Leonarda Cianciulli: Monster or Woobie?

Leonarda Cianciulli (1893-1970) was a kindly-looking affably evil woman who happened to be a serial killer who made her victims into soup and added some of their remains into her cake recipes. Yet she also has the saddest Trauma Conga Line that any Real Life person was forced to saddle with. A child of rape, she grew up under an unhappy childhood with a mother who didn't love her. According to her, her mother cursed her when she chose to marry registry office clerk Raffaele Pansardi. Their home was destroyed upon moving to Lariano in Alto Irpinia of Italy and later moved to Correggio where she set up a small shop. Losing three of her children to miscarriage and ten more in their youth, she became fiercely protective of her remaining kids until one of her sons was required to join the Italian army in preparation of World War II. This was probably the final straw that broke the camel's back as she came to the conclusion her son's safety required human sacrifice and in a Beware the Nice Ones fashion she murdered several of her neighbors, chopped them up, and used them as ingredients for soap to sell to her local customers (along with mixing the blood for her teacakes). She was later caught after murdering her last victim, an opera singer, and was sentenced to 30 years in prison where she eventually died of a brain hemorrhage.

• So what's your opinion? Does this woman deserve our pity for all the crap she had to endure in her life, or is she an unrepentent b%tch who deserved what was coming to her?

I might point out that there were likely a fair few women who befell similar misfortune without becoming deranged serial killers. Some measure of pity is appropriate, I feel, but that doesn't stop me from being relieved that she was eventually removed from society. After all, it's not like her victims deserved getting made into soup just because someone else had a tough life and wanted to take it out on them.

What's precedent ever done for us?

I don't pity her. If I knew more, I would. But as a set of abstract facts, her actions are monstrous.

Except for 4/1/2011. That day lingers in my memory like...metaphor here...I should go.

Neither. I do not subscribe to the idea that different individuals deserve different things.

This is the Platonic essence of On-Topic, right here.

Kill all math nerds

Being deserving of pity and being deserving of punishment are not mutually exclusive.

Sure, I pity her for what she went through, but were I to determine her fate, I would have sentenced her to death for her crimes.

edited 12th Feb '11 12:35:12 PM by Wanderhome

This.

I remember a story my mom would tell me about her days as a court translator. She saw this one case where a thirteen year old was at risk of going to juvie because he was an absolute terror - vandalism, theft, just about everything a young punk could get into. The trial made two things apparent: 1) the parents were absolute incompetents, and hearing them whine about how they'd failed to raise their kids because they were never at home was quite pathetic, and 2) this was a bright kid who was perfectly aware that he was being neglected, and he was furious at his parents for the treatment. The judge listened very carefully, and congratulated the boy for making a good point - BUT:

After the family picked their jaws up off the floor, the judge dismissed the defendant of all charges and sent them off, telling the kid to shape up and the parents to keep their kid in line, since there was enough evidence in this trial that the next judge to see this kid in court would be fully recommended to try him as an adult regardless of age.

That's how it goes. If you know what has been done to you is wrong, you have a sense of right and wrong.

Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.

@OP: I think she deserved every minute of her sentance and death. But that does not make her a Complete Monster.

CMOA for that judge. Although it would suck if the kid seriously hurt someone or the parents hurt the kid because he wasn't in juvenile hall... But presumably if that happened the guilty party would NOT get away with it.

Unless the people she killed were her abusers during her childhood, I don't think I can really pity her all that much...

Wait, was she raped as a child or was her mother raped and then pregnant with her?

edited 12th Feb '11 1:39:16 PM by Signed

"Every opinion that isn't mine is subjected to Your Mileage May Vary."

"a child of rape" means the latter.

Ehhhhh, no. I'll hold sympathy for abused people to a certain extent, and I am a beliver in personal vengeance, but I draw the line when you start to go after people for no reason other than that the voices in your head tells you to. She deserved her fate.

I dont know why they let me out, I guess they needed a spare bed

As others have said, pity and punishment can be deserved equally. I'm against torture and death, but she deserved severe punishment short of that. Abusive childhoods often explain abusive adulthoods. They do not, however, justify them or absolve the perpetrator of blame.

My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.

Yeah I kind of feel bad for her, but damn when life gives people shit like that they usually don't haul off and start killing folk. They either take it in stride or develop a drug habit/drinking problem.

She's a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds, though I usually don't feel much pity for those, and this is no exception.

The sin of silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.

It does sound as if she was not entirely sane, frankly. Such a person is probably best removed from society for the rest of their life anyway.

A brighter future for a darker age.

Since she apparantly belived that this would somehow protect her children, I doubt she was very sane. I think her life story is woobie worthy and she should be pittied... but she still killed three people so yeah prison's probably the best place for her.

Life's Gonna Suck When You Grow Up... But Is It That Great Now?... Also I'm Skylark2 now.

^ Pity only goes so far, you know. At some point, you cant rely on your shitty childhood as an excuse anymore.

I dont know why they let me out, I guess they needed a spare bed

I'm not saying her actions were justified or that she shouldn't have been incarcerated.

Life's Gonna Suck When You Grow Up... But Is It That Great Now?... Also I'm Skylark2 now.