Featured Image Credit: Netflix
Topics: Crime, True Crime, US News, Documentaries, Netflix
Rhianna Benson
Topics: Crime, True Crime, US News, Documentaries, Netflix
True crime fans have called out the 'wild' introduction Aileen Wuornos was given in a brand new feature-length documentary, re-examining the late serial killer's life and crimes.
For those unfamiliar with the murderer, after growing up in 1970s Michigan, the teen moved to Florida, turning to sex work in a bid to support both herself and her girlfriend, Tyria Moore.
By 1989, however, she'd made the decision to lure away and murder a customer named Richard Mallory. In the three years that followed, Wuornos went on to target David Spears, Charles Carskaddon, Troy Burress, Charles Richard 'Dick' Humphreys, Peter Siems and Walter Gino Antonio.
Eventually, Moore urged Wuornos to confess her crimes.
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In court, despite professing that each killing was committed in self-defence, Wuornos was found guilty of all seven murders and handed the death penalty as her punishment. She was subsequently placed on death row at the Florida Department of Corrections' Broward Correctional Institution, where she remained for nine years, until 2002.
As part of a brand new documentary released last week (30 October), producers caught up with those who knew her best - including her adoptive mother Arlene, her death row roommate, and even the police captain who saw her placed behind bars.
Titled Aileen: Queen of the Serial Killers, the programme relies on both archival footage and powerful first-person interviews to tell the tale of the 'Damsel of Death', including her difficult upbringing, criminal history, and thirst for blood.
By the sounds of things, however, one aspect of the riveting documentary has seemingly rubbed a number of viewers up the wrong way - the opening minute or so.
For those who haven't yet sank their teeth into Aileen, it starts with police captain Steve Binegar giving his assessment of the killer he helped to see placed on death row, telling viewers: "I honestly don't know how anybody could be attracted to that.
"I mean, she was not - she was vile, and she was not attractive. I wouldn't want to meet her in a dark alley."
Binegar - who fronted the initial police investigation into the Florida chain of killings - goes on to admit: "It kind of baffles me how she got any customers at all. I mean, hitchhiking and prostituting herself.
"I don't think that's the way our maker intended us to use our bodies."
Despite the documentary going on to show some sympathy towards Wuornos, given her heartbreaking upbringing - which was littered with abuse, rape, drugs, booze, grief and neglect - some viewers aren't best pleased by the way she was first introduced.
"Tuning into the Aileen Wuornos documentary and literally the very first few seconds of it there's some a**hole talking about how 'unattractive she was' man gtfo," one infuriated X user hit out.
A second added: "That opening dialogue of the #Aileen documentary made me feel sick, saying 'she wasn’t attractive enough to be a prostitute'."
A third agreed: "The very first line of the Aileen Wuornos Netflix documentary is a man talking about how unattractive he thinks she is. It was genuinely infuriating to listen to. There’s no hope for women."
Another said: "Watching a documentary on Aileen Wuornos and the amount of time it has spent on telling us how unattractive and lesbian she is is just baffling like can we get to the murders."
Someone else wrote: "The #AileenWuornos Netflix doc starting with the police captain saying 'I don’t know how anybody could be attracted to that. She was vile & not attractive' got me really good."
Towards the end of the documentary, the serial killer herself is seen revealing the truth about the multiple murders while awaiting her execution, claiming that the mistreatment she endured at the hands of men had spurred her on.
In archival footage, Wuornos tells broadcasters that, while the first two murders were committed in self-defence, the latter five were the result of rage.
"My head is swimming in thought," she explained in an often nonsensical final interview. "I’m not going to go to prison for life for these creeps. I’m gonna get me a bunch of rapists.
"So, I was ready - ‘Tell me a rapist, and you’re dead'. Well, that didn’t happen. I was running into these idiots, drug-smugglers - I’m highly against drugs.
"When he kept telling me about drug-smuggling, I side-waysed him. That’s what happened."
Wuornos continued: "I got first-degree, I don’t care about anything more now. It’s over.
"The real Aileen Wournos is not a serial killer, I was so drunk and so lost, so f****d up in the head, man, I turned into one, but my real self is not one. Now, I’ve told the truth. I want you all out there to know that telling the truth was the hardest thing."
She added: "I kept thinking for days, and I was fighting the demons in me that kept saying, 'Don’t tell the truth, you’ll go to hell with me’. And I said, 'No way, man, I’m going to the Lord, Jesus Christ, I’m going to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth'."
Wuornos also issued a controversial statement of apology to the families of her victims before biting the bullet.
"I’m really sorry that your father, brother or whoever he might have been for you in kinship or relationship, I’m really sorry they got killed," she cries in the doc. I was messed up in the head, and after the rapes, I lost it."
She continued: "I said, ‘You ain’t gonna take me to prison - if I spent the rest of my life in prison over these creeps, I’m gonna take a bunch of you creeps with me before I go’. And that’s what happened."
Aileen: Queen of the Serial Killers is available to watch on Netflix now.