others 77.oth.002 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

After the trial, the jury foreman wrote that California Governor Ronald Reagan was "as responsible" as Mullin for the deaths of thirteen people. Reagan's administration had been systematically closing down California's mental hospitals, with the plan to "deactivate" all of them in a few years.

"None of these deaths need ever have happened," he declared in an open letter to Reagan. Although the jury had believed that Mullin could tell the difference between right and wrong (and therefore sane, according to legal standards,) they were also convinced that Mullin should have been institutionalized after being repeatedly diagnosed as dangerous. "Five times prior to young Mr. Mullin's arrest, he was entered into mental hospitals. And five times his illness was diagnosed. At least twice, it was determined his illness could cause danger to lives of human beings. Yet, in January and February of this year he was free to take the lives of Santa Cruz residents." Reagan responded that it was a "psychiatric mistake" and that the state was not "dumping out on the street" the previously hospitalized mentally ill.

Mullin had been committed to five different mental hospitals, but always released despite the lack of his prognosis. Alarmed by his deteriorating sanity, his parents desperately tried to find a hospital for long term care, but mental hospitals were rapidly closing. It would have cost over $100 a day to keep Mullin in a private hospital, which was far beyond a postal worker's wages in the late sixties. Outpatient clinics were ineffective for someone like Herb Mullin. Although he received prescriptions and sporadically attended group therapy, without supervision he was incapable of taking his medication regularly. Even in a hospital setting, when he was closely monitored, he was still aggressive and violent. He was dangerous and should have been kept off the streets.

Within a year after the Mullin trial, California legislators passed a bill to prohibit the closure of any other mental hospitals.

Herb Mullin did not kill because he was schizophrenic. But for him, his bizarre paranoia and twisted self-importance justified his murders. After all, he was saving California from earthquakes. His life mission was to be his generation's scapegoat. But it was the others who would have to sacrifice their lives.

According to Dr. Donald Lunde, the mentally ill are actually less likely to murder than the general population. Those who argue that anti-social personality disorder, a common characteristic among killers, is a form of mental illness, will also concede that these people are not hospitalized for their condition, and are able to function in the world. The disorder is not diagnosed until the person is incarcerated for violent activities. Even after the diagnosis of anti-social personality disorder, there is little that can be done to treat the person. Incarceration is the only means of protecting others from sociopaths who have killed.

Paranoid schizophrenia, however, is a treatable disease, but in severe cases the patient must be closely monitored in a hospital-like setting. Medication helps, but paranoid schizophrenics can easily stray from treatment if left on their own. Unlike anti-social personality disorder, paranoid schizophrenia is usually diagnosed before violence occurs. Dr. Lunde, who examined John Linley Frazier, Herb Mullin, and Edmund Kemper, has said that "among the small proportion of murderers who are mentally ill, the single most common disorder is paranoid schizophrenia." (He did not find Kemper to be schizophrenic.)

Mullin's propensity toward violence was grimly evident to many, but there was nothing that could be done to keep him institutionalized. If his parents had the funds, they would have kept him in a hospital. If the hospitals who had held Mullin had the authority, they would have kept him in treatment.

multiple 33.o Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire

Mexican authorities were less concerned with Constanzo's impending resurrection than with making charges stick against the surviving cultists. El Duby's case was open-and-shut, his confession recorded on two murder counts, but Sara Aldrete first posed as a victim, betraying herself when she protested too much, revealing intimate knowledge of the cult's bloody rituals.

In the wake of the Mexico City shootout, 14 cult members were indicted on various charges, including multiple murder, weapons and narcotics violations, conspiracy and obstruction of justice. In August 1990, El Duby was convicted of killing Constanzo and Quintana, drawing a 35-year prison term. Cultists Juan Fragosa and Jorge Montes were both convicted of Raul Esquivel's murder and sentenced to 35 years each; Omar Orea, convicted in the same case, died of AIDS before he could be sentenced. Sara Aldrete was acquitted of Constanzo's slaying in 1990 but was sentenced to a six-year term on conviction of criminal association. La Madrina insisted that she never practiced any religion but "Christian Santeria"; televised reports of the murders at Rancho Santa Elena, she said, took her completely by surprise. Jurors disagreed, and in 1994 , when Aldrete and four male accomplices were convicted of multiple slayings at the ranch. Aldrete was sentenced to 62 years, while her cohorts—including Elio Hernandez and Serafin Jr.—drew prison terms of 67 years. American authorities stand ready to prosecute Aldrete, El Duby and the Hernandez clan for Mark Kilroy's murder, should they ever be released from custody.