Hannah Velez
FLM 400
Final Paper
Aileen Wuornos: The Dark Tale of One Woman’s Descent into Infamy

When did it all begin? Technically, Aileen became a murderer on December 1, 1989 when 51-year-old electrics shop owner Richard Mallory picked her up on I-75 (8) and together they drove off into the woods to meet an uncertain fate. But when did the murderous creature that is Aileen Wuornos come to be? She began prostituting herself as age 9 (5), without so much as an assault charge related to her profession for 24 years while working the streets. Yes, she was a hitchhiking prostitute that became famous for murdering and robbing seven of her johns, but what was it in her that snapped? What caused her transformation from a hooker into a …show more content…

“Something has permanently snapped inside Wuornos, and her once-suppressed fury at men is unleashed. The rest of her killings could be seen as paranoid responses to the rape,” (6). While on trial for his murder, her graphic testimony about being raped and tortured was, for one reason or another, not enough to convince the jury. She claims that her hands were tied together and bound to the steering wheel. He then took out a Visine bottle and said, “We’re going to clean you up.” He takes the bottle and squirts it up her rectum; it is at this point that Aileen realized that the bottle did not contain Visine, but rubbing alcohol, and it burned. She then claims Mallory squirt the bottle up her vagina and up her nose (3). It is definitely plausible that Mallory raped Aileen; he was discovered to have had a record of rape and assault, although this information was not allowed in her trial (8). Initially Aileen claimed all the murders were in self-defense, but throughout her years on trial and on Death Row she has changed her motive many times going back and forth between defense and the need to eliminate witnesses to her robbing the victims (4).

Tyria Moore, who was once the great love of Aileen’s life, was ultimately the one to turn her in, both intentionally and unintentionally. On July 4, 1990 Tyria was driving one of the cars stolen from a murder victim with Aileen in the passenger