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]

This article's factual accuracy is disputed. (January 2022)

Some of this article's listed sources may not be reliable. (January 2022)

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]

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 paraphilic disorders expressed in consuming the blood of her victims, sadomasochistic tendencies, fetishistic practices and pedophilia.^[1]

In late 1962 or early 1963, brothers Santos and Cayetano Hernández, working as petty scammers, travelled to the isolated community of Yerba Buena, an impoverished and mostly illiterate village of about 50 inhabitants. In a ploy for wealth, they proclaimed themselves as prophets 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]

Even though the Incas inhabited Peru and not Mexico, they convinced the inhabitants of Yerba Buena and founded a cult among the village, demanding economic and sexual tributes from adult members of all genders, ingesting drugs during orgies, and even selling some of their subordinates into sexual slavery.^[1]

Some time later^[timeframe?], the believers grew skeptical when the brothers failed to fulfill their promises.^[3] To remedy this, the Hernándezes went to Monterrey in search of prostitutes to participate in the scam. Eventually^[timeframe?], they met Magdalena Solís and her brother, who agreed to participate.^[2] They presented Solís in later rituals as the reincarnation of the goddess Cōātlīcue through a smoke screen trick and convinced the followers of her authenticity. Solís eventually^[timeframe?] came to believe that she truly was a reincarnated goddess and took command of the cult.^[2]

By the time Solís took control, two of her followers^[who?], 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 defectors be sacrificed. In response, fellow members lynched the two defectors.^[1]

Dismayed by the disappearance of both Guerrero and their colleague, the police 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 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^[quantify] 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^[where?]. 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^{[dubious – discuss]}, each was given a 30-year prison term. Years later, some of the former members began giving interviews about the cult.^[1]

• A Belgian rock band named itself after Magdalena Solís.

• List of serial killers by country

• 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.