A little more than four weeks later, on February 25, the murderer struck again, killing four members of the Andrus family in Lafayette, Louisiana. The police were somewhat used to crime happening in their largely poor part of town, but the brutality of the murders-'brained with ax,' as one source put it- surprised them.

The next killing took place in late January 1911, when Walter Byers, his wife, and their son were hacked to death in Crowley, Louisiana. While sources argue about the first murder connected to the case, it may have been a woman named Edna Opelousas and her three children, killed in Rayne, Louisiana, in November 1909. 'Brained With An Ax'Īt the start of the second decade of the 20th century, the murders blazed a path of terror through a cluster of towns along the Southern Pacific railroad line. She would eventually confess to killing 35 people-though exactly how many people she murdered is unknown. But though suspicion initially focused on several men, the murderer would turn out to be an African-American woman named Clementine Barnabet, who may have had little connection to Voodoo at all. The crimes would become connected to rumors of a deranged Voodoo priestess and a cult called the 'Church of Sacrifice,' which was said to butcher its victims as part of their strange rites. The local newspaper called it 'the most brutal murder in the history of this section,' but it was just one of the ax slayings that would terrify parts of Louisiana and Texas in the early 1910s. There was a bucket of blood in one corner, and at the head of the bed, just above the bashed-in bodies, stood a bloodied ax. The doors were locked, indicating that the killer had come in through a window and murdered the family while they slept.

The bed was drenched in blood, and bloody footprints speckled the floor. Neighbors feared something terrible had taken place at 605 Western Avenue, and indeed, when Office Ballew arrived at the house, he found the home's three occupants-a man, woman, and small boy-lying in bed with their skulls split open. Early one afternoon in late January 1911, a police officer in West Crowley, Louisiana received an urgent phone call.

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