The mystery of the death of Gianni Versace: who benefits from the murder of the great couturier?

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The theme of the mysterious death of the famous fashion designer Gianni Versace haunted many researchers for 20 years. On July 15, 1997, the fashion designer was shot dead on the steps of his Miami mansion. The killer was found very quickly, but before the arrest, he committed suicide. According to the official version, the motive for the crime was actions on homosexual grounds, but this explanation does not sound convincing. Very little is known about the real reasons for the murder.

The case of the murder of Gianni Versace was solved surprisingly quickly - in just two weeks. The killer was serial killer Andrew Cunenan, who has already had four victims. He made a living by prostitution, and, according to one version, all those killed were his lovers. He was on the wanted list, but the police were unable to arrest him. Suspicion fell on him when a van with clothes with traces of blood from the last victim of a serial killer was found near the Versace mansion. All the evidence was all too clear about a single suspect. In a suicide note, he allegedly admitted that he killed the fashion designer as "the banner of homosexuality." But the killer himself was a gay person, and therefore such an explanation sounds illogical. The real motive for the crime remained unclear.

Private detective Frank Mont is sure that the southern Italian criminal group - Nadranghetta was involved in the murder of Versace. According to him, the designer was killed for daring to challenge the mafia. The murder was organized so that suspicion fell on a serial killer, whose suicide was later staged. The detective claims that a few months before his death, Versace contacted his agency with a request to investigate. He suspected that the mafia had infiltrated his business to launder money. The designer was allegedly going to hold a press conference at the end of the summer and announce the names of the criminals.

The fashion designer was originally from Calabria, and during Versace's lifetime there were rumors of his connections with the Calabrian mafia. Its rise was too rapid and sudden, which led fashion historians to speculate about the help of sponsors from the underworld. Where the young designer got his start-up capital from, and how he managed to open his own Fashion House is really a mystery. Perhaps it was the money of a southern Italian criminal group, with which the couturier did not want to share his income later. A year before Versace's death, a scandal erupted, involving many designers whose fashion houses were front for money laundering by the Mafia. Gianni was also accused, but he himself categorically denied his connections with the underworld.

The Calabrian mafia often traded in counterfeiting famous brands, and when Versace gained worldwide popularity, factories that were engaged in the production of counterfeit goods appeared in Italy. Versace declared war on underground factories: because of the cheap counterfeits that flooded the market, his brand was losing its prestige. In addition, he lost hundreds of millions of dollars: in 1995-1996. the turnover of counterfeit products was two-thirds higher than the income of the Versace Fashion House. The designer collaborated with the Yellow Flame, the anti-corruption police, and was personally involved in investigations exposing the activities of underground factories. For a long time, the Medusa Gorgon was the emblem of the Versace brand, but since it was she who was most often forged, the couturier publicly abandoned this emblem.

Of course, the Calabrian mafia could not help reacting to such fierce resistance and opposition. Repeatedly Versace received peculiar black marks: once in his garden he found a dead bird, then - a dead dog. But the designer was not deterred by these warnings. He was a fatalist and believed that fate could not be avoided. Versace did not use the services of security and often went out into the street unaccompanied. Therefore, it was not difficult for the killer to carry out his plan.

However, if this was indeed the work of the mafia, why did they entrust the murder not to a hitman, but to a mentally unstable serial killer? Obviously, this mystery is still far from its final solution. And Gianni Versace forever went down in history as one of 10 clothing designers who changed the fashion world in the 1980s