Richard Kuklinski was a hitman. Neither his wife nor daughters had any clue about his real profession – being a mafia assassin for hire. After his conviction, Kuklinski took part in a number of interviews during which he claimed to have murdered from 100 to 250 men. The motive was simple – money, in order to give his family a better life than he had. He was dubbed as The Iceman for freezing his victim to mask the time of death and lacking any emotion toward his victims.
Being cold and calculative was what kept Kuklinski under the radar for over 30 years.
Kuklinski grew up in in a blue-collar family in New Jersey. Raised as a Catholic, he was forced to become an altar boy. Being constantly abused by his parents as a child, especially by the father who beat him regularly, he would let out his frustration by killing cats.
As an adult, he refused to practice his religion. In an interview, Kuklinski recalled one of the few murders he later regretted committing:
"It was a man and he was begging, and pleading, and praying, I guess. And he was 'Please, God'n all over the place. So I told him he could have a half an hour to pray to God and if God could come down and change the circumstances, he'd have that time. But God never showed up and he never changed the circumstances and that was that. It wasn't too nice. That's one thing, I shouldn't have done that one. I shouldn't have done it that way."
Kuklinski experimented with various methods of killing before settling on his favorite – cyanide. He knew medical examiners rarely suspect cyanide and he knew which foods would hide the taste of it. While he did enjoy planning and figuring out how to execute the hits successfully, he saw it as a job and didn't get any excitement out of killing itself.
"The greater the odds against me, the more juice I got out of it"
Kuklinski also stated that the most in life, he enjoyed being with his family. Because he felt safe and secure with them.
Watch documentary "The Iceman Tapes" about Richard Kuklinski
You can watch the documentary of Richard Kuklinski on crimedocumentary.com
"I've never felt sorry (for the murders), I do feel sorry for hurting my family. The only thing feel sorry for. I'm not looking for forgiveness and repentance."
