Nov. 11, 2025
Philippines: The Priest Who Murdered 57 Parishioners
In 1826, fellow priests caring for an ailing Father Juan Severino Mallari made a horrifying discovery in his residence: bloodstained clothing belonging to dozens of missing parishioners. Over the next ten years, investigators would uncover fifty-seven murders committed by the parish priest of Magalang, Pampanga—a man who believed killing his congregants would break a curse afflicting his mother. Father Mallari's victims trusted him completely. They came to him for confession, for blessings, for spiritual guidance. And then they disappeared. What makes this case even more tragic is that Spanish colonial authorities meticulously documented Mallari's education and artwork, but never bothered to record a single name of the fifty-seven Filipinos he murdered. This is the story of colonial erasure, untreated mental illness, and a murderous priest.
This is Episode 7 of Season 36: Serial Killers in History, our ambitious exploration of forgotten murderers from ancient Rome through the early 20th century. This season examines how social inequality, colonial systems, and institutional failures enabled killers across continents and centuries. Juan Severino Mallari's case reveals the devastating intersection of Spanish colonial racism, primitive mental healthcare, and religious authority in early 19th-century Philippines. The next episode continues our journey through history's darkest moments with another case of power, isolation, and the victims erased from official records.
Historical Context & Background
Juan Severino Mallari was born in 1785 in San Nicolas, Pampanga, into a respected Kapampangan family with church benefactor status. He earned his philosophy degree around 1800, his theology degree in 1805 at San Carlos Seminary, and was ordained at the University of Santo Tomas in 1809 by Archbishop Juan Antonio Zulaybar. But being a Filipino priest in Spanish colonial Philippines meant systemic discrimination. From 1809 to 1812, Mallari served as coadjutor in multiple parishes, applying repeatedly for parish priest positions in Orani, Mariveles, Lubao, and as chaplain at the Port of Cavite. Spanish authorities rejected him every time—not for lack of qualifications, but due to colonial racism that viewed Filipino secular priests as inferior to Spanish friars. Finally, in 1812, he became parish priest of San Bartolome Parish in Magalang, the first Filipino to hold that position in all of Pampanga. In that isolated agricultural community, trusted completely by his parishioners, Father Mallari would commit fifty-seven murders over the next decade.
The Descent into Madness
Around 1816, four years after becoming parish priest, Mallari's mother fell gravely ill. He became convinced she was cursed—a belief that merged Catholic faith with pre-colonial Filipino traditions about mangkukulam (witches) who could cast deadly kulam (curses). Historical accounts describe Mallari experiencing severe hallucinations during Mass, stopping mid-sermon to converse with invisible figures. Spain had pioneered psychiatric treatment in Europe, and the Hospicio de San Jose psychiatric facility in Manila had been operational since 1811. But Mallari was in rural Pampanga, miles from Manila, and he was the parish priest—the highest religious authority in Magalang. No one recognized his psychotic delusions as treatable illness requiring intervention. When Mallari decided that killing the people he believed were witches would cure his mother, no one stopped him. His first victim likely came to confession in 1816. We don't know this person's name, age, or family situation—Spanish colonial records didn't consider such details worth documenting.
The Ten-Year Killing Spree
Over the next decade, Father Mallari murdered fifty-seven of his parishioners. He killed in the privacy of the parish house—people who came for spiritual guidance, to arrange marriages, to request baptisms. After each murder, he carefully folded the victim's bloodstained clothing and preserved it in his residence. This level of organization existing alongside complete psychotic delusion reveals the terrifying complexity of his mental state. His mother died December 4, 1825. The killings hadn't saved her. Everything had been for nothing. But Mallari didn't stop because of his mother's death—he stopped because sixteen days later, several families finally gathered courage to file a formal complaint with the gobernadorcillo (town mayor). Imagine the bravery required: Filipino families in 1825 Spanish colonial Philippines accusing the parish priest—the most powerful religious figure in their town. In February 1826, when Mallari fell ill and fellow priests came to care for him, they discovered the horrifying evidence: bloodstained belongings of dozens of missing parishioners, folded and stored in his residence. Word reached the constabulary. Townspeople gathered with torches. Ten years of disappearances converged on that moment.
Investigation, Trial & Execution
When Spanish authorities arrested Mallari in 1826, he confessed immediately—not with remorse, but with explanation. He detailed his mother's curse, identifying fifty-seven witches, explaining why their deaths would break the curse. The trial began later that year, drawing unprecedented attention across Spanish colonial territory. Prosecutors methodically presented bloodstained clothing, stolen items from victims' families, witness testimony about Mallari's erratic behavior during Mass. The defense attempted to portray him as a respected leader framed by jealous rivals, but couldn't explain the overwhelming physical evidence or Mallari's own detailed confession. He was convicted, but not executed immediately. Mallari spent fourteen years imprisoned—fourteen years between his 1826 arrest and his 1840 execution. The colonial legal system required multiple levels of review for an unprecedented case: a Filipino priest convicted of fifty-seven murders. Those victim families waited fourteen years for justice. Finally, in 1840, Juan Severino Mallari was hanged at Bagumbayan field (today Luneta Park in Manila). He was fifty-five years old, the first Filipino priest ever executed by Spanish colonial authorities. Thirty-two years later, three more Filipino priests—the GOMBURZA martyrs—would be executed for allegedly inspiring revolt, helping spark the Philippine Revolution.
The Unnamed Fifty-Seven
Father Juan Severino Mallari's life is extensively recorded. Spanish colonial documents detail his birth in San Nicolas, his family's church benefactor status, his philosophy degree (circa 1800), theology degree (1805), ordination (1809), every parish appointment, every rejected job application. Examples of his calligraphy—ornate ecclesiastical documents—survive in historical archives. The Spanish system found Mallari worth documenting in extraordinary detail. The fifty-seven Filipinos he murdered? Not one name recorded. Not one age. Not one occupation. Not one family detail. Were they farmers? Merchants? Young? Old? Parents leaving behind children? We don't know. Spanish authorities didn't care. This isn't accident—it's colonial violence manifesting as bureaucratic erasure. The Spanish system existed to extract wealth and maintain control. Individual Filipino lives didn't serve Spanish interests, so they weren't recorded. Somewhere in Pampanga, descendants of those fifty-seven victims exist. People who grew up hearing family stories about a great-great-grandparent who vanished mysteriously in the 1820s, inheriting trauma without closure. Those descendants deserve to know their family member's death mattered, that their ancestor's life had value, that we haven't forgotten them even if we can't name them.
Resources & Further Reading
The National Archives of the Philippines in Manila maintain limited records from Spanish colonial Pampanga, though documentation of crimes against Filipino civilians remains incomplete. The University of Santo Tomas archives preserve ecclesiastical records from the period, including ordination documentation for Filipino priests like Mallari. Historical studies of Spanish colonial mental healthcare reveal the stark disparity between psychiatric facilities available in Manila (like the Hospicio de San Jose, operational from 1811) and the complete absence of mental health resources in rural provinces. Research into the principalía class structure and Spanish colonial racism illuminates how systemic discrimination created the conditions for Mallari's prolonged killing spree. Philippine Revolution history provides context for understanding how cases like Mallari's—and the later GOMBURZA executions—contributed to growing Filipino resistance against colonial rule.
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WEBVTT
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[SPEAKER_01]: Magalan Pampenga, Spanish colonial Philippines.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The year's 1826, the parish house of San Bartolo May church sits quiet under tropical heat.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The air is thick as humidity.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The kind that makes everything stick to your skin.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Inside, Father warns of arena Malaria, lies ill, feverish, weak, unable to perform his priestly duties.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Fellow priests have come from neighbouring parishes to care for their brother and faith.
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[SPEAKER_01]: An act of Christian charity, they tend to him, pray over him, prepare his meals.
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[SPEAKER_01]: They search his residence for clean bedding, for medicine, for anything that might ease his suffering.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And that's when one of them finds it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Bloodstained clothing, folded neatly, stiffened with dried blood, yet arranged with disturbing care.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The clothing doesn't belong to follow the Mallory,
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[SPEAKER_01]: Personal items, a shirt, a shawl, a small purse, all bearing blood that shouldn't be there.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Items that look like they belong to parishioners, people from the community, people who came to mass in confession and asked for blessings.
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[SPEAKER_01]: One priest calls the others.
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[SPEAKER_01]: They search further.
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[SPEAKER_01]: More items, more blood.
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[SPEAKER_01]: belongings of people they recognize, people who set out for errands months ago and never came home.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Items that have no business, being in their fellow priests, residents.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The attending priests don't want to believe what they're seeing.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This is Father 1 of Arunam, Malari, or Daint of the University of Santo Mas.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Parish priest of San Bartelome for over a decade.
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[SPEAKER_01]: A man who conducted mass, her confessions, baptized children, performed last rights, an artist whose elaborate caligraphic works
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[SPEAKER_01]: A man respected in his community, but the blood stanged belongings tell a story the priests can't ignore, word witches the constabularie chief, towns people gather outside the parish house, torches flickering in the tropical night.
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[SPEAKER_01]: 10 years of disappearances, 10 years of whispered fears, 10 years of parishioners who vanished without explanation.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It all converges on this moment, because Father warns of a reno-malauree, hasn't just been their priest.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He's been their predator.
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[SPEAKER_01]: and when Spanish authorities finally arrest him, what they discover will horrify the colony, 57 murders, 57 of his own parishioners, killed over 10 years, because he believed in the grip of severe, untreated psychosis that their deaths would cure his mother from a curse.
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[SPEAKER_01]: 57 people who trusted their priest more than anyone else in their small community,
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[SPEAKER_01]: and here's the part that should haunt us even more.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish colonial record to meticulously documented Father Malauree's education, his artwork, even his failed job applications, but they never even bothered to record the names of the 57 Filipinos that he killed.
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[SPEAKER_01]: not one name, not one age, not one family detail, 57 souls murdered and then erased from history by a system that didn't consider Filipino lives worth documenting.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This is the story of the first Filipino priest executed by Spanish colonial authorities.
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[SPEAKER_01]: A man suffering from severe mental illness who should have been hospitalized, not imprisoned.
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[SPEAKER_01]: A man whose crimes were enabled by primitive law enforcement and rural isolation.
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[SPEAKER_01]: In 57 parishioners, murdered by the man they trusted most, and then erased from history by a colonial system that valued Spanish priorities over Filipino lives.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This is the story of Father Warnes of Arena Mallory.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Hello friend, and welcome to foul play.
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[SPEAKER_01]: To understand how father Juan Severino Mollorà became colonial Philippines first documented serial killer.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We need to understand what it meant to be a Filipino priest and Spanish colonial society in the early 1800s.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Juan Severino Mollorà was born in 1785 in San Nicolas Pampenga, present-day macabre, and
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[SPEAKER_01]: His ancestors have been benefactors of their local church.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This was a family with standing, with history, with ambition.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Young Mollory showed promise.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He was intelligent, artistically gifted.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Around 1800, he completed his philosophy degree.
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[SPEAKER_01]: In 1805, he earned his theology degree as San Carlos Seminary.
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[SPEAKER_01]: In 1809, at the University of Santo Tomás, Archbishop Juan Antonio Zalabar, or Daintem as a Catholic priest.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This should have been his triumph, but the reality of being a Filipino priest in Spanish colonial Philippines
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[SPEAKER_01]: From 1809 to 1812, Mollary served as co-adjuder, assistant parish priest, bouncing between Gopong Lubau and Bocalo.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He applied for parish priest positions in Arani, Mauree Valice, Lubau, even as chaplain at the port of Kavidi.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He was shortlisted for every position.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish authorities rejected him every single time.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't about his qualifications.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This was systematic discrimination.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish authorities viewed Filipino secular priests as inferior to Spanish fryers.
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[SPEAKER_01]: No matter how educated, how talented, how devoted, Filipino priests had a ceiling built entirely from colonial racism.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Finally, in 1812, Malari achieved what should have been his vindication.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He became parish priest of San Barolomi Parish in Magaleng, Papenga.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The first Filipino to become a parish priest in the entire Providence of Papenga.
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[SPEAKER_01]: In that remote agricultural community, where the priest held more practical authority than any government official, where parishioners trusted him with their secrets, their confessions, their souls.
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[SPEAKER_01]: That's where one Severino Mallory would commit 57 murders over the next decade.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Like many phynerpinos of his time, he grew up in a society strictly layered by the Spanish colonial system, where social mobility was limited, and power structures were rigid and well-defined.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This rigid colonial hierarchy created the world, Mallory, and Habitat.
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[SPEAKER_01]: At the top were Spanish-born officials, the peninsulaas.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Below them came Spaniards born in the Philippines, the insularas.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Then the Principalia wealthy Filipino families who cooperated with Spanish rule.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And at the bottom, the vast majority of Filipinos considered indios, literally Indians, a deliberately demissive term.
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[SPEAKER_01]: As a Filipino priest, Malari occupied an unusual position, he had an education, religious authority, and the trust of his parishioners, but Spanish authorities still treated him as inferior to Spanish fryers.
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[SPEAKER_01]: That combination, genuine power within his community, the constant humiliation from colonial authorities, created a perfect storm.
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[SPEAKER_01]: especially when something went terribly wrong with his mother.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The details are scarce, but some time around 1816, four years after Malauri became parish priest, his mother fell gravely ill.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The nature of her illness isn't clear from historical records.
09:22.196 --> 09:26.663
[SPEAKER_01]: What is clear is that Malauri became convinced that she was cursed,
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[SPEAKER_01]: In the early 19th century Philippines, Catholic faith and pre-colonial beliefs often existed side by side.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Many Filipinos attended mass faithfully, while also fearing Minkukulum, witches or sorcerers who could cast curses called Kulam.
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[SPEAKER_01]: These weren't abstract theological debates.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Historical accounts describe Malorie, experiencing hallucinations during mass.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He would stop mid-Surman, staring at empty spaces, talking to figures no one else could see.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Parishaners noticed him conducting conversations with invisible presences.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He claimed to receive messages, instructions, visions,
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spain had pioneered psychiatric treatment in Europe.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The Hospicio de San Jose and Manila, a psychiatric facility, had been operational since 1811.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The same year, Malorie, became parish priest.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spain understood mental illness existed.
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[SPEAKER_01]: They had institutions designed to treat it.
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[SPEAKER_01]: but Maul-A-Ree was in rural Papenga, miles from Manila where the nearest Spanish authority might be days away.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And he was the parish priest, the highest religious authority in Magalang, who would recognize that the man leading mass, hearing confessions, and blessing marriages, was experiencing severe psychotic delusions
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[SPEAKER_01]: So when Father Mollary decided that killing the people he believed were witches, would cure his mother, no one stopped him.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The first murder likely happened in 1816, a parishioner who came to confession.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Some one mother reads delusional mind, identified as one of the witches, cursing his mother.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know this person's name.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know if they were younger, old, married or single, a farmer, or a merchant.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish colonial records didn't care enough to document that.
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[SPEAKER_01]: What we do know is that mother we killed them, kept their bloodstained clothing,
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[SPEAKER_01]: And then, he killed again, and again.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Over the next 10 years, Father Mawler re-emordered 57 of his parishioners, 57 people who trusted him completely, who confessed their sins to him, who asked him to bless their marriages, baptized their children, pray over their sick family members.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He killed them in the privacy of the parish house.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He killed parishioners who came to him for spiritual guidance.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He killed with disturbing method, strangling, stabbing, whatever served his delusional purpose.
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[SPEAKER_01]: And after each murder, he carefully folded the victim's bloodstained clothing, and kept it in his residence.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Think about that for a moment.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't a frenzy.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't a loss of control.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Each murder was deliberate enough that afterward, Mother Reed took the time to fold and preserve the victim's belongings.
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[SPEAKER_01]: That level of organization, existing alongside complete psychotic delusion, tells us something terrifying about how his mind was working.
13:19.062 --> 13:25.675
[SPEAKER_00]: Ironically, many turned to Malari himself for protection, unaware that they were seeking help from the very person they feared.
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[SPEAKER_01]: People who were experiencing this wave of disappearances would naturally turn to their parish priest for spiritual guidance and protection.
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[SPEAKER_01]: They had no idea that the man they trusted most was the one killing them.
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[SPEAKER_01]: His mother died on December 4th, 1825, the curse hadn't lifted, the killings hadn't saved her.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Everything Mother re-had done, 57 murders over nearly 10 years, had been for nothing.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But here's something crucial to understand.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Mother Reed didn't stop because his mother died.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He didn't stop because he realized the killings weren't working.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He stopped because on December 20th, 1825, just 16 days after his mother's death.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Several families finally gathered enough courage to file a report with a goblin otter seal, the town mayor.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Think about the bravery that required.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You're a Filipino family in 1825, Spanish colonial Philippines, and you're about to accuse not just anyone.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You're accusing the parish priest.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The most powerful religious figure in your town, a man who could deny you sacraments, who could exclude you from the church community who had the ear of Spanish colonial authorities.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But your daughter went to the parish house six months ago and never came home.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Well your brother, well your husband,
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[SPEAKER_01]: and you've heard whispers from other families, why it conversations about other people who vanished after going to see Father Mallory.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So those families, whose names we also don't know, because Spanish authorities didn't bother recording that either, went to the mayor.
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[SPEAKER_01]: and that formal complaint filed December 20th 1825 finally set an investigation and motion.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But modelry remained free for months.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He continued serving as parish priest through late 1825 and into early 1826.
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[SPEAKER_01]: He conducted mass, he hurt confessions, business as usual,
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[SPEAKER_01]: until he fell ill, and those visiting priests found the bloodstained clothing.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Further warns of arena-mala-reese life is extensively recorded.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We know where he was born, we know his family status as church benefactors.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We have a records of his philosophy degree around 1800, his theology degree in 1805, his ordination in 1809.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We know every parish where he served as co-adjuder from 1809 to 1812.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We know every position he applied for and was rejected from.
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[SPEAKER_01]: We even have examples of his artwork.
16:36.634 --> 16:38.436
[SPEAKER_01]: Model Rhee was a talented calligrapher.
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[SPEAKER_01]: His elaborate ecclesiastical documents, or Nate lettering for church records, decorative, religious texts, these survived.
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[SPEAKER_01]: You can find references to Model Rhee's artistic work in historical archives today.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The Spanish colonial system found father Juan Savarino Mallorà worth documenting an extraordinary detail.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The 57 Filipinos he murdered, not one name recorded, not one age, not one occupation, not one family detail.
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[SPEAKER_01]: were they farmers, merchants, young old, they have children, were they the primary breadwinners for their families, did their disappearances leave elderly parents without support, or children without a father or mother?
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[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish authorities didn't care to find out.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This isn't an accident.
17:40.012 --> 17:43.817
[SPEAKER_01]: This is colonial violence, manifesting as bureaucratic
17:44.911 --> 17:50.205
[SPEAKER_01]: The Spanish system and the Philippines existed to extract wealth and maintain control.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Individual Filipino lives, their names, their stories, their families grief, none of that served Spanish interests.
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[SPEAKER_01]: So it wasn't recorded.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The impact on the community was devastating.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Business activities slowed as merchants became reluctant to settle in the area.
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[SPEAKER_00]: Walthy families began leaving Mabalachat, bearing they might be next.
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[SPEAKER_00]: The atmosphere of terror and suspicion destroyed the traditional bonds of trust that had held the community together.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Megalang was an agricultural community in the early 1800s, rice patties surrounding the town, families waking before dawn to work the fields.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Markets were people traded rice, vegetables, maybe some livestock, small houses, bamboo and neepa palm construction mostly, designed to stay cool and tropical heat.
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[SPEAKER_01]: The church, San Bartolome, would have been the finest building in town.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Stone structure, white washed walls, a bell tower.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Mass on Sundays was the center of community life.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Baptisms, marriages, funerals.
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[SPEAKER_01]: All the major events happened.
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[SPEAKER_01]: As San Bartolome church, conducted by Father Mallory,
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[SPEAKER_01]: Imagine a typical victim, maybe a middle-aged farmer.
19:18.490 --> 19:25.776
[SPEAKER_01]: He's concerned about his daughter's upcoming marriage, and wants to ask Father Molly to perform the ceremony.
19:26.971 --> 19:33.521
[SPEAKER_01]: So he walks to the parish house one morning, asked to speak with the Padre, Malorie invites him in.
19:35.003 --> 19:39.730
[SPEAKER_01]: That farmer probably felt honored that the priest would take time to speak with him personally.
19:41.112 --> 19:43.976
[SPEAKER_01]: He probably confided things he wouldn't tell anyone else.
19:44.838 --> 19:51.848
[SPEAKER_01]: Family troubles, worries about the harvest, fears about whether he could provide an adequate
19:53.043 --> 20:01.758
[SPEAKER_01]: and then father Maulari in the grip of delusion, convinced this farmer was one of the witches, cursing his mother, killed him.
20:04.704 --> 20:17.987
[SPEAKER_01]: Or maybe a young mother, who came to have her infant baptized, or an elderly widow seeking last rights for her dying husband, or a teenage boy who served as an alter assistant at Mass,
20:19.317 --> 20:26.484
[SPEAKER_01]: We're imagining these victims because we have to, because Spanish authorities couldn't be bothered to document their actual identities.
20:27.966 --> 20:34.232
[SPEAKER_01]: What we do know is this, over 10 years, 57 people from Mangalang disappeared.
20:34.252 --> 20:41.759
[SPEAKER_01]: 57 families experienced the special torture of not knowing what happened to someone they loved.
20:43.080 --> 20:44.202
[SPEAKER_01]: Did their father run away?
20:45.042 --> 20:46.264
[SPEAKER_01]: Was their daughter kidnapped?
20:47.124 --> 20:48.666
[SPEAKER_01]: Did their husband abandon them?
20:49.861 --> 20:51.724
[SPEAKER_01]: but not knowing must have been agonizing.
20:52.406 --> 20:55.291
[SPEAKER_01]: An unlike cases today, there was no investigation.
20:56.092 --> 20:58.838
[SPEAKER_01]: No missing persons report, no search party.
21:00.220 --> 21:04.949
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish colonial law enforcement barely existed in rural areas, like Mangalang.
21:06.331 --> 21:13.725
[SPEAKER_01]: If people vanished, well, that was unfortunate, but hardly with Spanish authorities time to investigate.
21:15.089 --> 21:17.654
[SPEAKER_01]: So those families just lived with it.
21:18.756 --> 21:22.663
[SPEAKER_01]: With the absence, with the questions, maybe whispers from neighbors.
21:23.124 --> 21:25.929
[SPEAKER_01]: Did you hear the riots family lost their son last month?
21:26.490 --> 21:27.232
[SPEAKER_01]: Just disappeared.
21:28.133 --> 21:31.700
[SPEAKER_01]: And before that, the widow who lived near the market, she vanished too.
21:32.882 --> 21:35.427
[SPEAKER_01]: Strange things happening in Mangalang,
21:36.672 --> 21:38.113
[SPEAKER_01]: for 10 years this went on.
21:39.455 --> 21:47.042
[SPEAKER_01]: Until December 20th, 1825, when enough families finally gathered the courage to formally accuse their priest.
21:48.463 --> 21:57.632
[SPEAKER_01]: Even after Mala Reza rest, even after his confession to 57 murders, Spanish authorities still never bothered to identify the victims.
21:59.113 --> 22:01.976
[SPEAKER_01]: Never matched missing persons to the bloodstained clothing.
22:03.337 --> 22:06.240
[SPEAKER_01]: Never gave those families the closure
22:07.452 --> 22:11.896
[SPEAKER_01]: because to Spanish colonial Philippines, Filipino lives were disposable.
22:14.939 --> 22:18.503
[SPEAKER_01]: We're going to try to honor those 57 souls throughout this episode.
22:19.364 --> 22:22.267
[SPEAKER_01]: We can't name them, we can't tell their specific stories.
22:23.548 --> 22:25.630
[SPEAKER_01]: But we can refuse to let them be erased.
22:26.971 --> 22:35.940
[SPEAKER_01]: We can insist that their murders mattered that their lives had value and that the families who lost them deserved better than the bureaucratic indifference.
22:37.237 --> 22:53.777
[SPEAKER_01]: 57 people, 57 souls, 57 lives that should have been lived fully, ended by a man suffering from untreated mental illness, in a system that didn't care enough about Filipino lives to intervene.
22:56.626 --> 23:03.115
[SPEAKER_01]: After the family's filed their report on December 20, 1825, an actual investigation began.
23:03.175 --> 23:08.383
[SPEAKER_01]: But understand, this wasn't CSI colonial Philippines.
23:09.224 --> 23:19.579
[SPEAKER_01]: Law enforcement in rural Papenga, in 1825, consisted of the gobernatorcio, the town mayor, who had limited authority and even less training.
23:20.842 --> 23:24.326
[SPEAKER_01]: The families who filed the complaint told a consistent story.
23:25.167 --> 23:34.138
[SPEAKER_01]: Their loved ones had gone to see father Malorie, to request baptisms, to arrange marriages, to seek confession, and never returned.
23:35.520 --> 23:41.988
[SPEAKER_01]: Different families, different dates, same pattern, all trails ending at the parish house.
23:43.129 --> 23:50.578
[SPEAKER_01]: But investigating a Catholic priest required special permission,
23:51.436 --> 23:53.279
[SPEAKER_01]: formal inquiries had to be made.
23:54.101 --> 23:56.344
[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't a process that moved quickly.
23:57.827 --> 24:16.819
[SPEAKER_01]: So mother re-remained in his position continued his duties for months, until February 1826 when he fell ill. As suspicions grew within the community, it was a child's discovery by local farmer that finally led to maloris undoing.
24:17.052 --> 24:27.549
[SPEAKER_00]: While searching for a lost water buffalo in the dense forest outside Mabalachat, the farmer stumbled upon a cave containing various items that had been reported stolen from the murder victims.
24:28.891 --> 24:35.942
[SPEAKER_00]: The Spanish authorities already under pressure to solve the mounting number of murders, immediately launched a more focused investigation.
24:37.205 --> 24:40.630
[SPEAKER_00]: They began by quietly monitoring the movements of several suspects.
24:41.622 --> 24:47.048
[SPEAKER_00]: Breakthrough came when investigators noticed Malari's spending habits didn't match his official income.
24:48.249 --> 24:56.117
[SPEAKER_00]: Further scrutiny revealed that Malari had been selling valuable items in neighbouring towns, items that were later identified as belonging to murder victims.
24:57.239 --> 25:05.227
[SPEAKER_00]: Witnesses from those towns, feeling safe or speaking about someone from a different community, came forward with detailed descriptions of their dealings with him.
25:06.308 --> 25:10.853
[SPEAKER_00]: A pattern emerged showing Malari's presence in these markets shortly after each murder,
25:12.200 --> 25:18.818
[SPEAKER_01]: By mid-1826, enough evidence existed to formally arrest father Juan Savarino Malari.
25:20.022 --> 25:21.406
[SPEAKER_01]: The blood stained belongings.
25:22.308 --> 25:24.775
[SPEAKER_01]: The family's testimony about disappearances.
25:25.801 --> 25:33.149
[SPEAKER_01]: Malauree's own increasingly erratic behavior, the hallucinations during mass that multiple witnesses had observed.
25:34.450 --> 25:40.817
[SPEAKER_01]: When authorities questioned him, Malauree confessed, not with for more, with explanation.
25:41.738 --> 25:54.812
[SPEAKER_01]: He told them about his mother's illness, about the curse he believed afflicted her, about identifying the 57 witches who had cursed her.
25:56.935 --> 26:00.720
[SPEAKER_01]: Imagine being the constabulari official, taking that confession.
26:00.780 --> 26:14.997
[SPEAKER_01]: This Catholic priest, educated at the University of Santo Tomás, homely explaining that he murdered 57 of his parishioners, because invisible forces told him they were witches, cursing his mother.
26:16.519 --> 26:20.243
[SPEAKER_01]: Describing murders that spanned 10 years with disturbing clarity.
26:21.590 --> 26:31.705
[SPEAKER_01]: and imagine being one of those families who filed the original complaint, finally getting confirmation that yes, you're missing loved one head gone to follow Mollary.
26:32.826 --> 26:34.989
[SPEAKER_01]: And yes, Mollary had killed them.
26:36.111 --> 26:38.454
[SPEAKER_01]: And no, there was no rational reason.
26:39.676 --> 26:50.652
[SPEAKER_01]: Just the delusional beliefs of a man experiencing severe, untreated psychosis, an assistant that should have recognized his mental illness, and intervened years earlier.
26:50.632 --> 26:56.929
[SPEAKER_01]: The arrest happened in 1826 with the legal process which just beginning.
26:59.305 --> 27:08.057
[SPEAKER_00]: Trial of one Severino Mallari, a game in late 1816, during unprecedented attention from across the Spanish colonial territory.
27:09.018 --> 27:21.955
[SPEAKER_00]: The proceedings conducted in the colonial court of Pampanga, multi-significant moment in Philippine judicial history, not only for the brutality of the crimes, but for the meticulous way evidence was preserved.
27:21.935 --> 27:25.700
[SPEAKER_00]: Day after day, prosecutors methodically laid out their case against Malauri.
27:26.481 --> 27:29.225
[SPEAKER_00]: They presented the bloodstained clothing found in his cellar.
27:30.026 --> 27:36.415
[SPEAKER_00]: The detailed ledger containing victim information, and the stolen items recovered from both his home and the cave.
27:37.537 --> 27:47.250
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution also called numerous witnesses, including merchants who had purchased goods from Malauri, and neighbours who had noticed his suspicious behaviour following the murders.
27:47.230 --> 27:54.483
[SPEAKER_00]: Particularly damning was the testimony of surviving family members who identified personal belongings found in Malauri's possession.
27:55.745 --> 28:08.327
[SPEAKER_00]: These intimate items, family heirlooms, personal documents and religious artefacts, painted a picture of a man who not only killed for profit, but seemed to take pleasure in maintaining trophies from his victims.
28:09.455 --> 28:15.828
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense attempted to portray Mallory as a respected community leader who had been framed by jealous rivals.
28:16.950 --> 28:21.921
[SPEAKER_00]: They argued that his position made him an easy target for those seeking to destroy his reputation.
28:23.043 --> 28:30.298
[SPEAKER_00]: However, the defense struggled to explain the overwhelming physical evidence and the detailed nature of Mallory's own written records.
28:31.628 --> 28:34.151
[SPEAKER_01]: Historical records do confirm there was a trial.
28:35.213 --> 28:43.584
[SPEAKER_01]: There was physical evidence including the blood stained belongings, and there were witness testimonies from people who had observed Mala Rees erratic behavior.
28:44.645 --> 28:45.907
[SPEAKER_01]: That much is documented.
28:46.768 --> 28:55.780
[SPEAKER_01]: We also know for certain that Mala Rees confessed to 57 murders, explaining his delusional belief about witches cursing his mother.
28:57.127 --> 29:01.815
[SPEAKER_01]: the evidence was overwhelming, and the colonial court found him guilty.
29:04.139 --> 29:10.590
[SPEAKER_01]: After his conviction in 1826, Juan Severino Malore wasn't executed immediately.
29:10.630 --> 29:13.836
[SPEAKER_01]: He spent 14 years in prison.
29:14.930 --> 29:20.456
[SPEAKER_01]: 14 years between his arrest in 1826 and his execution in 1840.
29:21.958 --> 29:22.618
[SPEAKER_01]: Why the delay?
29:23.860 --> 29:27.984
[SPEAKER_01]: The colonial legal system had to refer his case to higher authorities.
29:29.246 --> 29:32.189
[SPEAKER_01]: A Filipino priest convicted of 57 murders.
29:33.050 --> 29:34.451
[SPEAKER_01]: This was unprecedented.
29:35.773 --> 29:44.262
[SPEAKER_01]: The case went through multiple levels of review, appeals, bureaucratic processing,
29:45.592 --> 30:05.727
[SPEAKER_01]: think about those families, the loved ones were murdered between 1816 and 1825, they filed their complaint in December 1825, Molloree was arrested in 1826, and then they had to wait 14 more years to see justice carried out.
30:06.989 --> 30:15.818
[SPEAKER_01]: 14 years of knowing their family members killer was alive, in prison, yes, but alive, while their loved one was gone.
30:18.464 --> 30:27.438
[SPEAKER_01]: Finally, in 1840, Wands of Arena Mallory was hanged at Boogam Field, today Lunetta Park and Manila.
30:28.701 --> 30:30.083
[SPEAKER_01]: He was 55 years old.
30:31.325 --> 30:38.877
[SPEAKER_01]: He spent the last 14 years of his life in prison, still experiencing the psychotic delusions that had driven him to murder.
30:40.299 --> 30:45.147
[SPEAKER_01]: He died the first Filipino priest ever executed by Spanish colonial authorities,
30:46.291 --> 31:04.840
[SPEAKER_01]: 32 years later, in 1872, three more Filipino priests, Father's Mariano Gomez, Jose Burgos, and Jacinto Zamora, known collectively, as Gombra's up, would be executed by Spanish authorities for allegedly inspiring a revolt.
31:06.082 --> 31:09.447
[SPEAKER_01]: Their executions would help spark the Philippine Revolution,
31:10.591 --> 31:11.873
[SPEAKER_01]: but Mallory was first.
31:13.174 --> 31:33.578
[SPEAKER_01]: First Filipino priest, arrested for violent crimes, first executed, a man whose severe mental illness should have been treated, whose crimes could have been prevented if Spanish colonial authorities had cared enough about Filipino lives to recognize the warning signs and intervene.
31:37.709 --> 31:55.093
[SPEAKER_01]: Everything about Maularee's behavior, the hallucinations during mass, the conversations with invisible figures, the elaborate delusional system about curses and witches, these weren't theological questions or folk belief, this was severe untreated psychosis.
31:55.073 --> 31:59.138
[SPEAKER_01]: A medical condition that required psychiatric intervention.
32:00.559 --> 32:03.322
[SPEAKER_01]: Spain had the knowledge and facilities to treat mental illness.
32:04.424 --> 32:09.830
[SPEAKER_01]: The Hospycio de Hose and Manila was operational before mother-read crimes even began.
32:11.131 --> 32:20.001
[SPEAKER_01]: But psychiatric care and colonial Philippines was reserved for Spanish citizens and maybe wealthy Filipinos with connections.
32:19.981 --> 32:31.257
[SPEAKER_01]: A parish priest in rural Papanga, experiencing psychotic breaks, no one recognized it as illness requiring treatment, no one intervened.
32:32.266 --> 32:38.115
[SPEAKER_01]: If Mauleree had been Spanish born, would authorities have noticed his deteriorating mental state earlier?
32:39.317 --> 32:43.182
[SPEAKER_01]: Would they have removed him from his parish position and provided treatment?
32:44.464 --> 32:51.034
[SPEAKER_01]: We can't know for certain, but the pattern of colonial medicine suggests the answer is probably yes.
32:52.381 --> 33:02.354
[SPEAKER_00]: In modern Filipino criminology studies, the Mallari case is often cited as a watershed moment in the development of forensic investigation techniques in Southeast Asia.
33:03.275 --> 33:06.919
[SPEAKER_00]: The case continues to fascinate true crime enthusiasts and historians alike.
33:07.840 --> 33:12.246
[SPEAKER_00]: With several books and academic papers published on the subject in recent decades,
33:13.188 --> 33:22.843
[SPEAKER_00]: Despite the centuries that have passed, the case of Shwann Severino Malari remains a cautionary tale about the abuse of power and the importance of robust systems of justice.
33:24.848 --> 33:36.140
[SPEAKER_01]: Somewhere in Papanga, there are descendants of those 57 victims, people who grew up hearing family stories, about a great-great-grandparent, who vanished mysteriously in the 1820s.
33:36.941 --> 33:40.905
[SPEAKER_01]: People who've inherited the trauma of not knowing what happened to their ancestor.
33:42.166 --> 33:45.290
[SPEAKER_01]: Those descendants deserve to know their family members death mattered.
33:46.031 --> 33:47.813
[SPEAKER_01]: Their ancestors' life had value.
33:48.733 --> 33:52.037
[SPEAKER_01]: That we haven't forgotten them, even if we can't name them,
33:55.105 --> 34:15.493
[SPEAKER_01]: Once a arena-mollary story is ultimately a story of multiple failures, the failure to recognize and treat severe mental illness, the failure of colonial law enforcement to protect vulnerable people, the failure of Spanish authorities to value Filipino lives enough to record their names.
34:16.402 --> 34:23.766
[SPEAKER_01]: But most of all, it's the story of 57 people whose lives were ended and then erased by a system that didn't care.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Their stories matter and they deserve to be remembered.
34:34.070 --> 34:41.039
[SPEAKER_01]: This has been Fowl Play, where we tell stories from history's darkest moments, to honor the victims who deserve to be remembered.
34:42.281 --> 34:52.034
[SPEAKER_01]: Next week we'll continue season 36, serial killers in history, with another case of power, madness, and the victims erased from the historical record.
34:53.016 --> 34:59.284
[SPEAKER_01]: If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to Fowl Play wherever you listen to podcasts, and leave a review.
34:59.264 --> 35:06.706
[SPEAKER_01]: It helps other crime listeners discover the show, until next time, remember, everyone deserves to have their story told.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Even when history tries to erase them.
35:11.239 --> 35:12.362
[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks for listening, friend.
00:05.060 --> 00:09.029
[SPEAKER_01]: Magalan Pampenga, Spanish colonial Philippines.
00:10.492 --> 00:18.510
[SPEAKER_01]: The year's 1826, the parish house of San Bartolo May church sits quiet under tropical heat.
00:19.934 --> 00:21.357
[SPEAKER_01]: The air is thick as humidity.
00:22.399 --> 00:24.604
[SPEAKER_01]: The kind that makes everything stick to your skin.
00:25.816 --> 00:35.131
[SPEAKER_01]: Inside, Father warns of arena Malaria, lies ill, feverish, weak, unable to perform his priestly duties.
00:36.814 --> 00:41.020
[SPEAKER_01]: Fellow priests have come from neighbouring parishes to care for their brother and faith.
00:42.342 --> 00:49.073
[SPEAKER_01]: An act of Christian charity, they tend to him, pray over him, prepare his meals.
00:50.302 --> 00:56.448
[SPEAKER_01]: They search his residence for clean bedding, for medicine, for anything that might ease his suffering.
00:58.190 --> 01:00.232
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's when one of them finds it.
01:02.995 --> 01:09.943
[SPEAKER_01]: Bloodstained clothing, folded neatly, stiffened with dried blood, yet arranged with disturbing care.
01:11.664 --> 01:14.267
[SPEAKER_01]: The clothing doesn't belong to follow the Mallory,
01:15.293 --> 01:23.122
[SPEAKER_01]: Personal items, a shirt, a shawl, a small purse, all bearing blood that shouldn't be there.
01:24.764 --> 01:33.235
[SPEAKER_01]: Items that look like they belong to parishioners, people from the community, people who came to mass in confession and asked for blessings.
01:34.957 --> 01:36.438
[SPEAKER_01]: One priest calls the others.
01:37.680 --> 01:38.421
[SPEAKER_01]: They search further.
01:39.762 --> 01:41.925
[SPEAKER_01]: More items, more blood.
01:43.137 --> 01:49.617
[SPEAKER_01]: belongings of people they recognize, people who set out for errands months ago and never came home.
01:51.202 --> 01:55.375
[SPEAKER_01]: Items that have no business, being in their fellow priests, residents.
01:57.717 --> 02:00.540
[SPEAKER_01]: The attending priests don't want to believe what they're seeing.
02:01.962 --> 02:07.328
[SPEAKER_01]: This is Father 1 of Arunam, Malari, or Daint of the University of Santo Mas.
02:08.370 --> 02:11.653
[SPEAKER_01]: Parish priest of San Bartelome for over a decade.
02:12.855 --> 02:25.750
[SPEAKER_01]: A man who conducted mass, her confessions, baptized children, performed last rights, an artist whose elaborate caligraphic works
02:25.730 --> 02:44.667
[SPEAKER_01]: A man respected in his community, but the blood stanged belongings tell a story the priests can't ignore, word witches the constabularie chief, towns people gather outside the parish house, torches flickering in the tropical night.
02:46.013 --> 02:55.149
[SPEAKER_01]: 10 years of disappearances, 10 years of whispered fears, 10 years of parishioners who vanished without explanation.
02:56.351 --> 03:04.064
[SPEAKER_01]: It all converges on this moment, because Father warns of a reno-malauree, hasn't just been their priest.
03:05.827 --> 03:07.009
[SPEAKER_01]: He's been their predator.
03:09.875 --> 03:31.120
[SPEAKER_01]: and when Spanish authorities finally arrest him, what they discover will horrify the colony, 57 murders, 57 of his own parishioners, killed over 10 years, because he believed in the grip of severe, untreated psychosis that their deaths would cure his mother from a curse.
03:31.140 --> 03:37.688
[SPEAKER_01]: 57 people who trusted their priest more than anyone else in their small community,
03:38.782 --> 03:41.107
[SPEAKER_01]: and here's the part that should haunt us even more.
03:42.249 --> 03:58.984
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish colonial record to meticulously documented Father Malauree's education, his artwork, even his failed job applications, but they never even bothered to record the names of the 57 Filipinos that he killed.
03:58.964 --> 04:12.113
[SPEAKER_01]: not one name, not one age, not one family detail, 57 souls murdered and then erased from history by a system that didn't consider Filipino lives worth documenting.
04:15.147 --> 04:21.135
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the story of the first Filipino priest executed by Spanish colonial authorities.
04:22.216 --> 04:28.044
[SPEAKER_01]: A man suffering from severe mental illness who should have been hospitalized, not imprisoned.
04:29.265 --> 04:34.692
[SPEAKER_01]: A man whose crimes were enabled by primitive law enforcement and rural isolation.
04:34.672 --> 04:48.169
[SPEAKER_01]: In 57 parishioners, murdered by the man they trusted most, and then erased from history by a colonial system that valued Spanish priorities over Filipino lives.
04:49.611 --> 04:52.534
[SPEAKER_01]: This is the story of Father Warnes of Arena Mallory.
04:54.717 --> 04:57.861
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello friend, and welcome to foul play.
05:02.043 --> 05:08.551
[SPEAKER_01]: To understand how father Juan Severino Mollorà became colonial Philippines first documented serial killer.
05:09.412 --> 05:15.880
[SPEAKER_01]: We need to understand what it meant to be a Filipino priest and Spanish colonial society in the early 1800s.
05:15.980 --> 05:27.915
[SPEAKER_01]: Juan Severino Mollorà was born in 1785 in San Nicolas Pampenga, present-day macabre, and
05:28.992 --> 05:31.940
[SPEAKER_01]: His ancestors have been benefactors of their local church.
05:32.963 --> 05:37.095
[SPEAKER_01]: This was a family with standing, with history, with ambition.
05:38.459 --> 05:40.003
[SPEAKER_01]: Young Mollory showed promise.
05:41.126 --> 05:44.014
[SPEAKER_01]: He was intelligent, artistically gifted.
05:43.994 --> 05:47.477
[SPEAKER_01]: Around 1800, he completed his philosophy degree.
05:48.778 --> 05:53.622
[SPEAKER_01]: In 1805, he earned his theology degree as San Carlos Seminary.
05:54.903 --> 06:04.151
[SPEAKER_01]: In 1809, at the University of Santo Tomás, Archbishop Juan Antonio Zalabar, or Daintem as a Catholic priest.
06:05.232 --> 06:13.579
[SPEAKER_01]: This should have been his triumph, but the reality of being a Filipino priest in Spanish colonial Philippines
06:14.791 --> 06:24.800
[SPEAKER_01]: From 1809 to 1812, Mollary served as co-adjuder, assistant parish priest, bouncing between Gopong Lubau and Bocalo.
06:26.162 --> 06:34.309
[SPEAKER_01]: He applied for parish priest positions in Arani, Mauree Valice, Lubau, even as chaplain at the port of Kavidi.
06:35.530 --> 06:37.372
[SPEAKER_01]: He was shortlisted for every position.
06:38.593 --> 06:42.537
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish authorities rejected him every single time.
06:42.517 --> 06:44.900
[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't about his qualifications.
06:46.101 --> 06:47.883
[SPEAKER_01]: This was systematic discrimination.
06:49.345 --> 06:54.350
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish authorities viewed Filipino secular priests as inferior to Spanish fryers.
06:55.672 --> 07:04.542
[SPEAKER_01]: No matter how educated, how talented, how devoted, Filipino priests had a ceiling built entirely from colonial racism.
07:05.905 --> 07:10.953
[SPEAKER_01]: Finally, in 1812, Malari achieved what should have been his vindication.
07:10.993 --> 07:17.323
[SPEAKER_01]: He became parish priest of San Barolomi Parish in Magaleng, Papenga.
07:18.585 --> 07:23.914
[SPEAKER_01]: The first Filipino to become a parish priest in the entire Providence of Papenga.
07:25.193 --> 07:37.472
[SPEAKER_01]: In that remote agricultural community, where the priest held more practical authority than any government official, where parishioners trusted him with their secrets, their confessions, their souls.
07:38.294 --> 07:44.383
[SPEAKER_01]: That's where one Severino Mallory would commit 57 murders over the next decade.
07:46.793 --> 07:57.752
[SPEAKER_00]: Like many phynerpinos of his time, he grew up in a society strictly layered by the Spanish colonial system, where social mobility was limited, and power structures were rigid and well-defined.
07:59.134 --> 08:03.722
[SPEAKER_01]: This rigid colonial hierarchy created the world, Mallory, and Habitat.
08:04.850 --> 08:08.294
[SPEAKER_01]: At the top were Spanish-born officials, the peninsulaas.
08:09.515 --> 08:14.200
[SPEAKER_01]: Below them came Spaniards born in the Philippines, the insularas.
08:15.241 --> 08:20.347
[SPEAKER_01]: Then the Principalia wealthy Filipino families who cooperated with Spanish rule.
08:21.368 --> 08:30.418
[SPEAKER_01]: And at the bottom, the vast majority of Filipinos considered indios, literally Indians, a deliberately demissive term.
08:31.647 --> 08:47.491
[SPEAKER_01]: As a Filipino priest, Malari occupied an unusual position, he had an education, religious authority, and the trust of his parishioners, but Spanish authorities still treated him as inferior to Spanish fryers.
08:49.033 --> 08:58.768
[SPEAKER_01]: That combination, genuine power within his community, the constant humiliation from colonial authorities, created a perfect storm.
09:00.183 --> 09:03.528
[SPEAKER_01]: especially when something went terribly wrong with his mother.
09:06.412 --> 09:16.648
[SPEAKER_01]: The details are scarce, but some time around 1816, four years after Malauri became parish priest, his mother fell gravely ill.
09:18.150 --> 09:21.255
[SPEAKER_01]: The nature of her illness isn't clear from historical records.
09:22.196 --> 09:26.663
[SPEAKER_01]: What is clear is that Malauri became convinced that she was cursed,
09:28.043 --> 09:35.609
[SPEAKER_01]: In the early 19th century Philippines, Catholic faith and pre-colonial beliefs often existed side by side.
09:37.071 --> 09:47.279
[SPEAKER_01]: Many Filipinos attended mass faithfully, while also fearing Minkukulum, witches or sorcerers who could cast curses called Kulam.
09:48.680 --> 09:57.848
[SPEAKER_01]: These weren't abstract theological debates.
09:59.954 --> 10:05.259
[SPEAKER_01]: Historical accounts describe Malorie, experiencing hallucinations during mass.
10:06.601 --> 10:12.787
[SPEAKER_01]: He would stop mid-Surman, staring at empty spaces, talking to figures no one else could see.
10:14.249 --> 10:18.793
[SPEAKER_01]: Parishaners noticed him conducting conversations with invisible presences.
10:20.255 --> 10:24.139
[SPEAKER_01]: He claimed to receive messages, instructions, visions,
10:25.283 --> 10:29.709
[SPEAKER_01]: Spain had pioneered psychiatric treatment in Europe.
10:29.729 --> 10:36.218
[SPEAKER_01]: The Hospicio de San Jose and Manila, a psychiatric facility, had been operational since 1811.
10:36.618 --> 10:41.685
[SPEAKER_01]: The same year, Malorie, became parish priest.
10:41.705 --> 10:43.968
[SPEAKER_01]: Spain understood mental illness existed.
10:44.008 --> 10:47.393
[SPEAKER_01]: They had institutions designed to treat it.
10:48.571 --> 10:55.780
[SPEAKER_01]: but Maul-A-Ree was in rural Papenga, miles from Manila where the nearest Spanish authority might be days away.
10:55.800 --> 11:12.300
[SPEAKER_01]: And he was the parish priest, the highest religious authority in Magalang, who would recognize that the man leading mass, hearing confessions, and blessing marriages, was experiencing severe psychotic delusions
11:13.647 --> 11:20.680
[SPEAKER_01]: So when Father Mollary decided that killing the people he believed were witches, would cure his mother, no one stopped him.
11:22.162 --> 11:27.572
[SPEAKER_01]: The first murder likely happened in 1816, a parishioner who came to confession.
11:28.750 --> 11:34.638
[SPEAKER_01]: Some one mother reads delusional mind, identified as one of the witches, cursing his mother.
11:35.960 --> 11:37.422
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know this person's name.
11:38.503 --> 11:43.650
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know if they were younger, old, married or single, a farmer, or a merchant.
11:45.112 --> 11:48.276
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish colonial records didn't care enough to document that.
11:49.598 --> 11:58.690
[SPEAKER_01]: What we do know is that mother we killed them, kept their bloodstained clothing,
11:59.986 --> 12:02.629
[SPEAKER_01]: And then, he killed again, and again.
12:02.669 --> 12:23.429
[SPEAKER_01]: Over the next 10 years, Father Mawler re-emordered 57 of his parishioners, 57 people who trusted him completely, who confessed their sins to him, who asked him to bless their marriages, baptized their children, pray over their sick family members.
12:24.930 --> 12:27.833
[SPEAKER_01]: He killed them in the privacy of the parish house.
12:29.078 --> 12:32.483
[SPEAKER_01]: He killed parishioners who came to him for spiritual guidance.
12:33.925 --> 12:40.676
[SPEAKER_01]: He killed with disturbing method, strangling, stabbing, whatever served his delusional purpose.
12:42.078 --> 12:49.149
[SPEAKER_01]: And after each murder, he carefully folded the victim's bloodstained clothing, and kept it in his residence.
12:50.591 --> 12:51.833
[SPEAKER_01]: Think about that for a moment.
12:53.175 --> 12:54.377
[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't a frenzy.
12:55.454 --> 12:57.156
[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't a loss of control.
12:57.216 --> 13:05.707
[SPEAKER_01]: Each murder was deliberate enough that afterward, Mother Reed took the time to fold and preserve the victim's belongings.
13:07.069 --> 13:16.922
[SPEAKER_01]: That level of organization, existing alongside complete psychotic delusion, tells us something terrifying about how his mind was working.
13:19.062 --> 13:25.675
[SPEAKER_00]: Ironically, many turned to Malari himself for protection, unaware that they were seeking help from the very person they feared.
13:27.919 --> 13:35.855
[SPEAKER_01]: People who were experiencing this wave of disappearances would naturally turn to their parish priest for spiritual guidance and protection.
13:37.177 --> 13:41.205
[SPEAKER_01]: They had no idea that the man they trusted most was the one killing them.
13:42.569 --> 13:51.582
[SPEAKER_01]: His mother died on December 4th, 1825, the curse hadn't lifted, the killings hadn't saved her.
13:52.563 --> 13:59.133
[SPEAKER_01]: Everything Mother re-had done, 57 murders over nearly 10 years, had been for nothing.
14:00.595 --> 14:02.738
[SPEAKER_01]: But here's something crucial to understand.
14:03.848 --> 14:06.672
[SPEAKER_01]: Mother Reed didn't stop because his mother died.
14:07.953 --> 14:11.498
[SPEAKER_01]: He didn't stop because he realized the killings weren't working.
14:12.699 --> 14:19.328
[SPEAKER_01]: He stopped because on December 20th, 1825, just 16 days after his mother's death.
14:20.329 --> 14:27.818
[SPEAKER_01]: Several families finally gathered enough courage to file a report with a goblin otter seal, the town mayor.
14:29.280 --> 14:31.543
[SPEAKER_01]: Think about the bravery that required.
14:32.620 --> 14:39.886
[SPEAKER_01]: You're a Filipino family in 1825, Spanish colonial Philippines, and you're about to accuse not just anyone.
14:41.070 --> 14:42.917
[SPEAKER_01]: You're accusing the parish priest.
14:43.876 --> 14:55.661
[SPEAKER_01]: The most powerful religious figure in your town, a man who could deny you sacraments, who could exclude you from the church community who had the ear of Spanish colonial authorities.
14:57.023 --> 15:01.292
[SPEAKER_01]: But your daughter went to the parish house six months ago and never came home.
15:02.515 --> 15:05.040
[SPEAKER_01]: Well your brother, well your husband,
15:06.421 --> 15:15.419
[SPEAKER_01]: and you've heard whispers from other families, why it conversations about other people who vanished after going to see Father Mallory.
15:16.882 --> 15:25.138
[SPEAKER_01]: So those families, whose names we also don't know, because Spanish authorities didn't bother recording that either, went to the mayor.
15:26.266 --> 15:33.534
[SPEAKER_01]: and that formal complaint filed December 20th 1825 finally set an investigation and motion.
15:34.895 --> 15:36.917
[SPEAKER_01]: But modelry remained free for months.
15:38.239 --> 15:44.045
[SPEAKER_01]: He continued serving as parish priest through late 1825 and into early 1826.
15:46.007 --> 15:51.413
[SPEAKER_01]: He conducted mass, he hurt confessions, business as usual,
15:52.777 --> 15:57.508
[SPEAKER_01]: until he fell ill, and those visiting priests found the bloodstained clothing.
16:00.816 --> 16:04.525
[SPEAKER_01]: Further warns of arena-mala-reese life is extensively recorded.
16:05.652 --> 16:10.900
[SPEAKER_01]: We know where he was born, we know his family status as church benefactors.
16:12.183 --> 16:20.676
[SPEAKER_01]: We have a records of his philosophy degree around 1800, his theology degree in 1805, his ordination in 1809.
16:22.279 --> 16:27.407
[SPEAKER_01]: We know every parish where he served as co-adjuder from 1809 to 1812.
16:28.501 --> 16:32.227
[SPEAKER_01]: We know every position he applied for and was rejected from.
16:33.569 --> 16:35.512
[SPEAKER_01]: We even have examples of his artwork.
16:36.634 --> 16:38.436
[SPEAKER_01]: Model Rhee was a talented calligrapher.
16:39.658 --> 16:48.292
[SPEAKER_01]: His elaborate ecclesiastical documents, or Nate lettering for church records, decorative, religious texts, these survived.
16:49.794 --> 16:54.441
[SPEAKER_01]: You can find references to Model Rhee's artistic work in historical archives today.
16:55.687 --> 17:02.443
[SPEAKER_01]: The Spanish colonial system found father Juan Savarino Mallorà worth documenting an extraordinary detail.
17:05.129 --> 17:14.691
[SPEAKER_01]: The 57 Filipinos he murdered, not one name recorded, not one age, not one occupation, not one family detail.
17:16.038 --> 17:30.979
[SPEAKER_01]: were they farmers, merchants, young old, they have children, were they the primary breadwinners for their families, did their disappearances leave elderly parents without support, or children without a father or mother?
17:32.501 --> 17:32.982
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know.
17:34.023 --> 17:36.006
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish authorities didn't care to find out.
17:37.488 --> 17:38.770
[SPEAKER_01]: This isn't an accident.
17:40.012 --> 17:43.817
[SPEAKER_01]: This is colonial violence, manifesting as bureaucratic
17:44.911 --> 17:50.205
[SPEAKER_01]: The Spanish system and the Philippines existed to extract wealth and maintain control.
17:51.708 --> 17:58.827
[SPEAKER_01]: Individual Filipino lives, their names, their stories, their families grief, none of that served Spanish interests.
18:00.210 --> 18:01.333
[SPEAKER_01]: So it wasn't recorded.
18:03.406 --> 18:05.550
[SPEAKER_00]: The impact on the community was devastating.
18:06.412 --> 18:10.299
[SPEAKER_00]: Business activities slowed as merchants became reluctant to settle in the area.
18:11.361 --> 18:15.368
[SPEAKER_00]: Walthy families began leaving Mabalachat, bearing they might be next.
18:16.711 --> 18:22.782
[SPEAKER_00]: The atmosphere of terror and suspicion destroyed the traditional bonds of trust that had held the community together.
18:24.854 --> 18:35.385
[SPEAKER_01]: Megalang was an agricultural community in the early 1800s, rice patties surrounding the town, families waking before dawn to work the fields.
18:36.906 --> 18:50.760
[SPEAKER_01]: Markets were people traded rice, vegetables, maybe some livestock, small houses, bamboo and neepa palm construction mostly, designed to stay cool and tropical heat.
18:51.162 --> 18:55.287
[SPEAKER_01]: The church, San Bartolome, would have been the finest building in town.
18:56.708 --> 19:00.152
[SPEAKER_01]: Stone structure, white washed walls, a bell tower.
19:01.154 --> 19:03.837
[SPEAKER_01]: Mass on Sundays was the center of community life.
19:04.678 --> 19:06.780
[SPEAKER_01]: Baptisms, marriages, funerals.
19:07.581 --> 19:09.183
[SPEAKER_01]: All the major events happened.
19:09.924 --> 19:13.508
[SPEAKER_01]: As San Bartolome church, conducted by Father Mallory,
19:14.737 --> 19:18.430
[SPEAKER_01]: Imagine a typical victim, maybe a middle-aged farmer.
19:18.490 --> 19:25.776
[SPEAKER_01]: He's concerned about his daughter's upcoming marriage, and wants to ask Father Molly to perform the ceremony.
19:26.971 --> 19:33.521
[SPEAKER_01]: So he walks to the parish house one morning, asked to speak with the Padre, Malorie invites him in.
19:35.003 --> 19:39.730
[SPEAKER_01]: That farmer probably felt honored that the priest would take time to speak with him personally.
19:41.112 --> 19:43.976
[SPEAKER_01]: He probably confided things he wouldn't tell anyone else.
19:44.838 --> 19:51.848
[SPEAKER_01]: Family troubles, worries about the harvest, fears about whether he could provide an adequate
19:53.043 --> 20:01.758
[SPEAKER_01]: and then father Maulari in the grip of delusion, convinced this farmer was one of the witches, cursing his mother, killed him.
20:04.704 --> 20:17.987
[SPEAKER_01]: Or maybe a young mother, who came to have her infant baptized, or an elderly widow seeking last rights for her dying husband, or a teenage boy who served as an alter assistant at Mass,
20:19.317 --> 20:26.484
[SPEAKER_01]: We're imagining these victims because we have to, because Spanish authorities couldn't be bothered to document their actual identities.
20:27.966 --> 20:34.232
[SPEAKER_01]: What we do know is this, over 10 years, 57 people from Mangalang disappeared.
20:34.252 --> 20:41.759
[SPEAKER_01]: 57 families experienced the special torture of not knowing what happened to someone they loved.
20:43.080 --> 20:44.202
[SPEAKER_01]: Did their father run away?
20:45.042 --> 20:46.264
[SPEAKER_01]: Was their daughter kidnapped?
20:47.124 --> 20:48.666
[SPEAKER_01]: Did their husband abandon them?
20:49.861 --> 20:51.724
[SPEAKER_01]: but not knowing must have been agonizing.
20:52.406 --> 20:55.291
[SPEAKER_01]: An unlike cases today, there was no investigation.
20:56.092 --> 20:58.838
[SPEAKER_01]: No missing persons report, no search party.
21:00.220 --> 21:04.949
[SPEAKER_01]: Spanish colonial law enforcement barely existed in rural areas, like Mangalang.
21:06.331 --> 21:13.725
[SPEAKER_01]: If people vanished, well, that was unfortunate, but hardly with Spanish authorities time to investigate.
21:15.089 --> 21:17.654
[SPEAKER_01]: So those families just lived with it.
21:18.756 --> 21:22.663
[SPEAKER_01]: With the absence, with the questions, maybe whispers from neighbors.
21:23.124 --> 21:25.929
[SPEAKER_01]: Did you hear the riots family lost their son last month?
21:26.490 --> 21:27.232
[SPEAKER_01]: Just disappeared.
21:28.133 --> 21:31.700
[SPEAKER_01]: And before that, the widow who lived near the market, she vanished too.
21:32.882 --> 21:35.427
[SPEAKER_01]: Strange things happening in Mangalang,
21:36.672 --> 21:38.113
[SPEAKER_01]: for 10 years this went on.
21:39.455 --> 21:47.042
[SPEAKER_01]: Until December 20th, 1825, when enough families finally gathered the courage to formally accuse their priest.
21:48.463 --> 21:57.632
[SPEAKER_01]: Even after Mala Reza rest, even after his confession to 57 murders, Spanish authorities still never bothered to identify the victims.
21:59.113 --> 22:01.976
[SPEAKER_01]: Never matched missing persons to the bloodstained clothing.
22:03.337 --> 22:06.240
[SPEAKER_01]: Never gave those families the closure
22:07.452 --> 22:11.896
[SPEAKER_01]: because to Spanish colonial Philippines, Filipino lives were disposable.
22:14.939 --> 22:18.503
[SPEAKER_01]: We're going to try to honor those 57 souls throughout this episode.
22:19.364 --> 22:22.267
[SPEAKER_01]: We can't name them, we can't tell their specific stories.
22:23.548 --> 22:25.630
[SPEAKER_01]: But we can refuse to let them be erased.
22:26.971 --> 22:35.940
[SPEAKER_01]: We can insist that their murders mattered that their lives had value and that the families who lost them deserved better than the bureaucratic indifference.
22:37.237 --> 22:53.777
[SPEAKER_01]: 57 people, 57 souls, 57 lives that should have been lived fully, ended by a man suffering from untreated mental illness, in a system that didn't care enough about Filipino lives to intervene.
22:56.626 --> 23:03.115
[SPEAKER_01]: After the family's filed their report on December 20, 1825, an actual investigation began.
23:03.175 --> 23:08.383
[SPEAKER_01]: But understand, this wasn't CSI colonial Philippines.
23:09.224 --> 23:19.579
[SPEAKER_01]: Law enforcement in rural Papenga, in 1825, consisted of the gobernatorcio, the town mayor, who had limited authority and even less training.
23:20.842 --> 23:24.326
[SPEAKER_01]: The families who filed the complaint told a consistent story.
23:25.167 --> 23:34.138
[SPEAKER_01]: Their loved ones had gone to see father Malorie, to request baptisms, to arrange marriages, to seek confession, and never returned.
23:35.520 --> 23:41.988
[SPEAKER_01]: Different families, different dates, same pattern, all trails ending at the parish house.
23:43.129 --> 23:50.578
[SPEAKER_01]: But investigating a Catholic priest required special permission,
23:51.436 --> 23:53.279
[SPEAKER_01]: formal inquiries had to be made.
23:54.101 --> 23:56.344
[SPEAKER_01]: This wasn't a process that moved quickly.
23:57.827 --> 24:16.819
[SPEAKER_01]: So mother re-remained in his position continued his duties for months, until February 1826 when he fell ill. As suspicions grew within the community, it was a child's discovery by local farmer that finally led to maloris undoing.
24:17.052 --> 24:27.549
[SPEAKER_00]: While searching for a lost water buffalo in the dense forest outside Mabalachat, the farmer stumbled upon a cave containing various items that had been reported stolen from the murder victims.
24:28.891 --> 24:35.942
[SPEAKER_00]: The Spanish authorities already under pressure to solve the mounting number of murders, immediately launched a more focused investigation.
24:37.205 --> 24:40.630
[SPEAKER_00]: They began by quietly monitoring the movements of several suspects.
24:41.622 --> 24:47.048
[SPEAKER_00]: Breakthrough came when investigators noticed Malari's spending habits didn't match his official income.
24:48.249 --> 24:56.117
[SPEAKER_00]: Further scrutiny revealed that Malari had been selling valuable items in neighbouring towns, items that were later identified as belonging to murder victims.
24:57.239 --> 25:05.227
[SPEAKER_00]: Witnesses from those towns, feeling safe or speaking about someone from a different community, came forward with detailed descriptions of their dealings with him.
25:06.308 --> 25:10.853
[SPEAKER_00]: A pattern emerged showing Malari's presence in these markets shortly after each murder,
25:12.200 --> 25:18.818
[SPEAKER_01]: By mid-1826, enough evidence existed to formally arrest father Juan Savarino Malari.
25:20.022 --> 25:21.406
[SPEAKER_01]: The blood stained belongings.
25:22.308 --> 25:24.775
[SPEAKER_01]: The family's testimony about disappearances.
25:25.801 --> 25:33.149
[SPEAKER_01]: Malauree's own increasingly erratic behavior, the hallucinations during mass that multiple witnesses had observed.
25:34.450 --> 25:40.817
[SPEAKER_01]: When authorities questioned him, Malauree confessed, not with for more, with explanation.
25:41.738 --> 25:54.812
[SPEAKER_01]: He told them about his mother's illness, about the curse he believed afflicted her, about identifying the 57 witches who had cursed her.
25:56.935 --> 26:00.720
[SPEAKER_01]: Imagine being the constabulari official, taking that confession.
26:00.780 --> 26:14.997
[SPEAKER_01]: This Catholic priest, educated at the University of Santo Tomás, homely explaining that he murdered 57 of his parishioners, because invisible forces told him they were witches, cursing his mother.
26:16.519 --> 26:20.243
[SPEAKER_01]: Describing murders that spanned 10 years with disturbing clarity.
26:21.590 --> 26:31.705
[SPEAKER_01]: and imagine being one of those families who filed the original complaint, finally getting confirmation that yes, you're missing loved one head gone to follow Mollary.
26:32.826 --> 26:34.989
[SPEAKER_01]: And yes, Mollary had killed them.
26:36.111 --> 26:38.454
[SPEAKER_01]: And no, there was no rational reason.
26:39.676 --> 26:50.652
[SPEAKER_01]: Just the delusional beliefs of a man experiencing severe, untreated psychosis, an assistant that should have recognized his mental illness, and intervened years earlier.
26:50.632 --> 26:56.929
[SPEAKER_01]: The arrest happened in 1826 with the legal process which just beginning.
26:59.305 --> 27:08.057
[SPEAKER_00]: Trial of one Severino Mallari, a game in late 1816, during unprecedented attention from across the Spanish colonial territory.
27:09.018 --> 27:21.955
[SPEAKER_00]: The proceedings conducted in the colonial court of Pampanga, multi-significant moment in Philippine judicial history, not only for the brutality of the crimes, but for the meticulous way evidence was preserved.
27:21.935 --> 27:25.700
[SPEAKER_00]: Day after day, prosecutors methodically laid out their case against Malauri.
27:26.481 --> 27:29.225
[SPEAKER_00]: They presented the bloodstained clothing found in his cellar.
27:30.026 --> 27:36.415
[SPEAKER_00]: The detailed ledger containing victim information, and the stolen items recovered from both his home and the cave.
27:37.537 --> 27:47.250
[SPEAKER_00]: The prosecution also called numerous witnesses, including merchants who had purchased goods from Malauri, and neighbours who had noticed his suspicious behaviour following the murders.
27:47.230 --> 27:54.483
[SPEAKER_00]: Particularly damning was the testimony of surviving family members who identified personal belongings found in Malauri's possession.
27:55.745 --> 28:08.327
[SPEAKER_00]: These intimate items, family heirlooms, personal documents and religious artefacts, painted a picture of a man who not only killed for profit, but seemed to take pleasure in maintaining trophies from his victims.
28:09.455 --> 28:15.828
[SPEAKER_00]: The defense attempted to portray Mallory as a respected community leader who had been framed by jealous rivals.
28:16.950 --> 28:21.921
[SPEAKER_00]: They argued that his position made him an easy target for those seeking to destroy his reputation.
28:23.043 --> 28:30.298
[SPEAKER_00]: However, the defense struggled to explain the overwhelming physical evidence and the detailed nature of Mallory's own written records.
28:31.628 --> 28:34.151
[SPEAKER_01]: Historical records do confirm there was a trial.
28:35.213 --> 28:43.584
[SPEAKER_01]: There was physical evidence including the blood stained belongings, and there were witness testimonies from people who had observed Mala Rees erratic behavior.
28:44.645 --> 28:45.907
[SPEAKER_01]: That much is documented.
28:46.768 --> 28:55.780
[SPEAKER_01]: We also know for certain that Mala Rees confessed to 57 murders, explaining his delusional belief about witches cursing his mother.
28:57.127 --> 29:01.815
[SPEAKER_01]: the evidence was overwhelming, and the colonial court found him guilty.
29:04.139 --> 29:10.590
[SPEAKER_01]: After his conviction in 1826, Juan Severino Malore wasn't executed immediately.
29:10.630 --> 29:13.836
[SPEAKER_01]: He spent 14 years in prison.
29:14.930 --> 29:20.456
[SPEAKER_01]: 14 years between his arrest in 1826 and his execution in 1840.
29:21.958 --> 29:22.618
[SPEAKER_01]: Why the delay?
29:23.860 --> 29:27.984
[SPEAKER_01]: The colonial legal system had to refer his case to higher authorities.
29:29.246 --> 29:32.189
[SPEAKER_01]: A Filipino priest convicted of 57 murders.
29:33.050 --> 29:34.451
[SPEAKER_01]: This was unprecedented.
29:35.773 --> 29:44.262
[SPEAKER_01]: The case went through multiple levels of review, appeals, bureaucratic processing,
29:45.592 --> 30:05.727
[SPEAKER_01]: think about those families, the loved ones were murdered between 1816 and 1825, they filed their complaint in December 1825, Molloree was arrested in 1826, and then they had to wait 14 more years to see justice carried out.
30:06.989 --> 30:15.818
[SPEAKER_01]: 14 years of knowing their family members killer was alive, in prison, yes, but alive, while their loved one was gone.
30:18.464 --> 30:27.438
[SPEAKER_01]: Finally, in 1840, Wands of Arena Mallory was hanged at Boogam Field, today Lunetta Park and Manila.
30:28.701 --> 30:30.083
[SPEAKER_01]: He was 55 years old.
30:31.325 --> 30:38.877
[SPEAKER_01]: He spent the last 14 years of his life in prison, still experiencing the psychotic delusions that had driven him to murder.
30:40.299 --> 30:45.147
[SPEAKER_01]: He died the first Filipino priest ever executed by Spanish colonial authorities,
30:46.291 --> 31:04.840
[SPEAKER_01]: 32 years later, in 1872, three more Filipino priests, Father's Mariano Gomez, Jose Burgos, and Jacinto Zamora, known collectively, as Gombra's up, would be executed by Spanish authorities for allegedly inspiring a revolt.
31:06.082 --> 31:09.447
[SPEAKER_01]: Their executions would help spark the Philippine Revolution,
31:10.591 --> 31:11.873
[SPEAKER_01]: but Mallory was first.
31:13.174 --> 31:33.578
[SPEAKER_01]: First Filipino priest, arrested for violent crimes, first executed, a man whose severe mental illness should have been treated, whose crimes could have been prevented if Spanish colonial authorities had cared enough about Filipino lives to recognize the warning signs and intervene.
31:37.709 --> 31:55.093
[SPEAKER_01]: Everything about Maularee's behavior, the hallucinations during mass, the conversations with invisible figures, the elaborate delusional system about curses and witches, these weren't theological questions or folk belief, this was severe untreated psychosis.
31:55.073 --> 31:59.138
[SPEAKER_01]: A medical condition that required psychiatric intervention.
32:00.559 --> 32:03.322
[SPEAKER_01]: Spain had the knowledge and facilities to treat mental illness.
32:04.424 --> 32:09.830
[SPEAKER_01]: The Hospycio de Hose and Manila was operational before mother-read crimes even began.
32:11.131 --> 32:20.001
[SPEAKER_01]: But psychiatric care and colonial Philippines was reserved for Spanish citizens and maybe wealthy Filipinos with connections.
32:19.981 --> 32:31.257
[SPEAKER_01]: A parish priest in rural Papanga, experiencing psychotic breaks, no one recognized it as illness requiring treatment, no one intervened.
32:32.266 --> 32:38.115
[SPEAKER_01]: If Mauleree had been Spanish born, would authorities have noticed his deteriorating mental state earlier?
32:39.317 --> 32:43.182
[SPEAKER_01]: Would they have removed him from his parish position and provided treatment?
32:44.464 --> 32:51.034
[SPEAKER_01]: We can't know for certain, but the pattern of colonial medicine suggests the answer is probably yes.
32:52.381 --> 33:02.354
[SPEAKER_00]: In modern Filipino criminology studies, the Mallari case is often cited as a watershed moment in the development of forensic investigation techniques in Southeast Asia.
33:03.275 --> 33:06.919
[SPEAKER_00]: The case continues to fascinate true crime enthusiasts and historians alike.
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[SPEAKER_00]: With several books and academic papers published on the subject in recent decades,
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[SPEAKER_00]: Despite the centuries that have passed, the case of Shwann Severino Malari remains a cautionary tale about the abuse of power and the importance of robust systems of justice.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Somewhere in Papanga, there are descendants of those 57 victims, people who grew up hearing family stories, about a great-great-grandparent, who vanished mysteriously in the 1820s.
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[SPEAKER_01]: People who've inherited the trauma of not knowing what happened to their ancestor.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Those descendants deserve to know their family members death mattered.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Their ancestors' life had value.
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[SPEAKER_01]: That we haven't forgotten them, even if we can't name them,
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[SPEAKER_01]: Once a arena-mollary story is ultimately a story of multiple failures, the failure to recognize and treat severe mental illness, the failure of colonial law enforcement to protect vulnerable people, the failure of Spanish authorities to value Filipino lives enough to record their names.
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[SPEAKER_01]: But most of all, it's the story of 57 people whose lives were ended and then erased by a system that didn't care.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Their stories matter and they deserve to be remembered.
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[SPEAKER_01]: This has been Fowl Play, where we tell stories from history's darkest moments, to honor the victims who deserve to be remembered.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Next week we'll continue season 36, serial killers in history, with another case of power, madness, and the victims erased from the historical record.
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[SPEAKER_01]: If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe to Fowl Play wherever you listen to podcasts, and leave a review.
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[SPEAKER_01]: It helps other crime listeners discover the show, until next time, remember, everyone deserves to have their story told.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Even when history tries to erase them.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Thanks for listening, friend.
