The "Monster of Florence" case has nothing to do with this one. I have been doing a bit of digging around tonight and it seems that it is at least as complex as the one we are discussing and it is surrounded with a load of misinformation and dubious reporting too. I am not prepared to go into that in depth but I will say a few things about what I have found, as it relates to this thread.
I can find no evidence that Spezi was charged with murder at any stage. He appears to have been charged with obstructing an investigation; perhaps with planting evidence; maybe with calumny; maybe with withholding evidence. I cannot find the charge sheet. There is plenty of stuff in Italian: not so much in english. It may be that if we have any Italian speakers they will have more success
Spezi has indeed been "obsessed" with the case for 25 years or so. He wrote a book about it in 1983 which, unfortunately for him, was not hugely successful: unlike Thomas Harris's book Hannibal which was apparently based in part on the same case. There is no doubt that he was very knowledgeable about those murders and he was very keen indeed to solve them. Those of us who have participated in this thread may have some small inkling of how that could happen
Far from being the voice of reason in this case Spezi seems to have believed early on that the murders arose from a rather bizarre "mafia type" operation involving Sardinians who lived in the area. There is a very strange story about what seemed to be the first kiliing (I think it was 1974) whereby this group of Sardinians, who allegedly indulged in unorthodox sexual practices including the sharing of the first female victim, became enraged when she had an affair with a Sicilian (not part of their group). Supposedly she and her lover were killed for this: and someone within that group inherited the gun and went on to kill the rest, presumably because he was bonkers in a different way. It should be noted that this gun has a distinctive flaw and has been used in all of the murders. Both Spezi and the police seem to have entertained this theory and Spezi continues to subscribe to it, so far as I can tell
Guitarri, one of the police officers involved was equally obsessed, it seems. As well as being a policeman he is also a best selling author, and he also had a book about this case. There is some evidence that he did indeed believe that there was a conspiracy of some sort involving respectable and powerful members of Florentine society. I do not know when he came to that conclusion and I do not know whether he seriously believed the motive was satanic. It would appear that he did think there was some ritualistic element.
So you pays your money and you takes your choice: Sardinian sex maniacs or Florentine satanists.
To me it is astonishing either way: but then I have no idea how Italians might view such notions. It appears that the satanic theory was also entertained by a firm of french private investigators employed by the family of the last victims (who were French) and also by the Italian secret service (neither of which claims I have found independent verification for: only one article I read mentions this).
What I do seem to see is two men who were both obsessed with a case which has all the appeal of Jack the Ripper (and we have seen the flights of fancy
that has generated over the years) and both of whom were writers. Make of that what you will
The murders had stopped around 1985 and the police had no clues at all. In 1993 for reasons which are not clear to me they focussed on a suspect called Pacciano, an illiterate man who had served time for murder and was released in 1968. Coincidentally the year of the first monster killing. He had also been jailed in 1987 and 1991 for domestic violence and incest rape. Apparently he had told people he participated in satanic masses presided over by a doctor: whether this was the origin of Guittari's theory I do not know: but Guittari apparently did not believe Pacciano was smart enough to have planned the monster's crimes. At any rate, he was charged and convicted but there was no real evidence and his conviction did not stand. This whole episode is not to anyone's credit but it did give us Hannibal Lector, apparently. Two other men associated with Pacciano were later convicted and jailed: and that was where things stood in 1998. Pacciano himself died of a drug cocktail, bizarrely, before what would have been a retrial
I do not know what led to the re-opening of the investigation in 2004 but I think it was to do with the events surrounding Francesco Narducci. He was a Perugian gastroenterologist who was drowned in 1985 in odd circumstances. Orginally his death was presumed to be accidental (or a suicide) but in 1985 there was a protection racket in Perugia and some of the victims were threatened that they would meet the same fate as he did. So his death was reinvestigated at the instigation of a Florentine police official called Canessa and his body was exhumed. The forensic investigators said he had been strangled and from there it was hypothesised there was a connection with the monster killings: as the killer (because the murders stopped around the time of his death) or as part of the presumed group who organised the killings. At this time some further investigations into fresh suspects was undertaken and I am not sure how those people came under suspicion.
However that may be Mignini was asked to take the lead into the investigation of Narducci's death and that is how he became involved.
I can find absolutely nothing which suggests that Mignini subscribed to the Satanist theory which seems to have been in Guitarri's mind: but it seems to be true that Guitarri believed his investigation was being blocked. He presumably thought it was because powerful people were somehow involved. I have not been able to discover what Mignini thought but his focus appears to have been on police officers and journalists whom he thought were not helping.
Meantime Spezi pursued his own line of investigation/ research entirely at odds with the line the police were pursuing. And into this mess, in 2000, waltzed Douglas Preston, another writer. He wanted to write a thriller set in Florence and he was put in touch with Spezi as someone who could help with details about how the Italian justice system works. I have no idea why Preston decided to get involved with Spezi's agenda but he just impresses as hopelessly naive. I imagine the excitement got to him or somthing. In any case he and Spezi pursued this and they believed they had found the killer. I can imagine it is extremely difficult to decide when one should go to the police in these circumstance and there was no love lost between Spezi and Guittari. Nevertheless their behaviour seems at best reckless. Interviewing a man whom you believe to be a serial killer goes beyond journalistic zeal and is downright irresponsible in a foreigner newly arrived in the counry and with no prior knowledge of the case at all. It is "Boy's Own" stuff to my way of thinking. To continue after that interview (in which their putative killer allegedly threatened them ) on the word of an ex-convict who claimed to know where the gun was, and to go there, is insane. Yet when they get there the villa is closed for lunch so they dont get to look around? Go figure.
Preston claims that Guitarri suspected Spezi of complicity in the murders: he may well have done. He thought there was a conspiracy of respectable folk (however odd that is in itself). But he would also be aware of Spezi digging about and I do not know if he had an interest in this "villa"; or of the role of this "ex-convict" who was so intimate with a monster who had not been in jail.
What I am sure of is that the police were suspicous of Spezi and Preston in terms of obstructing/ misdirecting the investigation. And so they tapped Spezi's phone
Whatever Mignini's view of Guitarri's theory it seems likley to me that he thought Spezi was obstructive and Preston was an idiot. I think he had grounds for that belief. So on what I have been able to discover so far I am very willing to believe that he brought Preston to an appreciation that this was not a game: and he seems to have succeeded.
There is nothing to suggest he believed in satanic rites: or that he falsified evidence. Spezi has not succeeded in making a case for wrongful imprisonment. We will see what happens about the phone tapping charges on appeal. But on the basis of what I have learned I am not about to take either Spezi or Preston seriously.
In addition to the link I provided above and which I give again here:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-07-01/the-other-murders-that-could-save-her/2/
This interview with Preston and Spezi is instructive, I think. See what you make of it
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19333195/ns/dateline_nbc-crime_reports//
