Tuesday 13th of December 1521

227th Pope Sixtus V aka Xystus V is born as Felice Peretti di Montalto in Grottammare, Marche, Italy.

Tuesday 13th of December 1740

Composer Franz Xaver Schnizer is born in Bad Wurzach, Baden-Württemberg, Germany.

Friday 13th of December 1782

Cannibal Blaise Ferrage aka Seyé is broken on the wheel and exposed to die on the gibbet at the age of 25 in Place Saint-Georges, Toulouse, Midi-Pyrénées, France.

A prodigious multitude attended Ferrage's execution to which the monster walked with an unaltered countenance. It is affirmed that the number of women victim of Ferrage's brutality amounted to no less than eighty.

Wednesday 13th of December 1797

Poet Heinrich Christian Johann Heine is born in Düsseldorf, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany.

Sunday 13th of December 1863

Serial killer and cannibal Karl Friedrich Wilhelm Großmann aka Die Bestie vom Schlesischen Bahnhof is born in Neuruppin, Brandenburg, Germany.

Wednesday 13th of December 1899

Murderer Everett C. Applegate is born in New York, Manhattan, New York, United States.

Saturday 13th of December 1913

32-year-old Thief Vincenzo Peruggia known for stealing the Mona Lisa is arrested when he tried to sell the Mona Lisa, stolen by him two-and-a-half years earlier, to an antique dealer in Paris, Île-de-France, France.

Sunday 13th of December 1925

Comedian, actor, singer and dancer Dick Richard Wayne Van Dyke is born in West Plains, Missouri, United States.

Saturday 13th of December 1930

Murderer Charles Chapin aka The Rose Man of Sing Sing dies of pneumonia at the age of 72 in Sing Sing Prison, Ossining, New York, United States.

Wednesday 13th of December 1944

Actress Lupe Vélez aka The Mexican Spitfire commits suicide by an overdose of 80 Seconal pills at the age of 36 in Glendale, California, United States.

Instead of dying from the overdose, Vélez' stomach got upset and she drowned while vomiting in the toilet. A popular belief is that Vélez was unable to face the shame of giving birth to a child out of wedlock. Eventual fathers of the unborn child were actors Harald Maresch, Arturo de Córdova and Gary Cooper.

Wednesday 13th of December 1944

Painter and art theorist Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky dies of a stroke at the age of 78 in Paris, Île-de-France, France.

Thursday 13th of December 1945

KZ-Aufseherin in Ravensbrück, Auschwitz-Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen Irma Ida Ilse Grese aka Die Hyäne von Auschwitz is executed by hanging by Albert Pierrepoint at the age of 22 in Zuchthaus Hameln, Hameln, Sachsen, Germany.

On this day Grese, two other women and eight men were hanged.

Thursday 13th of December 1945

Oberaufseherin im KZ Auschwitz Elisabeth Volkenrath is executed by hanging by Albert Pierrepoint at the age of 26 in Zuchthaus Hameln, Hameln, Sachsen, Germany.

On this day Volkenrath, two other women and eight men were hanged.

Thursday 13th of December 1945

KZ-Aufseherin in Ravensbrück, Auschwitz-Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen Johanna Bormann aka Wiesel is executed by hanging by Albert Pierrepoint at the age of 52 in Zuchthaus Hameln, Hameln, Sachsen, Germany.

On this day Bormann, two other women and eight men were hanged.

Monday 13th of December 1948

Musician Ted Theodore Anthony Nugent aka The Atrocious Theodocious aka Motor City Madman is born in Redford, Michigan, United States.

Sunday 13th of December 1959

Billy Peterson dies of Spontaneous Human Combustion in Pontiac, Michigan, United States.

Peterson was found dead in the front seat of his car. The exhaust pipe had been bent to lead into the car's front seat in what appeared to be a suicide, but Peterson's body displayed third-degree burns on the back legs and arms, and while his flesh was burned, neither his clothing nor the front seat of the car were damaged in any way. In fact, hairs on the charred portions of the body were not even singed. 

Wednesday 13th of December 1967

26-year-old Serial killer Hans van Zon is arrested in Utrecht, Utrecht, Netherlands.

Wednesday 13th of December 1967

80-year-old Postal worker and would-be assassin Richard Paul Pavlick is released from a mental hospital. in New Hampshire State Mental Hospital, 36 Clinton Street, Concord, New Hampshire, .

Pavlick planned to blow up President Kennedy in Palm Beach on 11 December 1960.

Sunday 13th of December 1970

14-year-old James Eugene Glass is tortured and strangled by serial killer Dean Corll aka The Candyman in Houston, Texas, United States.

Sunday 13th of December 1970

14-year-old Danny Michael Yates is tortured and strangled by serial killer Dean Corll aka The Candyman in Houston, Texas, United States.

Monday 13th of December 1971

46-year-old Satan worshipper and serial rapist Edward John Louis Paisnel aka The Beast of Jersey is sentenced to 30 years imprisonment in Saint Helier, Jersey, United Kingdom.

Thursday 13th of December 1973

70-year-old Electrician George P. Metesky aka The Mad Bomber is released from a mental hospital after serving two-thirds of the 25-year maximum sentence he would have received at trial in Creedmoor Psychiatric Center, New York, Queens Village, New York, United States.

Thursday 13th of December 1973

42-year-old Founder and leader of the Peoples Temple Jim James Warren Jones is arrested for soliciting a vice officer in a cinema-toilet in Westlake Theatre, 638 S. Alvarado Street, Los Angeles, MacArthur Park, California, United States.

Jones had been watching 'Dirty Harry'.

Thursday 13th of December 1973

31-year-old Marietta DiGirolamo is shot dead by murder gang The Black Zebra Killers aka The Death Angels in Divisadero Street, San Francisco, California, United States.

Earlier that evening 35-year-old future San Francisco mayor Art Agnos was shot twice in the chest in Potrero Hill but he survived.

Tuesday 13th of December 1977

9/11 terrorist Ahmed bin Abdullah al-Nami aka Abu Hashim is born in 'Asir, Saudi Arabia.

Tuesday 13th of December 1988

Murderer Raymond Landry is executed by lethal injection at the age of 39 in Huntsville Prison, 815 12th Street, Huntsville, Texas, United States.

Two minutes into the execution the syringe came out of Landry's vein, spraying the deadly chemicals across the room toward the witnesses. The execution team had to reinsert the catheter into the vein. The curtain was drawn for 14 minutes so witnesses could not see the intermission.

Wednesday 13th of December 1995

A search of the house of 39-year-old Kidnapper, serial killer and child molester Marc Paul Alain Dutroux by state policeman René Michaux fails to discover 8-year-old Julie Lejeune and Mélissa Russo who are kept in a dungeon in his basement in 128 Route de Philippeville, Marcinelle, Hainaut, Belgium.

Children's voices were heard but Michaux thought they were coming from outside.

Tuesday 13th of December 2005

Upcoming lonely Christmas atmosphere in Antwerpen, Borgerhout, Antwerpen, Belgium.

Saturday 13th of December 2008

Actor Horst Tappert known from Derrick dies of unknown causes at the age of 85 in Planegg, Bayern, Germany.

Tuesday 13th of December 2011

Mass murderer Nordine Amrani commits suicide a shot in the head at the age of 33 in Place Saint Lambert, Liège, Liège, Belgium.

Minutes before Amrani killed five people with grenades and a fussilage.