Claudia Mijangos

Claudia Mijangos was born on 25 May 1956 in Sinaloa, Mexico,[7] where she was raised in an upper-middle-class family. In her youth, she was named beauty queen of her hometown of Mazatlán.[5] After graduating in commerce, she married Alfredo Castaños Gutiérrez. They had three children. After the death of her parents, the family inherited a sizable amount of money and moved to Querétaro City, Querétaro.[8] There, the three children were enrolled in the Catholic school Colegio Fray Luis de León, where Claudia Mijangos worked as a catechism teacher.[5][9] Claudia later opened a clothing store downtown.[5]

In the late 1980s, Claudia and her husband Alfredo began to develop marital problems. She began to display signs of emotional instability, according to relatives and friends. The couple attended marriage counseling with Dr. Jaime Flores of Instinto Asesino, a television show on Discovery Channel Mexico. Dr. Flores asserted that the power struggle apparent within the marriage was irreconcilable. Shortly after, Claudia became obsessed with Father Ramón, another teacher at the Colegio Fray Luis de León.[10] Claudia and Alfredo separated in 1989.

When Claudia was 33 years old, she began to experience severe psychotic attacks in the months preceding the murders. These attacks reportedly involved hallucinations of demons and angels which left Claudia psychologically tormented.

On April 23, 1989, Claudia's husband picked up their children from a school fair and brought them to Claudia's house.[8] There, Castaños and Claudia engaged in an intense argument.[5] He probed her about Father Ramon and articulated his desire to get back together. Furious, Claudia defended Father Ramon and rejected Castaños's desire to rekindle their relationship. Before he left, Claudia threatened Castaños saying he would be sorry.[11] After locking the door behind him, Claudia went upstairs to tuck her children in bed and went to sleep.

A few hours later on April 24, 1989, at around four in the morning, Claudia awoke to loud voices in her head. She stated that the voices told her Mazatlan had disappeared and that "all of Queretaro was a spirit". Desperate, Claudia called her friend Veronica Vazquez who asked Claudia to calm down. Veronica promised to come in the morning to help her. Following the call, Claudia got out of bed, dressed, went to the kitchen and took three knives while her children were still sleeping.

At about five in the morning Claudia woke up her 6-year-old son Alfredo and attacked him with a knife. Leaning on his bed, she grabbed his left hand and completely amputated it. Alfredo screamed out which awoke his eldest sister, 11-year-old Claudia Maria, came to the room and begged her mother to stop. Switching knives, Claudia rushed over her eldest daughter and stabbed her six times. Wounded, Claudia María managed to leave the room and loudly pleaded her mother for mercy. The screams woke the neighbors. Claudia took the third knife and stabbed her nine-year-old daughter Ana Belén in the heart. Claudia ran downstairs, searching for Claudia Maria who had fainted on the dining room floor and stabbed her again. She then dragged her upstairs and placed her lifeless body in the master bedroom.[4]

• The house of Claudia Mijangos on Google Maps - Street View.