The blonde bombshell & Satan’s curse
What caused the collision that killed Hollywood star Jayne Mansfield?
At a Black Mass, she stretched naked across the altar
Her name had shone in lights above cinemas worldwide. She’d been on 500 magazine covers. And in 1960, more words were printed about US film star Jayne Mansfield than anyone else alive at the time.
Newspapers detailed her alleged affairs with directors, politicians, actors… They covered her album releases, discussed her meeting with the Queen, and when she bared all for Playboy.
Then, in 1967, Jayne Mansfield got her biggest headline – she was dead, killed in a car crash at just 34.
On 29 June, she and her boyfriend Sam Brody had been at Gus Stevens Supper Club in Biloxi, Mississippi.
They left after midnight, and headed for New Orleans in their chauffeur-driven Buick Electra.
Little more than two hours later, their car crashed into the back of a trailer on US Highway 90.
Jayne, Sam and their 20-year-old chauffeur Ronnie Harrison were killed.
Some journalists reported the car had run under the trailer, and that Jayne had been decapitated.
It seemed Ronnie had been speeding and hadn’t noticed the mosquitofogger on the roadside, chugging out a dense cloud of insecticide across the fields.
And he hadn’t noticed the trailer ahead slowing down because of it.
Straightaway, questions were asked – why hadn’t there been any lights or signs alerting drivers to the fogging that night on Highway 90?
And what happened to the trailer driver? It seemed he’d been allowed to leave after the accident, hadn’t been questioned by the police.
Rumours started to circulate. Tragic accident…or foul play? Had the signs been left off deliberately? If so, by whom…and why?
Some suspected a Mafia hit. Jayne’s boyfriend Sam had at one point been her lawyer. He had connections with Jimmy Hoffa, a trade union leader who’d turned to organised crime.
Sam had borrowed $250,000 from Hoffa, and struggled to pay it back.
Had Hoffa set up the accident as revenge?
But there was another, even darker theory…
That Satan had caused the crash, at Jayne’s request.
Fascinated by the Occult and Satanism, a year earlier in 1966, she’d joined the Church of Satan.
At a Black Mass, stretched naked across the altar, she’d begged Satan to help her career, make her a star, some of her friends claimed.
Jayne had become friendly with the Church of Satan’s founder Anton Lavey.
Impressed by her commitment to the Church, he’d made her High Priestess. Following her initiation ceremony, she hung the certificate on her bedroom wall. And Sam Brody didn’t like it. So, according to some, Jayne asked for him to be cursed. Others say she asked for him to be cursed because he hit her.
Either way, Jayne turned to Anton Lavey to carry out the Satanic Destruction Ritual.
All Lavey had to do was write Sam’s name on parchment and set it alight.
As the fire burned, Lavey invoked the power of Satan… and declared Sam Brody would be dead within the year.
And he was – but so, too,