By 1976, his mother later claimed, Constanzo had begun to display psychic powers, predicting future events with amazing accuracy. Months before the 1981 shooting of President Ronald Reagan by John Hinckley, Constanzo reportedly predicted the event and proclaimed that Reagan would survive his wounds. Constanzo didn't have as much luck foretelling his own future, which included two arrests for shoplifting in 1981, one case involving the theft of a chainsaw.

By early 1983,   Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire had chosen his patron saint, pledging himself to Kadiempembe, his religion's version of Satan. With his padrino's blessing, he devoted himself to the worship of evil for profit. His final initiation included ritual scarring, his mentor wielding the knife to carve mystic symbols into Constanzo's flesh. "My soul is dead," he proclaimed, at the climax of that ceremony. "I have no god."