This week 48 Hours on ID spotlights the 1997 murder of Italian fashion designer Gianni Versace by Andrew Cunanan.
Versace was 50-years-old and the founder of the famous fashion brand, which was expanding to become a global powerhouse when he was shot and killed outside his house.
15 July 1997 and Versace had just come back from a morning walk to get a newspaper and was standing on the steps of his Miami Beach home when Andrew Cunanan shot him dead.
Cunanan was a 27-year-old who dropped out of college and made a living selling sex to older men, as well as a sideline in drug dealing and theft.
In 1997 for unknown reason Cunanan began a killing spree near Minneapolis, which started with the killing of Jeffrey Trail. He was an associate of Cunanan and was beaten to death with a claw hammer. The next victim was former lover David Madson, who was shot in the head and back.
Next he headed to Chicago and brutally murdered 72-year-old Lee Miglin. He was restrained with duct tape and stabbed more than 20 times with a screwdriver and had his throat sawn open.
It was at this point that Cunanan appeared on the FBI’s radar and made the top ten most wanted list. He then drove Miglin’s car to New Jersey where he shot dead 45-year-old William Reese, who was the caretaker at Finn’s Point National Cemetery.
Watch the Latest on our YouTube ChannelCunanan then drove to Miami Beach and laid low for two months. Then in July he killed Versace, before shooting himself in the head nine days later.
The motive for Cunanan’s killings remains unknown.
48 Hours on ID airs Mondays at 9:00 PM on Investigation Discovery.