Murder on the New Moon Page 8

  It’s not a huge leap of logic to picture the Monster as a serial-killer obsessive who probably kept cuttings of the reports of his crimes along with the other foul flesh souvenirs he had picked up during his reign of terror.

  He was not a brave man. His ritual mutilation methods and use of the same weapons betrayed a need to feel comfortable. He even invariably operated on moonless weekend nights, wearing the same clothes, if the FBI’s profile is to be believed. He would have needed to feel at ease with the tools of his trade, almost to the point of taking extra risks to satisfy the obsessive-compulsive need to perform the killings in a certain way.

  The Monster used an automatic weapon, and any armed robber will tell you that while they offer the advantage of giving you a quick firing weapon, they have one major drawback, especially with older models like that which the Monster used—a tendency to jam. If you find yourself unable to fire, you can be left suddenly unarmed at the mercy of your target. It’s surely one reason why the Monster had the insurance policy of the knife, in case plan A was suddenly scuttled by the failure of his weapon. He was a cautious, calculating operator all the way.

  There are other clues, of course. We know the killer was right-handed. We strongly suspect he was of above-average height and his shoe size was 11 (but we don’t know either of those things for sure). He knew how to handle both a scuba-style knife and a pistol.

  Ultimately, such character sketches aren’t going to lead us much further towards the Monster’s door.

  In my view, he is more than likely dead by now or serving a prison sentence so long that it will make him no danger to the public once he emerges. That doesn’t mean that he won’t one day be identified. In fact, I’m willing to bet that he already has been named.

  Amid the tens of thousands of statements, tip-offs, false confessions and inconclusive leads, I think someone will have pointed the police towards their man at least once, probably more often.

  The killer may have presented them with what appeared to be a cast-iron alibi, which put a stop to any investigation. Someone close to him may also have falsely corroborated his story. It’s even possible, if he did work in law enforcement, that he might have been able to ensure that records of any tip-offs or leads linking him to the case were quietly disposed of.

  All things considered, it surely wouldn’t have been easy for anyone to keep body parts (as profilers suggest he kept “trophies” from the murders) along with a gun and two boxes of bullets in a hiding place where no-one would go for the best part of half a century. There’s a good chance that someone somewhere knew he had them, may not have been aware of their significance, or may have informed the authorities about their suspicions, expecting a response. Then, when faced with official indifference or disbelief from overworked police, they convinced themselves that they were mistaken, and did not follow it up.

  The Sardinian clan probably did know more than they were letting on, certainly about the 1968 murder, and they could have been very useful in tracing where the gun ended up, even if none of them went on to commit the Monster killings. It was not in their nature or culture to help the police, and because all of them, with a couple of exceptions, are now either dead or disappeared. It doesn’t look likely that they’ll be suddenly spilling the beans now.

  Yet even if we have our doubts about his validity as a suspect, you have to wonder how deeply the investigation looked into what became of Salvatore Vinci—surely the closest the original detectives came to a prime suspect? Can a man really “disappear” in this day and age? Should they have spread the net wider to include the associates and underworld around the time of the Locci murders?

  What is the likelihood of that .22 Beretta pistol having been used more than once between 1968 and 1985? Gun crime wasn’t all that common in northern Italy during those years, so if such an instance could be established from the archives during that period, it could prove the breakthrough that could crack the whole case.

  Given the advances in crime detection technology since the era when the Monster was at large, you also have to wonder if forensic or DNA evidence from the bodies could potentially be put under a 21st century microscope.

  One big problem, evidently, is that so much evidence was spoiled and forensic evidence contaminated and compromised, if it was collected at all.

  The last murder in particular was notable for a more meticulous investigation.

  Could new evidence yet come to light? Is the Della Monica letter still in existence? Has it been re-examined in recent years?

  There is no doubt that a new investigation is needed, ideally with a new team looking at it with fresh eyes. They need to go back to the evidence. Not to theories pursued to the point of obsession, or even academic profiles or local gossip. Just cold, hard evidence.

  The problem is that after a quarter of a century of failure, it would be a brave detective indeed who would take the plunge back into the impossibly murky waters of this uniquely baffling case. The politics, egos, rivalries, conspiracy theories and other agendas that have hampered all the various investigations would still overshadow any new search for the Monster. Even Sherlock Holmes himself would surely think twice about taking on a cold case that has given so many people a serious case of frostbite.

  No doubt, in the future, more amateur “Monstrologists” will build their own hypotheses to try and explain this aging mystery. Some will be wild and fantastical, others mundane and analytical. They will surely only add to the legend of a truly hideous series of killings that have indelibly stained the history of one of Europe’s most beautiful regions.

  The reality is, the case is unlikely to be solved by such speculation. It’s sad to admit it, but it may well be that the best chance we have of unmasking the Monster now is if a relative or partner with a long-held secret decides they can live with their suspicions no longer.

  It’s far from inconceivable; after all, the identity of Europe’s most notorious unidentified serial killer is one hell of a secret to keep. Will someone, some day, find that burden too much to bear?

  Might we one day uncover the gun, or one of the boxes of Winchester “H” bullets, the contents of which once spilled so much young blood? It may have been hidden somewhere and, if the killer died or ended up in jail, it is far from impossible that someone may one day stumble across it when clearing out an old loft or digging up their garden.

  Until such a development, The Monster of Florence will only grow in infamy, the way other notorious unsolved murder cases such as the Black Dahlia and Jack the Ripper did. Yet while the sepia tint of history has a habit of slowly turning such stories into comic-book kitsch, the horror somehow neutralized by nostalgia, we should never forget that the victims are still suffering.

  They are people like Bruna Bonini and the other relatives and friends who still make their lonely pilgrimages to the graves of their loved ones, who still grieve for the 16 young men and women whose lives were cut short in the most horrific way imaginable.

  To us, it’s an enduring mystery, a dark and twisting tale to be consumed at a safe distance. To those who lived through it, the nightmare continues.

  www.crimescape.com

  Photo Index

  Florence by Night

  Florence Skyline

  Pettini Crime Scene

  Pasquale Gentilcore & Stefania Pettini

  Borgo San Lorenzo Tower

  Scandicci

  Carmela De Nuccio & Giovanni Foggi

  Calenzano

  Stefano Baldi & Susanna Cambi

  Baldi & Cambi Crime Scene

  Machiavelli Piazza in Montespetoli

  Antonella Magliorini & Paolo Mainardi

  Signa Castle

  Stefano Mele

  Francesco Vinci

  Horst Meyer & Uwe Rusch Sens

  Van at Crime Scene

  Beretta .22 cal Model 74 Pistol

  Piazza in San Piero a Sieve

  Pia Rontini & Claudio Stefanacci

  Nadine Jeanine Gisele Mauri
ot

  Jean-Michel Kraveichvili

  Silvia della Monica

  Pietro Pacciani

  Botticelli’s Primavera

  Calenzano

  Pietro Pacciani

  San Casciano

  Francesco Narducci

  Guiliano Mignini

  Winchester cal .22 Bullets

  Dennis Rader

  Sources

  Preston, Douglas and Mario Spezi. The Monster of Florence: Grand Central Publishing, 2008.

  Pezzan. Jaccopo and Giacomo Brunoro. Italian Crimes: The True Stories of The Monster Of Florence: LA CASE, 2009.

  Nabb, Magdalen. The Monster of Florence: Collins Crime, 1996.

  Filastò, Nino. Storia delle merende infami: Mascietto Editore, 2005

  Gumbel, Andrew, “How Italy Failed To Trap Its Monster”: The Independent (London), 1996

  Internet and TV:

  The Monster of Florence, Crime Library, 2001, TruTV network.

  Chi L’ha Visto, Rai 3. May 2002

  http://calibro22.blogspot.com

  http://insufficienzadiprove.blogspot.com

  NBC Dateline: Murder in a Lovers’ Lane (NBC, 2009)

  Serial Killers—The Monster of Florence (Discovery Networks Europe, 2008)