Fictional Murders: La Llorona

There once was a beautiful Hispanic woman who lived somewhere in either Mexico or the Southwest of the U.S.A. After her husband died she had believed that she would never fall in love again. She believed that nobody would love her because she already had children.

She met a man and hid the fact that she had children from him. She knew that he wouldn't stay with her because of them. But she could not keep the secret forever so she admitted to him to have children. He gave her a hard ultimatum. It was either him or the children. She loved this man and did not want to be alone. So she did what she thought was best.

She went on a stroll with the children. They walked by the river and they didn't know why, but she did. She then drowned her children one by one. After the horrible deed, she went straight to her lover. She told him what she had done and the children wouldn't be a burden on them.

Horrified he rejected her. He didn't want her to murder the children, but to give them up.

This was when she realized what she had done. That she should have never chosen a man over her own children. She went to the same place she drowned the children and committed suicide by drowning. She was hoping to see them in her next life and live together in heaven. When she got to the gates of heaven they barred her. In order to come into heaven, she would have to find her children's souls.

Now she walks the night weeping loudly for her children. She searches all over for them. It had been so long that she doesn't remember what they looked like. Whenever she happens upon a lone child she thinks that they are one of hers. She then drags that child to the nearest body of water and drowns them when she realizes that they aren't one of hers.

There are other variations of this story.

Some say La Llorona had drowned her own children in a jealous rage. In order to get back at her husband for either stepping out on her or paying too much attention to the children. She then drowns herself.  In this version, she searches for her children in order to go to heaven or because she regrets it.

In others, it's the husband who kills their children by drowning them. They didn't have enough money to feed all of their children. After La Llorona found out she had drowned herself in the same body of water her children were killed in. What is known is that she wanders trying to find her children.

The legend is used as a warning to children in a form of curfew and not wander by bodies of water at night.

SOURCES:
Wikipedia
Legends of America