After the Pipitone murder of October 1919, he had not been heard from again. As the months passed without another ax attack, police began to suspect that their “fell demon from the hottest hell”—whoever he was—had simply left town, like so many other figures from the city’s underworld.That conclusion was given some credence in December 1921, when inquiries came from authorities in Los Angeles about a man from New Orleans named Joseph Monfre, who had been shot dead in L.A. the day before. Monfre’s killer was another ex-New Orleanian—one Mrs. Esther Albano, the former Mrs. Esther Pipitone, widow of the man widely regarded as the axman’s last victim. According to Mrs. Albano, Monfre had killed her second husband, Angelo Albano—a small-time gangster who had gone missing in L.A. several weeks earlier—after he had refused to pay $500 in extortion money. When Monfre had shown up to collect the money from the widow, claiming that he was willing to kill her as well, Esther Albano was ready for him.
