Chapter 4 - Aileen Wuornos
SYNOPSIS
Branded, by many, including the FBI, as America’s first known serial killer. She has been given many nicknames, one of them is “Monster”. But was this title only a creation of society? Born on February 29th 1956, making her a leaper, only one other serial killer is a leaper and that was Richard “The Night Stalker” Ramirez. In 1989–1990, while engaging in street prostitution along Florida highways, she shot dead and robbed seven of her male clients. She claimed that they had either raped or attempted to rape her, and that all of the homicides were committed in self-defence. She was sentenced to death for six of the murders and on October 9, 2002, after 12 years on Florida's death row, she was executed by lethal injection. But was she wrongfully railroaded into the execution chamber after an unfair trial? This is the controversial deep-dive story of Eileen Wuornos.
CHILDHOOD
Aileen “Lee” Carol Wuornos was born Aileen Carol Pittman in Rochester, Michigan, on February 29, 1956 making her a leaper. The only other serial killer leaper is Richard “The Night Stalker” Ramirez. Her mother, Diane Wuornos, was 14 years old when she married Aileen's father, 18-year-old Leo Dale Pittman, on June 3, 1954. On March 14, 1955, Aileen's older brother Keith was born. After just under two years of marriage, and two months before Aileen was born, Diane filed for divorce. She gave birth to Aileen at the age of 16. Wuornos never met her father, as he was in prison at the time of her birth. Leo Dale Pittman was diagnosed with schizophrenia. He was later sentenced to life imprisonment for kidnapping and raping a 7-year-old girl and he committed suicide by hanging in prison on January 30, 1969. In January 1960, when Wuornos was almost four years old, Diane abandoned her children, leaving them with their maternal grandparents, Lauri and Britta Wuornos, both alcoholics, who legally adopted both children on March 18, 1960. They raised Aileen and Keith with their own children in Troy, Michigan. They did not reveal that they were, in fact, the children’s grandparents. Aileen discovered the truth at around age twelve, information, which more than likely did not help an already troublesome situation. By the age of 11, Wuornos began engaging in sexual activities in school in exchange for cigarettes, drugs, and food. She had also engaged in sexual activities with her brother. Wuornos said that her alcoholic grandfather had sexually assaulted and beaten her when she was a child. Before beating her, he would force her to strip out of her clothes. In 1970, at age 14, she became pregnant, having been raped by a friend of her grandfather. Wuornos gave birth to a boy at a home for unwed mothers on March 23, 1971, and the child was placed for adoption. The staff at the home found Wuornos hostile, uncooperative and unable to get along with her peers. A few months after her son was born, she dropped out of school at about the same time that her grandmother died of liver failure. It was around this time when Wuornos and her brother became wards of the court. When Wuornos was 15, her grandfather threw her out of the house, and she began supporting herself through prostitution and living in the woods near her old home, or hitchhiking around the country, often under assumed names.
CRIMINAL BACKGROUND
Having previously been a ward of the state, Wuornos subsisted on a vagabond existence as an adult, hitchhiking and engaging in sex work to survive. On May 27, 1974, at age 18, using the alias Sandra Kretsch, Wuornos was arrested in Jefferson County, Colorado, for driving under the influence (DUI), disorderly conduct, and firing a .22-calibre pistol from a moving vehicle. She was later charged with failure to appear.. In 1976, Wuornos hitchhiked to Florida, where she met 69-year-old yacht club president Lewis Gratz Fell. They married quickly and the announcement of their nuptials was printed in the local newspaper's society pages. Wuornos continually involved herself in confrontations at their local bar and went to jail briefly for assault. She also hit Fell with his own cane, leading him to gain a restraining order against her within weeks of the marriage. She returned to Michigan where, on July 14, 1976, she was arrested at Bernie's Club, in Mancelona, in Antrim County and charged with assault and disturbing the peace for throwing a cue ball at a bartender's head. On July 17, her brother Keith died of esophageal cancer and Wuornos received $10,000 from his life insurance. Wuornos and Fell annulled their marriage on July 21 after only nine weeks. In August 1976, Wuornos was given a $105 fine for drunk driving. She used the money inherited from her brother to pay the fine and spent the rest within two months buying luxuries including a new car, which she wrecked shortly afterwards. In 1978, at the age of 22, she attempted suicide by shooting herself in the stomach. Between the ages of 14 and 22, she attempted suicide six times.
By the early 1980s, after her brother’s death from cancer, Wuornos moved to Florida to work as a prostitute. She frequently was in trouble with the law, for being a prostitute and for other crimes. On May 20, 1981, Wuornos was arrested in Edgewater, Florida, for the armed robbery of a convenience store, where she stole $35 and two packs of cigarettes. She was sentenced to prison on May 4, 1982, and released on June 30, 1983, so she spent over a year in prison for stealing $35 and 2 packs of cigarettes!!! Am I the only one thinking that there is something dreadfully wrong here already??? On May 1, 1984, Wuornos was arrested again for attempting to pass forged checks at a bank in Key West. On November 30, 1985, she was named as a suspect in the theft of a revolver and ammunition in Pasco County: At this point, she was using the alias Lori Grody borrowed from an aunt in Michigan. Eleven days later, the Florida Highway Patrol cited Grody for driving without a valid licence.
On January 4, 1986, Wuornos was arrested in Miami under her own name and charged with car theft, resisting arrest, and obstruction of justice for providing identification bearing her aunt's name. Miami police officers found a .38-calibre revolver and a box of ammunition in the stolen car. On June 2, 1986, Volusia County deputy sheriffs detained Lori Grody/Wuornos for questioning after a male companion accused her of pulling a gun in his car and demanding $200. Despite her denials, Wuornos was found to be carrying spare ammunition, and police discovered a .22 pistol under the passenger seat she had occupied. A week later, using the new alias of Susan Blahovec, she was ticketed for speeding in Jefferson County, Florida.
In 1986, 30-year-old Wuornos met 24-year-old Tyria Moore, a hotel maid, at a Daytona Beach gay bar called Zodiac. They moved in together, and Wuornos supported them with her earnings as a prostitute. On July 4, 1987, Daytona Beach police detained Susan Blahovec/Wuornos and Tina Moore at a bar for questioning regarding an incident in which they were accused of assault and battery with a beer bottle. Blahovec was alone on December 18 1987, when highway patrolmen cited her for walking on the inter-state and possessing a suspended drivers licence. On July 23 1988, a Daytona Beach landlord accused Moore and Susan Blahovec of vandalising their apartment, ripping out carpets and painting the walls dark brown without his permission.
On March 12, 1988, Wuornos accused a Daytona Beach bus driver of assault claiming that he pushed her off the bus following a confrontation. Moore was listed as a witness to the incident. In November 1988, Susan Blahovec launched a six-day campaign of threatening calls against a Zephyr Hills supermarket, following an altercation over lottery tickets. By 1989, Aileens demeanour was increasingly erratic and belligerent. Wuornos’ associates and law enforcement personnel often described her as erratic and easily angered. Her arrest records frequently noted “Attitude POOR.”
MURDERS
Richard Mallory, a 51-year-old electrician from Palm Harbor, was last seen alive by coworkers on November 30, 1989. On December 1, 1989, his car was found abandoned at Ormond Beach, by a deputy in Volusia County. His wallet and personal papers were scattered nearby, along with several condoms and a half-empty bottle of vodka. On December 13, his fully-dressed corpse was found in the woods northwest of Daytona Beach several miles away from where his car was found. He was shot three times in the chest with a .22 pistol. Two of the bullets hit his left lung and caused haemorrhaging resulting in his death. The medical examiner also determined that Mallory had been drinking at the time of his death, though it was not clear whether he was legally intoxicated. Police searching for a motive in the murder learned that Mallory had been divorced five times, earning himself a reputation as a heavy drinker who was very paranoid and very much into porno and the topless-bar scene. A former employee described him as mental, but police came up empty in their search for a criminal record. We will come back to this later because it plays a big role in Wuornos’ trial. The middle-aged owner of a Clearwater, Florida electronics repair business was known to close up shop abruptly and disappear for a few days at a time on drinking and sex binges. He changed the locks to his apartment eight times in three years. He kept employees at his business only long enough to clear the backlog of work that accrued during one of his disappearances, letting them go once his repair orders were caught up again. His only constants were alcohol, sex and paranoia. So when he didn’t show up to open his shop in early December 1989, no one thought much of it. There was no one close enough to him to notice he was gone. It wasn’t until his 1977 Cadillac was found a few days later outside Daytona that anyone knew anything was amiss. Several months of investigation into his sordid lifestyle and somewhat shady acquaintances produced no real leads. Initial suspicion revolved around a stripper who went by the name of Chastity, but the evidence, what little of it there was, didn’t add up. Mallory’s case went cold.
On December 1, 1989, after several days working along the roadways, Wuornos returned to a Volusia County motel where she and Tyria Moore were living. Wuornos was intoxicated and told Moore that she had shot and killed a man early that morning. She said she sorted through the man's things, keeping some, discarding others. Wuornos said she abandoned the man's car near Ormond Beach, and left his body in a wooded area.
On May 5, 1990 the body of an unidentified male was found naked in Brooks County, Georgia, close to Interstate 75 and just across the state line from Florida. Two .22 calibre slugs were found in the remains, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation had no leads as to the identity of their mysterious corpse. But this one is not listed as one of Wuornos’ official 7 victims.
The investigation was stalled at that point on June 1, 1990, when a nude John Doe victim was found, shot six times with a .22 and dumped in the woods of Citrus County, about forty miles north of Tampa. By June 7, the corpse had been identified from dental records as 43-year-old David Spears, last seen leaving his Sarasota workplace on May 19. Spears had planned to visit his ex-wife in Orlando that afternoon, but he never made it. Ironically, his boss had spotted his missing pickup truck on May 25, parked along I-75 south of Gainesville, but there the trail went cold. Police initially suspected Mathew Cocking, a surveyor who had found the body, as he was known to carry a gun and spewed profanity and threats at anyone who questioned him about his find. By the time Spears was identified, a third victim had already been found.
Charles Carskaddon, age forty, was a part-time rodeo worker from Booneville, Missouri, missing since May 31. He had vanished somewhere along Interstate-75, en route from Booneville to meet his fiancée in Tampa, his naked corpse found thirty miles south of the Spears murder site on June 6. Carskaddon had been shot nine times with a .22-calibre weapon, suggesting a pattern to officers who still resisted the notion of a serial killer at large. On June 7, Carskaddons car was found in Marion County, a .45 automatic and various personal items listed as stolen from the vehicle. His body was so badly decomposed that medical examiners were not able to obtain fingerprints and could not estimate time of death. The nine bullets found in the remains were damaged by the decomposition, but were determined to have come from a .22 calibre weapon.
Pasco County detective Tom Muck had no immediate luck identifying his John Doe (later determined to be Charles Carskaddon), but had heard about the case in Citrus County. He notified Citrus County sheriff’s investigator Marvin Padgett about the similarities and told him to stay in touch.
Peter Siems, a 65-year-old merchant seaman who devoted much of his time to a Christian outreach ministry, was last seen on June 7, 1990, when he left his Jupiter, Florida, home to visit relatives in Arkansas. Siems never arrived, and a missing-person report was filed with police on June 22. On July 4, a car careened off State Road 315 near Orange Springs, Florida and came to rest in some brush. Rhonda Bailey, who was sitting on her porch at the time and watched the accident happen, said two women clambered frantically from the car, throwing beer cans into the woods and swearing at each other. The brown-haired woman said little; the blond, whose arm was bleeding from an injury sustained in the crash, did most of the talking. She begged Bailey not to call the police, saying her father lived just up the road. She and her companion got back in the car, which now had a smashed windshield and other damage, and got it out of the brush. The crippled vehicle didn’t take them far, though. They abandoned it just down the road and began walking. Hubert Hewett of the Orange Springs Volunteer Fire Department responded to a call about the accident and asked the two women if they had been the ones in the car. The blond cursed at him and said no, they had not, and they did not want any help. He left them alone and they walked on. Marion County sheriff’s deputies found the car where the women had left it. It was a 1988 Pontiac Sunbird, grey with four doors. The glass in the front doors, as well as the windshield, was smashed. There were apparent bloodstains throughout the interior, and the licence plate was missing. A computer search based on the VIN number revealed that the car belonged to Peter Siems. John Wisnieski of the Jupiter Police, who had been working the case since Siems was reported missing, sent out a nationwide teletype containing descriptions of the two women. He also sent a synopsis of the case and sketches of the women to the Florida Criminal Activity Bulletin. Then he waited. He was not optimistic about finding Siems alive.
Troy Burress, age fifty, left the Ocala sausage factory where he worked to make his normal delivery rounds on July 30, 1990. A missing-person report was filed when he had not returned by 2:00 A.M. the next day, and his delivery van was found two hours later on the shoulder of State Road 19, twenty miles east of Ocala. It was unlocked and the keys were missing. So was Burress. He was found five days later on August 4, 1990. A family out for a picnic in the Ocala National Forest happened upon his body in a clearing just off Highway 19, about eight miles from where his truck was found. Nearby, police found his credit cards, clipboard, business receipts, and an empty cash bag from a local bank. The Florida heat and humidity had hastened decomposition, precluding identification at the scene, but his wife identified his wedding ring. He had been killed with two shots from a .22 calibre gun, one to the chest and one to the back. Investigator John Tilley’s initial suspect was a drifter named Curtis Michael Blankenship. He had been hitchhiking on Highway 19 the day of Burress’s disappearance and was picked up close to the abandoned truck. It became evident as the investigation progressed, however, that Blankenship was not involved. For the time being, Tilley had no more suspects.
Fifty-six-year-old Dick Humphreys was a retired Alabama police chief, lately employed by the Florida Department of Health and Rehabilitative Services to investigate child abuse claims in Ocala. His wife reported him missing when he failed to return home from work on the night of September 11, 1990, and Humphreys was found the next day in Marion County, shot seven times with a .22 pistol, his pants pockets turned inside-out. On September 19, his car was found abandoned in Suwannee county, stripped of licence plates, behind a defunct service station in Live Oak. Impounded on September 25, the car was not traced to Humphreys until October 13, the same day his discarded badge and other personal belongings were found in Lake County, seventy miles southeast of the murder scene.
Victim number seven was 60-year-old Walter Antonio, a truck driver from Merritt Island who doubles as a reserve police officer for Brevard County. Found on a logging road in Dixie County on November 19, 1990, he had been shot three times in the back and once in the head. Antonio was nude except for socks, his clothes later found in a remote area of neighbouring Taylor County. He had been dead for less than 24 hours. His car, meanwhile, was found back in Brevard County on November 24. Police determined that Antonios killer had stolen a distinctive gold ring, along with his badge, nightstick, handcuffs, and flash-light.
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| List of murder victims |
INVESTIGATION
By that time, journalists had noted the obvious pattern detectives were reluctant to accept, and media exposure forced authorities to go public with their suspect sketches on November 30, 1990. Captain Steve Binegar was commander of the Marion County Sheriff’s Criminal Investigation Division, and he knew about the crimes in Citrus and Pasco Counties. He could not ignore the similarities and was formulating a theory, along with a multi-agency task force with representatives from counties where victims were found. No one stopped to pick up hitchhikers anymore, he reasoned, so the perpetrator(s) of these crimes had to be initially non-threatening to the victims. He suspected women—specifically, he suspected the two women who had wrecked Peter Siems’s car and walked away. He turned to the press for help. In late November, Reuters ran a story about the killings, saying police were looking for the women. Papers across Florida picked up the story and ran it, along with police sketches of the women in question. It didn’t take long for the leads to start pouring in, and by mid-December, police had several tips involving the same two women. Over the next weeks, police received calls identifying the nameless women including from Rhonda Bailey, the woman who witnessed the accident with Peter Siems’ car. She provided police with a description of the two women. A man in Homosassa Springs said the two women had rented a trailer from him about a year earlier. Their names were Tyria Moore and Lee. A woman in Tampa said the women had worked at her motel south of Ocala. Their names, she said, were Tyria Moore and Susan Blahovec. An anonymous caller identified the women as Ty Moore and Lee Blahovec, who bought an RV in Homosassa Springs. Lee Blahovec was the dominant one, the caller said, and a truck stop prostitute. Both were lesbians.
Police had been tracking the movements of Lee Blahovec and Tyria Moore, and provided a detailed account of the couple’s movements from late September to mid-December. They had stayed, primarily, at the Fairview Motel in Harbor Oaks, where Blahovec registered as Cammie Marsh Greene. They spent a bit of time living in a small apartment behind a restaurant very near the Fairview, but returned to the motel. In early December they left the Fairview. Blahovec/Greene returned alone, and stayed until December 10.
A quick compter check gave driver’s licence and criminal record information on Tyria Moore, Susan Blahovec and Cammie Marsh Greene. Moore had no real record, breaking and entering charges against her in 1983 having been dropped. Blahovec had one trespassing arrest, while Greene had no record at all. Additionally, the photograph on Blahovec’s licence did not match the one for Greene. The Greene ID was the one that paid off best. Volusia County officers checked area pawn shops and found that in Daytona, Cammie Marsh Greene had pawned a camera and a radar detector, and had left the requisite thumbprint on the receipt. These items had belonged to Richard Mallory. In Ormand Beach, she pawned a set of tools that matched the description of those taken from David Spears’s truck. The thumbprint was the key. Jenny Ahern of the Automated Fingerprint Identification System found nothing on her initial computer search, but came to Volusia County and began a hand search of fingerprint records there. Within an hour, she found what she came for. The print showed up on a weapons charge and outstanding warrant against a Lori Grody. A bloody palm print found in Peter Siems’s Sunbird matched Lori Grody’s prints as well. All this information was sent to the National Crime Information Center. Responses came from Michigan, Colorado and Florida. Lori Grody, Susan Blahovec and Cammie Marsh Greene were all aliases for Aileen Carol Wuornos.
ARREST
The hunt for Wuornos began in earnest on January 5, 1991. They knew who they were looking for but her root-less lifestyle made it more difficult to pin her down. Pairs of officers, including two undercover as "Bucket" and "Drums," drug dealers from Georgia, hit the streets hoping to track her down. On the evening of January 8, Mike Joyner and Dick Martin, in their roles as "Bucket" and "Drums," spotted her at the Port Orange Pub. They meant for their takedown to develop gradually, as they wanted an airtight case, but Port Orange police entered suddenly and took Wuornos outside. Mike Joyner frantically phoned the command post at the Pirate’s Cove Motel, where authorities from six jurisdictions had come to work the case. This development wasn’t because of a leak, they surmised; these were just cops doing their jobs. Bob Kelley of the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office called the Port Orange police station and told them not to arrest Wuornos under any circumstances. The word was relayed to the cops in the nick of time, and Wuornos returned to the bar. Joyner and Martin struck up a conversation with her and bought her a few beers. She left the bar at around 10:00, declining an offer for a ride. Once again, the cautious takedown was almost ruined. Two Florida Department of Law Enforcement officers pulled up behind Wuornos as she walked down Ridgewood Avenue, following her with their lights off. Officers at the command post made a call and got the FDLE officers off the street and Wuornos made it to her next destination, a biker bar called the Last Resort. Joyner and Martin met her there for a while and drank more beers. They left just after midnight. Wuornos didn’t leave at all. She spent her last night of freedom sleeping on an old car seat in the Last Resort. The following afternoon, Joyner and Martin were back at the Last Resort as "Bucket" and "Drums," talking Wuornos up and wearing transmitters that kept the police apprised of everything that went on. They had planned on making their collar later that night, but the Last Resort was gearing up for a barbecue, and bikers would start pouring in any second. The decision was made at the command post to go ahead with the arrest. Joyner and Martin asked Wuornos if she’d like to get cleaned up at their motel room. She accepted their offer and left the bar with them.
On January 9, 1991, Wuornos was arrested. Outside on the steps, Larry Horzepa of the Marion County Sheriff’s Office approached her as she exited The Last Resort biker bar in Volusia County and told her she was being arrested on the outstanding warrant for Lori Grody. No mention was made of the murders, and no announcement was made to the media that a suspect had been arrested. Their caution was wise: as of yet, they had no murder weapon and no Tyria Moore. On January 10 Moore was located. When Moore began seeing media reports that law officers were looking for two women suspected of being involved in a series of murders, she left Wuornos and ran to her family in Scranton, Pennsylvania. She was living with her sister in Pittston, Pennsylvania. Jerry Thompson of Citrus County and Bruce Munster of Marion County flew to Scranton, Pennsylvania to interview her. She was read her rights but not charged with anything. Munster made sure she knew what perjury was, swore her in, and sat back as she gave her statement. She had known about the murders since Lee had come home with Richard Mallory’s Cadillac, she said. Lee had openly confessed that she had killed a man that day, but Moore told her not to say anything else. “I told her I didn’t want to hear about it,” Moore told Munster and Thompson. “And then any time she would come home after that and say certain things, telling me about where she got something, I’d say I don’t want to hear it.” She had her suspicions, she admitted, but wanted to know as little as possible about Lee’s doings. The more she knew, she reasoned, the more compelled she would feel to report Lee to the authorities. And she didn’t want to do that. “I was just scared,” she said. “She always said she’d never hurt me, but then you can’t believe her, so I don’t know what she would have done.” She agreed to elicit a confession from Wuornos in exchange for prosecutorial immunity. Moore returned with police to Florida, where she was put up in a motel. Under police guidance, Moore made numerous telephone calls to Wuornos, pleading for help in clearing her name. One conversation led police to a storage warehouse Aileen had rented, a search revealing tools stolen from David Spears, the nightstick taken from Walter Antonio, another camera and electric razor belonging to Richard Mallory.
Their phone conversations would be taped, and Moore was to tell Wuornos that authorities had been questioning her family, that she thought the Florida murders would be mistakenly pinned on her (Moore). Munster and Thompson hoped that, out of loyalty to Moore, Wuornos would confess. The first call from Wuornos came on January 14. She was still under the impression that she was only in jail for the Lori Grody weapons violation. When Moore broached her suspicions, Wuornos reassured her.
WUORNOS: “Hey, Ty?”
MOORE: “Yeah.”
WUORNOS: “What are you doing?”
MOORE: “Nothing. What the hell are you doing?”
WUORNOS: “Nothing. I’m sitting here in jail!”
MOORE: “Yeah. that’s what I heard.”
MOORE: “There’s been officials up at my parent’s house asking some questions…”
WUORNOS: “Ohoh!”
MOORE: “... and I’m getting scared.”
WUORNOS: “I think what happened was… there was pictures in the newspaper…”
MOORE: “Mmm!”
WUORNOS: “... and it was a case of mistaken identity.”
WUORNOS: “Look, I gotta ask you something. Is there anybody in that room?”
MOORE: “No! Just me.”
WUORNOS: “What?”
MOORE: “What??”
WUORNOS: “Is there anybody in your room?”
MOORE: “No!”
MOORE: “I don’t know if I should keep on living or if I should…”
WUORNOS: “No, Ty, listen…”
MOORE: “What?”
WUORNOS: “You go ahead and let ‘em know what they need to know… if they want to know anything… you’re innocent”
For three days the calls continued. Moore became more insistent that the police were after her, and it became clear that Wuornos knew what was expected of her. She even voiced suspicion that Moore was not alone, that someone was there taping their conversations. But as time passed, she became less careful about what she said. She would not let Moore go down with her.
WUORNOS: “Listen, if I have to confess, I will.”
CONFESSION
Three days later, on 16 January 1991, that’s exactly what Wuornos did. She claimed the men had tried to rape her and she killed them in self-defense. Wuornos came back to two main points over and over during her confession to Larry Horzepa and Bruce Munster. First, she made it clear that Moore was not involved in any way in any of the murders. Additionally, she was emphatic in her assertion that nothing was her fault, not the murders and not any circumstance that led her down the criminal path that was her life. All the killings were done in self-defence, she claimed. Each victim had either assaulted her, threatened her, or raped her. She’d been raped several times in the past few years, she claimed, and had had enough. When each of her victims became aggressive she killed out of fear. Several times Michael O’Neill, a public defender from the Volusia County public defender’s office, advised Wuornos to stop talking, finally asking in exasperation, “Do you realise these guys are cops!” Wuornos answered, “I know. And they wanted to hang me. And that’s cool, because maybe, man, I deserve it. I just want to get this over with.” She denied killing Peter Siems, whose body was still missing, and likewise disclaimed any link to the murder of a John Doe victim shot to death with a .22-calibre weapon in Brooks County, Georgia, found in an advanced state of decay on May 5, 1990. (No charges were filed in that case.) Wuornos said she was engaging in roadside prostitution when she was picked up by one of the victims, Antonio. She asked him if she could "make some money," and he agreed. The pair then proceeded to an isolated wooded area. At this point Wuornos said Antonio pulled out a false police badge and said he could arrest her but would not do so if she had sex with him for free. Wuornos said she challenged him, contending he was not a law officer. He kept on making his demand for sex, she said, and she then pulled a gun. She said a struggle ensued, during which she shot Antonio twice. According to her confession, Antonio called her a profane name, and she shot him twice more. Wuornos then said she took some of Antonio's personal effects and his car and fled.
TRIAL
On January 14, 1992, Wuornos went to trial for the murder of Richard Charles Mallory.
In Florida a defendant convicted of murder can be punished by death if the murder is found to have been committed under certain circumstances listed in the Florida Penal Code, such as the murder of a police officer or firefighter, that the defendant murdered two or more victims, that the defendant committed a murder for hire, or that the murder was intentionally committed in the course of a kidnapping, burglary, robbery, aggravated rape or other statutorily specified felony. The subclass of murders falling into these categories is called "capital murder." Wuornos was charged with the first-degree murder of Richard Mallory, armed robbery with a firearm or deadly weapon, and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Prosecutors argued Wuornos qualified for the death penalty based on the charge of murder committed in the course of a robbery. Capital trials are different in several ways from murder trials in which the defendant is not eligible for the death penalty. First, jury selection in capital cases requires that prospective jurors be "death qualified" (questioned about their ability to consider both aggravating and mitigating evidence and to render a death sentence in an appropriate case). Only jurors who are willing to consider sentencing someone to death may be selected. After the jury is chosen, the government has the burden of proving the defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt and offers evidence to convince the jury the defendant committed the offence. The defendant can offer evidence to rebut the prosecution’s evidence or to establish innocence, but has no burden of proof and is presumed innocent until proven otherwise. That is very important. That will come up later in this video. Wuornos’ capital trial for the murder of Richard Mallory began on January 14, 1992. Wuornos took the stand as the only defense witness, repeating her tale of violent rape and beating at Mallorys hands, insisting that she shot him dead in self-defense, using her pistol only after he threatened her life.
The Defense Attorney
Wuornos’ case was tried in Volusia County, Florida. Tricia Jenkins, Chief Assistant Public Defender of the Fifth Judicial Circuit, represented Wuornos at her trial. Wuornos stood trial only once, as she pleaded no contest or guilty to the subsequent murder charges. Private Attorney Steven Glazer represented her following the first trial and arranged those pleas of no contest or guilty.
The Prosecuting Attorney
The District Attorney at the time of Wuornos’ trial was State’s Attorney John Tanner. Judge Uriel Blount came out of retirement specifically to try the Wuornos case.
Trial: Guilt/Innocence Phase
The Prosecution’s Case
Prosecutors based their case mainly on the videotaped confession Aileen Wuornos gave to detectives during interrogation. Although previous convictions are normally inadmissible in criminal trials, under Florida's Williams Rule, the prosecution was allowed to introduce evidence related to her other crimes to show a pattern of illegal activity thus showing motive, intent, knowledge, modus operandi or lack of mistake. Prosecutors dismissed Wuornos' initial claims that all 7 murders were in self-defence by pointing out that Wuornos’ story varied with each subsequent telling. In the earliest confession to officers Wuornos said Mallory picked her up while she was hitchhiking and they later went into a secluded wooded area to engage in an act of prostitution. She and Mallory then began arguing. Wuornos said she felt Mallory was going to "roll her" (take her money) and rape her. She grabbed a bag in which she kept a gun, and the two began struggling over the bag. Wuornos prevailed, pointed the gun at Mallory, and said: "You son of a bitch, I knew you were going to rape me," to which Mallory responded: "No, I wasn't. No, I wasn't." At this point Wuornos shot Mallory at least once while he was still sitting behind the steering wheel. Mallory crawled out of the driver's side and shut the car door. Wuornos said she ran around to the front of the car and shot Mallory again, causing him to fall to the ground. While he was lying there, Wuornos shot him twice more, went through his pockets, concealed the body beneath a piece of rug, and drove off in his car. Wuornos also told law officers she had given Tyria Moore inconsistent versions about what happened. In one, Wuornos told Moore she had found a dead body hidden under a scrap of rug in the woods, but in another, she confessed to the killing. In her initial taped confession, Wuornos never mentioned that Richard Mallory had raped her. During the confession it appeared Wuornos was not focused on clearing herself so much as clearing her lover, Moore. Moore had cooperated with police to convince Wuornos that Moore was going to be prosecuted unless Wuornos fully cooperated. Many believed Wuornos appeared confident and not at all upset during her confession. She made easy conversation with her interrogators and repeatedly told her public defender to be quiet. She said, “I took a life…I am willing to give up my life because I killed people…I deserve to die.”
Prosecutors based their case mainly on the videotaped confession Aileen Wuornos gave to detectives during interrogation. Although previous convictions are normally inadmissible in criminal trials, under Florida's Williams Rule, the prosecution was allowed to introduce evidence related to her other crimes to show a pattern of illegal activity thus showing motive, intent, knowledge, modus operandi or lack of mistake. Prosecutors dismissed Wuornos' initial claims that all 7 murders were in self-defence by pointing out that Wuornos’ story varied with each subsequent telling. In the earliest confession to officers Wuornos said Mallory picked her up while she was hitchhiking and they later went into a secluded wooded area to engage in an act of prostitution. She and Mallory then began arguing. Wuornos said she felt Mallory was going to "roll her" (take her money) and rape her. She grabbed a bag in which she kept a gun, and the two began struggling over the bag. Wuornos prevailed, pointed the gun at Mallory, and said: "You son of a bitch, I knew you were going to rape me," to which Mallory responded: "No, I wasn't. No, I wasn't." At this point Wuornos shot Mallory at least once while he was still sitting behind the steering wheel. Mallory crawled out of the driver's side and shut the car door. Wuornos said she ran around to the front of the car and shot Mallory again, causing him to fall to the ground. While he was lying there, Wuornos shot him twice more, went through his pockets, concealed the body beneath a piece of rug, and drove off in his car. Wuornos also told law officers she had given Tyria Moore inconsistent versions about what happened. In one, Wuornos told Moore she had found a dead body hidden under a scrap of rug in the woods, but in another, she confessed to the killing. In her initial taped confession, Wuornos never mentioned that Richard Mallory had raped her. During the confession it appeared Wuornos was not focused on clearing herself so much as clearing her lover, Moore. Moore had cooperated with police to convince Wuornos that Moore was going to be prosecuted unless Wuornos fully cooperated. Many believed Wuornos appeared confident and not at all upset during her confession. She made easy conversation with her interrogators and repeatedly told her public defender to be quiet. She said, “I took a life…I am willing to give up my life because I killed people…I deserve to die.”
The Defence Case
Wuornos’s attorneys engineered a plea bargain, to which Wuornos agreed, in which she would plead to six charges and receive six consecutive life terms. One state attorney, however, thought she should receive the death penalty, so on January 14, 1992, Wuornos went to trial for the murder of Richard Mallory. . The trial court rejected this argument and denied the defence motion to suppress the videotaped confession. Moreover, the videotaped confession had already been leaked to the media, further influencing the public’s perception of Wuornos. During later interviews with police, Wuornos went into detail about her self-defence claim. She explained she had offered to perform an act of prostitution with Mallory and he drove to an isolated area where the two drank, smoked marijuana, and talked for about five hours. Wuornos described herself as "drunk royal." About 5 a.m., Wuornos disrobed to perform the act of prostitution. She asked Mallory to remove his clothes, but he said he wanted only to unzip his pants and didn't have enough money to pay her fee. Wuornos went to retrieve her clothes, but Mallory whipped a cord around her neck, threatened to kill her "like the other sluts I've done," and tied her hands to the steering wheel. According to Wuornos's later version, Mallory violently raped her vaginally and anally, and took pleasure from her cries of pain. Mallory eventually untied her and told her to lie down. Believing he intended to kill her, she began to struggle. Mallory told her, "You're dead, bitch. You're dead." At this point Wuornos found her purse and removed her gun. Mallory grabbed her hand, and the two began fighting for the gun. Wuornos prevailed and shot Mallory. Mallory kept coming at her, despite her warnings, so she shot him twice more. Against her attorneys’ wishes, Wuornos testified at trial. . During her testimony she repeated her claim of self-defence. During cross-examination she became agitated and angry. Her attorneys repeatedly advised her not to answer questions, and she invoked her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination twenty-five times. She was the only defence witness. Wuornos’ defence also raised an issue that soon after her arrest, three detectives on the case, as well as Tyria Moore, talked to the media to sell their story. Some people suspected such deals influenced the witnesses to exaggerate their stories to more lucrative offers. We will go into the media frenzy a bit later.
The evidence and witnesses against her were severely damaging. Dr. Arthur Botting, the medical examiner who had autopsied Mallory’s body, stated that Mallory had taken between ten and twenty agonising minutes to die. Tyria Moore testified that Wuornos had not seemed overly upset, nervous or drunk when she told her of killing Mallory. Twelve men told of encounters with her along Florida’s highways over the years. Wuornos' defense made efforts during the trial to introduce evidence that Mallory was previously convicted for attempted rape in Maryland and served a sentence in a providing remediation to sexual offenders. Records obtained from the correctional institution showed that from 1958 to 1962, Mallory was committed for treatment and observation resulting from a criminal charge of assault with intent to rape and received an overall eight years of treatment from the facility. In 1961, "it was observed of Mr. Mallory that he possessed strong sociopathic trends". However, the judge refused to allow the records to be admitted in court as evidence and denied Wuornos' request for a retrial. Wuornos’s claim of having killed in self-defence would have been a lot more believable had the jury known about Mallory. Now, with the jury made aware of all of the other murders, self-defence seemed improbable, at best. After the excerpts from her videotaped confession were played, the self-defence claim seemed ridiculous. On the tape Wuornos appeared confident and not at all upset by the story she was telling. Tricia Jenkins, one of Wuornos’s public defenders, did not want her client to testify and told her so. But Wuornos insisted on telling her story. By now, her account of Mallory’s killing barely resembled the one she gave in her confession. Mallory had raped and sodomized her, she claimed, and had tortured her. On cross-examination, prosecutor John Tanner obliterated any shred of credibility she may have had. As he brought to light all her lies and inconsistencies, she became agitated and angry. When she left the stand there was not much doubt about how her trial would end.
VERDICT
On January 27, Judge Uriel Blount charged the jury. They returned with their verdict less than two hours later. They found Wuornos guilty of first-degree murder, and as they filed out of the courtroom she exploded with rage, shouting, “I’m innocent! I was raped! I hope you get raped! Scumbags of America!” Expert witnesses and psychiatrists for the defence testified that Wuornos was mentally unstable and diagnosed her with borderline personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder. They also added that her tumultuous upbringing had stunted and ruined her. Jenkins referred to her client as “a damaged, primitive child” as she pleaded with the jury to spare Wuornos’s life. But jurors neither forgot nor forgave the woman they’d come to know during the trial and found her guilty on all counts, including first-degree murder and armed robbery. This outburst likely was fresh in the juror's minds as they began the sentencing phase the next day.
The Trial: Sentencing Phase
The penalty trial or sentencing phase was held before the same jury to determine whether she would be sentenced to death or life in prison. In most states, at this penalty trial, the jury chooses between death and life imprisonment by deciding whether the case involves certain statutorily specified “aggravating circumstances” (facts that make the crime more serious or the defendant more deserving of death), any “mitigating circumstances” (facts that extenuate the crime or make the defendant less culpable), and then whether the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigating circumstances. The high court ruled that only juries and not judges can sentence inmates to death. In Florida, juries make a recommendation to the trial judge, who imposes the sentence.
Reasons For Sentencing Wuornos to Death
The State’s expert psychologist, Dr. Bernard, testified that Aileen Wuornos suffered from both borderline personality disorder as well as antisocial personality disorder. Although he agreed with other experts that Wuornos experienced impaired capacity and mental disturbance at the time of the crime, he concluded the impairment was not substantial and the disturbance was not extreme. He also agreed there was evidence of non-statutory mitigating evidence, such as Wuornos’ mental problems, alcoholism, disturbance, and genetic or environmental deficits. In response to the introduction of evidence of Wuornos’ difficult childhood and upbringing, the State called two witnesses from her childhood: Lori Grody, Wuornos’ biological aunt and step-sister, and Barry Wuornos, her biological uncle and stepbrother. Barry Wuornos testified Wuornos’ grandfather “laid down rules” and was someone to look up to. Although he had never seen his father beat Aileen, she sometimes was spanked, and when she was 10 the discipline became more “tight.” Barry testified that Aileen’s biological father, who committed suicide while in prison for rape and kidnapping, was abusive and “a criminal-type.”
Reasons for Sparing Wuornos's Life
In the penalty phase the defence introduced evidence about Wuornos' background. Her teenage parents separated months before she was born. Her father, Leo Pittman, moved on to serve time in Kansas and Michigan mental hospitals and later committed suicide in prison where he was serving time for child molestation and kidnapping. Aileen's teenage mother, Diane Wuornos, described her and her older brother Keith as crying, unhappy babies. Diane's troubled parents adopted Aileen and Keith after she abandoned them. Wuornos' life with her grandparents was physically and verbally abusive. At 6, she suffered facial burns and scarring when she and Keith set fires with lighter fluid. During junior high, Wuornos began exhibiting hearing loss, vision problems, and trouble in school. Her IQ was established at 81, in the low dull-normal range. (An IQ at or below 70 is generally accepted as indicating mental retardation. Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Atkins v. Virginia in 2002, the mentally retarded cannot be sentenced to death). School officials urged that Wuornos receive counselling and tried to improve her behaviour by administering a mild tranquilliser. At about 14, Wuornos was raped by her grandfather’s adult friend. She waited six months before revealing she was pregnant, for which her grandparents blamed her. Her grandfather later sent her away and forced her to give up the child for adoption. After her grandmother died, her alcoholic grandfather threatened to kill her and her brother if they weren't removed from his house. At age 15 she became a ward of the court. She soon dropped out of school and began engaging in prostitution, as well as alcohol and drug abuse. Her brother died of cancer at 21, and her grandfather committed suicide. Three defence psychologists concluded Wuornos suffered from borderline personality disorder at the time of her crime, resulting in extreme mental or emotional disturbance. They said her ability to conform her conduct to the law was substantially impaired, and she exhibited evidence of brain damage. One testified her inconsistent confessions should not be considered "lying" or "changing stories” in a subjective sense because of her borderline personality disorder. The defence attempted to portray her as a woman who had lived a horrible life of victimisation and violence, with little help from anyone, and who later lashed out at one of her victimizers.
THE JURY’S RECOMMENDATION
The jury recommended the death sentence by a vote of 12 to 0, concluding that 5 aggravating circumstances, and only one mitigating factor, were present in Wuornos’ case.
The 5 aggravating circumstances found were:
1. Wuornos had a previous felony conviction involving the use or threat of violence.
2. Murder was committed during the commission of a robbery
3. Murder was committed in order to avoid arrest
4. Murder was heinous, atrocious, or cruel
5. Murder was cold, calculated and premeditated.
The trial jury found one mitigating factor:
1. Aileen Wuornos suffered from borderline personality disorder.
The jury decided that despite her psychological difficulties, Wuornos knew the difference between right and wrong. The judge found the following non-statutory mitigators: (1) Wuornos suffered antisocial and borderline personality disorders; (2) she may have been physically abused as a child; (3) her natural father and grandfather committed suicide; (4) her grandmother died an alcoholic; and (5) her mother abandoned her as an infant. Judge Blount followed the jury’s recommendation of death and sentenced Wuornos to the electric chair on January 31, 1992. Wuornos did not stand trial again.
MEDIA FRENZY
A bizarre sideshow to the pending murder trial began in late January 1991, with the appearance of Arlene Pralle (PRONOUNCED PRAYLEE) as Aileens chief advocate. A 44-year-old rancher's wife and born-again Christian, Pralle ran a horse breeding and boarding facility near Ocala. She had seen Wuornos’ picture in a newspaper and wrote her a letter. “My name is Arlene Pralle,” she began, “I’m born-again. You’re going to think I’m crazy, but Jesus told me to write you.” She provided her home telephone number, and on January 30 Wuornos called her (collect) for the first time. Soon, they were having daily telephone conversations. Pralle became her ardent defender and helpmate. Pralle advised her that her public defenders were trying to profit from her story, as was everyone else. Wuornos asked for and got new attorneys. Pralle spoke with reporters, describing her relationship with Wuornos as, “a soul binding. We’re like Jonathan and David in the bible. It’s as though part of me is trapped in jail with her. We always know what the other is feeling and thinking.” To another reporter she said, “If the world could know the real Aileen Wuornos, there’s not a jury that would convict her.” “I just wish I was Houdini. I would get her out of there. If there was a way, I would do it, and we could go and be vagabonds forever.” Throughout 1991, Pralle appeared on talk shows and in tabloids, talking to anyone who would listen about what she perceived as Wuornos’s true, good nature.
She arranged interviews for Wuornos with reporters she thought would be sympathetic, and in this forum Wuornos continued to tell her story. Both Wuornos and Pralle emphasised Wuornos’s troubled upbringing, and both levelled accusations of corruption and complicity at anyone who was handy. And just when it seemed things couldn’t get any weirder, on November 22, 1991, Arlene Pralle and her husband legally adopted Aileen Wuornos. Pralle said God had told her to. What Wuornos did not know at this point but eventually realised was that Pralle was receiving money for giving interviews, including one with Nick Broomfield, who paid her $10,000. Part of the money went to Wuornos' new lawyer, Steven Glazer, whom Pralle hired. Chief Assistant Public Defender Tricia Jenkins, whose office handled Wuornos´ Volusia County trial, accused Glazer of mishandling Wuornos’ subsequent cases and appeals. Jenkins testified that Glazer never picked up the discovery files from that case, even as he prepared the case in Marion County. Instead, Glazer filed a notice that he was taking over the case and a motion to change Wuornos´ original not-guilty plea to “no contest” on the same day. "He told me he was taking the case because he needed the media exposure," Jenkins said.
On March 31, 1992, Wuornos pleaded no contest to the murders of Charles Richard Humphreys, Troy Eugene Burress, and David Andrew Spears, saying she wanted to "get right with God". In a rambling statement to the court, she said, in part, "I wanted to confess to you that Richard Mallory did violently rape me as I've told you; but these others did not. [They] only began to start to." In reaction to the Judge condemning her again to deathrow, she hissed “I hope your wife and children get raped in the ass!”
On May 15, Judge Thomas Sawaya handed her (2,3,4) three more death sentences. She turned to Assistant State Attorney Ric Ridgeway and hissed, “I hope your wife and children get raped in the *ss!” She made an obscene gesture and muttered, “Motherf****r!”
The relationship between Wuornos and Pralle was not to last; Wuornos began to suspect that Pralle was there only for the publicity and the money. Wuornos told Broomfield in an interview that Pralle and Glazer were telling her ways to kill herself in prison. She suspected they advised the “no contest” plea because Glazer was too inexperienced to handle a multiple murder trial.
It was around this time that Aileen offered to show police where the corpse of Peter Siems was hidden, near Beaufort, South Carolina. Authorities flew her to the Piedmont State, but nothing was found at the designated site, Daytona police insisting that Wuornos created the ruse to get a free vacation from jail. They speculate that Siems was dumped in a swamp near I-95, north of Jacksonville, but his body has never been found.
In June 1992, defeated by the loss of her once trusted friend Pralle, Wuornos pleaded guilty to the murder of Charles Carskaddon.
The Wuornos case took an ironic twist on November 10, 1992, with reporters' revelations. Detectives had previously denied any evidence existed to corroborate Wuornos’ claims of rape or a history of sexual crimes by Mallory. Had detectives searched federal criminal records to check into claims that Mallory was violent, they would have produced this history. However, the judge refused to allow this to be admitted in post-trial proceedings, and Wuornos was never given a retrial. In the official view, Mallory was clean, if somewhat paranoid and sex-crazy. Reporters, though had no apparent difficulty finding out that Mallory had served ten years for a violent rape in another state, facts easily obtained by checking his name through the FBIs computer network. This information is conflicting because some sources say attempted rape and others say rape. Either way, he had a history of sexual violence. The fascinating part about this, is that here is a woman who for the past year has been screaming that she didn't get a fair trial and that everyone was rushing to make a TV movie about her--and in reality that comes true.
In November 1992, she received her fifth death sentence.
In February 1993, Wuornos pleaded guilty to the murder of Walter Jeno Antonio and was (6) sentenced to death again. No charges were brought against her for the murder of Peter Abraham Siems, as his body was never found. In all, Wuornos received six death sentences. She claimed initially that all seven men had raped her while she was working as a prostitute but later recanted the claim of self-defense, citing robbery and a desire to leave no witnesses as the reason for murder. During an interview with filmmaker Nick Broomfield, when Wuornos thought the cameras were off, she told him that it was, in fact, self-defence, but she could not stand being on death row—where she had been for ten years at that point—and wanted to die. Assessed using the Psychopathy Checklist, Wuornos scored 32/40 with the cutoff score of 30 for determining psychopathy. The checklist evaluates individuals on a 20-item list of antisocial and interpersonal behaviours, with each item being scored as zero, one, or two, with a maximum score of 40.
POST-TRIAL. APPEALS & DEATHROW
Aileen was housed at Broward Correctional Institution in Pembroke Pines. Sidenote and kinda FUN FACT: Broward Jail is now abandoned, permanently shut down in 2012 and is now, apparently, the creepiest place in Florida. Originally built for men, it ended up being used for women whilst on death row.
The Post-Trial Period
After the trial it was revealed that Tyria Moore made several book and movie deals selling her story. So did three detectives on the case, who later resigned. The officers maintained that they were moved to sell their version of the case by pure intentions, planning to put the money in a victims fund.
Appealing the Conviction and Death Sentence
In Florida, the state constitution requires that an automatic direct appeal be taken to the Supreme Court of Florida on behalf of a defendant who has been sentenced to death. The direct appeal cannot be waived by the defendant, and legal representation must be provided to the defendant. Further review may be sought in the Supreme Court of the United States by a procedure called “certiorari review.” The U.S Supreme Court has complete discretion to grant or deny certiorari; it need not give any reason for its decision to review or not to review a case. The automatic appeal to the Supreme Court of Florida and any certiorari review of it are collectively called the “direct appeal.” For the automatic direct appeal, Wuornos was provided a court-appointed attorney, Assistant Public Defender Christopher S. Quarles.
On November 16, 1994, the Supreme Court of Florida affirmed Wuornos’ conviction and sentence. Wuornos then filed a Petition for Writ of Certiorari in the United State Supreme Court, which was denied on April 17, 1995.
Post-Conviction Proceedings
During the extensive post-conviction period, from 1994 until 2002, Wuornos argued her original trial counsel provided ineffective representation. One example of poor representation revealed in subsequent appeals was trial counsel’s failure to uncover Richard Mallory’s prior rape conviction, which could have corroborated Wuornos’ argument of self-defense. In addition, trial counsel failed to call lay mitigation witnesses during the penalty trial who could have testified to the defendant’s claims of abuse during her childhood and adolescence, even though several childhood friends and neighbours said they would have testified if they had been called. In later hearings several of these potential witnesses testified they were contacted by the media following Wuornos’ arrest, but never by the Public Defender’s office. The defendant also argued she had not been effectively evaluated regarding her competency to stand trial. Throughout the post-conviction period Wuornos’ erratic behaviour continued to worsen. She fired several attorneys and in 2001 dropped her appeals completely. Some of these attorneys contacted the Florida Supreme Court to express their concerns that Wuornos was not competent to be executed. Wuornos also wrote several extensive and rambling motions to the courts in which she claimed prison staff were abusing her. All of Wuornos’ claims were evaluated and rejected by the state and federal appellate courts.
In a 2001 petition to the Florida Supreme Court, she stated her intention to dismiss her legal counsel and terminate all pending appeals. "I killed those men," she wrote, "robbed them as cold as ice. And I'd do it again, too. 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. I wanted to clear all the lies and let the truth come out. I have hate crawling through my system" While her attorneys argued that she was not mentally competent to make such a request, Wuornos insisted that she knew what she was doing, and a court-appointed panel of psychiatrists agreed. Florida Governor Jeb Bush instructed three psychiatrists to give Wuornos a 15-minute interview. The test for competency requires the psychiatrist(s) to be convinced that the condemned person understands that she will die and for which crime(s) she is being executed. All three judged her mentally fit to be executed.
After a hearing in Daytona Beach, the Florida Supreme Court agreed to allow Wuornos to fire her attorneys and stop her appeals. Fort Lauderdale lawyer Raag Singhal wrote a letter to the state Supreme Court expressing "grave doubts" about Wuornos' mental condition.
Clemency
Executive clemency is the power of an official or agency in the executive branch of government to nullify a criminal conviction (by granting a "pardon"), to reduce a court-ordered punishment (by granting a "commutation of sentence"), or to delay an execution (by granting a “reprieve”). In some states, the Governor alone has these powers; in others, the powers are given exclusively to a board of pardons and paroles; in still others, the powers are divided between the Governor and the board. In Florida, the governor makes clemency decisions in conjunction with the Executive Clemency Board on which he sits. The Governor has complete discretion to deny clemency at any time, for any reason; to grant clemency, however, the governor needs the approval of at least two members of the Clemency Board.
On September 30, 2002, Governor Jeb Bush granted a Stay of Execution and ordered a mental examination to determine whether Wuornos was competent to be executed. Florida law mandates that an inmate cannot be executed unless she understands both why she has been sentenced to death and that execution results in death. An examination by three psychiatrists appointed by the state concluded Wuornos was competent to be executed and the stay was lifted. Before Wuornos’ execution, an Ohio group called Florida Support filed a motion on her behalf to stay the execution, citing her extreme mental illness. Florida allows groups or individuals to file such motions on behalf of defendants as “next friend” in capital post-conviction proceedings. This motion was denied.
Speaking from death row, she believes that she is a victim of her life, and not a predatory prostitute. Her defence attorney states that Wuornos operates at the emotional level of a 2-3 year old, and her behaviour should be understood within that framework. Wuornos’ attorney, Raag Singhal suggested that Wuornos' competency may come into q uestion again if the judge rejects her claims of prison abuse. "If the allegations don't have any truth to them, she's clearly delusional," he said. "She believes what she's written." Maxine Streeter, senior assistant attorney general, asked Backman to delay the hearing because Wuornos' 25-page filing was delivered after business hours Thursday. The hearing was called on the basis of a two-page letter written in January to the clerk of the state Supreme Court. The note ended, "P.S. Happy New Year!" Wuornos, who calls herself a model prisoner, complained about eight sergeants and officers assigned to the women's death row unit at the Broward Correctional Institution after she dropped her death appeals. "Our guards at Broward who work on the wing where she is being housed have not been exhibiting this type of behaviour, and the Department of Corrections will firmly deny any of these allegations," said spokesman Sterling Ivey. Wuornos accused the prison staff of waging psychological and physical warfare against her and wants the eight officers to be transferred "until my X," her shorthand for execution. She also wants the old staff returned. In a list of 17 complaints, the 11th complaint said, "To overhearing conversations in 'trying to get me so pushed over the brink by them I'd wind up committing suicide before the X."' Singhal said the issue of suicide was a real concern because her father hanged himself in prison and a grandfather committed suicide. Wuornos also reported overhearing staff conversations about "wishing to rape me before execution" and "on the way to Starke, in transport or at Starke itself." Death row inmates are executed at Florida State Prison near Starke. She also complained of strip searches, being handcuffed so tightly that her wrists bruise any time she leaves her cell, door kicking and frequent window checks by guards, low water pressure, mildew on her mattress and "cat calling ... in distaste and a pure hatred towards me." Wuornos threatened to boycott showers and food trays when the eight officers are on duty. "In the meantime, my stomach's growling away and I'm taking showers through the cell of my sink," she wrote. Wuornos told Singhal that conditions improved after he was appointed.
Trial and Execution
Her attorney stated that "Ms. Wuornos really just wants to have proper treatment, humane treatment until the day she's executed." Circuit Judge Paul Backman set a hearing Aug. 19 for a full airing of her allegations. The state promised in court to investigate, but a Corrections Department spokesman later rejected the allegations.
In the weeks before her execution, Wuornos gave a series of interviews to documentarian Nick Broomfield and talked about "being taken away to meet God and Jesus and the angels and whatever is beyond the beyond". In her final interview, she once again charged that her mind was "tortured" at BCI, and her head crushed by "sonic pressure". Food poisonings and other abuses worsened, she said, each time she complained, with the goal of making her appear insane, or to drive her insane. She also turned on her interviewer: "You sabotaged my ass! Society, and the cops, and the system! A raped woman got executed, and was used for books and movies and shit!" Her final on-camera words were "Thanks a lot, society, for railroading my ass." Broomfield later met Dawn Botkins, a childhood friend of Wuornos', who told him, "She's sorry, Nick. She didn't give you the finger. She gave the media the finger, and then the attorneys the finger. And she knew if she said much more, it could make a difference on her execution tomorrow, so she just decided not to."
Billy Nolas, who represented Wuornos in some trials, said she suffers from borderline personality disorder as a result of neglect and sexual abuse as a child. "She is the most disturbed individual I have represented," said Nolas, who now practises law in Philadelphia. "As she has gotten older and older, she has gotten worse and worse," said Nolas, who believes Wuornos is too mentally ill to comprehend what dropping her appeals and seeking death will mean. "She is like a kid," Nolas said, adding that she pouts and stomps around and doesn't want to deal with difficult situations. Nolas, who refers to Wuornos as "Lee," said he believes Mallory raped Wuornos and that pushed her over the edge. Information on Mallory's prior history of sexual assault was withheld from defense attorneys, he said "Before that, she had no history of physical violence," Nolas said.
EXECUTION
Wuornos was transferred to the Florida State Prison for execution by lethal injection which took place on October 9, 2002. She declined her last meal which could have been anything under $20 and opted for a cup of coffee instead. She was woken up at 5:30, requested a towel and washcloth to wash her face and freshen up. She was very calm and not as talkative as she had been in the past. A half-dozen anti-death penalty demonstrators were outside the prison, but were outnumbered by corrections officers. Wuornos was strapped to a gurney and hooked to two intravenous lines. Thirty-two witnesses watched as she was wheeled into the death chamber where an executioner pumped deadly chemicals into her system. Her last words were, Wuornos was pronounced dead at 9:47 a.m. EDT, but the process of injecting lethal drugs into both of her arms started promptly at 9:30. A brown curtain was drawn back, and witnesses saw Wuornos turn to them, make a bizarre face, kind of smile, roll her eyes and turn away; she was strapped in completely, unable to move anything but her head. At 9:31, she shut her eyes, and her head jerked backward; at 9:32, her mouth seemed to drop open, her eyes opened to slits, and it appeared she was gone.
Wuornos was the second woman in Florida and the tenth in the United States to be executed since the 1976 United States Supreme Court decision restoring capital punishment. The first woman was Judy Buenoano, who was electrocuted on March 30, 1998. Buenoano was known as the “black widow” for poisoning her husband, drowning her handicapped son and for trying to kill her boyfriend. She was a suspect in the poison death of another boyfriend in Colorado, but she wasn't charged. Buenoano was the first woman to be executed in Florida since a freed slave was hanged in 1848.
After death
After her death, Wuornos' body was cremated and her ashes were scattered beneath a tree in her native Michigan by Wuornos' childhood friend Dawn Botkins. At Wuornos' request, Natalie Merchant's song "Carnival" from her album Tigerlily was played at her funeral: Wuornos spent many hours listening to this album on death row. When Merchant found out about this, she gave permission to use the song in the closing credits of Nick Broomfield's documentary Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer: “When director Nick Broomfield sent a working edit of the film, I was so disturbed by the subject matter that I couldn't even watch it. Aileen Wuornos led a tortured, torturing life that is beyond my worst nightmares. It wasn't until I was told that Aileen spent many hours listening to my album Tigerlily while on death row and requested "Carnival" be played at her funeral that I gave permission for the use of the song. It's very odd to think of the places my music can go once it leaves my hands. If it gave her some solace, I have to be grateful”. Broomfield later speculated on Wuornos' motive and state of mind: “I think this anger developed inside her. And she was working as a prostitute. I think she had a lot of awful encounters on the roads. And I think this anger just spilled out from inside her. And finally exploded. Into incredible violence. That was her way of surviving. I think Aileen really believed that she had killed in self-defence. I think someone who's deeply psychotic can't really tell the difference between something that is life threatening and something that is a minor disagreement, that you could say something that she didn't agree with. She would get into a screaming black temper about it. And I think that's what had caused these things to happen. And at the same time, when she wasn't in those extreme moods, there was an incredible humanity to her”. Broomfield said. "My conclusion from my last interview with Eileen is, today we are executing someone who is mad. Here is someone who has totally lost her mind,"
TIMELINE
UNFAIR TRIAL
Issues Raised by the Wuornos Case
The case of Aileen Wuornos highlights issues that are prevalent in many other capital cases.
Background information on Mental Illness
When the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Ford v. Wainwright (1986) that the Eighth Amendment prohibits the execution of a person who is insane and not aware of his execution or the reasons for it, relatively few people who suffered from mental illnesses were within that ruling. When the Supreme Court ruled in Atkins v. Virginia (2002) that executing defendants with mental retardation was unconstitutional, it did not address the constitutionality of executing persons with mental illness. Mental illness differs from intellectual disability (previously “mental retardation”). Intellectual disability is measured by subnormal intellectual development with various cognitive deficiencies, usually appearing at an early age. The National Alliance on Mental Illness defines mental illnesses as "medical conditions that disrupt a person's thinking, feeling, mood, ability to relate to others and daily functioning."
On August 8, 2006, the American Bar Association passed Resolution 122A (PDF), recommending that individuals with severe mental illness be exempt from the death penalty. An almost identical resolution was approved by the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, and the National Alliance on Mental Illness for the mentally ill. The resolution addresses the various points in capital cases where the defendant's mental illness can be relevant: the defendant's intent when the crime was committed; the defendant’s ability to assist in his or her defence at trial and post-conviction proceedings; the defendant's competency to waive appeals; and the defendant’s mental condition at the time of execution. It recommends exempting from execution those defendants whose mental illness "impaired their capacity (a) to appreciate the nature, consequences or wrongfulness of their conduct, (b) to exercise rational judgement in relation to conduct, or (c) to conform their conduct to the requirements of the law." It also suggests exempting those who cannot effectively assist counsel or understand the punishment they are to receive: "A sentence of death should not be carried out if the prisoner has a mental disorder or disability that significantly impairs his or her capacity (i) to make a rational decision to forgo or terminate post-conviction proceedings available to challenge the validity of the conviction or sentence; (ii) to...assist counsel...or (iii) to understand the nature and purpose of the punishment, or to appreciate the reason for its imposition in the prisoner's own case."
Background information on Insanity
"Insanity" is a legal term, not a medical diagnosis. The term "incompetency" is also sometimes used as an alternative to "insanity." It refers to any mental illness severe enough to affect the defendant's ability to understand the crime he or she is committing, the trial proceedings, or the punishment for the crime of which he or she was convicted. Insanity can affect a capital case at three points.
First, if the defendant was insane at the time of the crime, he or she can be found not guilty by reason of insanity. In most states, the burden of proof falls on the defence to show that the defendant was insane. The jury must decide, based on testimony by psychiatric experts and other evidence presented during the trial. When the jury hands down a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity, the defendant is committed to a mental institution. Four states (Kansas, Montana, Idaho, and Utah) do not allow a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity.
Second, if the defendant is incompetent at the time of the trial and cannot understand the legal proceedings or cooperate with his or her counsel, then he or she can be found incompetent to stand trial. In most states, a judge makes this determination. If such a finding is made, the defendant is sent to a mental institution to be treated until he or she regains competency.
Finally, a defendant who is insane as his or her execution approaches can be found incompetent to be executed. Under Ford v. Wainwright, it is unconstitutional to execute an inmate who does not understand his or her punishment or the reason for it. However, if the inmate's competency is later restored, he or she can then be executed.
Mental Illness Issues in the Aileen Wuornos case
The case of Aileen Wuornos highlights some of the legal hurdles mentally ill capital defendants can face during their trial and appeals. Wuornos was never found legally insane, but her mental illness played a role in mitigation during her trial, and in her decision to waive her appeals. Mental health experts linked Wuornos' mental illness to the serious abuse she suffered in childhood. Court documents detail the mistreatment she endured: her mother abandoned her as an infant; her father committed suicide in prison while serving time for child molestation; she suffered physical abuse by her grandfather (who also committed suicide); and she had a sexual relationship with her brother at a very young age. When she was in junior high school, school officials treated her by administering mild tranquillisers. After being raped by a family friend at age 14, Wuornos was blamed by her family for the resulting pregnancy, forced to give the child up for adoption and thrown out of the house rendering her homeless.
Borderline Personality Disorder
Mental health experts have pointed to a history of such abuse as a trigger to the development of Borderline Personality Disorder. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition defines Borderline Personality Disorder as marked by "a pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image, and affects, and marked impulsivity." When Dr. Harry Kropp examined Wuornos in July of 1992, the year of her trial, he found her to be suffering from a “full blown delusional system” and having a “Borderline Personality Disorder with Paranoid Features.” Based on a review of Wuornos' records, psychologist Dr. Jethro Toomer stated,
“[The] totality of the data is consistent with a diagnosis of a borderline personality disorder, the existence of which is life-long and has adversely impacted Ms. Wuornos’ overall functioning and adaptive capacity. This disorder is characterised by a pervasive pattern of instability in mood, affect, identity and interpersonal relationships presented in a variety of contexts and situations. She has exhibited transient periods of bizarre behaviour, irrational impulses and delusional thoughts. Her overall functioning has been characterised by the existence of mini-psychotic episodes, where reality is blurred and she is unable to adequately test reality. Her condition is chronic and unpredictable. Predispositional family history [of BPD] is characterised by early trauma and nurturance deprivation consistent with the above diagnosis and serves to negate the stability and predictability of life necessary for acquiring a consistent pattern of behaving and thinking.”
Experts later testified about the disorder’s symptoms, including delusional thoughts, bizarre behaviour, and mini-psychotic episodes that might have influenced both her decision to confess to the murders to legally protect her lover Tyria Moore, and, more important, to commit the murders out of a (possibly delusional) fear of being raped. At trial the defence presented evidence of Wuornos’ diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder and Antisocial Personality Disorder. The State’s expert agreed with the Borderline Personality Disorder diagnosis. The defence tried to show how the disorders related to the inconsistencies in her confessions, and that she wasn’t “lying” in conventional terms, which prosecution witnesses disputed. The defence also tried to show evidence of brain damage from childhood and that her disorders impaired her ability to conform her conduct to the requirements of the law. During the sentencing trial, the jury found the only mitigating factor to be Wuornos’ diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder. The judge found she had Antisocial and Borderline Personality Disorders.
Trauma and the Trial
Wuornos later argued on appeal that at trial she was not allowed to introduce evidence of the traumatic effects of rape on her mental health and decision-making. She had always maintained the first victim, Richard Mallory, had violently raped her and she shot him in self-defense. The courts found “post traumatic prostitution stress disorder” is not accepted by medical science. It was later that Journalists discovered Mallory had served time in prison for the rape of another woman, but this information, not known at the time of the trial, was not introduced in her defence.
Impact of Mental Illness on Wuornos’ Appeals
Attorneys' Difficulty Working With Wuornos
Mental illness continued to be a dominant issue in the case after Wuornos was sentenced to death. Her mental health significantly deteriorated during her time on death row. Numerous attorneys appealed to the courts on her behalf, citing her bizarre and delusional behaviour. The defence lawyer who defended Wuornos in her trials, Billy Nolas, told the press, “She is the most disturbed individual I have represented. As she has gotten older and older, she has gotten worse and worse. She is like a kid,” In a letter to the Florida Supreme Court, Wuornos' appeals lawyer, Raag Singhal, explained, “In Court and at the jail, she exhibits bizarre behaviour, laughing and crying at inappropriate times and obsessing on points having no importance to her cases.”
Delusional Claims of Abuse in Prison
Wuornos herself wrote to the courts with apparently delusional claims of abuse by prison staff that included pressurising chambers with “head shrinking” devices, harassment, and food cooked in dirt. As one of her attorneys, Charles Kaplan, wrote in a petition, “Petitioner’s claims of prison abuse and mistreatment are either true or false. They are clearly believed to be true by Petitioner based upon her writings and behaviour in Court on July 12, 2002. If true, Petitioner’s claims must be resolved and corrected. If false, Petitioner’s claims further support previous expert findings that she is delusional and mentally ill.”
Waiving Appeals
Wuornos began to refuse to meet with mental health experts or her attorneys. She persistently filed petitions to waive her appeals and volunteered for execution in long rambling letters. A legal battle ensued over her competency to waive her appeals. Governor Jeb Bush ordered a mental health assessment, conducted simultaneously by three experts. Some sources say it was 15 minutes while others say 30. Her attorneys disputed that a 30-minute examination conducted by three experts simultaneously and without a comprehensive review of her records, could adequately assess her condition. As one petition asserted, “A person with borderline psychosis is not continuously openly psychotic, but might be psychotic in, for her, special traumatic situations. In a 30-minute interview with many people attending, there is no chance that the psychiatrists may be able to find her psychotic dilemmas.” Nevertheless, the three psychiatrists concluded Wuornos was competent to waive her appeals. In her last statement before execution, Wuornos said, "I'd 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." Does that sound like someone who is in their right mind?
Publicity in the Aileen Wuornos Case
Pre-trial
The media branded Aileen Wuornos as the first female serial killer in U.S. history, and turned this theme into the centrepiece of her trial coverage. Prosecutors jumped on this notion in making their case and trying to prove how dangerous she was. Television and tabloid coverage that made her out to be a “man-hating lesbian murderer” helped sway public opinion against her. The sex-role stereotypes constructed by the media allowed the prosecution to build its case around the fact that women typically do not commit violent crime, especially against strangers, making it easier for a jury to decide against her. Within two weeks of her arrest, three top investigators on her case retained their own lawyer to field offers from Hollywood, cringing with embarrassment when their unseemly haste to profit on the case was publicly revealed.
Judicial Remedies
Although Wuornos changed her story numerous times regarding what happened in each of the murders and whether she acted in self-defence, her claims of a media bias remained consistent. Before her initial trial, Wuornos requested a change of venue because of all the publicity her case had received; her request was denied. This issue was brought up again on appeal, but the appellate court found that “…parties were able to select jurors who all agreed that any pretrial publicity would not bias them and would not interfere with their ability to honour the trial court’s instructions." When Wuornos was asked by a reporter after the first trial concluded why she was found guilty, she claimed it was because of “media coverage” that was out to get her.
Problems in Particularly High-Profile Cases
Another troubling aspect of this case was law enforcement’s involvement with the media. Three police officers were relieved of their duties because they had entered into deals to be part of a major motion picture being made about Wuornos. This called into question the credibility of some of their testimony, which may have been influenced by the money they received for their role in the case and their subsequent movie deal. It was later discovered that Wuornos’ lawyer, Steven Glazer, who lacked prior criminal law experience, took her case for self-promotion, as he knew how much media coverage the case was receiving. Assistant Public Defender Tricia Jenkins said, “[Glazer] told me he was only taking on the case because he needed the media exposure.” Glazer requested $25,000 in return for speaking to documentary filmmaker Nick Broomfield and discussing Wuornos’ case with him. Wuornos had no money to pay him, so his compensation came from interviews. He failed to investigate the officers who were making money from their movie deal, and advised Wuornos to plead guilty to all of the charges because of his limited legal experience and the lack of resources at his disposal. Although there was little debate about Wuornos’ guilt, media coverage likely played a role in her receiving the death penalty for her crimes.
Representation Issues in the Aileen Wuornos Case
Aileen Wuornos’ appeals raised the issue of inadequate representation in her trial for the murder of Richard Mallory, as well as in her other five cases (the murders of David Spears, Charles Carskaddon, Tony Burress, Charles Humphreys, and Walter Antonio), for which she pled guilty or no contest. In her appeal to the Florida Supreme Court, Wuornos contended that her penalty phase lawyer in the Mallory case failed to call as mitigation witnesses people who had known her as a child and who would have humanised her by describing the abuse she experienced. The court held that her counsel was not ineffective because much of the information offered by those witnesses was presented to the jury by three defence experts who testified during the penalty phase. In addition, Wuornos claimed inadequate representation because her defence counsel had not uncovered evidence of Mallory’s past criminal conviction, which could have corroborated her argument that she committed the murder in self-defence. The court rejected this claim because such evidence is admissible only under two conditions: the first is “to present the general reputation for violence the victim has in the community” and the second is to allow “evidence of the specific violent acts of the victim if known to the defendant.” In responding to Wuornos’ appeal, the Florida Supreme Court stated that “The defendant does not claim that she was aware of Mr. Mallory’s criminal past at the time of his murder. Consequently, the fact that Mr. Mallory was charged with a sex offence well over thirty years prior to his fatal encounter with Wuornos is not relevant.”
Wuornos’ appeal in the Walter Antonio case, in which she originally pled guilty, argues that Glazer “professed a lack of experience needed to represent her during a guilt-phase trial and, as a result, had an inherent conflict of interest when permitting her to enter a guilty plea.” She also argued that her plea was not voluntary because Glazer did not advise her of its consequences. Tricia Jenkins, Wuornos’ original attorney, later testified that Glazer had not picked up discovery files from her regarding Wuornos’ case”. In her appeal of the Charles Carskaddon case, in which Glazer filed Wuornos' guilty plea, Wuornos claimed a conflict of interest between herself and Glazer, based on movie and book deals Glazer had sought. Additional problems with Glazer’s representation were raised in the documentary “Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer” , in which Glazer requests payment of $25,000 for an interview, stating that Wuornos was unable to pay him and he needed the interview payment to work on her case. In 2001, Wuornos dropped her appeals. Numerous attorneys, advocacy groups, and mental health experts appealed to have the courts allow them to act on her behalf, arguing that her deteriorating mental state made her incompetent to waive her appeals or to be executed. Although Wuornos’ case raises a number of other issues, problems with her representation were the main focus of her appeals. Similar problems have arisen in other capital cases in which overworked public defenders cannot give cases the attention they need. Additionally, Glazer’s quest for publicity highlights the particular dangers in highly publicised cases and illustrates the influence of the media in such cases.
Purpose of Mitigation
The death penalty is intended only for “the worst of the worst” crimes. In order for juries to determine whether a particular defendant deserves a sentence of death, they must weigh evidence that this murderer is actually one of the worst of the worst (the aggravating factors) against the reasons for sparing him or her (the mitigating factors). States vary in the specific circumstances they define as aggravating factors, but generally include murders committed during the commission of another crime, murders committed for monetary gain, murders of police officers, multiple murders, or other murders considered to be particularly aggravated. Mitigating factors frequently address the defendant’s background, including a history of mental illness or intellectual disability, previous trauma suffered by the defendant, or the absence of a prior criminal record. A defendant who has faced life with physical or emotional handicaps may be deemed less fully responsible for his criminal actions.
As mitigation has become recognized as a critical part of a capital trial, defence attorneys have turned to mitigation specialists to investigate defendants' backgrounds. Mitigation specialists examine defendants' family history, medical history, educational and employment background, and any other element of an individual's life that may convince the jury to return a sentence other than death. With this information, they assist defence counsel in presenting a coherent case for mitigation. The role of the mitigation specialist is so central to a client's defence that the American Bar Association includes them in their guidelines on the defence in death penalty cases: "The defence team should consist of no fewer than two attorneys…an investigator, and a mitigation specialist." (Guideline 4.1, page 952) In the commentary to this guideline, the ABA says,
"A mitigation specialist is also an indispensable member of the defence team throughout all capital proceedings. Mitigation specialists possess clinical and information-gathering skills and training that most lawyers simply do not have. They have the time and the ability to elicit sensitive, embarrassing and often humiliating evidence (e.g., family sexual abuse) that the defendant may have never disclosed. They have the clinical skills to recognize such things as congenital, mental or neurological conditions, to understand how these conditions may have affected the defendant’s development and behaviour, and to identify the most appropriate experts to examine the defendant or testify on his behalf." (Commentary on Guideline 4.1, page 959) “The defence team's mitigating evidence is presented during the penalty phase of the trial, after the prosecution's aggravating evidence. Juries are instructed to consider both sets of factors, but not simply to count the number of factors on each side and determine the sentence based on whether there are more aggravating or mitigating factors. Rather, jurors are expected to use their own judgement in deciding which factors carry greater weight. If the aggravating circumstances are stronger, jurors may choose a death sentence, but if the mitigating circumstances are more compelling, they must choose a life sentence.”
The Role of Mitigation in the Aileen Wuornos Case
The mitigating evidence presented in Aileen Wuornos’ trial focused on her traumatic childhood and mental illness. Three psychologists testified that Wuornos suffered from Borderline Personality Disorder, likely brought on by her traumatic upbringing. The jury’s sentencing recommendation found only one mitigating factor: the defendant suffered from Borderline Personality Disorder. The judge, however, found five mitigating factors:
Despite the facts inexcusably undetected by investigators, the death sentence was extremely harsh to begin with in this case, considering the mitigating evidence in the punishment phase of the trial. The defence showed that Wournos suffered a tragic, abusive upbringing, which resulted in antisocial and borderline personality disorders. During both the trial and the appeal, the court declined to find the statutory factor of extreme emotional disturbance. This case, from the early investigations to the appeals process, has been tainted by publicity and media drama. Three top investigators in the case hired lawyers within weeks of the arrest to field offers from Hollywood concerning movie deals.
Did Wuornos act in Self-Defence?
At the time of the killings, Wuornos was working as a highway prostitute. All of the men she killed were men who picked her up and who, she says, violently attacked her. Wuornos was picked up by many other men during this period and she did not harm them. Several men have testified that they spent days or weeks with her and she never threatened them. They did say that she was worried that they would attack her. Prostitutes are much more likely to be raped than women in other jobs. One study of a group of prostitutes said that they had been raped an average of 33 times a year.
Did Wuornos Receive a Fair Trial?
Wuornos has been tried only once--for the killing of Richard Mallory--but has been convicted of six murders. In her videotaped confession, which was the key evidence used by the prosecution in her trial, Wuornos said more than 60 times that she acted in self-defence. None of these references was included in the version of that tape which was shown to the jury. The prosecution claimed that Mallory had no history of sexual violence. It was later revealed that Mallory had been convicted of attempted rape in Maryland, and had threatened to harm other women. Evidence of these prior attacks was not presented at her trial, yet the jury was allowed to hear evidence of crimes Wuornos had not been convicted of.
Was Wuornos Inadequately Represented By Counsel?
Her trial attorneys first failed to interview, and later failed to call, several witnesses who had volunteered information which corroborated Wuornos's testimony. Her trial attorneys delayed in researching evidence of Mallory's history of violence against women. The judge then ruled it inadmissible because it was introduced too late. Private attorney Steven Glaser encouraged her to plead no contest to five murder charges, without securing a sentencing offer or informing her of all her options.
Did Officers Involved In Investigating The Case Behave Unethically?
There is evidence that Volusia County sheriff deputies negotiated contracts for book and movie deals about Wuornos's case before she was even arrested. Deputies arranged with Tyria Moore, Wuornos's former girlfriend, to set Wuornos up. Though Tyria was implicated in several of the killings, she was never charged. Officer Brian Jarvis, initially the chief investigator on the case, was removed from the case when he questioned the conduct of his colleagues on the case. He later reported vandalism to his house, theft of his records on the case and threats against him and his family.
Was Wuornos a Serial Killer?
According to the prosecution, portraying Wuornos as a "serial killer" won them the death penalty.
Were Sexism, Anti-Lesbian and Anti-Prostitute Prejudice Used To Condemn Wuornos To Death?
Prosecutors made repeated references to Wuornos's romantic relationships with women. 80% of women on death row in Florida are lesbians. Though Wuornos does not consider herself a lesbian, society's fear and hatred of lesbians was used against her. People have trouble believing that a prostitute would need to kill six times in self-defence. Yet recently, a Los Angeles store owner killed five men in four different armed robbery attempts. This man was never charged with any crime. Tens of thousands of women are in prison in the U.S. for killing men who abused them. A study by the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence found that men who kill their wives or girlfriends serve an average of 2-6 years, while women who kill their male partners serve an average of 15 years. Ted Bundy, who killed more than 30 women in Florida, had offers from several well-known private criminal attorneys to defend him pro bono. At one time his defence team included five public defenders and a volunteer consultant on jury selection. Wuornos's supporters have been unable to find any such assistance for her; she has had to rely on overworked public defenders.
MY THOUGHTS
Thus far I have refrained from injecting any comments because I wanted to leave them for the end. Throughout the years, I have always been conflicted with this case. I’ve been researching true crime with a focus on serial killers for over 40 years and I have known about Aileen Wuornos since her arrest. I read her book years ago. I have always had a level of empathy for her. I do not condone her murders, of course I don’t. Murder is wrong no matter what. But the whole point of our justice system is to weigh up the aggravating and mitigating factors and to sentence accordingly. There is this ongoing debate as to what exactly makes a serial killer. Is it nature or nurture? I have always believed that Aileen Wuornos was a product of society. The only monster here is the one society created. We will never know if she had become a killer had her life been different, had she gotten the help from people around her. I feel that 7 men died unnecessarily. I think this could have been avoided had society been kinder and more willing to help.
Wuornos endured a terrible childhood that no child should experience. And of course that is not a reason or excuse for her murders. However, as I already said, I think these murders could have been avoided. Wuornos was not a natural born killer. Just to make things clear, I am not a professional in the crime field. I am not a psychologist. However, I have learnt a lot through my 40+ years of research in criminology and serial killings and I think I can make an educated opinion on this. But it is just my opinion. Wuornos’ childhood was filled with instability, sexual abuse from her grandfather, her brother and associates of her grandfather, and all this before she was 11. She was also homeless at 15 - thrown out by her grandfather because she got pregnant. A pregnancy that resulted in the rape from one of her grandfather’s friends, may I add. Regardless of how you look at this, even if you believe that the pregnancy resulted from her prostitution - which she was already practising at a young age in exchange for cigarettes and money and maybe even comfort of any kind - she was still a minor. This would have been rape according to the law.
With most serial killers, there is a culmination of factors that make them what they are. This can be the MacDonalds triad - which is a set of 3 factors whereas the presence of any 2 are considered by many to be predictive of violent behaviour and these are 1) bed wetting, 2) setting fires and 3) animal cruelty. Then we have the Dark Triad of personality traits which I personally have renamed to the Dark Quadrad of personality traits because they have recently added a 4th element. These are 1) Machiavellianism, 2) Narcissism, 3) psychopathic behaviour and 4) Sadism. Many serial killers have experienced trauma or abuse in their childhood but it is not associated with violence. It is just an added factor. Most people who have been abused do not go on to kill because they don’t have those added predispositions that make them go over that line. So, why did Aileen kill? We may never really know for sure but I don’t believe she was a cold-blooded, psychopathic killer. Was her first murder really self-defence? I think so. Maybe that is what tipped her over the edge. She was in possession of guns for years prior to her first killing, so why then?
Why was the public so interested in her at the time?
I think it was a mixture of elements. Most people tend to think that women do not commit murder in this way, and when they do, it is usually Black Widows or Angels of Death, who poison their spouses or administer deadly drugs to their patients. Very few women commit the kind of crime that Wuornos committed and especially alone. But right there is another problem as far as I am concerned. Was she really alone in all of the murders? Law enforcement did have enough evidence that put Tyria Moore at one of the murders. She was at the very least complicit. Wuornos has been branded as the only female sexual predator, America’s first known serial killer, an Organised Lust killer and a Monster. I will look at each of these a little later and give my opinion on each one. But there was a press frenzy and they were doing what the press do so well - sensationalising. Pretty much everybody around her was using this to make money, including her own lawyer and law enforcement. People accused her of looking remorseless and angry but I don’t agree with this. Sure, there were probably times when she was angry because everything was against her, but I think she looked more panic-stricken and even manic.
Another very important factor in the make-up of Aileen Wuornos is her relationship with Tyria Moore. This may have been the first and only time in her life that she felt loved. But even that love would ultimately be misplaced. It is also important to know that Wuornos was not a woman devoid of emotion or feeling. Let me talk a little about Tyria Moore while we are on the subject. Aside from the fact that she blatantly betrayed Wuornos in the end, I do believe she should have been convicted of something. She was no angel. She was fully aware of what Wuornos was doing. It is known that towards the end, Moore and Wuornos would argue about money or the lack thereof, and I even question whether Wuornos, through her love for Tyria, felt somehow pressured to prostitute herself more and quite frankly, put her in more danger. I listened to the phone conversation between them when law enforcement were listening and taping the conversation and 2 things jump out at me. 1. Tyria lied when Wuornos asked her if there was anybody else in the room with her and 2. She put on tears and begged Wuornos to confess “right now.
“Do it now”. That’s very cold. And we must not forget that Tyria enjoyed the spoils of Wuornos’ kills. Aside from the fact that using Tyria in this way to elicit a confession was very risky and controversial from an investigative point of view as ensnarement is known for eliciting false confessions, this was also the ultimate betrayal. She got immunity from prosecution and spilled all the beans on Wuornos. Yet Wuornos remained honourable towards her right up to the end, something you do not see in narcissists or psychopaths. They would not sacrifice themselves in this way in order to save someone else. Tyria should have been charged with something. I have a thing about plea deals at the best of times - I think they are open to abuse and with a plea deal you are going to say what the police want you to say.
So, why did Wuornos continue to kill if her first murder was self-defence? Firstly, it is possible that the other murders were also self-defence. The problem here is that at this point I think her perceptions were getting more and more skewed. It is possible that she believed they were going to harm her. It is also possible that they were going to harm her. We don’t know for sure. But many people have asked why she didn’t turn herself in after the first murder if it really was self-defence? This was a woman who did not trust the authorities and for good reason. She had been horribly let down by the system. Would they believe her? Professionals have been asked if they believe in Wuornos’ self-defence story and one person said No because “she had other options that she didn’t take, for example, she could have run away: She could have made the choice not to pick up the gun or to become a hooker”. I have a huge problem with that statement because firstly, this came from a well-to-do professional who probably has no idea what it is like to live in survival mode. When confronted with violence, it is not always easy to just run away. That’s the first thing I want to say right off the bat. But there is another aspect to this that directly relates to Wuornos.
Take, for example, the time she robbed a store just to get $35 and 2 packs of cigarettes. She was incarcerated for over a year for a crime that I believe she committed out of a need to survive. The system was not kind to Wuornos and worked very much against her in every way possible. We know that Mallory, her first victim, had a criminal record as a sex offender and she knew the authorities were not going to listen to her and they probably wouldn’t have given her record thus far. The other 6 killings are debatable for me. Maybe she did kill purely to get money or maybe she chose her victims specifically through criteria of how they treated her, and somewhere in her own delusional and broken thinking, she believed they would have or were turning violent towards her and she had now learned a new method of survival, and she was going to use it. No more fuckery, so to speak. That might explain why she never killed more: the men who treated her with respect got to walk away. And as far as her choice to become a hooker is concerned, some people really do not have a choice or their choices are limited and these pompous professors do not understand this level of survival. One guy said “If you get to the point where your clients will rough you up, why not stop there?” This made me so angry. Privileged people like that really have no idea what it is like to live like that. To have limited choices and all you are thinking of is how to survive with the little that you have and with all the odds against you. And what makes this case quite complex is that it is multifactorial because she is driven by the need to make money the only way she felt she could and the need to look after Tyria as well as dealing with the perception of the abuse that she was getting from these men, so all of this running at the same time is what makes this complex.
Is it so hard to believe that Wuornos acted in self-defence? Her profession is renowned for being dangerous, we know that. But because she was an exit-to-exit highway sex worker, this made it even more dangerous for her. You don’t have to look far and wide for evidence on this. Wikipedia is a good start “In one study, 44% of sex-workers reported having experienced sexual abuse in their lifetime. The overall rates of sexual assault and rape is high with one study finding that 68% of respondents had been raped since entering prostitution. These high levels of sexual violence suffered by sex workers have very traumatic effects on the men and women working as prostitutes and have been linked to higher levels of PTSD.” After everything Wuornos experienced as a child, I would imagine she already had PTSD. The abandonment, the abuse. Nurture is a really powerful motivator behind certain types of behaviour. Her own mother abandoned her when she was 4. Her own father committed suicide in prison after being convicted of sex crimes against children. Wuornos was taught, unfortunately, at an early age that sex was a commodity for her and perhaps this is one of the reasons she turned to prostitution. It was what she knew. Abandonment can have a huge effect on a child, leaving them with so many questions about what was wrong with them, why weren’t they loved, what could they have done better? Future relationships can be fractured. We know from the extensive background history on Wuornos that she had problematic social skills at school and struggled to fit in. She had endured enough pain, rape, trauma and abandonment to exacerbate any mental health issues she may have had. We also know that Wuornos’ first victim had a history of sexual violence.
What I would also like to add is that some have said that it is unlikely that all her victims became violent and that it was a lot and too much to believe. But if you look at the statistics with violence and rape against sex workers, this ratio of Wuornos’ victims actually fit into that. There were many others that she had paid sex with and she didn’t kill them, so the idea that these men became violent or threatening is actually not that far-fetched. I’m not saying that she was justified in killing them but all of this should have come into the trial as mitigating factors. There is no dispute that Aileen murdered these men. What is in dispute is whether or not she got a fair trial.
This myth that sex workers have to put up with violence and rape needs to be quashed. I have heard authorities say “It’s part of their job, what do they expect?” No it isn’t part of their job. They are not selling rape and violence. They are selling sex. What they expect is to be treated with respect. Being raped and violently attacked is not part of their job description and the sooner we begin to think along those lines then maybe sex work will start to become a safer profession.
Let’s go back to the classification of Aileen Wuornos being a sexual predator, revenge killer, or organized lust serial killer as well as America’s first known serial killer. These are incorrect for many reasons and I am not alone in my thinking.
Sexual predator - Wuornos’ murders were not sexually motivated. Whatever you want to believe, at best, her motivation was defence and at worst, robbery. Wuornos never displayed any interest in her victims’ body - alive or deceased - in a sexual manner. The only sexual connection here is that she was a sex worker. This had nothing to do with her crimes as far as motive was concerned.
Revenge Killer - Some say there was an element of revenge, putting her in the typology of “Revenge Killers” but I don’t agree. I don’t think this was a conscious factor when she pulled the trigger. I think the emotions behind her pulling the trigger were much more complex, especially with the first murder.
Lust serial killer -For the same reason that she is not a sexual predator, her murders were not lust or sexually motivated. Yes, the murders most likely were committed just after a sexual act or just before but this had no connection with her motives. She got no sexual pleasure from killing. I would even debate whether she got any pleasure at all from killing. If you look at other serial killers, they usually have an element of sadism or pure pleasure of killing. They enjoy the actual killing and this is their driving force. Wuornos did not have that. But Wuornos did not kill all of her clients. And she certainly wasn’t interested in collecting souvenirs in the same sense that other serial killers do this. Yes, she took items from her victims but this was financially motivated not reminders of her crimes. She was also not interested in tormenting her victims or drawing out their death. Many female serial killers, especially those that use a knife, for example, Joanna Dennehy in the UK, kill because they enjoy killing. They get a kick out of it. That cannot be said for Wuornos.
Organized serial killer - I disagree with this categorization. Generally, an organised offender is defined as an individual who plans their murders and displays control at the crime scene. A disorganised offender is an individual who is spontaneous, their crime scenes appear more muddled and the crimes more opportunistic in nature. Wuornos’ crimes and crime scenes were fairly chaotic. She didn’t even try to hide the bodies. She left fingerprints all over the place and even rode around in her victims’ car. This is not the behaviour of an organised killer. She was not a sophisticated killer and often left evidence that easily led the police back to her. According to an article from the University of Huddersfield on researchgate.net they say this “The organized offender is described as leading an orderly life that is also reflected in the way he commits his crimes. Highlighting some proposed characteristics, he is claimed to be of average to high intelligence, socially competent, and more likely than the disorganized offender to have skilled employment. It is also claimed that he is apt to plan his offences, use restraints on his victim, and to bring a weapon with him to commit the murder and to take the weapon away with him from the crime scene. In contrast, the crime scene of the disorganized offender is described as reflecting an overall sense of disorder and suggests little, if any, pre-planning of the murder. The disarray present at the crime scene may include evidence such as blood, semen, fingerprints, and the murder weapon. There is minimal use of restraints and the body is often displayed in open view. The disorganized offender is thought to be socially incompetent and to have below-average intelligence.” The only discrepancy here is that Wuornos took the weapon to the crime scene and didn’t leave it there. But I think this is more to do with the fact that she simply couldn’t buy a gun every time. You own a gun for protection and if you use it, you don’t tend to leave it at the crime scene. Guns don’t tend to be throwaway weapons unless you are trying to conceal it. Wuornos’ confession was chaotic. It was more of a rambling which revealed very little of her actual crimes. It was a confession of someone who clearly had been through the mill. Someone who had been through hell. It was confused and not the words of a cold-blooded, calculating psychopathic killer. That type of killer would have been much more organized in their story and less emotionally disturbed and very clear and succinct in what they were saying. We also know that Wuornos had a below average IQ and she wasn’t exactly socially competent. The only planning that Wuornos did was to have her revolver with her, but as I have said earlier, she had a revolver for many years as protection prior to her murders.
America’s first known (female) serial killer - Some media outlets even referred to her as “the nation’s first known serial killer”. She certainly wasn’t America’s first known serial killer but she wasn’t even the first female serial killer. Good lord, women have been murdering serially for as long as men though their victims are usually family members and they often choose poison over other means of disposal. Yes, her modus operandi was somewhat unique for a woman. Wuornos killed strangers with a gun, an unusual but not unprecedented fact that the media ran with rampantly, quickly followed by book and movie deals that even law enforcement within weeks of her arrest had exploited.
Monster - I don’t think Aileen was a monster. And if she were, then it was society that created her. I truly believe that Aileen Wuornos was not born a killer.
Man-hater - This picture that was painted of her being a man-hater is completely untrue. It is possible that when these guys started to show signs that they might abuse her or get violent with her that this brought back the trauma of her childhood and she lost the plot. She was a people-hater, a society-hater, because society never gave her a break. She was constantly betrayed by pretty much everybody around her.
Was she mentally incompetent?
Her traumatic upbringing, including her physical and sexual abuse, have been partially linked to the development of her borderline personality disorder. Personally, I don’t believe in the death penalty. There have been too many cases where innocent people get convicted. Wuornos became more and more unhinged whilst on death row. The justice system seemed more interested in ensuring that she'd get the death penalty instead of considering her disturbed mental state. And if we railroad people into death row without looking at their lives, what led up to their crimes, then we are never going to learn to prevent this, because I really do believe that if somebody at some point had intervened, then these murders could have been prevented. At the very least, Wuornos’ traumatic childhood and background should have been mitigating factors in her trial and while I believe she deserved some kind of punishment - we can’t all go around killing people, right? But I do not believe she deserved the death penalty. I do think she could have been rehabilitated. If she was shown kindness or compassion, she may have been saved. Instead, through public and political pressure, she was railroaded into death row. One criminal psychologist presented a theory to explain Wuornos’ inconsistencies during her confession and I agree with her: “The apparent inconsistencies are fitting with what we know of human beings, and the psychology of all human beings which is that we don’t have a single motivation for anything that we do and that we are not always clear on what our motivations are”. So the so-called inconsistencies are all part of the big picture. They are all valid as far as Wuornos is concerned and she is just moving in and out of the different explanations. She is herself not clear as to why she did what she did and she is just drawing on everything to find this motivation. Her confession was not strategic at all. This also corroborates what I said earlier about whether Wuornos was an organized or disorganized killer. An organized killer would have a clear confession. It may not be the truth but it would have been planned and not all over the place. Her confessions were how she experienced the situations and how she felt about what was happening, whether or not that is reality or that it was all distorted by her own perception of what she was doing or her own understanding is debatable.
Did she get a fair trial?
No, I don’t think she did for so many reasons.
#1, it is a legal and human right to have the presumption of innocence until proven otherwise. This did not happen in Wuornos’ case. Yes, they had a confession but the confession was elicited through ensnarement and remember, these types of confessions carry a high probability of being false. Everything was stacked against her from the start. She was portrayed as a heartless cold-blooded killer but actually she wasn’t. She was convicted of murder long before the trial even began. Law enforcement decided this at the beginning and would not waver. She clearly was not psychopathic. She was borderline and explosive as a character, a little crazy and paranoid but she did not show that she was an ongoing danger to others. She had clearly killed people but under great duress and a set of circumstances that were complex but they still executed her. They didn’t need to.
#2, there was enormous public pressure to send her to the chair. At the time of Wuornos’ execution, Governor Jeb Bush was running for re-election. Brad Thomas, Jeb Bush’s political adviser is reported as saying “We want to become more like Texas. Bring in the witnesses. Put them on a gurney and let’s rock n roll”. Shortly before the execution, Jeb Bush ordered 3 psychiatrists to examine Wuornos for just 15 minutes. Based on their analysis they got the thumbs up to go ahead with the execution. She had been found to be mentally competent. To quote Broomfield “it was really pretty incredible that Eileen had just sailed through the psychiatric test. it makes you wonder what you'd have to do to fail” She then requested that Nick perform her last interview. “here was somebody who has obviously lost her mind and has totally lost touch with reality and we're executing a person who's mad and I don't really know what kind of message that gives us”
#3, there were corrupt police officers who were offered bribes and money from film companies well before Wuornos was even convicted. A state attorney’s report found that 3 law enforcement officers currently working on the case were negotiating with Hollywood producers and that they needed a conviction to get paid a lot of money. How much money were they getting to twist this investigation? The police officers appointed an attorney to negotiate with the various movie companies after Wuornos was arrested. The same attorney also represented the interests of Tyria Moore in these discussions. 2 of the officers involved in movie negotiations were later transferred out of the criminal investigation division, while the 3rd officer resigned after a phone bug revealed conversations of movie deals. One officer, Sergeant Brian Jarvis of the Marion County police force, who led the murder investigation, was later demoted into traffic patrol after a month of continuing harassment on the job as detective resulting from his finding out about the movie rights deals being made between Tyria Moore and several law enforcement officers. Sergeant Jarvis said that Tyria was initially targeted as one of the killers and there was a lot of evidence to corroborate this. Soon after, he got home to find a note on his back door telling him to keep his mouth shut or something could happen to his family. Shortly after that, his house was broken into and all the files to the Wuornos case were trashed. Nothing else was touched in the break-in. He reported it and nothing was done about it. Brian Jarvis resigned from the police force and is now a private detective in Tampa, Florida.
#4, she did not have sufficient counsel. Her first lawyer, Trish Jenkins, was way over her head. The second lawyer, Steve Glazer, was accused of greasing Wuornos’ path to the electric chair and being unfit to represent her. I am inclined to agree. Steve was asked just after she pleaded no contest and got 3 additional death sentences “Are you sure that Aileen wants to die?” His answer was not “yes, she told me” but rather “Yes, I’m sure….I’m sure that in her anger and grief and torment, and the fact that it’s very hard to live with the fact that she killed 7 men, that she does want to die for it.” YOU PLONKER: THIS WAS NOT FOR YOU TO DECIDE!!! and this was his whole justification for entering the no contest plea. Like WTF??? This guy is unbelievable!!
#5, a myriad of experts on the case say the media attention surrounding her crimes made it difficult for the trial to play out in a fair manner and Wuornos’ request to change venue was denied.
#6, her mental health was in question. Wuornos was medically described as a damaged and primitive child who sees the world as a place full of evil spirits and ghosts. She was described as having uncontrollable rages and temper tantrums and being too immature to properly grasp the finality of death.
#7, the mitigating and aggravating factors were very much biased in favour of the prosecution. mitigating factors supporting Wuornos were not considered. She had a life of trauma and the jury needed to understand this. But it wasn’t done. Aggravating factors, however, that were allowed in should not have been - other murders which she hadn’t even been convicted of. Again, I see this as a violation of her rights to presumption of innocence.
#8, the evidence supporting her claim that the murders were self-defence was not considered. Mallory’s criminal record of sexual violence should have been allowed into court just as the other crimes of Wuornos was allowed in. I find that incredible. Mallory’s crimes had been proven. Whilst being incarcerated for 10 years in an institute for the criminally insane, Mallory even attempted to rape one of the nurses. This was revealed by one of the private detectives looking into the case. The judge overlooked this. The prosecution overlooked this. Law enforcement overlooked this. In fact, the judge would not allow this in saying that it was irrelevant. This alone proves that Wuornos did not get a fair trial. This should have changed everything, but it didn’t. The jurors never even heard any of this.
#9, the prosecution misled the jury. They played back her original confession in court but it was heavily edited. Wuornos stated in her confession at least 50 times that it was self-defense and this was completely edited out of the tape played back in court. 3 hours was edited down to 16 minutes. The prosecution relayed to the jury that there was no evidence of self-defence, no evidence of violence from Mallory and that he was a decent man with no prior history of violence. But this wasn’t true.
The jury chose to sentence someone to death who should not have been sentenced to death. You had media influence infecting the trial, the edited confession tape, deals with Hollywood producers with the investigating officers, Tyria’s questionable testimony paid for with a plea deal giving her immunity, the prosecution was even allowed to bring in the other murders and the defence team was in way over their head. This was a perversion of justice.
Wuornos’ final appeals attorney, Raag Singhal, said that Wuornos' final moments on October 9, 2002 impacted him. “It was a difficult day because, no matter what, she wanted to die.” Singhal was brought onto the case earlier in 2002, to determine if the complaints Wuornos was making about the prison she was in were true. Before her eventual execution, Wuornos claimed that the guards were mistreating her, going as far as to accuse them of tampering with her food. “If her complaints were valid, if something could be proven, then there’s a real issue with the prison system,” “If the complaints weren’t valid, then there’s a real issue with her mental state. Either way, something must be done.” ”I think she had a whole host of mental issues,” “If you were to kind of look at the totality of the circumstances, her complaints, her behaviour, some of the things that she would do… She was someone who, in my view, was going in and out of competency, which is somewhat of a normal thing. When we talk about competency in the criminal context, we say it’s something that waxes and wanes. You can have someone who is confident one day, then you meet them three days later and they’re not. I have no doubt that she had entire periods where she was lucid and could converse. There were times I met with her when I had no issues with her, then there were times I met with her and she clearly had mental issues.” As an example, Singhal recalls Wuornos would occasionally laugh uncontrollably for no real reason in meetings with him. But she was the same woman who, in her letters to the Florida Supreme Court, was capable of a level of advanced penmanship. Singhal believes this is why she could pass some of the competency tests. To Singhal, this was a clear example of her waxing and waning periods of competence. “She was definitely someone who had good days and bad days, and rarely were the two consecutive.” “But, when you think about the fact that someone like Ted Bundy was offered life in prison while Aileen Wuornos was someone where death seemed to be really all that was ever on the table, I think there’s a lot of things that come into play that make it seem like the level of fairness was a little bit different for her.”
Nick Broomfield said that he found Wuornos to be the only honest person in the case. Everyone else, including the police, were all involved in selling her story for as much money as possible. There was no proper investigation into this. It was all covered up. He said: “One of the reasons i had felt so much sympathy for Aileen was that she was betrayed by those closest to her all her life” The life and death of Aileen Wuornos is a tragedy in every respect, from her own childhood to the justice system. It all seems so warped. In the case of Aileen Wuornos, everyone was a victim including herself.
ENDSCREEN
In 1989 the supreme court ruled it was not unconstitutional to execute the mentally impaired. However, months before Wuornos’ execution, On June 20, 2002, the Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling ending the death penalty for individuals with intellectual disability. In Atkins v. Virginia, the Court held that it is a violation of the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel unusual punishment to execute death row inmates with “mental retardation” On May 27, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Hall v. Florida that Florida’s strict IQ cutoff for determining intellectual disability in capital cases is unconstitutional. The Court found that “Florida’s law contravenes our Nation’s commitment to dignity and its duty to teach human decency as the mark of a civilized world.” In 2002, when the Court in Atkins banned the execution of people with “mental retardation,” it allowed states leeway in selecting a process for determining who would qualify for that exemption. According to Florida’s Supreme Court, defendants with an IQ even one point above 70 cannot be considered intel lectually disabled, even though most states allow for a margin of error in such tests. The Supreme Court’s ruling stated that Florida’s strict rule “disregards established medical practice” and noted that the “vast majority of states” rejected such a narrow interpretation of IQ scores. The Court held that, “When a defendant’s IQ test score falls within the test’s acknowledged and inherent margin of error, the defendant must be able to present additional evidence of intellectual disability, including testimony regarding adaptive deficits.” Aileen Wuornos’ IQ was 81.
LEGACY
In 1992, the same year after Wuornos was convicted of killing Mallory, the Lifetime cable network aired the made-for-television movie Overkill: The Aileen Wuornos Story, starring Jean Smart.
A more recent film, Damsel of Death, premiered at a film festival in New York, promising in an advertisement, "You've seen Ted Bundy, Son of Sam, Jeffrey Dahmer. Now see the Damsel, herself, Aileen Wuornos." There was even a film documenting the fanfare surrounding Wuornos' case.
Books
Reynolds, Michael (1992). Dead Ends. Warner (first publiсation of the book). ISBN 9780446362825.
Russell, Sue (2002). Lethal Intent. Pinnacle Books. ISBN 0786015187.
Wuornos, Aileen; Berry-Dee, Christopher (2004). Monster: My True Story. John Blake Publishing. ISBN 978-1844540792.
Wuornos, Aileen (2012). Kester, Lisa; Gottlieb, Daphne (eds.). Dear Dawn: Aileen Wuornos in Her Own Words. Soft Skull Press. ISBN 978-1593762902.
Other works
The poem "Sugar Zero" by Rima Banerji (appears in the 2005 Arsenal Pulp Press publication Red Light: Superheroes, Saints, and Sluts).
The poem "Aileen Wuornos" by Doron Braunshtein (appears in his 2011 spoken word CD The Obsessive Poet).
The book Life of the Party (2019): the poet Olivia Gatwood refers to Wuornos throughout her book.
Documentaries
Filmmaker Nick Broomfield directed two documentaries about Wuornos:
Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer (1993)
Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer (2003)
Books
Reynolds, Michael (1992). Dead Ends. Warner (first publiсation of the book). ISBN 9780446362825.
Russell, Sue (2002). Lethal Intent. Pinnacle Books. ISBN 0786015187.
Wuornos, Aileen; Berry-Dee, Christopher (2004). Monster: My True Story. John Blake Publishing. ISBN 978-1844540792.
Wuornos, Aileen (2012). Kester, Lisa; Gottlieb, Daphne (eds.). Dear Dawn: Aileen Wuornos in Her Own Words. Soft Skull Press. ISBN 978-1593762902.
Other works
The poem "Sugar Zero" by Rima Banerji (appears in the 2005 Arsenal Pulp Press publication Red Light: Superheroes, Saints, and Sluts).
The poem "Aileen Wuornos" by Doron Braunshtein (appears in his 2011 spoken word CD The Obsessive Poet).
The book Life of the Party (2019): the poet Olivia Gatwood refers to Wuornos throughout her book.
Documentaries
Filmmaker Nick Broomfield directed two documentaries about Wuornos:
Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer (1993)
Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer (2003)
Documentarist AngelEowyn made a deep-dive documentary covering all of the legal aspects that demonstrates the unfairness of the trial:
Aileen Wuornos - Monster or Victim of Society (2023)
Wuornos was the subject of episodes of the documentary TV series American Justice, Biography and Deadly Women. She was also featured in an episode of the TV series The New Detectives (season 3, episode 1: "Fatal Compulsion"). An episode of Murder Made Me Famous on the Reelz television network, airing December 1, 2018, chronicled the case. In February 2020, the series Very Scary People was shown on the Crime & Investigation; episodes 3 and 4 describe how the investigation into Wuornos was conducted. A 2021 episode of Catching Killers from Netflix is centred around Wuornos: the 40-minute episode is titled, "Manhunter: Aileen Wuornos." A UK documentary “Notorious - Aileen Wuornos” looking into whether she had a fair trial was aired on “Snapped”, Season 23, Episode 100 in 2018.
Films
The biographical drama film Monster (2003), written and directed by Patty Jenkins, stars Charlize Theron as Wuornos and Christina Ricci as Tyria Moore (named Selby Wall in the film). It chronicles Wuornos' life and her relationship with her girlfriend, Moore, who testified against Wuornos. Theron won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the film.
The horror-thriller film Aileen Wuornos: American Boogeywoman which shows a fictional version of the early life of Wuornos, was released as Video-on-demand on October 8, 2021, and on DVD on October 15, 2021. It stars Peyton List as Wuornos.
Television
The TV movie Overkill: The Aileen Wuornos Story (1992) starred Jean Smart as Wuornos. The antagonist of the 2002 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Chameleon" — Maggie Peterson (Sharon Lawrence), a prostitute who murders her johns — is based on Wuornos.
In 2015, Lily Rabe portrayed a fictionalised version of Wuornos as part of a Halloween storyline in American Horror Story: Hotel in the fourth episode of the show's fifth season, and later in the season finale.
Music
An operatic adaptation of Wuornos' life premiered at San Francisco, California's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on June 22, 2001. Entitled Wuornos, the opera was written by composer/librettist Carla Lucero, conducted by Mary Chun, and produced by the Jon Sims Center for the Performing Arts.
Several musicians have written songs about Wuornos, including Jewel ("Nicotine Love"), the New York-based metalcore band It Dies Today ("Sixth of June"), and Pablo Hasél ("Inéditas por culpa de Aileen Wuornos").
The singer Diamanda Galás recorded a live cover of the Phil Ochs song "Iron Lady", which she would often perform as a tribute to Wuornos, for her performance album Malediction and Prayer.
Japanese doom metal band Church of Misery released the song "Filth Bitch Boogie (Aileen Wuornos)" on their 2004 studio album The Second Coming.
Samples of interviews with Wuornos feature prominently throughout Dragged into Sunlight's 2009 album Hatred for Mankind, and Lingua Ignota's 2017 album All Bitches Die at the beginning of the songs "For I Am the Light (and Mine is the Only Way)" and "Holy is the Name (Of My Ruthless Axe)". Lingua Ignota's song "If the Poison Won't Take You My Dogs Will" of her 2018 album Caligula is also about Wuornos.
The song "Poor Aileen" by Superheaven, which is the final track from the 2015 album Ours Is Chrome, is written about Aileen Wuornos.
A parody cover version of Dolly Parton's song "Jolene" called "Aileen", dedicated by Wuornos, is featured on Willam Belli's third album. The music video, featuring Gigi Gorgeous portraying Wuornos, was released on November 1, 2018.
In 2019, rapper Cardi B recreated Wuornos' famous mugshot for her single "Press". In 2020, rapper Sadistik released the song "Aileen Wuornos", dedicated to the serial killer, on his Delirium EP.
Wuornos was the subject of episodes of the documentary TV series American Justice, Biography and Deadly Women. She was also featured in an episode of the TV series The New Detectives (season 3, episode 1: "Fatal Compulsion"). An episode of Murder Made Me Famous on the Reelz television network, airing December 1, 2018, chronicled the case. In February 2020, the series Very Scary People was shown on the Crime & Investigation; episodes 3 and 4 describe how the investigation into Wuornos was conducted. A 2021 episode of Catching Killers from Netflix is centred around Wuornos: the 40-minute episode is titled, "Manhunter: Aileen Wuornos." A UK documentary “Notorious - Aileen Wuornos” looking into whether she had a fair trial was aired on “Snapped”, Season 23, Episode 100 in 2018.
Films
The biographical drama film Monster (2003), written and directed by Patty Jenkins, stars Charlize Theron as Wuornos and Christina Ricci as Tyria Moore (named Selby Wall in the film). It chronicles Wuornos' life and her relationship with her girlfriend, Moore, who testified against Wuornos. Theron won the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in the film.
The horror-thriller film Aileen Wuornos: American Boogeywoman which shows a fictional version of the early life of Wuornos, was released as Video-on-demand on October 8, 2021, and on DVD on October 15, 2021. It stars Peyton List as Wuornos.
Television
The TV movie Overkill: The Aileen Wuornos Story (1992) starred Jean Smart as Wuornos. The antagonist of the 2002 Law & Order: Special Victims Unit episode "Chameleon" — Maggie Peterson (Sharon Lawrence), a prostitute who murders her johns — is based on Wuornos.
In 2015, Lily Rabe portrayed a fictionalised version of Wuornos as part of a Halloween storyline in American Horror Story: Hotel in the fourth episode of the show's fifth season, and later in the season finale.
Music
An operatic adaptation of Wuornos' life premiered at San Francisco, California's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on June 22, 2001. Entitled Wuornos, the opera was written by composer/librettist Carla Lucero, conducted by Mary Chun, and produced by the Jon Sims Center for the Performing Arts.
Several musicians have written songs about Wuornos, including Jewel ("Nicotine Love"), the New York-based metalcore band It Dies Today ("Sixth of June"), and Pablo Hasél ("Inéditas por culpa de Aileen Wuornos").
The singer Diamanda Galás recorded a live cover of the Phil Ochs song "Iron Lady", which she would often perform as a tribute to Wuornos, for her performance album Malediction and Prayer.
Japanese doom metal band Church of Misery released the song "Filth Bitch Boogie (Aileen Wuornos)" on their 2004 studio album The Second Coming.
Samples of interviews with Wuornos feature prominently throughout Dragged into Sunlight's 2009 album Hatred for Mankind, and Lingua Ignota's 2017 album All Bitches Die at the beginning of the songs "For I Am the Light (and Mine is the Only Way)" and "Holy is the Name (Of My Ruthless Axe)". Lingua Ignota's song "If the Poison Won't Take You My Dogs Will" of her 2018 album Caligula is also about Wuornos.
The song "Poor Aileen" by Superheaven, which is the final track from the 2015 album Ours Is Chrome, is written about Aileen Wuornos.
A parody cover version of Dolly Parton's song "Jolene" called "Aileen", dedicated by Wuornos, is featured on Willam Belli's third album. The music video, featuring Gigi Gorgeous portraying Wuornos, was released on November 1, 2018.
In 2019, rapper Cardi B recreated Wuornos' famous mugshot for her single "Press". In 2020, rapper Sadistik released the song "Aileen Wuornos", dedicated to the serial killer, on his Delirium EP.
LINKS & SOURCES
Wikipedia Aileen Wuornos - Wikipedia
The case of Aileen Wuornos - The facts The Case of Aileen Wuornos - The Facts | Capital Punishment in Context
The case of Aileen Wuornos - The trial Aileen Wuornos - The Trial | Capital Punishment in Context
The case of Aileen Wuornos - Post trial Aileen Wuornos - The Post-Trial Period | Capital Punishment in Context
Criminal minds Aileen Wuornos | Criminal Minds Wiki | Fandom
Murderpedia Aileen Wuornos | Murderpedia, the encyclopedia of murderers
Biography Aileen Wuornos - Son, Last Words & Childhood (biography.com)
Aileen Wuornos - IMDb
Fox Aileen Wuornos' attorney talks about serial killer's last days in new documentary | Fox News
This Abandoned Broward Correctional Institution Is the Creepiest Place in South Florida | South Florida | Broward Palm Beach New Times | The Leading Independent News Source in Broward-Palm Beach, Florida
Aileen Wuornos timeline | Timetoast timelines
2002 Supreme Court ruling Intellectual Disability Supreme Court Cases | Death Penalty Information Center
Violence against sex workers: Fact Sheet-Sexual Violence Against Sex Workers (urbanjustice.org)
Transcripts: Catching Killers: Season 1, Episode 2 script | Subs like Script
Confessions of a serial killer https://youtu.be/u0-kEq-qUQE
The last interview https://youtu.be/K6a5gmbPV98
Part 2 - Life and death of a serial killer https://youtu.be/rm_s8EPzttA
Part 1 - The selling of a serial killer https://youtu.be/lqEvtvr4Rgc
Aileen Wuornos pleading no contest https://youtu.be/w_f6m41UVIE
Snapped: Notorious - Aileen Wuornos Snapped - Se23 - Ep100 - Notorious Aileen Wuornos HD Watch - video Dailymotion
Aileen Wuornos coming clean https://youtu.be/3yi2dbaQ3mM
Aileen Wuornos cross examination https://youtu.be/e6_F0V-RmII
Tyria Moore cross examination https://youtu.be/HK25inIf-ic
The last interview https://youtu.be/K6a5gmbPV98
Part 2 - Life and death of a serial killer https://youtu.be/rm_s8EPzttA
Part 1 - The selling of a serial killer https://youtu.be/lqEvtvr4Rgc
Aileen Wuornos pleading no contest https://youtu.be/w_f6m41UVIE
Snapped: Notorious - Aileen Wuornos Snapped - Se23 - Ep100 - Notorious Aileen Wuornos HD Watch - video Dailymotion
Aileen Wuornos coming clean https://youtu.be/3yi2dbaQ3mM
Aileen Wuornos cross examination https://youtu.be/e6_F0V-RmII
Tyria Moore cross examination https://youtu.be/HK25inIf-ic
CREDITS
Support me on patreon. A PDF of this video’s transcript, research notes and all resource links is available on patreon: https://www.patreon.com/angeleowyn
The full-length deep-dive documentary on every aspect of Aileen Wuornos' life: