The Damsel of Death – Aileen Wuornos
Happy Friday Horror Freaks! Today we’re going to present the case of one of the most famous serial killers in the United States; Aileen Wuornos “The Monster”.
Aileen Carol “Lee” Wuornos Pralle was born on February 29, 1956 in Rochester, Michigan. Two months before her birth her parents divorced and she never met her father. Leo Dale Pitman committed suicide hanging himself on prison on January 30, 1969. He was convicted by sex crimes against children and diagnosed with schizophrenia.
When she was almost four her mother gave her with her brother to her maternal grandparents who were both alcoholics. The adopted them legally on 1960. Aileen was just eleven when she started to exchange sexual activities for food, drugs and cigarettes, also having sexual activities with her brother. She claimed that her grandfather sexually assaulted and force her to strip her clothes when she was a child. At fourteen she got pregnant by being raped by a friend of her grandfather. Wuornos gave birth to a boy on March 23, 1971 and gave him for adoption. Months later she dropped out of school and her grandmother died on the same time. At 15 her grandfather threw her to the streets and started to work as a prostitute and living in the woods.
On the period of 1974 to 1987 Aileen was arrested several times for disorderly conduct and drunk driving. She married in 1976 to a 69 year old yacht club owner, nine weeks after they divorced. Her brother died of esophageal cancer on July 17, 1976. From November of 1989 to November of 1990 Wuornos murdered seven men, she shoot them all.
- Richard Charles Mallory – November 1989
- David Andrew Spears – May 1990
- Charles Edmund Carskaddon – May 1990
- Peter Abraham Siems – Summer 1990
- Troy Eugene Burrens – July 1990
- Charles Richard “Dick” Humphreys – September 1990
- Walter Jeno Antonio – November 1990
Aileen Wuornos confessed the murders on January 16, 1991 claiming that all seven tried to rape her and that it was self defense. A year later she went for trial for the murder of Richard Charles Mallory in the state of Florida. On January 31, 1992 she was sentenced to death. By November 1992 she has received five death sentences. Wuornos was incarcerated at the Florida Department of Corrections Broward Correctional Institution (BCI) the death row for woman and transferred to the Florida State Prison for execution.
“I killed those men, robbed them as cold as ice. And I’d do it again, too. There’s no chance in keeping me alive or anything, because I’d kill again. I have hate crawling through my system…I am so sick of hearing this ‘she’s crazy’ stuff. I’ve been evaluated so many times. I’m competent, sane, and I’m trying to tell the truth. I’m one who seriously hates human life and would kill again.”
Aileen Wuornos – Petition to the Florida Supreme Court (2001)
Aileen Wuornos was executed on October 9, 2002 at 9:47 am. Her last meal was a cup of coffee. She became the tenth woman in the United States and the second in Florida to be executed since the restore of capital punishment decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1976. Her body was cremated.
“Yes, I would just like to say I’m sailing with the rock, and I’ll be back, like Independence Day, with Jesus. June 6, like the movie. Big mother ship and all, I’ll be back.”
Aileen Wuornos last words
Her life on the big screen
Her life has been brought back several times but the most famous is the film Monster (2003) having Charlize Theron portraying Wuornos. She won the Academy Award for Best Actress.
In 2015 during the fifth season of American Horror Story Wuornos was portrayed by Lily Rabe on the fourt and Halloween episode “The Devils Night”.
Until next time horror freaks!