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Her name is Maria del Socorro Rodriguez and, if a man is smart, he’ll run away from the alter as fast as he can. To marry the widow Rodriguez can spell death.
The plot began to unfold in January. An insurance company became suspicious after paying a $150,000 death claim on Rodri-guez. The casket was exhumed and was found to be full of a variety of items, none of them the body of the dearly departed. Police only discovered a variety of stones, boards, rocks, flow-ers and newspapers.
And so the investigation expanded.
Next police dug up the grave of Rodriguez’s sister, Maria del Consuelo. The two Maria’s had a few things in common: 1) Life insurance claims made after their untimely demise and 2) the stuff found in their coffins.
And so it expanded some more.
Additional investigation revealed that the widow Rodriguez was, in all, a widow seven times over. Her spouses had a few things in common as well: 1) Each was dead, 2) each was an American and 3) each had named Rodriguez as the beneficiary on life insurance policies. Either the widow was the unluckiest bride in the universe—or—there was more going on that needed further investigating.
So more investigation ensued.
The first unfortunate husband, Douglas Lapine Burgess of Mas-sachusetts, was reported to have died from natural causes.
The second, Thomas Bernard Prixon, met his fate in an attack on the couple in their own home.
Numero tres, James Richard Piper, suffered a fatal car accid-ent.
Husbands four, five and six were all friends of the first three and their deaths are now being re-investigated.
And another interesting tidbit: The funeral director who handled the burials of the two Maria’s was murdered just a few weeks after the “death” of Rodriguez.
Do you think? Could it have been? The answers lie with the two Maria’s—but with the half million in insurance proceeds, it may be awhile before the Mexican police catch up to the gal so aptly dubbed, “The Black Widow.”
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