Featured Image Credit: Channel 5
Topics: Crime, True Crime
Claire Reid
*Warning: this article mentions sexual assault*
Serial killer Aileen Wuornos uttered a disgusted and defiant phrase after she was sentenced to death for her crimes.
Wuornos was working as a sex worker in the US when she shot, killed and robbed seven of her clients between 1989 and 1990.
In January 1991, she was apprehended by law enforcement and confessed to the killings, but claimed she had acted in self-defence and had only shot the men because they had either raped or attempted to rape her.
At a trial the following year, Wuornos was convicted of the murder of Richard Mallory and given the death penalty.
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Later the same year, she pleaded no contest to the murders of Charles Humphreys, Troy Eugene Burress and David Spears. She was given three death sentences for the three killings - but then shocked the courtroom with a dramatic outburst.
“I’ll be up in Heaven while you are all rotting in Hell,” she said.
Before defiantly turning to the state attorney’s table and saying: “May your wife and kids get raped.”
In a later court hearing, Wuornos pleaded guilty to the murder of Charles Carskaddon and Walter Antonio.
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In total, she was given six death sentences and ordered to live out the rest of her days at Florida Department of Corrections Broward Correctional Institution death row.
In the case of a seventh victim - 65-year-old Peter Siems - no charges were ever brought as his body was never found. However, Wuornos' palm print was found on the interior door handle of his car.
Following her incarceration, Wuornos took part in two Nick Broomfield documentaries; Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer and Aileen: Life and Death of a Serial Killer, where she spoke about her crimes.
In 2001, Wuornos said it was a ‘waste’ to keep her alive and urged the state to execute her.
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“There is no point in sparing me," she said in July 2001. "It's a waste of taxpayers' money."
She went on to say: "I killed those men, robbed them as cold as ice. And I'd do it again, too.
"There's no chance in keeping me alive or anything, because I'd kill again. I have hate crawling through my system."
And the following year, after more than a decade on death row, Wuornos got her wish and was put to death by lethal injection aged 46.
According to reports at the time, Wuornos ‘smiled at witnesses’ as she sat in the execution room.
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When asked if she would like to make a final statement, Wuornos replied: "Yes, I would 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, I'll be back".