To this day, The Iceman Tapes is one of HBO’s most successful original documentary series.

Serial killers are fascinating, disturbing, frightening, and unique. Richard Kuklinski is all of these things. He is rumored to have murdered between 100 to 200 people. Richard murdered for money, peace of mind, power, and curiosity. Sometimes he murdered random victims for no other reason than testing out a new weapon such as cyanide spray or how long it would take hundreds of rats to eat a human corpse—bones and all (2 days). He killed dozens of people for cutting him off in traffic, random homeless men for begging, absolutely anyone who talked down to him, and countless contract killings for five different Mafia families. Richard killed his first victim at 13 years old, a local gang leader who refused to stop abusing him. No one fucked with Richard after that, and his name began its destined course to legendary status. Like most other psychopaths, he felt no love as a child. His father beat the shit out of him, murdered his little brother, and treated his mother as if she was a worthless piece of garbage. He even fucked other women in front of his wife and children. His mother was no better as a parent and after Richard came home early one day to find her fucking the neighbor, he left for good.

Many moons later, he was finally arrested for murder and then came The Iceman Tapes. In the tapes he talks about how much he loved his new family (he married and had children of his own) and how he would do absolutely anything for them. He could never speak enough of how much he loved his new family, yet at the same time was a stone-cold killer with zero remorse. Naturally, chicks went nuts and sent the dude thousands of fan letters with nude pictures and promises of wild sexual adventures. He came across as a total badass with a heart of gold when it came to his wife and children. Pussies across the globe were creaming all over themselves and pulsating loudly, RIIIIICHAAARD!!!

But it was all bullshit.

I know because last night I finished reading The Ice Man: Confessions of a Mafia Contract Killer and discovered many purposely omitted details. The dude beat the living fuck out of his wife, breaking her nose a dozen times, countless black eyes, even more body bruising and three miscarriages from kicking her ass while she was pregnant. He also had two other children with a different woman and abandoned his first family. His new wife hated his fucking guts and never felt freer until he was locked away. Sure, he was sweet sometimes, but it was no comparison to beating his wife in front of the children. The dude was a total psycho. His son spent his entire life plotting ways to kill his father and Richard even admits to wanting to murder his son out of jealousy. He couldn’t stand the fact his wife would give attention to another male. Richard’s 12-year-old daughter started fucking everyone around her as way to get back at her evil father. She knew he would snap if knowing what a slut she was and at such a young age. She felt no sexual satisfaction, only pride knowing it would kill her father.

Richard’s third child, also a girl, was the only person to ever love him. She had kidney problems and always in the hospital, and Richard would wait on her hand and foot and she never forgot that. I’ll tip a hat to that, but everything else is bullshit. A psycho killer can’t turn the knob off when coming home from a day of killing. It doesn’t work like that. Richard repeatably told his children that if he had to kill Mommy, he would have to kill them, too. They would tell him, “We know, Daddy” and then go lose their minds. He also repeatably raped his wife getting her pregnant a total of six times, but she lost the first three because he beat her. Richard Kuklinski was not the total badass/golden husband portrayed on HBO. The simple fact is a psycho killer can’t turn it off.

Richard died behind bars in 2006 under very strange circumstances, but surprisingly enough he was scheduled to testify against an old business partner, Sammy “The Bull” Gravano. The day after Richard’s death, the case was dropped. Go figure. It doesn’t take a smart man to put the pieces together. Richard died the same as so many of his victims—poisoned. He even spoke this on his deathbed by softly whispering, “They are trying to kill me.”

—JESSE ANDREW

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