Located in the Virgin Islands, the island of St. Croix is one of the many popular vacation destinations in the Caribbean Sea. With its warm weather, beautiful scenery, and array of beaches, St. Croix bills itself as a paradise.

In the 1980s, however, some believe the devil invaded paradise as five people died of cyanide poisoning. The victims were linked by an underground form of witchcraft prevalent in the Caribbean culture.

The St. Croix Cyanide Victims

Voodoo is a widely practiced ritual and religion throughout the Caribbean. It is a blend of Roman Catholicism and African traditions. Contrary to popular belief, there is nothing inherently sinister about Voodoo.

The hexes, curses, potions, and effigy dolls traditionally associated with Voodoo are more practiced in the realm of Obeah, also spelled Obia or Obiya, an underground form of sorcery founded in Jamaica during the seventeenth century. Obeah, unconnected to Voodoo, is popular in many parts of the Caribbean.

During the 1980s, St. Croix was one of the locales in which Obeah was prevalent.

An Illustration of an Obeah Figure

On the morning of May 24, 1984, a girl on her way to school in St. Croix came upon a car that appeared to have run off the road. She found a man’s body hunched behind the wheel.

The victim was identified as thirty-eight-year-old Haig Caesar, who lived less than a mile away. He had resided in St. Croix for ten years after emigrating from Dominica, an island country approximately two-hundred-eighty miles to the southeast. He appeared to have been dead for several hours. Nothing at the scene suggested a struggle or foul play. An autopsy showed he had died from cyanide poisoning.

Haig’s friends told police he had contacted a man who may have been operating in Obeah. He had told some of his friends, but not his wife, Rosmund, that the man said three coins of great monetary value were buried on the couple’s property but were guarded by ancient spirits. For the coins to be obtained, the spirits needed to be banished, which the Obeah man claimed he could do through a ceremony of manipulating voodoo rituals . . . for the sum of $100,000. The value of the buried coins, Obeah man claimed, would far eclipse his service fee.

Unbeknownst to Rosmund, her husband withdrew money from their bank account and borrowed more money from several friends. He is believed to have given $100,000, in cash, to the Obeah man.

Police believe on the evening of May 23, 1984, Haig Caesar was sent to a venue where the Obeah man said the coins were buried. Once there, Haig was told to drink a potion which would drive away the evil spirits guarding the coins. Instead, the potion was a lethal dose of cyanide.

Haig Caesar

Two years later, Edsel Striden and Carmen Torres took out a loan to expand their small neighborhood bar. They converted the loan into $54,000 cash.

At dusk on September 13, 1986, Edsel and Carmen left their home in Edsel’s pickup with the money. Their daughter recalled her father’s slipping a small bottle into his pocket before leaving.

Three hours later, a barely breathing Carmen was found lying on a beach, drenched in seawater. She died shortly after being transported to the hospital. At approximately the same time, Edsel was found dead in his truck on another nearby beach. His shorts, the only item of clothing he was wearing, were also soaked with seawater.

Carmen and Edsel had also been killed by cyanide poisoning. The $54,000 in cash was gone.

Edsel Streiden And Carmen Torres

Each of their parents had been born in India, but Kristhnadeth and Rada Maharaj were both born in the Caribbean. The married couple owned a small grocery store which they ran with the help of Rada’s two daughters from her first marriage. During the summer of 1988, they took out a loan to expand their store but soon encountered financial problems.

Rada’s daughters say their stepfather then began receiving phone calls from an unknown man. Whenever he called, Krtisthnadeth asked his step-daughters to leave the room.

In October, the Maharaj’s borrowed $25,000 from Rada’s family. Rada told her daughters they had to pay the money to a particular man but would not tell them the reason.

At approximately 7:00 p.m. on November 18, 1988, Rada left her home in her car, driving east. Her daughters found this strange, because she rarely left her home alone, especially during the evening. Half an hour later, Krtisthnadeth, without any explanation, drove off in the opposite direction.

Shortly before 9:00 Rada’s car was seen coasting out of control near a local beach before crashing into a fence. The area was less than a half-mile from where Carmen Torres had been found two years earlier.

When police arrived on the scene, Rada was unconscious and near death. Also akin to Carmen Torres two years earlier, her dress was soaked in seawater, and she died en route to the hospital.

Sixteen miles away, Kristhnadeth was found lying on the side of a beachfront road. He, like Edsel Striden two years earlier, was wearing only a pair of shorts which had also been saturated with sea water.

The Maharaj’s autopsies revealed they, too, had each succumbed to cyanide poisoning. The $25,000 the couple had left their home with, was, not surprisingly, gone.

Kristhnadeth and Rada Maharaj

St. Croix Police believe the five murders are connected, the doing of a con man practicing Obeah, cloaked under the more reputable guise of Voodoo. The man lures his victims with promises of financial gains only to rob and kill them through a lethal potion of cyanide. Investigators believe the killer probably knew all of the victims, their financial status, and their vulnerability.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, a man fitting the profile was said to travel throughout the Caribbean and into the continental United States as he was rumored to have been in Florida. He is a dark-skinned black man who spoke with a heavy French West Indian accent.

No clues surfaced to the man’s identity and police did not have enough information to produce a composite sketch.

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/126356908/haig-gilbey-caesar

 

The St. Croix Cyanide Killer Is Still Unknown

SOURCES:
• Miami Herald
• Unsolved Mysteries