Mystery as spree killer with ‘delusions of grandeur’ gunned down Versace founder

A serial killer with an IQ of 147 who suffered delusions of grandeur ended his own life just eight days after slaughtering his highest profile victim, legendary designer Gianni Versace.

The mystery surrounding the murder of the iconic fashion house’s founder grew in the days after the event.

It is 26 years ago to the day that Versace founder was twice shot on the steps of his lavish, Mediterranean-style mansion in Miami Beach, Florida, as he came home from a café that he regularly frequented, once in the back of the head and once through his left cheek.

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And just eight days later, cops found his killer, Andrew Cunanan had shot himself on a luxury houseboat in the same city.

The final killing came after a spree of four more murders, which saw the deluded killer, who had a penchant for collecting old and wealthy lovers, slaughter several people he was close to between April and May 1997.

But to this day, Cunanan’s motive for murdering the fashion house founder is unknown. While Andrew was a comparatively well-known figure in the Miami Beach area in the 1990s, the pair reportedly only met a handful of times and barely knew each other.

Eyewitnesses told Vanity Fair that they met briefly at a San Francisco nightclub in 1990, years before their deaths.

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They also may have met as they were reportedly both heavily involved in sex-for-hire circles in Miami and San Francisco.

But the Versace family has always strongly denied that the pair ever actually met.

On top of this, Cunanan, who was 27 when he died, suffered from delusions of grandeur, and was often overheard claiming that he was good friends with celebrities.

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This proclivity to tell tall tales appeared to stem from childhood, with people who knew the spree killer as he grew up telling a documentary crew that he would regularly change the backstory of where he came from.

He reportedly once told his schoolmates that his dad was an Israeli millionaire and an aristocrat from New York, despite neither of those things being true.

He also had a mean streak as he grew up, at one point throwing his mum into a wall and dislocating her shoulder following a heated argument.

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