Gerald Stano was born in Schenectady, New York. His given name at birth was Paul Zeininger. His natural mother neglected him to such an extent that when she finally gave him up for adoption when he was six months old, county doctors declared him unadoptable because he was functioning at what they described as “an animalistic level”, even ingesting his own faeces to survive. He was eventually adopted, however, by Norma Stano, a nurse, who renamed him Gerald Eugene Stano. By all accounts, the Stanos were loving parents, but discipline problems nevertheless plagued their adopted son all his life. He earned C’s and D’s in all subjects in school (except music, at which he excelled). He was a bed wetter until the age of 10. He lied compulsively and was once caught stealing money from his father’s wallet to pay fellow members of the track and field team to finish behind him, so he would not be viewed as a complete failure. He graduated high school at the age of 21 and did not attend college.

Officially, Gerald Stano admitted that he began killing in the early 1970s, when he was in his 20s but also claimed to have begun killing in the late 1960s, at the age of 18. Several girls had gone missing in Stano’s area of residence at that time, but since insufficient physical evidence was found when these claims were investigated almost 20 years later, Stano was never charged. He was most active in Florida and New Jersey. By his 29th birthday, he was in prison for murdering 41 women. He was housed with fellow serial killer Ted Bundy until Bundy’s execution in 1989. Gerald Stano was executed by electric chair on March 23, 1998 in Florida State Prison. Stano’s final statement proclaimed innocence and directed blame for his false confessions at the lead investigator, Paul Crow.