The Mystical Killings of Lonco Luan:

** (Content Warning: This article contains detailed descriptions of violence, including the deaths of children, as well as themes of cultural trauma and psychological distress. Reader discretion is advised, particularly for those sensitive to such topics.)

In August 1978, in the remote Patagonian highlands of Argentina, a Mapuche community led by a spiritual figure named Lonco Juan “Lonco”, meaning chief or leader in the Mapuche language, carried out a ritual that turned into a deadly episode. Believing several members of their group were possessed by evil spirits, they killed a woman and three children in what they believed was a collective exorcism. Argentine authorities ultimately declared the accused not criminally responsible due to a state of mystical trance and cultural alienation.

A Ritual Turns Deadly

Between August 22 and 27, 1978, in the high plains near Lake Aluminé in Neuquén Province, the Catalán Painitrul Mapuche community gathered for a faith-healing ceremony to cure a young woman named Sara Catalán. She was suffering from severe illness and unable to reach the nearest hospital due to the remote location and lack of transportation.

Turning to spiritual resources, the community that had recently incorporated apocalyptic Pentecostal beliefs called upon Ricardo Painitrul, a community member trained as a spiritual guide by Casimiro Maliqueo, a traveling evangelist. Maliqueo had introduced an end-times version of Pentecostalism to Mapuche livestock herders during the seasonal grazing periods, known locally as verandas.

Painitrul, invoking both biblical and ancestral elements, led a ritual based on faith-healing practices. Witnesses later described how Sara, during the ceremony, suddenly stood up, eyes shut, and arms raised, proclaiming herself to be Jesus Christ. Painitrul interpreted this as a sign of demonic possession. The ceremony spiraled into violence.

A Chain of “Possessions”

The participants, in a collective trance, struck Sara repeatedly with wooden canes native to the region (cañas de colihue), as well as a Bible. When she did not recover, they used a metal rod to strike her head, killing her. Believing the demon had moved to her 11-year-old daughter Carmen Emilia, the group beat the child to death during a second exorcism. Two more children, five-year-old Héctor Efraín and two-year-old Irma Graciela, also died from blunt force trauma as the ritual continued over the following days.

The sequence of deaths only stopped when a neighbor, passing nearby, saw Sara’s body with a disfigured face and alerted police and border patrol officers (Gendarmería Nacional). They arrived to find the community in trance, murmuring chants and huddled in silence. One doctor who accompanied the officers described the scene as resembling “a hive of bees.”

Inside the Mind of the Ritual

Those who participated later described visions of black dogs, snakes, witches, and colorful auras around the “possessed.” Police found a young woman, Sara’s sister, hiding in fear, having been accused of being a witch. Another teenager, José Ramón Ñanco, managed to escape after being beaten and accused of harboring a demon that wanted to kill his mother.

Psychological and psychiatric evaluations concluded that the participants were not mentally ill, nor under the influence of drugs or alcohol. Instead, they had entered a collective mystical trance, influenced by a fusion of indigenous beliefs and Pentecostal end-time theology, commonly referred to in Spanish as milenarismo —a doctrine centered on the imminent end of the world and the active struggle between divine and demonic forces.

A Collision of Cultures

Anthropologists and forensic experts identified the event as the result of acculturation, the forced blending or replacement of cultural traditions. In this case, ancestral Mapuche spirituality was being overwritten by a new, uncontextualized evangelical belief system introduced by outsiders, such as Maliqueo.

The Mapuche had historically relied on machis (traditional healers or shamans) to guide them through spiritual matters. However, in this case, Painitrul was thrust into that role with only fragmented teachings and no grounding in the traditional structure. The result was chaos.

In interviews, the community spoke of “spirits, black magic, and signs of the apocalypse”, unable to distinguish between spiritual metaphor and physical reality. Many didn’t remember their actions clearly, only visions, colors, and emotions.

The Legal Aftermath

Judge Arturo Simonelli, recognizing the unprecedented nature of the case, ordered a series of psychiatric, psychological, and anthropological evaluations. The Argentine Penal Code at the time still treated Indigenous individuals as having “diminished criminal responsibility.” That outdated clause became a legal foothold for the defense.

Experts concluded the community acted out of sincere belief, unable to comprehend the criminality of their actions. In December 1979, the court ruled that the accused were not criminally responsible due to a state of trance (what the law referred to as inimputabilidad por éxtasis místico colectivo).

However, the group was still considered dangerous and was held in custody until 1983. They received no cultural or psychological rehabilitation. Over time, the adults returned to rural work and the children entered public schooling, but the trauma lingered.

An Evangelist’s Responsibility

Casimiro Maliqueo, the man who introduced the Pentecostal teachings, defended himself before the courts. He admitted to training Painitrul and organizing prayer meetings but maintained that the killings occurred because “the courts don’t believe in the existence of the devil.”

Yet experts like anthropologist Beatriz Kalinsky, who later published an academic study titled The Concept of Criminal Responsibility in the So-Called Massacre of Lonco Luan, criticized the introduction of a dogmatic belief system into a vulnerable, isolated Indigenous community. Pentecostalism, she argued, had not replaced Mapuche cosmology; it had fused with it in dangerous and unpredictable ways.

Nearly 50 years later, the events of Lonco Juan’s community remain a painful and largely forgotten episode. While the killings were horrific, many scholars and human rights advocates see the perpetrators as victims of cultural erosion, spiritual abandonment, and institutional neglect.

They were not monsters. They were a community caught in a crisis of faith, identity, and survival, one where tragedy became inevitable when belief systems clashed without guidance or understanding.