Gertrude Baniszewski: Difference between revisions

'''Gertrude Baniszewski''' (September 19th, 1929 - June 16th, 1990) was an Indiana woman who was convicted for the torture and murder of Sylvia Likens, a young and innocent teenage girl whom she brought into her home. She also encouraged and enlisted her own children and several neighborhood children to torture SylviaHer case is considered to be the worst murder case in the state's history.

Baniszewski began to physically abuse Sylvia in 1965. She appointed her own children into bullying her and they would do horrible things to her like pushing her down the stairs, burning cigarettes onto her skin multiple timesand forcing her to consume her excrement and vomit. Her daughter Paula, one of the torturers, once tried to repent of her hatred towards Sylvia to a pastor but Gertude prevented her from doing so by stating that Sylvia was the one being hateful. Gertrude also accused Sylvia of being a prostitute, and "preached" to her about how it was wrong to sell your body for money, and that women were filthy in general. Hypocritically, Gertrude decided to please her fellow torturers, most of them male neighborhood children, by forcing Sylvia to participate in a strip tease, where she was stripped naked and had her vagina forcibly violated by an empty glass Coca Cola bottle. The most infamous and horrific act throughout the months of torture was when Baniszewski, with the help of her child torturers, carved the words "I'M A PROSTITUTE AND PROUD OF IT" onto her stomach with a heated needle. The letter "S" (ended up looking like a "3") was also burnt above the words with a hot iron poker.