Damsel of Death: The facts behind Monster
In order to detail the prime differences between the dramatic movie, Monster, and the real life expliots of convicted serial murderer Aileen Carol Wuornos, it might be helpful to know a little about her life and her victims.
Aileen was born in Rochester, Michigan, on February 29, 1956. Her father, a convicted child molester, was later strangled in prison in 1969. She was left her with her Grandparents, who adopted her on March 18, 1960. She turned to an early age of prostitution after giving birth at the age of 14. She then jumped from place to place. She was arrested and spent some time in jail in Jefferson County, Colorado, for disorderly conduct, drunk driving, and firing a .22-caliber pistol from a moving vehicle. In Michigan, she had an outstnading warrant for failure to appear for driving without a license and consuming alcohol in a motor vehicle, and was arrested for simple assault and disturbing the peace after she threw a cue ball at a bar tender.
She then traveled down to Florida and on May 20, 1981, she was arrested in Edgewater, Florida, for armed robbery of a convenience store, and was again arrested on May 1, 1984, was for trying to pass forged checks at a bank in Key West, and again on January 4, 1986, when she was arrested in Miami and charged with auto theft, resisting arrest, and obstruction by false information.
In June, 1986, Aileen met and befriended Tyria Moore, named Selby in the movie. They became open lesbian lovers, and even though over the next 4 years, their relationship cooled, they remained close.
Now, the movie was most strikingly different in the relationship between Aileen and Selby. Although they were lovers, the movie implies that they only knew each other for a short time before her first murder, and the movie also implies a much more compressed timeline for the murders. It even implied that a pair of the murders occurred on the same night while they attempted to gather a getaway car.
The movie also implies that Selby was something of a savior for her. In reality, Aileen had many relationships in Florida, and jumped from relationsihp to relationship to make ends meet. Reality also differs on this point, since both were arrested, under aliases, many times in Florida over the course of their friendship.
Another mistruth in in the movie was the timeline and the impression of the murders. The movie stuck to stuck only to 5 of the 6 murders for which she later confessed, not mentioning the other 3 murders in which she was either suspected or convicted of.
Her first victim, Richard Mallory, was found on 12/13/89 with three shots to the chest with a .22 caliber weapon. He was an Electronics repair businessman, and was known for his secluded and paranoid lifestly. Of all her victims, Mallory was the only one with a known violent and masogonistic past. He spent 10 years in jail for a previous rape conviction. He was last seen on 11/30/89.
The movie, most likely accurately, portrayed this first murder as the self defense she asserted. He attacked her, raped her, and bound her for her aparent murder. She freed herself, murdered him, and stole his car and his money. Mallory’s car was located in early december, a few days after was last seen at work, and two weeks before his body was located on 12/13/89.
The movie implies that Aileen stole the cars of each of her vicitims, but this doesn’t match what occurred in reality. In most cases, the cars were found, with license plates missing, close to the bodies. The exception was the Gray Sunbird, owned by Peter Siems, which Aileen and Moore crashed on July 4th. The accident was reported to police, and the car was recovered close to the crash scene, but Siems body was never recovered. Although Aileen was convicted in Seims’ death, this is one of two convictions that Aileen did not confess to.
The rest of her victims fit the profiles as outlined in the movie. They were each men of standing or non-violent men who wanted her professionalism. They even managed to nail the death of the ex-police officer as her second to last victim.
She was arrested in a bar called “The Last Resort,” as depicted in the movie, and she was arrested by a pair of under cover cops that had been tailing her for a few days. In reality, they managed to talk her into coming back to their hotel room, as opposed to getting change from their car, as depitcted in the movie. She was arrested after she stepped outside. I have been unable to determine if her friend, the bartender, attempted to help her escape before her arrest.
Aileen confessed to the murders, in among other ways, during a taped phone conversation between herself and Moore. Moore had been picked up by investigators, and worked with them to record many phone conversations over a period of a couple of days. At first, Aileen was very careful about not admitting any wrong doing in connection with murders. She tried to convince Moore that she had only been picked up on an old outstanding warrant, which is what police officicers had been telling her. Over the course of a few days, Aileen admitted to the murders, and took full responsibility for them, basically aquitting Moore of any connection with the murders. Although the movie compressed this into one phone converstaion, it was needed and well written to have the same effect.
In summary, the movie did portray the murders as reported, with the exception of some dramatic liberties needed to make the movie more interesting for a consumptious society.
Fact Summary:
Aileen Carol Wuornos was sentenced to death by the State of Florida, and was executed October 9, 2002 by Lethal Injection.
There were 8 victims over the course of a year. Only 7 bodies were recovered, and she was never officially charged with one of the murders. Wuornos was arrested on 1/9/1991.
She proclaimed her innocence to her death, saying “I shot em cause to me it was like a self-defending thing, she told police, because I felt if I didnt shoot em and didnt kill em, first of all … if they had survived, my ass would be gettin in trouble for attempted murder, so Im up shits creek on that one anyway, and if I didnt kill em, you know, of course, I mean I had to kill em … or its like retaliation, too. Its like, You bastards, you were going to hurt me.”
Her final words were “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.” She declined her final meal, taking only a cup of coffee.
Victim List:
- Richard Mallory, a white male, Florida electronics repair busines, was aged 51 when he was reported missing on 11/30/1989 by work associates. His car was found on 12/1/1989. His body recovered several miles away from his car on 12/13/89 with three shots to the chest from a .22 caliber weapon. Mallory was the only victim with a criminally violent record.
- John Doe
