Axeman Murders Of New Orleans 1918-1919

Trevor Riley

Mrs. Schlatt

Academic English 4

5 October 2017

Axeman Murders of New Orleans 1918-1919

For over a decade, a man known as the axeman murdered multiple people, and was never apprehended. The murder of Joseph and Catherine Maggio sniped the attention of many. All of the suspects have unfortunately been let go because there has not been enough evidence to prove their guilt. However, the investigation led to affirm points to one suspect, a guy named Joseph Mumfre.

A young couple, Joseph and Catherine Maggio, were the axeman’s first murders in almost a decade, and this was the start of another killing spree. In the middle of the night on May 22, 1918, Jake and Andrew Maggio were sleeping in their rooms until Jake heard loud groaning

The New Orleans article on the Axeman says, “The axe had been washed but some blood still remained on the blade (reports of the axe’s location vary with one account saying the axe was found underneath the house and another reporting it was found on or under the rear doorstep)”(New Orleans). The axe that bashed the heads of the two victims was recovered but couldn’t trace anything back to who it was. For some reason, the axeman never used his own weapon, and instead would find an axe at his victim’s house and use it to murder them with. He did this for almost all of his killings. A lot of times he hides the axe for reasons that were never proven because they never caught this man and it still remains unsolved. The axeman would also use the axe sometimes to break into the homes, such as in this murder where he busted the panel on the door to enter. An axe is a very interesting weapon of choice, it is very frigid so maybe the killer had some type of problem and is not affected by how gruesome things can get, or he was just so mad and wanted revenge at something that he really didn’t care what happened at this point. After finding the weapon, they weren’t able to pinpoint who the killer was, but were able to link all the other murders by an axe in the past because the murderer always leaves his weapon behind. This leads to the murders in the past

The evidence all points to that smart person that covered up his tracks by changing clothes, and leaving his murder weapon behind. Also, no one ever saw this man, except for the lady that murdered him in cold-blood because she said she recognized his face and his build after one of her family members were murdered by him. This woman saved probably tons of lives by ending this man’s life because no one was going to catch him. He kept getting away with every murder, so the lady ended his life and took matters into her own hands, and served the jail time. After the man was murdered, the murders stopped, which was another big piece of evidence that led to Mumfre being the lead suspect. Mumfre has also had multiple times of service in jail, which showed that he was not just any guy, it was a guy with a criminal record that was continuing to make bad decisions and kill people. He died as a result of his actions, but left New Orleans people terrified of what might happen to them in their sleep. Joseph Mumfre scarred New Orleans, and the further evidence shows that that was his