THE CHARGE AGAINST BERTHA BERONDA
Yes, O.G. Original Gangsta in the house with Bertha.
Bertha Beronda has a colorful and checkered past that deserves mention. She’s not your typical lady, by the stretch of anyone’s imagination.
Bertha Beronda was a notorious one of kind rebel who was ahead of her time. Progressive beyond her years and beyond the times. She was tough as nails and sharp as a tack.
Charged with Mayhem – today it would be so different. We’ve come a long way and ladies back in the day could get a hefty charge for an assault on a cheating husband. Bertha was charged with Mayhem. And for those times that was quite notorious for a lady to land in jail and on the stand in trial.
Her husband was a city of San Jose fire Captain. He alleged he had been maimed by his wife. Legend has it Bertha took a razor to him and caused grave bodily harm.
However Bertha was not your run of the mill gal. She was a rebel who was defiant in making her point even if meant drawing blood from her all too swooning husband.. She was up to things and determined to put an end to his philandering ways.
Philandering husbands today get away with a courtroom divorce settlement paying a little here or there, some not paying at all, signing some legal mumbo jumbo and on to their womanizing ways and as it seems we have come accustomed to it, but back in the day a hundred years ago it was considered awful, preposterous even to cheat.
We’re not in any way alleging that all divorces happen cause of a cheating husband, but the divorce process and infidelity along with a woman possibly attacking her husband are treated very differently in a court of law today.
The world was different. Society was different. People married and generally stayed married and most husbands did not stray.
On January 15, 1908 Bertha Beronda appeared in a San Jose courtroom facing a charge of Mayhem. She entered a plea of emotional insanity as her defense.
Captain Frank Beronda of the local fire department alleged Bertha attacked him and drew exponential blood from his cheating veins and so it was.
She was arrested in men’s attire wearing her brother’s garments to spy on her husband who had a wandering eye and gaze that lead him into the arms of other women. She claimed it was a sense of overwhelming jealousy that lead to her to the point of causing her cheating husband harm.
Let’s consider how different it is today when women seek revenge on their unfitting husbands.
Another famous gal who maimed her husband, but took a much more assertive approach with a snip at his penis while he was asleep, chopping it right off was Lorena Bobbit. Check out this article for a deeper perspective of how times have changed. What If Lorena Bobbit Were On Trial Now?
She then chucked it outside in the front yard where paramedics located it and by shear luck and in a most miraculous outcome doctors were able to stitch his penis back on.
Bobbit’s husband went on to the most obvious thing. He became a porn star. Meanwhile continued sending love letters to his estranged wife.
Shaking My Head –
And if we really want to talk about Mayhem we should consider the wildest lady of them all – Dorothea Puente – Northern California Female Serial Killer.
You can check her out in the new Netflix Docuseries – Worst Roommate Ever.
Dorothea is the most infamous female serial killer in history.
