In 1992, a year after Aileen Wuornos was arrested for the murders of seven men in Florida, filmmaker Nick Broomfield released the documentary Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer. A decade later, they were reunited when he was subpoenaed to appear at her final state appeal before execution. Broomfield subsequently spent the next year and a half revisiting her case, conducting multiple interviews with Wuornos and the people who knew her best. The disturbing America Undercover documentary Aileen: Life and Death of A Serial Killer provides his fresh insights into her story when it debuts Monday, Nov. 15 (9-10:30 p.m. CST), exclusively on HBO. Check schedules for more airdates.
Broomfield’s original documentary exposed the corruption and incompetence surrounding her case and trial, at which she was found guilty of seven murders and sent to death row. The new film examines her past, illuminating the inhumanity of Wuornos’ upbringing in suburban Detroit and debates whether the persistent abuse she endured may have driven her over the edge, culminating in the killings that she originally claimed were self-defense.
Abandoned at birth, Wuornos was raised by an abusive grandfather. As friends and family members attest, she was beaten by relatives, molested by strangers, had an incestuous relationship with her brother, and was raped repeatedly. After getting pregnant at age 13, she was thrown out of the family home, and lived in the nearby woods for two years. From there she drifted into prostitution, an abusive marriage, robbery and murder.
Wuornos eventually found a lover in Tyria Moore, with whom she lived for three years. Police recorded her phone calls with Wuornos in jail, leading to her lover’s confession. In her original trial testimony, Wuornos graphically described the torture she endured at the hands of the first man she killed, claiming she acted in self-defense. Broomfield speculates that she then killed the other six ‘johns’ in a state of insanity. But after serving 12 years on death row, Wuornos suddenly announced that she had killed the six men in cold blood, and said she wanted to die immediately. In a subsequent interview with Broomfield, Wuornos admits she did kill in self-defense, but that she can no longer stand being on death row.