Gregorio Cardenas

Case record

Characteristics

Gregorio Cárdenas buried the bodies in his garden.

People

• Gregorio Cárdenas Hernández (Goyo), also known as the strangler of Tacuba (estrangulador de Tacuba), was a Mexican spree killer.
• María de los Ángeles González was a 16-year-old prostitute who was visited in his house in the Tacuba neighborhood of Mexico City.
• Rosa Reyes was a prostitute murdered in the following weeks and was aged 16.
• Raquel Martínez de León was a prostitute murdered in the following weeks and was aged 16.
• Graciela Arias Ávalos was a 19-year-old fellow chemistry student.

Background

Gregorio Cárdenas Hernández was born in Mexico City in 1915 to a family originating from the state of Veracruz. In part due to an encephalitis infection, he showed abnormal behavior as a child, including cruelty to animals.

Cárdenas received a scholarship from Petróleos Mexicanos to study chemistry at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). He rejected a scholarship from PEMEX.

During his imprisonment, Dr Quiroz Cuarón diagnosed him from criminológica psychology: neurotic personality, evolutionary neurosis, organ-neurosis, narcissism and anal sadistic eroticism. From the psychiatric point of view, his neurotic state was esquizo-paranoide.

Cárdenas learned to play the piano, wrote poetry, and married in prison. His wife bore him four children. He was allowed to pursue psychiatry and law studies while in prison, completed his law studies, and worked as a lawyer until his death in 1999.

A chance meeting with Alejandro Jodorowsky in a backstreet bar in Mexico City inspired the psycho-magician to create the 1989 film Santa Sangre, based loosely on Cárdenas's life.

The offence

Cárdenas Hernández killed four women. After killing, he tried to hide the bodies in his house on Mar del Norte No. 20. The account describes asphyxia to three victims and the fourth victim being killed by hitting her, and it states that he had sex with the victim.

Timeline

• 15 August 1942 — María de los Ángeles González, aged 16, was visited in Cárdenas’s house in the Tacuba neighborhood of Mexico City; after having sex with her, Cárdenas strangled her and buried her body in his garden.
• 7 September 1942 — Cárdenas was arrested on 7 September 1942 after committing himself to a psychiatric hospital shortly before the police exhumed the bodies.
• 1943 — Cárdenas was sentenced to life in prison.
• 1947 — Cárdenas escaped prison in 1947 and fled to Oaxaca.
• September 8, 1976 — Cárdenas was released.
• 1976 — Cárdenas was pardoned by president Luis Echeverría.
• August 2, 1999 — Cárdenas died.

Investigation

His neighbors started to get suspicious and informed the police. Shortly before the police exhumed the bodies, Cárdenas had himself committed to a psychiatric hospital. He was then arrested on 7 September 1942.

The account states that Cárdenas was regularly questioned and investigated by the country's top psychiatrists and criminologists.

Arrest

Cárdenas was arrested on 7 September 1942.

Trial

During his trial, Cárdenas pleaded guilty and was given a life sentence.

Sentencing

Cárdenas was sentenced to life in prison in 1943.

Appeals

No appeal information was included.

Outcome

Cárdenas was convicted after pleading guilty, received a life sentence, and later was released.

Aftermath

In 1976, Cárdenas was pardoned by president Luis Echeverría. He was invited by interior secretary Mario Moya to give a speech in the Congress of the Union, where he was celebrated as a hero and hailed as a “great example” and a “clear case of rehabilitation”.

The narrative also states that after his liberation, he received a tribute, including a standing ovation to him.

Reports included copycat murderers imitating his crimes, and an (illegal) pornographic movie based on his story was made.

Cárdenas wrote three books while in prison.

Works inspired by his history

• “El Asesino” (the Assassin), a kind of porn short movie, from the years forty.
• “El profeta Mimí” (Mimí prophet), film directed by Jose Estrada in 1973.
• “El Criminal de Tacuba” (The Tacuba Criminal), work of Víctor Hugo Rascón Banda, directed by Raul Quintanilla, who showed the play in the “Helénico” Theater in the ninety.
• Cárdenas went to see the play and, as he displeased the references to his personality, he demanded to the producers and writers, who were forced to pay 8 million old pesos.
• “Raptola, matola, violola” (kidnaped, raped, killed her), a videohome of Benjamín Cann, making reference to the case in “The Nativitas strangler”.
• “Goyo”, documentary made in 2003 by Verónica de la Luz, Marco Jalpa, Ricardo Ham and Salvador Méndez.

Other details

Cárdenas Hernández committed his murders in August and September 1942. In the following weeks after 15 August 1942, he murdered prostitutes Rosa Reyes and Raquel Martínez de León, both aged 16, and finally 19-year-old fellow chemistry student Graciela Arias Ávalos.

He escaped prison in 1947 and fled to Oaxaca, but eventually was rearrested.

The account describes Gregorio Cárdenas Hernández (Mexico City, 1915 - Los Angeles, 2 August 1999) as the Tacuba strangler who killed four women, and it states he died when he was 82 years old. It also states that he was the first multiple murderer whose case was widely published in the Mexican media and became a national celebrity.

He went to see the play “El Criminal de Tacuba” and demanded compensation; the producers and writers were forced to pay 8 million old pesos.