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Andrew Cunanan’s Background

Andrew Cunanan was born in National City, California, on August 31st, 1969. He was the youngest of four children, a good student with an IQ of 147, and voted “most likely to be not forgotten” by his classmates. Cunanan was openly gay in high school and routinely had relationships with wealthy, older men, but his parents were oblivious to his activities.

After graduating from The Bishop’s School in 1987, Cunanan enrolled at the University of California San Diego. Enjoying the freedoms of young adulthood, he got involved in the San Diego gay scene. Soon, his devoutly Catholic mother found out he was gay, and she was not happy. In a heated argument, he once shoved her against a wall, dislocating her shoulder.

In 1989, Cunanan dropped out of college and moved to San Francisco’s Castro District. In San Francisco, Cunanan continued his relationships with wealthy, older men who financially supported him. He also reportedly sold illicit drugs and filmed adult entertainment. Over the years, his substance abuse problems worsened, and he struggled with addiction to alcohol, painkillers, and methamphetamines.

Cunanan supposedly met fashion designer Gianni Versace in San Francisco in October 1990, when Versace was to be honored for his costume designs for an Opera Production. However, this is not confirmed, as Versace’s family vehemently denied that the two men met.

In December 1995, Cunanan met David Madson while Madson was visiting San Francisco from Minneapolis, Minnesota. They started a long-distance relationship, but Madson broke it off months later.

Return to Minnesota leads to a spree of murders

In April 1997, Cunanan told friends he was headed to Minneapolis to “take care of some business matters” with Jeffery Trail, a former friend who had been avoiding Cunanan. Trail was expecting Cunanan and mentioned to his sister that he didn’t want Cunanan to come. A week before his death, Trail told a friend he’d been through a “huge falling out” with Cunanan, saying, “I made a lot of enemies this weekend … I’ve got to get out of here. They’re going to kill me.”

Cunanan landed in Minnesota on April 25th, 1996. He stayed with his ex-boyfriend Madson, and the two men went clubbing and dined at restaurants. It was a seemingly ordinary vacation.

On April 26th, Cunanan stayed in Trail’s apartment while Trail was out of town with his boyfriend, Jon Hackett.

At some point, on April 27th, 1997, Trail returned to his apartment, and he and Cunanan argued about something. Cunanan stole Trail’s gun and returned to Madson’s loft. He then called Trail, telling him to retrieve his stolen gun. When Trail arrived, Cunanan violently beat him to death with a hammer.

It is unclear if Madson was in the apartment when the murder occurred, but he most likely learned about it at some point.

Over the next two days, other residents saw Cunanan and Madson hanging around the apartment. Madson didn’t go to work, and one of his concerned coworkers went to his apartment on April 29th to ensure he was okay.

Cunanan and Madson were gone, but inside the apartment, the coworkers discovered Trail’s body behind the sofa, stuffed inside a rug.

At first, Madson and Cunanan were both suspects, while Madson’s family insisted Cunanan held him hostage and that he was not complicit in Trail’s murder.

On May 2nd, the two men were seen driving Madson’s Jeep and eating lunch together north of Minneapolis.

But the next morning, Madson, age 33, was found dead on the east shore of Rush Lake near Rush City, Minnesota. He had been shot in the head and back.

Cunanan fled to Chicago, Illinois in Madson’s red jeep, where he brutally murdered a 72-year-old real estate developer, Lee Albert Miglin, on May 3rd. Cunanan tied Miglin’s hands and feet, wrapped his head in duct tape, stabbed him over 20 times with a screwdriver, slit his throat with a hacksaw, and finally, stole his 1994 green Lexus LS sedan.

Around the time of the murder, Miglin’s wife was waiting at the airport for him. When he didn’t show up, she made her way home. She contacted authorities when she saw the gate open and the kitchen a mess.

With the brutal nature of the attack, some felt it was personal, and they had a previous connection, but none was ever established between the two men, and Cunanan likely just needed to switch vehicles.

The vehicle had a phone, and authorities were tracking its location, but they weren’t fast enough, and Cunanan struck again.

On May 9th, Cunanan shot and killed 45-year-old cemetery caretaker William Reese in Pennsville Township, New Jersey, at Finn’s Point National Cemetery. Cunanan then stole Reese’s 1995 red Chevrolet pickup truck. Concerned when her husband failed to come home that night, Reese’s wife went to the cemetery to find him. She called the police, who discovered Reese had been shot in the head with the same Taurus pistol Cunanan used to shoot Madson.

Cunanan fled to Florida and stayed in a fleabag motel for $29 a night.
The FBI put him on their Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list on June 12th, and he was on every episode of America’s Most Wanted.

Cunanan wasn’t doing a great job of hiding.

And authorities still couldn’t catch him.

He pawned some items using his real name, and the pawn shop owner tipped off the FBI, but they didn’t follow up.

Another person called the police after seeing Cunanan on July 11th. Police searched the area but didn’t find him.

He would commit his last murder 4 days after that missed opportunity.

Murder of Gianni Versace

On July 15th, 1997, around 8:45 a.m. Cunanan killed 50-year-old fashion designer Gianni Versace on the front steps of his Miami Beach mansion, Casa Casuarina, shooting him in the back of the head and the left cheek. Versace was pronounced dead at Jackson Memorial Hospital at 9:21 a.m.

When investigators started looking into the case, they found Reese’s stolen vehicle with items belonging to Cunanan and news clippings from some of his crimes.

Soon, the forensics teams were able to determine that the gun used to kill Versace was also used to kill Madson and Reese.

Cunanan was quickly named the prime suspect in Versace’s murder.

Andrew Cunanan’s Suicide

A day after the Versace murder, someone called authorities to say that he saw a man who looked like Cunanan break into a sailboat. Investigators took two days to respond to the call and didn’t bother collecting evidence until an additional 4 days passed.

On July 23rd, 1997, a caretaker and his wife visited a boat that was supposed to be unoccupied, as the owner was out of the country, but they saw the door open and a pair of sandals on the ground.

They heard a gunshot, fled the boat, and contacted authorities.

Many law enforcement officials showed up, and they were convinced Cunanan was alive inside. They tossed a phone in so they could communicate with him, and they fired several rounds of tear gas.

After 5 hours of trying to get the maniac to come out, eight people barged in and found him dead of a gunshot to the head. He did not leave a note behind.

Aftermath

After his death, rumors spread that his crime spree started because he found out he was HIV positive; however, an autopsy revealed that he did not have the virus, and authorities never determined what his motive was.

With three of his five victims being openly given, law enforcement was criticized by the gay community for not caring about the murders until someone famous got killed.

A guy who knew Cunanan told American Crime Story, “The other cops weren’t searching so hard because he killed a bunch of nobody gays.”

Many feel that the Versace murder could have been prevented if not for homophobia.