Commit murder, on prison release write successful murder mysteries. Almost a cliché of truth stranger than —. But the background story of Anne Perry’s folie a deux with her childhood friend, Pauline Parker, which ended in the brutal death of Parker’s mother when both were fifteen is even stranger.
Living in New Zealand, the two school girls formed an intense bond which included an elaborate fantasy life about which they wrote plays and books. They invented their own personal religion, with their own ideas on morality, rejected Christianity and worshipped their own saints, envisioning a parallel dimension called The Fourth World, essentially their version of Heaven, which offered spiritual enlightenment. By their account, they achieved this spiritual enlightenment because of their friendship. Perry would become ill and withdrawn if Parker was not with her.
Perry’s parents ran into difficulties and decided to leave New Zealand. Heartbroken at the prospect of being separated, the teenagers decided that killing Parker’s mother would allow them to be together. Their long term plan was to head to Hollywood or New York City, where they would publish their writing and work in film.
They bludgeoned her over the head with a brick twenty times, were caught and sentenced to five years imprisonment and never saw each other again. Perry lived in the USA, became a Mormon, moved to Scotland, started publishing award-winning murder mysteries in her forties and her background only became known when Peter Jackson’s 1994 well-received film Heavenly Creatures was released in 1994 when she was in her late fifties.
Anne Perry born 28 October 1938 was a Sun Scorpio square Pluto; with Mercury, North Node also in Scorpio opposition Uranus conjunct the South Node square Jupiter in Aquarius. Certainly intense and controlling/possessive but not short of confidence with a focal point Jupiter.
When the murder was committed on 22 June 1954, tr Pluto was on the opposition to her Jupiter pumping up her boldness to a degree where she felt she couldn’t lose; with her Solar Arc Pluto square her North Node exactly (tugging on her Mercury opposition Uranus).
Pauline Parker, 28 May 1938, was a Sun Gemini with Mercury, Moon, Uranus in Taurus and her South Node also in Taurus was conjunct Algol. When the murder took place her Mars in Gemini was being stoked up by tr Neptune trine and tr Pluto sextile; with an exact head-in the-clouds Solar Arc Jupiter opposition Neptune. And tr Pluto heading to square her North Node in the aftermath.
Their synastry, without birth times, is not noteworthy. But their relationship chart is. There was an over-confident composite Sun opposition Jupiter square North Node, which was being ramped up to boundless proportions in 1954 by tr Pluto magnifying the effect. The composite Sun was was in a competitive, over-excitable conjunction to Mars and square Uranus, provoking them to seek thrills and excitement. Venus was in an illusory, can-be-delusional, spiritual-yearnings conjunction to Neptune in a wide yod to Saturn sextile Mercury. A fated connection.
Pluto in hard aspect to the North Node either by transit or Solar Arc repeats in these instances – dark Lord of the underworld clashing with the spirit of the age. It also recurs in a recent modern murder case – but that is still on trial so will have to wait a dissection.
Gemini and Scorpio seem an odd combination but is often found in thrill-seeking partnerships, where Gemini’s wish to walk on the dark side chimes with Scorpio’s depths.
“Gemini and Scorpio seem an odd combination but is often found in thrill-seeking partnerships, where Gemini’s wish to walk on the dark side chimes with Scorpio’s depths.”
Thank you Marjorie and an interesting point. Indeed, this combination occurred also in the case of Richard Loeb and Nathan Leopold, two wealthy students – Loeb an unaspected Gemini Sun conjunct Pluto was thought to have been the dominant of the two and Leopold (who was in love with Loeb), a Scorpio Sun. They kidnapped and killed a 14 year old boy, Bobby Franks, simply to prove to themselves that they could carry out the perfect crime due to their shared fantasy of intellectual supremacy. Loeb, who was killed by a fellow inmate in jail also had Saturn conjunct his South Node, whereas Leopold had Pluto squaring his nodal axis. Hitchcock later made Patrick Hamilton’s play about the murderers, ‘Rope’ into a film.
The Papin sisters, Christine and Léa murdered their employer’s wife and daughter in February of 1933. Their parents had an unhappy marriage and both girls were eventually sent to an orphanage in Le Mans, France and employed as live-in housemaids to a retired solicitor and his wife and daughter. Unfortunately, the wife developed mental illness and it was claimed became critical the sisters’ work, scolding and physically attacking them. The murders were planned and extremely bloody, the rage and violence all too apparent in the way the bodies were mutilated. Christine was a Pisces Sun and Léa a Virgo, but marked in Léa’s chart is her Mars, Moon and Pluto in Gemini square her Sun/Venus in Virgo. Christine however, the elder of the two has a quincunx of Pluto in Gemini and Mars in Scorpio. Moreover Christine’s Pisces Sun squares Pluto and also squares Léa’s Viro Sun. (Their father was alleged to have rapec their older sister Emilia when the girl was just 9.) Léa fared better in prison than Christine and was released after 8 years, but Christine suffered from deep depression and was eventually sent to an institution in Rennes, refused to eat, wasted away and died.
The Slenderman attemted murderers in the US, Anissa Weier and Morgan Geyser were both 12 years old in May, 2014, the time of the attempted killing of another young girl, inspired by their obsession with Slenderman, a sinister mythical figure on the creepy pasta website, a modern, internet based creation. Anissa is a Scorpio Sun square Uranus in Aqua, but she also has Pluto in Sag opposition Saturn in Gemini with her North Node at the 29th degree of Gemini. Morgan has her Taurus Sun on Algol but with a stellium in Gemini of Mercury, Saturn, Mars, Venus and North Node.
Thank you. It’s fascinating to see the astrology of Anne/Juliet and Pauline. I look forward to your discussion of the modern murder.
My understanding is that the two women later were (or are) “secretly” living near each other in the north of England or Scotland, with disguised identities.
Really? That’s very interesting. I thought Pauline was running a riding school in rural England and the two hadn’t met since they were trialled as teenagers. Did you hear this in the news?
Thanks for doing this one Marjorie. I had been reading about her and wondering about the question of why so many youngsters (even today) think that they can solve their own problems by killing somone else. Looking forward to the pending dissection.