On the morning of the 15th of July 1997 one of the world’s most recognized fashion designers,
Gianni Versace, had gone for a morning stroll.
The sky was blue, the sun was shining, and on this particular day Versace had told his
assistant that he would pick up the day’s newspapers for a change.
As he returned to his Miami Beach mansion, papers in hand, a man came up behind him and
shot him through the cheek with a .40 caliber handgun.
As the 50-year old collapsed on the ground, the killer put one in the back of his head
to make sure the job was done.
That killer was called Andrew Cunanan, a 27-year old whose actions still perplex the police
and public.
His cold-blooded murder of the Italian designer was just a final chapter in a lurid story
of deceit, depravity and death.
Before we start with the main story we should tell you that Cunanan was not a typical serial
killer.
He was what’s known as a spree killer, the difference being that while he might have
killed a number of victims over a period of months, he did not hide in plain site as serial
killers do.
Serial killers generally act out horrific sadistic fantasies, murdering, sometimes doing
terrible things with the corpses, and then many of them go to work and play badminton
with their beloved children.
A spree killer on the other hand sets out on a mission and doesn’t stop until he is
arrested, or on many occasions, takes his own life.
A spree killer hardly covers his tracks, he doesn’t wrestle with his dark fantasies,
he just lets hell break loose until the flames devour him.
Andrew Cunanan was born on August 31st, 1969.
His father was Filipino-American and his mother Italian-American.
As you should know by now after watching our shows on killers, what happens in childhood
is often a marker of what drove serial murderers to commit such heinous acts.
In the seminal serial killer book, “The Method and Madness of Monsters”, we are
told that Cunanan grew up in Rancho Bernardo, California, in quite a wealthy neighborhood.
He, his two sisters and one brother didn’t want for anything, with the family becoming
quite well-off after the father left the U.S. Navy and became a stockbroker.
Andrew was said to be the favorite of his father, who even gave him the master bedroom.
The sisters later said their parents suspected Andrew was gay, but no one really talked about
it.
It was a loving family, and according to the siblings the parents would have accepted the
fact their son was homosexual.
Andrew was a happy-go-lucky child and he was also very intelligent and did well at school.
So, what could go wrong?
Well, the answer to that lies in this perfect existence, because it all came crumbling down.
You see, while his parents wouldn’t have minded his sexuality, Andrew was afraid to
tell them.
This is the beginning of him living a lie, a kind of double existence.
Not only that, there is evidence that in 1996 he could well have been the caller on a sexual
abuse hotline.
Although police say the evidence is tenuous, the person who called in to say he was an
altar boy and had been abused by a priest could have been Cunanan.
In school he was said to be very flamboyant, once turning up to a function dressed in a
bright red, tight leather jumpsuit.
He wanted to be noticed; he wanted to be different.
In his yearbook in 1987 he was voted, “Most likely never to be forgotten.”
Those fellow students of his certainly got that right.
Academically he was smart, with an IQ of 142; he had fluency in French, and some fluency
in Spanish.
He knew the bible back to front, could talk politics, history, philosophy; he could regale
people with fascinating stories and was said to be very witty.
He was also something of a refined kid, knowing how to verbalize the aromas of a good wine
and knowing where to eat when travelling in Italy.
The problem, though, with such popularity, such high-mindedness, is ego and pride.
Oh, how Andrew wanted to be special, and he tried very hard to make an impact on people.
But what goes up, must come down, and this charismatic kid was about to experience his
first great Fall.
Andrew was nineteen, at the peak of his powers, when his doting father was charged with embezzlement.
The father didn’t wait for the judgment and just left the family, returning to the
Philippines.
The mother, now with four kids, was broke.
This perfect existence for Andrew was shattered, and rather than put the pieces back together
in the USA he followed his father to Asia.
Here he saw this man he had admired all his life living in abject squalor.
It was a bubble burst, a sight Andrew couldn’t stand and so he returned to the U.S., his
carefully constructed identity in ruins.
It’s also said at this time in life he started to show violent propensities, once pushing
his mother so hard against a wall her shoulder was dislocated.
Now we see a new Andrew, a bitterness and anger on the other side of his extravagant
flamboyance.
He dropped out of college and instead found his good looks and charm could make him money
as a gay gigolo in San Francisco and San Diego.
He looked the part: lean, handsome, and he was great company.
In the early 90s he had a long client list of rich men, in cities all over the U.S..
If it wasn’t gigolo work Andrew was doing he simply started hanging around with the
rich, and sometimes famous, and he took some of these wealthy guys as lovers.
He was often showered with gifts and given monthly stipends so he could live the high
life.
At some point it’s said this is the time he met Versace, but the relationship between
the two remains a mystery.
Did they know each other well, or did they merely share a few words one night?
No one knows, because Andrew was a compulsive liar and would often tell his friends lies
about how he rubbed shoulders with celebrities.
It was later discovered that Cunanan was obsessed with Versace, but also Madonna, Tom Cruise,
John Travolta, Leonardo DiCaprio and Sylvester Stallone.
It’s very likely one of them could have wound up being Cunanan’s victim.
They were all listed in something police later discovered and called the little black book.
So, there he was, receiving gifts from wealthy lovers or just renting himself out for 140
bucks night when he needed some extra cash.
He was known to leave $200 tips after $1,000 meals he shared with his friends.
Just like when he was in school, he wanted very much to be admired, and in his eyes it
was this decadence, the spending of money, that would gain him affection.
Of course that wasn’t the truth, it only garnered him false admiration, the kind of
stuff that underneath can cause depression.
Still in 1996 he was living in a retried millionaire’s mansion, receiving $2,000 a month from that
rich man, a former art dealer, and driving an expensive sports car.
But again, this came crashing down and the two spilt.
At the time Cunanan had been dating this old, wealthy man, he had fallen in love with a
young, intelligent and successful man called David Madson.
Cunanan also had found a friend in a former U.S. Navy officer, Jeffrey Trail.
The former was aged 30 and latter, 28.
These were, to Andrew at least, his best buddies.
They were his real life love away from aged millionaires that only wanted his fine body
to somehow rescue their own youth.
Madson had been in an intimate relationship with Cunanan, but got rid of him when he realized
Cunanan was playing all over town.
At some point, Trail also fell out with Cunanan.
He’d lost his rich benefactor and he’d lost his young lover and friend, and to make
it worse, he started putting on weight and was finding it harder to land those hour-long
gigs bouncing on hotel room beds.
At this time he started dealing pharmaceutical pills and also smoking crack cocaine and methamphetamine.
His life had come apart again.
Sometime later Madson and Trail then by coincidence both ended up living in Minnesota.
They had not known each other well in the past, but because they had both dated Andrew
they were aware of each other.
They became friends, but not lovers.
Still, this infuriated Andrew.
He had been left out of the friendship.
One day Madson got a call from Cunanan to say he was going to come and visit the two,
but what Cunanan really wanted was to get back with Madson.
He turned up to his house, broke, having maxed his credit cards, and then gave Madson a very
expensive watch.
All this time Madson was aware that Cunanan seemed overwrought, like he was at the edge
of despair.
Sometime later Trail got a message on his answering machine and it was Andrew saying
come over to Madson’s apartment and hang out with us.
Trail never returned home again, and it took days for someone to report him missing.
When Madson didn’t turn up for work, his colleagues went around to his apartment.
They heard the dog scratching at the door and asked the superintendent to investigate.
Trail was found wrapped in a rug.
He’d been violently hit in the head with a claw hammer about 30 times.
But where was Madson?
Police believed after seeing Andrew do this, he probably just ran with him fearing for
his own life.
After all, it was discovered that Cunanan had a gun, one that had once belonged to Trail.
No one knows exactly what went down on that fateful night.
Madson was found dead two days later near a lake.
He’d been shot in the back and through the eye.
Cunanan had now killed his two best friends, the guys he always said he loved the most.
A week later and the wife of a very rich and prominent property developer, Lee Miglin,
returned home to their grand house and she got a terrible shock.
Her husband’s body was lying in the garage.
It was discovered that all his ribs had been broken, he’d been stabbed 20 times with
a screwdriver, his head was almost severed, and he had a plastic bag over his face.
Holes had been cut for the nostrils, so police believed the killer had wanted to keep the
75-year old alive before he used a saw to cut his throat.
Pruning shears had also been driven into the victim’s chest.
One thing we know about this extraordinary rich man was that he liked to frequent the
gay communities of Chicago, but of course this was his secret life.
It turned out that the killer had mutilated and killed his man, and then made some sandwiches
and had a shave.
A few days later and another man was found dead, this time the victim was shot in the
head.
This wasn’t a revenge killing, there was no sign of emotional rage.
Police called this murder “functional.”
The function for Andrew was to drive to Miami.
As we said, spree killers go out in a hail of fire, they leave traces, and they often
don’t intend to escape or even live through it.
The FBI had enough evidence to know for sure it was Cunanan, it was a matter of finding
him.
His face appeared in the media, and authorities were told by 12 people he’d been spotted
in Miami, but for some reason they were slow to respond.
Meanwhile Andrew had one more thing he wanted to do, and that was murder his idol, the great
fashion designer Gianni Versace.
This took some planning, since a high profile man like Versace was away a lot and often
had people around him.
While cops were looking for Cunanan, he was waiting in a cheap Miami hotel for the right
time to get his man.
You know what happened next, and that was Versace’s fatal newspaper run.
We will never know why Cunanan took those lives because soon after he broke into a houseboat
and shot himself in the head.
The question everyone has asked was what drove this intelligent kid to do these things?
Was it the possible abuse in childhood by the priest?
The downfall of his family?
His double lives, his being used as a human pleasure doll, or just the fact he couldn’t
bare not to be the person in his fantasies?
Did he just crack up after that first rejection, and then think, I’m taking them all down?
Tell us what you think in the comments.
Also, be sure to watch our other video about the horrible serial killer Ted Bundy.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget to like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.