The True Story Behind the Murder That Inspired "House of Gucci" (2024)

Three years after earning an Oscar for A Star Is Born, Lady Gaga will be back in theaters this fall, starring in Ridley Scott's crime drama, The House of Gucci.

Alongside Adam Driver (Maurizio Gucci), Al Pacino (Aldo Gucci), Jared Ledo (Paolo Gucci), and Salma Hayek (Pina Auriemma) she'll be unraveling the unbelievable tale of Patrizia "Black Widow" Reggiani.

In the 1990s, the infamous socialite was convicted of arranging the assassination of her ex-husband and Gucci fashion house heir, Maurizio Gucci. The scandalous case created the trial of the century in Italy. Before The House of Gucci hits theaters on November 24, we're delving into the true story behind these events.

First, who are Maurizio Gucci and Patrizia Reggiani?

Maurizio was the grandson of House of Gucci founder, Guccio Gucci, while Reggiani was an Italian socialite and daughter of a trucking magnate. They met at a party in Milan and were married in 1972 when both were 24 years old. They'd go on to have two daughters, Allegra and Alessandra.

For over a decade, the pair seemed to live in marital bliss, with their luxurious lifestyle making them favorites of the Italian press. As one of the original celebrity couples, British Vogue reports that when they'd visit New York City, they were chauffeured around in a car with the license plate "Mauizia," a combination of their names. They owned private islands and properties in various locations across the world including Saint Moritz, Connecticut, and Acapulco. And Reggiani, who The Guardian says was known in elite circles as the “Liz Taylor of luxury labels," would host extravagant themed parties attended by the Kennedys.

“Maurizio felt free with me. We had fun, we were a team,” Reggiani told the U.K. newspaper in 2016. "We were a beautiful couple and we had a beautiful life, of course.”

But their relationship took a turn for the worse in 1983 when Maurizio's father, actor Rodolfo Gucci, died. At the time, Maurizio inherited 50 percent stake in the family company and became its chairman. Reggiani highly disapproved of her husband's poor business decisions, which included buying out his family's board seats for a reported $135 million via Bahrain-based investment banking firm, Investcorp, according to Forbes.

“Maurizio got crazy," she told The Guardian. "Until then I was his chief adviser about all Gucci matters. But he wanted to be the best, and he stopped listening to me... I was angry with Maurizio about many, many things at that time. But above all, this. Losing the family business. It was stupid. It was a failure. I was filled with rage, but there was nothing I could do.”

After claiming to be going away on a business trip, Maurizio left Reggiani in 1985. As the head of Gucci, he'd go on to lose the company millions. By 1993, he was forced to sell his shares of the business to Investcorp for $120m, The Guardian reported. He also had a new live-in girlfriend, interior designer Paola Franchi.

In 1994, Reggiani received a divorce settlement that would net her $1 million a year (a decade after they split) but she was publicly still extremely resentful of her ex.

Forbes reported that at the time she said to the press: "He recently told me: ‘Do you know why our marriage failed? Because you fancied yourself the president, and here there is only one president.’”

How was Maurizio Gucci killed?

On the morning of March 27, 1995, Maurizio was fatally shot three times on the steps of his private office in Milan. The tragedy was deemed an assassination, and due to Maurizio's high profile, authorities had various theories about the killer's identity and motives.

A clear suspect was Reggiani, who was vocal about her disdain for her estranged husband and wanting to see him dead. "'I was furious with Maurizio," she said in the 2021 documentary, Lady Gucci: The Story of Patrizia Reggiani. "I went around asking everyone, even the local grocer, is there someone who has the courage to murder my husband? I can’t aim a gun very well—I couldn’t have done it myself.'"

However, without any valid evidence, police were unable to charge anyone. It wasn't until two years later in January 1997 that Italian police received an anonymous tip that sparked their investigation into Reggiani. They soon discovered that Reggiani colluded with her friend and psychic, Pina Auriemma, and seemingly agreed to pay Auriemma 600 million lire ($365,000) in exchange for having Maurizio killed, according to Forbes.

Auriemma then got in touch with an acquaintance, hotel night porter Ivano Savioni, for his help. Savioni then brought the matter to Orazio Cicala, who found the killer, Benedetto Ceraulo. The culprits, in addition to Reggiani, were discovered by authorities when an undercover police officer recorded a call with them all in which he posed as a hitman threatening Reggiani to pay the rest of the money she owed the group. On January 31, 1997, all five were arrested and charged with premeditated murder in connection to Maurizio's assassination.

Throughout the trial, Reggiani was called "Black Widow" by the media.

Of course, Reggiani's arrest and connection to her husband's murder set off a media firestorm. Dubbed, the "Black Widow," the sensational 1998 trial was highlighted by Reggiani's unapologetic and colorful personality. Prosecutors alleged she was motivated by greed and jealousy of her ex's new partner, Franchi.

As for the evidence stacked against Lady Gucci? There were the witnesses that attested to Reggiani asking around town for a hitman and a damning one-word entry in her Cartier diary the day Maurizio was killed: “Paradeisos,” Greek for "paradise."

"I think that Patrizia was bothered above all that she couldn’t call herself a Gucci any more," Franchi said in court, according to the AP.

However throughout the trial, Reggiani denied directly ordering Maurizio's assassination. Instead, her lawyers insisted that Auriemma blackmailed and framed her for a payout—though Reggiani contradicted herself in court by saying, "It was worth every lira." Her lawyers also argued that a brain tumor Reggiani underwent surgery for in 1992, impaired the socialite, rendering her incapable of planning the crime.

"In Pina’s eyes, Patrizia Reggiani Martinelli was a golden cow, to be milked for money," they said.

Reggiani said on the TV show Storie Maledette, “I have to admit that for a time, I truly wanted to get rid of him. I wanted to do it and so I was going around asking for people to do it. But my intentions ended there—a mere obsession, a mere desire. What wife has never said, ‘I’d kill that guy?’”

Following a five month trial, Reggiani and the rest of her co-conspirators were convicted of premeditated murder. She was sentenced to 29 years in prison.

Where is Reggiani now?

She was placed in Milan's San Vittore prison, where she was allowed one special privilege negotiated by her lawyer. “I think I am a very strong person because I survived all these years in captivity,” she told The Guardian. “I slept a lot. I took care of my plants. I looked after Bambi, my pet ferret.” (Side note: Bambi was killed after being sat on by a fellow inmate.)

In 2011, Reggiani had a chance of early release after being offered parole on the condition of finding a job. In her opinion at the time, the idea of being employed was blasphemous. She reportedly told her lawyer, "I’ve never worked in my life and I don’t intend to start now.”

By 2014 she agreed to the terms and was released after 16 years in prison. She was first seen shopping in one of Milan's most popular streets, donning oversized glasses and toting her pet macaw on her shoulder.

“I dream of returning to Gucci. I still feel like a Gucci—in fact, the most Gucci of all,” she told the Italian press. "I have the qualifications; for years I went shopping around the world. I came from the world of jewels, and it is to that world that I want to return.”

Understandably, Gucci was not receptive to her public job application. Instead she began working as a design consultant for Bozart, a costume jewelry firm. However, she remarked to The Guardian in 2014 that she was unsatisfied with the wardrobe she'd now been subject to. At the time she said the relationship with her daughters was strained, as they had cut her off from the the fortune they inherited from Maurizio.

"It's Zara," she said referring to her dress. "I don’t earn enough at this place to buy proper clothes."

In subsequent years, the 72-year-old has given sporadic interviews about the case. Most recently, in March 2021, she told Italian news outlet, Ansa, that she was happy with Lady Gaga's casting in The House of Gucci, but did have one complaint. "I’m annoyed by the fact that Lady Gaga is portraying me in the new Ridley Scott film without even having the courtesy or the good sense to come and meet me. It’s nothing to do with money because I won’t be taking a single cent from the film. It’s about common sense and respect. I say this with all the sympathy and appreciation that I have for her."

The Gucci family does not approve of the Ridley Scott film.

Now, when taking into account Maurizio's surviving family members, they aren't particularly happy about the upcoming movie. His second cousin, Patrizia Gucci, told the AP that she's reached out to Scott’s wife, Giannina Facio, but has not gotten a response.

“We are truly disappointed. I speak on behalf of the family,” she said. “They are stealing the identity of a family to make a profit, to increase the income of the Hollywood system... Our family has an identity, privacy. We can talk about everything, but there is a borderline that cannot be crossed.”

As for her more superficial complaints? For one, she thinks that Jared Leto's casting as Paolo Gucci is "Horrible, horrible." But that's not all.

"My grandfather was a very handsome man, like all the Guccis, and very tall, blue eyes and very elegant," she said. "He is being played by Al Pacino, who is not very tall already, and this photo shows him as fat, short, with sideburns, really ugly. Shameful, because he doesn’t resemble him at all."

And there's more Gucci drama where that came from.

If you can't quite wait for The House of Gucci drama and would like to dive into all of the chaos Patrizia Reggiani has to offer, we have options. First, the film is adapted from the 2000 book by Sara Gay Forden, The House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed.

There's also the 2021 documentary featuring interviews with Reggiani, Lady Gucci and 1997's Fashion Victim: The Last of the Guccis.

Watch "Lady Gucci" Now Watch "Fashion Victim" Now