Louisiana serial killer tortured slaves
One of those who entered the premises was Judge Jean-Francois Canonge, who subsequently deposed to having found in the LaLaurie mansion, among others, a "negress. suspended by the neck, with their limbs apparently stretched and torn from one extremity to the other", who claimed to have been imprisoned there for some months. Upon being refused the keys by the Lalauries, the bystanders broke down the doors to the slave quarters and found "seven slaves, more or less horribly mutilated. As reported in the New Orleans Bee of April 11, 1834, bystanders responding to the fire attempted to enter the slave quarters to ensure that everyone had been evacuated. She later confessed to them that she had set the fire as a suicide attempt for fear of her punishment, being taken to the uppermost room, because she said that anyone who had been taken there never came back. When the police and fire marshals got there, they found a seventy-year-old woman, the cook, chained to the stove by her ankle. On April 10, 1834, a fire broke out in the LaLaurie residence on Royal Street, starting in the kitchen. Similarly, Martineau reported stories that LaLaurie kept her cook chained to the kitchen stove, and beat her daughters when they attempted to feed the slaves. These nine slaves were then bought back by the Lalauries through the intermediary of one of their relatives, and returned to the Royal Street residences. According to Martineau, this incident led to an investigation of the Lalauries, in which they were found guilty of illegal cruelty and forced to forfeit nine slaves. The body was subsequently buried on the mansion grounds. Lia had been brushing Delphine's hair when she hit a snag, causing Delphine to grab a whip and chase her. She claimed that, subsequent to the visit of the local lawyer, one of Lalaurie's neighbors saw one of the LaLaurie's slaves, a twelve-year-old girl named Lia (or Leah), fall to her death from the roof of the Royal Street mansion while trying to avoid punishment from a whip-wielding Delphine LaLaurie. Martineau also recounted other tales of Lalaurie's cruelty that were current among New Orleans residents in about 1836. During this visit the lawyer found no evidence of wrongdoing or mistreatment of slaves by Lalaurie. Nevertheless, Martineau reported that public rumors about Lalaurie's mistreatment of her slaves were sufficiently widespread that a local lawyer was dispatched to Royal Street to remind LaLaurie of the laws relevant to the upkeep of slaves. Harriet Martineau, writing in 1838 and recounting tales told to her by New Orleans residents during her 1836 visit, claimed Lalaurie's slaves were observed to be "singularly haggard and wretched" however, in public appearances Lalaurie was seen to be generally polite to black people and solicitous of her slaves' health, and court records of the time showed that Lalaurie emancipated two of her own slaves (Jean Louis in 1819 and Devince in 1832 Accounts of Delphine Lalaurie's treatments of her slaves between 18 are mixed. The Lalauries maintained several black slaves in slave quarters attached to the Royal Street mansion. Lalaurie's house was subsequently sacked by an outraged mob of New Orleans citizens, and it is thought that she fled to Paris, where she is believed to have died. She maintained a prominent position in the social circles of New Orleans until April 10, 1834, when rescuers responding to a fire at her Royal Street mansion discovered bound slaves in her attic who showed evidence of torture over a long period. Born in New Orleans, Lalaurie married three times over the course of her life.