HORROR IN YBOR CITY-The Victor Licata Murders
According to Victor, he didn’t kill his family. Instead, he told police his family had attacked him.
He told police that on the night of October 16, 1933, he drove around town in the back of a friend’s truck, drinking moonshine and smoking marijuana. He returned home sometime between 8 and 10 p.m. His sister Providence was out. His mother was in the kitchen. And Philip and Jose were in bed. He said he then went to bed and fell asleep but woke up a few hours later when his father came charging into the room, pulled him from bed, and held him against the wall. According to Victor, his mother entered the room wielding a kitchen knife and jeered and taunted him as his brothers and sister pointed and laughed at him. Finally, he said his mother sawed off his arms with the knife and jabbed homemade wooden arms with iron claws as hands into his stumps. He told the police he sought revenge when the attack ended, and his family left the room. He said he found an ax on the porch, but it wasn’t normal. Victor said it was a “funny ax,” rubbery, like something from a slapstick cartoon. He said he then took the funny ax and whacked his family members in their heads with it, knocking them unconscious, but never killed them. He did say, though, that when he finished the attack, he found it odd when he could wring blood out of the ax, which caused great pain in his stomach.
What made this story even creepier was that Victor seemed to be 100 percent honest when he told it. He thought it was true. Investigators believed that he had a nightmare that his family attacked him, as explained. Investigators stated that he then woke up and, in a delirious state, murdered his family and family dog with the ax, thus earning himself the nickname “The Dream Slayer.”
Philip died in the hospital soon after he was admitted, and Victor was arrested for the murder of his five family members. But, just days later, friends and family came to his rescue. They refused to allow him to be tried for murder, bringing insanity proceedings against him in Civil Court.
Family and friends claimed that Victor’s insanity was due to his habitual marijuana use. But, according to a court-appointed commission’s report, the ax-murderer suffered from dementia. His brother Philip was also said to have dementia as well. Victor also had a grand-uncle who died in an asylum and two cousins who were in asylums at the time of the murder. Finally, the commission discovered that Victor’s parents, Michael and Rosalie were first cousins.
