The Monster of Florence

"Take another look at this crime."

The Monster of Florence, or Il Mostro di Firenze (real identity unknown), was a notorious Italian serial killer. Though several men have been tried for the murders, it is still popularly believed that the real killer was never caught.

Early Crimes
The first known victims of the Monster of Florence were Antonio Lo Bianco and his Sardinian lover, Barbara Locci. They were killed on the night of August 21, 1968 in Signa, a small town near Florence, while having sex in a car. Locci's six-year-old son, Natalino, was asleep in the car and was awoken by the gunshots. The killer then carried him over his shoulders, while singing a popular song to ease him, to a stranger's house and left him there alive. Natalino told the stranger that his father was sick at home and that his mother and "uncle" were dead in a car. Natalino was later able to give a physical description of the killer, though his story didn't definitively point out anyone. In later interrogations, Natalino would recant his previous version and claim that he walked to the house alone (negated by the fact that he had no shoes on when he was found and didn't appear to have walked shoe-less); or that there was more than one person present and that one had called the killer "Salvatore".

Locci's husband, Stefano Mele, was arrested and confirmed his son's first version that he had been home sick during the murders. When a paraffin glove test showed that he had recently fired a gun, he admitted that he had been present at the crime scene. He also claimed that another one of his wife's lovers, Salvatore Vinci, had been the trigger man, but soon afterwards withdrew the accusations and claimed full responsibility. He said that he had thrown the murder weapon in a ditch, but it was never found. Mele was found guilty of the murder and sentenced to 14 years in prison on the grounds of "infirmity of mind", though he later recanted his confession. A theory that was made later suggested that he had been an accomplice and fired a shot into Locci post-mortem. Six years later, another couple, Pasquale Gentilcore and Stefania Petti, was murdered. Another seven years went by and a third double murder occurred in June of 1981. The victims were Giovanni Foggi and Carmela di Nuccio. All three crimes were believed unrelated until Mario Spezi, a crime journalist at La Nazione, realized the similarities between the 1974 and 1981 murders and proclaimed them the work of a serial killer, whom he dubbed The Monster of Florence. A local voyeur, Enzo Spalletti, was arrested because he had talked about the murders with his wife before it was publicized and spent three months in preventive prison, but was released when another murder was committed in October. The victims were Stefano Baldi and Susanna Cambi. Two couples came forward and stated that they had seen a lone and 'slightly crazy'-looking man driving away from the scene in a red Alfa Romeo. These testimonies led to the elaboration of the first and most popular sketch of the killer (pictured in the infobox). The next victims, Paolo Mainardi and Antonella Migliorini, were killed on June 19, 1982. Because Migliorini was afraid of the Monster, the couple sacrificed some privacy and parked in a slightly busy area that was visible from the street, rather than deep in the woods. As a result, Mainardi could see the Monster approaching. He started the engine and kept driving in reverse after both were shot, leaving the car in a ditch across the street. The car was soon found by a passing motorist, who initially mistook it for an accident, and stopped to help. Interrupted, the Monster abandoned the scene without performing his signature mutilation on Migliorini or finishing Mainardi, who was still barely alive. Mainardi died a few hours later in a hospital. Though he had never recovered consciousness, the assistant prosecutor on the case, Silvia Della Monica, made a press release claiming that Mainardi had survived long enough to "say some words", in an attempt to get the killer to expose himself. On the afternoon the statement was published, a Red Cross emergency worker who had accompanied Mainardi to the hospital was called by a man who claimed to be the killer and asked what Mainardi said. He was later called again by the same person while on vacation in Rimini, leaving the investigators baffled as to how the caller knew how to reach the man.

The "Sardinian Connection"
On July 1, twelve days after the Migliorini-Mainardi murder, the police headquarters received a letter containing a yellowed 1968 newspaper clipping of the Locci-Lo Bianco murder. Over the article, someone had scrawled "Take another look at this crime." The police compared the shells of the 1968 murder with those found at the recent killings and found that they had all been fired by the same gun, and also that all the bullets had come from the same box. The Monster's gun had a defective firing pin that left behind distinctive, unique markings on each casing. The type of ammo was copper-jacketed Winchester rounds of series H. Though Mele could not be responsible for the 1981 crime, as he was still in prison, he was located by Spezi in a halfway house of Verona and interviewed under the guise of shooting a documentary about the place. Mele mumbled several confusing remarks before finishing with "They need to figure out where that pistol is. Otherwise there will be more murders. They will continue to kill... They will continue." Mele's words were taken as confirmation that the 1968 murder had been a traditional Sardinian "clan killing", planned beforehand and performed by a group of men, rather than an impromptu crime of passion by Mele alone. In clan killings, the gun was either destroyed or preserved in a safe location, rather than abandoned at the site like Mele originally said. The police theorized that one of the other men present had kept the gun and liked the experience so much that he was recreating years later. This theory was dubbed the Pista Sarda or Sardinian Connection. The officers investigated the brothers of Mele and Salvatore Vinci, the man Mele had originally accused in 1968, all of whom were part of Florence's Sardinian community. When they discovered a car in the woods that belonged to Salvatore's brother Francesco, they theorized that the car had been used in a crime and that Francesco had hid it in an attempt to evade suspicion. Francesco was arrested in late 1983 and soon after, the Monster killed two German tourists, Horst William Meyer and Jens Uwe Rüsch. This time, both victims were male and neither was mutilated. It is believed that the Monster mistook Rüsch, who had long, blonde hair, for a woman. A torn-up gay pornographic magazine was found on the scene, leading some to suspect that the victims were a homosexual couple and that the Monster tore up the magazine in anger when he realized his mistake. Meyer and Rüsch were in a van, higher than a car, yet the Monster had no problem shooting them through the windows. This meant that the killer was a man 1.80 meters tall (5.90 feet) or taller. The police still wasn't sure that Vinci wasn't the Monster, however, and took the mistake as proof that one of Vinci's relatives had tried to copycat a crime in an attempt to get him released. Francesco's nephew Antonio was arrested on a weapons charge, followed by Francesco's brother and Antonio's father, Salvatore Vinci, for the suspicious 1961 death of his wife in Sardinia. All three were interrogated for months in hopes that they would break down and confess to being the Monster, but they denied everything and were eventually released.

On July 29, 1984, the Monster killed again, the victims being Claudio Stefanacci and Pia Gilda Rontini. This time, all the traits of a typical Monster murder were present, along with a new one: Rontini's left breast was taken along with her genitalia. The Monster used gloves like in other occasions, but he made the mistake of leaving a hand print on top of the car and knee marks on the side, confirming the police's suspicions that he was right-handed and over 1.80 meters tall. This new crime led to the formation of a special strike force dubbed the Squadra Anti-Mostro, formed by both policemen and members of the Carabinieri, and a direct precedent of Italy's modern Investigative Group of Serial Crimes (GIDES). The government also offered a reward of $290,000 for any information leading to the capture of the Monster, and distributed posters and postcards advising tourists to not go into the hills around Florence at night. Despite these efforts, the Monster killed one last time in September of 1985. The victims were a couple of French tourists named Jean Michel Kraveichvili and Nadine Mauriot. Their bodies were found at two o'clock in the afternoon on the Monday of September 9 by a mushroom picker. The investigators estimated the time of death to have been the previous day, Sunday, though a local girl, Sabrina Carmignani, came forward and recounted how she and a friend spotted the dead, greatly decomposed bodies that day. Her testimony was ignored completely, even though Kraveichvili and Mauriot would have had to be driving back to France on Sunday for her to be present when her daughter went on her first day of school on Monday. The evidence suggested that the Monster had punctured the tent with the knife and waited outside for the victims to come outside to investigate, moment he used to shoot them. Mauriot was hit in the face and died instantly, but Kraveichvili, an amateur champion of 100 meter dash, was only injured on the wrist and run from the tent into the woods. However, the Monster run after Kraveichvili and caught with him, slicing his throath to the point of near-decapitation. The killer then returned to Mauriot's body and took her left breast and genitalia. On Tuesday, September 10, Silvia della Monica received a letter, the address of which was made of letters cut out of magazines and read "DOTT. DELLA MONICA SILVIA PROCURA DELLA REPUBLICA [sic] CA 5000 FIRENZE". Inside, wrapped in a tissue paper, was Mauriot's niple. The letter was estimated to have been mailed sometime during the weekend and to have entered the postal system on Monday. There were no fingerprints and the sender had even avoided sealing the letter with his tongue, despite DNA technology being non-existent at the time. The experience shattered Della Monica, who dropped out of the case and soon left Law Enforcement. After this, the Monster wasn't heard of again.

The Examining Magistrate, Mario Rotella, remained convinced that a member of the Sardinian clan was responsible and was particularly suspicious of Salvatore Vinci, even though he was still in custody when the French couple was murdered. Without evidence of Vinci's involvement in the Monster's murders, Rotella opted to indict him for the murder of his wife. The subsequent trial was a disaster, because Vinci's son refused to testify against his father and the other witnesses were extremely vague. Vinci was acquitted and he left the country immediately. The verdict was the last straw for Chief Prosecutor Pier Luigi Vigna, who advanced the theory that the Monster was not involved in the 1968 murder (for which nobody could be legally prosecuted, since Mele had been already convicted of it) and had just somehow acquired the gun from the Sardinians. Vigna demanded to re-start the crime investigation afresh with the support of the Police, while Rotella and the Carabinieri refused. In the end, Vigna prevailed and Rotella and the Carabinieri quit the task force at once. Henceforth, the Squadra Anti-Mostro would be a pure Police operation led by Commissario (Chief Inspector) Ruggero Perugini.

The "Satanic Connection"
Over 100,000 people would be questioned by Italian authorities over the course of the investigation. On September 11, 1985, the Monster task force received an anonymous letter reporting Pietro Pacciani, a semi-illiterate farmer with a violent past; in 1951, he had attacked his girlfriend while she was in an amorous moment with her lover in a car, raping her and killing the boyfriend, raping his corpse afterwards. It was argued that his crime bore a resemblance to the Monster's M.O., though a profiler would argue that his attack was a textbook disorganized crime while the Monster's murders were organized. Pacciani's name appeared again in the investigation in a computer search of suspects who lived in the area in which the murders had been committed. During a search of his house, the investigators found a reproduction of Botticelli's Primavera, which the head of the task force, Ruggero Perugini, thought resembled the way one of the Monster's earliest victims had been found. They also found five knives and a round from a hunting rifle. One item they found of particular interest was a painting signed "PaccianiPietro" depicting a bizarre-looking centaur; an expert came to the conclusion that it was "compatible with the personality of the so-called Monster".

In 1989, the FBI's Behavioral Science Unit made a profile of the Monster. Because it sounded nothing like Pacciani, it was completely ignored. In April of 1992, the SAM made complete search of Pacciani's entire property. On April 29, they found a rusted Winchester series H cartridge, the same kind of ammo the Monster used. Because it hadn't been fired, it didn't have the marking the Monster's gun left on his casings, though there was evidence that it had been loaded into a gun. After being intensely pressured by their superiors, ballistic experts stated that the round was "not incompatible" with having been inserted into the Monster's gun. In a candidly recorded interview with Mario Spezi, the journalist who covered the Monster case, Arturo Minoliti, a police officer, voiced his suspicions that the round was planted by the investigators and that they had also manufactured evidence in the form of a rag containing the spring guide rod of a gun sent to the police anonymously along with a note implying that it had belonged to Pacciani. On January 19 the next year, Pacciani was charged with being the Monster. The trial, which was broadcast live on television, began on April 14. Pacciani maintained his innocence, loudly and feverishly. In an embarrassing moment for the prosecutors, the centaur painting found at Pacciani's house was revealed not have been his work at all; the actual artist was Christian Olivares, a Chilean painter. Though there wasn't much evidence against Pacciani that wasn't circumstantial, he was found guilty of all Monster murders apart from the first one, for which Stefano Mele had already been convicted. One decisive factor had been the testimonies of Mario Vanni, a friend of Pacciani's whose only concrete statement was that they were "picnicking friends", and of Lorenzo Nesi, who claimed that Pacciani had boasted about shooting pheasants with a gun even though Pacciani had denied owning one and also implicated him in the Monster murder on the Sunday of September 8, 1985.

There were also four witnesses, who initially were anonymous. The first, Pucci (code-named "Alpha"), was a mentally retarded man who claimed to have seen Pacciani commit the September 7, 1985 murder. The second was Giancarlo Lotti (code-named "Beta"), a vagrant and village idiot who claimed to have aided Pacciani in several Monster murders. The third was an alcoholic prostitute named Ghiribelli (code-named "Sigma") who claimed that Pacciani and his friends had been members of a satanic cult. The fourth was a pimp named Galli (code-named "Delta"). In 1996, Pacciani was cleared of "all fault" by an appeals court and released. Two years later, Pacciani died of a heart attack induced by an overdose of his heart medication the day before he was going to be put on trial again. A few months later, Vanni and Lotti were convicted of being accomplices in the murders (though Lotti's accounts of the murders hadn't matched the evidence at all). The investigation was reopened in 2001 when, the authorities claimed, the investigators had reason to suspect that an alleged sect of ten to twelve wealthy, sophisticated Italians had been behind the murders. Some years later, Mario Spezi did some investigation of his own in tandem with American thriller author Douglas Preston while the two co-authored a book about the case. In 2004, they showed crime scene photos of the 1985 Monster killing, which Spezi had gotten hold of, to Francesco Introna, a respected entomologist. On the photos, which were taken on the afternoon of Monday the ninth, the maggots on Nadine Mauriot's mutilated body can be seen clearly.

Based on their development, Introna determined that the victims had been killed no less than 36 hours before the pictures were taken; this, coupled with the ignored witness statement made by Sabrina Carmignani, proved that the victims were killed on Saturday the seventh, not Sunday the eighth, as the authorities maintained. By extension, this also proved that the witnesses at Pacciani's trial who stated that murder occurred on the Sunday lied, also blowing a big hole in the satanic sect theory, which had relied on Pacciani's guilt. And on the actual date of the murder, the seventh, Pacciani was at a country fair, giving him an alibi. When the news was broadcast, there was virtually no reaction from anyone. Surprisingly, Vanni and Lotti's convictions were not re-investigated. A few months later, Spezi was arrested on accusations of sidetracking a criminal investigation. He and Preston were also implicated in the death of a doctor alleged to have been part of the satanic sect theory. Spezi was even briefly imprisoned, but was released and cleared of all charges. Preston left Italy while the charges against him were on hold; in an interview, he claimed that the interrogator had done so and sub-textually told him to leave the country and never come back. In 2008, prosecutor Giuliano Mignini and Michele Giuttari, the police officer who took over the Monster case after Minoliti was promoted, were indicted for abuse of office, not only for having Spezi and Preston illegally arrested, but for abusing an anti-terrorism law to have Spezi's phone wiretapped. Both were acquitted on the grounds that it couldn't be proven that any crime had been committed. Today (September 2011), the true identity of the Monster of Florence remains a mystery.

Suspects



 * Stefano Mele (January 13, 1919 - February 16, 1995)
 * Husband of first female victim, Barbara Locci
 * Convicted of the first double murder
 * Did not mention the presence of Natalino in his confession
 * Claimed to have thrown the gun used in the murder into an irrigation ditch, though it was never found
 * Was arrested again on vague suspicions for the 1985 murder, but was released
 * Later admitted that he was gay and claimed to have been blackmailed into accepting his jail sentence by Salvatore Vinci, with whom he'd had a sexual relationship
 * The Vinci family:
 * Salvatore Vinci (b. December 1, 1935)
 * Choice suspect of Examining Magistrate Mario Rotella
 * Middle brother
 * Lover of Barbara Locci
 * Sometimes called the "ringleader" of the first double murder
 * Raped his wife, Barbarina, when she was dating a local boy he disliked. Married her when she got pregnant. She was found dead in her bedroom in 1961. At the time, the death was treated as a suicide since the room reeked of gas and there was an opened propane tank in the room, though there was bruising around her neck and scratches in her face.
 * Cleared on December 13, 1989
 * Last seen in Spain in 1995 and still alive in 2002 according to a private investigator
 * Current whereabouts unknown
 * Francesco Vinci (d. c.August 7, 1993)
 * Youngest brother
 * Lover of Barbara Locci
 * Bricklayer
 * Known for his skills with a knife
 * Associated with Sardinian gangsters
 * Cleared on December 13, 1989
 * Found tortured, mutilated, murdered and incinerated inside his car, along with a friend named Angelo Vargiu, on August 7, 1993
 * A shepherd named Giampaolo Pisu was accussed of the double crime but acquitted
 * Giovanni Vinci
 * Oldest brother
 * Lover of Barbara Locci
 * Raped one of his sisters
 * Often confused with Giovanni Mele, brother of Stefano
 * Antonio Vinci (b. December 15, 1959)
 * Choice suspect of crime journalist Mario Spezi
 * Son of Salvatore and Barbarina Vinci
 * Raised by an aunt in Sardinia, after his mother died and his father moved to Florence
 * Moved with his father in 1970 but run away in 1973, after several altercations, threatening his father with a scuba knife at least once
 * Was arrested for breaking into his father's home in 1974 but no theft was proven
 * Lived in Sardinia and Lake Como between 1975 and 1980
 * Married by the Catholic rite in 1982, but was granted an annulment in 1985, on the grounds of non-consummation
 * Arrested for illegal firearm possession in 1983 shortly after the sixth double murder, but was acquitted after acting as his own lawyer
 * Jailed for robbery attempt in 1988
 * Works as a driver in Florence
 * Enzo Spalletti (b. 1945)
 * Peeping Tom active in the area, along with his friend and accomplice, Fosco Fabbri
 * His car was seen near the place of the Di Nuccio and Foggi murders on June 6, 1981
 * Returned home at 2:00 PM, and told his wife and two bar patrons that he had seen "two murdered dead people" before the bodies were discovered on June 7
 * While under arrest, his wife and brother received anonymous calls, telling them to calm because Spaletti would be released soon; the caller added that Spalletti was in jail for being "an idiot" and saying that he had read about the murders on the press before the news were published
 * Charged with the murders but released the day after Baldi and Cambi were murdered
 * Told Vanni and Lotti's lawyers that they were innocent and suggested that the Monster was a police officer
 * Mario Vanni (December 23, 1927 - April 12, 2009)
 * Retired postman
 * Convicted of being Pacciani's accomplice
 * Claimed in court to be a "picknicking friend" of Pacciani
 * Convicted of being an accompice of Pacciani and sentenced to life in prison in 2000, but released on medical grounds in 2004
 * Died in a nursing home, of natural causes
 * Giancarlo Lotti (December 16, 1940 - March 30, 2002)
 * Nicknamed "Katanga"
 * Vagrant and "village idiot"
 * Alcoholic
 * Was a secret witness, "Beta", in the trial against Pacciani
 * Claimed to have murdered Meyer and Rüsch himself, and to have assisted Paccianni and Vanni in other murders
 * Alleged member of an occult group
 * Sentenced to 30 years in prison but released on medical grounds on March 15, 2002
 * Died of liver cancer
 * Pietro Pacciani (January 7, 1925 - February 22, 1998)
 * Choice suspect of Chief Inspector Ruggero Perugini
 * Farm laborer
 * Alcoholic
 * Former World War II partisan
 * Hunter
 * Enjoyed taxidermy
 * Not impotent, but over-sexed
 * Nicknamed "The Fire" or "The Blaze" for his bad temper and career as a carnival fire-eater in his youth
 * Imprisoned between 1974 and 1981 for raping his daughters; imprisoned again between 1987 and 1991 for beating his wife and raping his daughters
 * In 1951, he attacked his 16-year-old girlfriend and her lover while they were having a romantic encounter in the woods in Vicchio. He first pulled the lover out of the car they were inside, bashed him on the head with a rock and stabbed him to death. He then raped his girlfriend next to his dead body, carried the corpse to a nearby lake and engaged in necrophilia with it
 * Allegedly a member of an occult group of which Giancarlo Lotti was also a member
 * The last known male victim of the Monster had been an amateur champion of 100 meter dash and was chased ca. 30 yards before being caught by the killer and stabbed to death. At the time, Pacciani was 58 years old, had previously suffered a heart attack, undergone a bypass surgery, and had a bad knee, scoliosis, pulmonary emphysema, angina pectoris, diabetes and hypertension
 * Was only 1.60 m tall (5.25 feet), while circumstancial evidence indicated that the Monster was on the range of 1.80-1.85 m (5.90-6.07 feet)
 * Was found guilty of all double murders attributed to the Monster except for the first one, for which Stefano Mele had been convicted, in 1994, but was acquitted on appeal in 1996 due to lack of evidence
 * Indicted in December 1996 for the 1992 abduction and assault of his wife, who filled for divorce and accussed Pacciani after he was acquitted
 * Spent his last years in isolation, bolting all doors and windows at night, until he was found dead with his pants lowered and a sweater around his neck, in 1998
 * Death caused by anti-asthmatic medicine strongly contraindicated to heart patients like Pacciani, who was not asthmatic; his death was investigated as a murder

Modus Operandi
The Monster targeted couples while they were having sex in cars parked in some secluded area in a remote county at night. He would walk up to the cars and fire at the victims through the windows or sometimes through the car doors with the same .22 Beretta loaded with Winchester series H bullets, all from the same box. When both victims were dead or dying, he would drag the women a few feet away from the car, undress them and mutilate and stab them post-mortem, in particular around the breasts and sexual organs, which were subsequently removed and taken by the killer (with the exception of Barbara Locci, since she was his first female victim; and Antonella Migliorini, because he was interrupted by a passing motorist). The type of knife was not positively identified, but may have been a scuba knife. He is also believed to have worn surgical gloves to avoid leaving fingerprints.

Profile
An FBI-made profile said that the Monster would be of average intelligence, would probably have completed secondary school studies or the equivalent in the Italian education system and would have had experience in work that required the use of his hands. He would have his own car and would have lived alone in a working class area during the murders. He may have had a criminal record, though only for smaller crimes such as petty theft or arson and not for seriously violent crimes, would not have been habitually violent and would not have been a rapist. He would have had little sexual contact with women in his own peer group and been immature and inadequate in sexual matters. The reason for the 1974-1981 hiatus was likely that the killer was living in some other place than Florence at the time.

The profile also stated that the Monster was a lone, sexually impotent 40-45 year old male, most likely right-handed, with a pathological hatred of women who targeted specific places he knew, not specific victims, and acted alone. He might have lived close to where he killed his first victims (either in solitude or with an elderly person) and worked as a manual laborer. He may have used drugs or alcohol to give him the confidence to kill his victims. He is more comfortable using a knife than a gun during the killings. The fact that he watched his victims having sex and struck with a blitz attack while they were off-guard suggests that he lacked confidence in his ability to control his victims or couldn't confront them while they were alive. He targeted the men first in order to eliminate what he perceived as the greatest threat. The fact that the killer fired so many shots suggests that he wanted to ensure that both victims were dead before he proceeded to mutilate the women. This ritual, which is marked by the killer's act of possessing the victims, was very important to him, which is why he uses the same gun, ammo from the same boxes and the same knife in all murders; he probably even wore the same clothing and accessories. The body parts which the Monster took as souvenirs, possibly along with the victims' jewelry and trinkets, allowed him to relive the murders. He may even have eaten some of the body parts to complete the act of possession. Him sending a letter to the authorities may indicate that the media coverage was important to him and that he was growing more and more confident.

On Criminal Minds
Though the Monster of Florence has never been mentioned on Criminal Minds, his M.O. is similar to that of George Foyet, a.k.a. "The Boston Reaper". Both would attack couples in or near cars in non-populated areas and both tended to do overkill with their younger female victims by stabbing them dozens of times.