and naming Adolfo de Jesus Constanza as the leader, El Padrino.
On April 27, Adolfo moved himself and his elite entourage one last time. Still unable to leave Mexico City, they moved to an apartment on Rio Sena. Witnessing the daily change in Adolfo and his increasing paranoia, and consequently fearing for her own safety, Sara secretly wrote a note which she threw from the window on to the street below. It read:
The note was discovered, but discarded. Its finder believed it to be a joke in very poor taste and thought nothing more of it.
In spite of her failed attempt, Sara did not have much longer to wait. On May 6, police were conducting a routine door-to-door enquiry, looking for information on a missing child, completely unconnected with Adolfo’s crimes. They arrived at the building on Rio Sena. Within an hour, Adolfo de Jesus Constanzo lay dead.
SHOOT-OUT
Adolfo had spied the police from his window and lost his nerve, assuming they had come for him. He opened fire, raining bullets down on them. The unsuspecting police very quickly called for help and were instantly joined by their backup. In total, 180 policemen surrounded the building. The shoot-out continued for 45 minutes, until Adolfo realised that he was never going to escape. He gave his gun to the former Hernandez hitman and ordered him to kill him and one of his male lovers. At first, the order was refused, but Adolfo became angry and threatened him with eternal damnation. The gun was fired, and Adolfo slumped to the ground. Police charged into the building, found the two dead bodies, and arrested the three survivors.
SENTENCES FOR THE SURVIVORS
With El Padrino dead, the Mexican authorities turned their attention to the surviving members of Adolfo’s cult – the three they had pulled out of the apartment on Rio Sena, and the many who had already been arrested and had
