Mariam Soulakiotis

Rare card · No. 37684

Abbess Mariam Soulakiotis (c. 1883 – 23 November 1954), née Marina Soulakiotou, also known either to her followers as Mariam of Keratea, or in contemporary media pejoratively as "Mother Rasputin", was a Greek Old Calendarist Orthodox abbess and serial killer who was found guilty of numerous counts of murder, fraud and other crimes, which public prosecutors of the Kingdom of Greece alleged she committed against both laypeople and other nuns in her abbey between 1939 and her arrest in December 1950. During the time period of the crimes she was convicted of, Soulakiotis was neither a member of the mainstream Greek Orthodox Church nor in communion with the other, larger Old Calendarist group (the "Florinites")—she was a devoted follower of Archbishop Matthew Karpathakis of Vresthena, whom both groups consider a schismatic. Greek civil authorities first arrested Soulakiotis on two charges unrelated to serial murder: export of olive oil to Cyprus and import of tires after a large raid on her...

Read on Wikipedia · Image A.P. Photo published 26 Jan 1951, author not identified., Public domain