Facing Death

The police didn't check out the Normandy Plaza for five more days. By then, Cunanan had made his move. On Monday, a source at the hotel says, he slipped out the door of the Normandy without paying his bill. Police later found fashion magazines in the room - along with an electric hair trimmer. Falin, the hotel owner, later recalled that Cunanan had been going to the beach more often (to get a tan?) and that he had cropped his hair close.

In the small hours of Tuesday morning, Cunanan was sighted three times, once in the wood-paneled gay bar Twist and twice at the tri-level nightclub Liquid. Dressed in a clean white T shirt and black jeans, Cunanan approached a pair of the club's performing drag queens and tried to strike up a conversation. Most patrons ignore the drag queens or tease them. Cunanan earnestly told the transvestites that he was a political-science major new in town.

But Cunanan was apparently there for something else, and Versace made relatively easy prey. In Milan, the Versace homes and offices are fortresses, with steel doors and bodyguards. In South Beach, however, Versace walked about alone. He loved the freedom. He felt, with justification, that he had discovered a once seedy neighborhood of rundown hotels and dope dealers and helped transform it into a gay festival that revolved around La Casuarina, as he renamed the rundown seaside mansion he had bought for $3.7 million in 1992 and lovingly restored. He relished the easiness and informality of the place. He dismissed the guard who once stood by the wrought-iron gate where he would later perish. On the day of his death, none of the eight security cameras at La Casuarina was working.

That Tuesday morning, July 15, dawned like most summer mornings on South Beach - blue skies, a light breeze, a warm sun. Exhausted from a blur of European fashion shows, Versace that week had been lazing about his villa, watching videos and reading. Versace had a morning routine. At about 8:30, while the streets were empty, the late-night revelers still asleep, he would wander down to the News Cafe to buy magazines. He liked to see photos of celebrities sporting his fashions. On this morning, Versace plunked down $15.07 for copies of People, The New Yorker, Vogue, Entertainment Weekly and the Spanish-language version of NEWSWEEK. Then he wandered back down Ocean Drive.

The police think Cunanan knew Versace's routine. NEWSWEEK has learned that the security cameras at the News Cafe recorded Cunanan scoping out the cafe the day before, about a half hour before Versace made his usual rounds. On this morning, a man believed to be Cunanan - dressed in the typical South Beach uniform of gray muscle T shirt, black shorts, black cap and tennis shoes - walked up to the fashion designer just as he was putting his keys into the lock of the black iron gate of his villa. Two shots rang out. Versace collapsed, blood puddling around him and trickling down the pink coral steps. Inside the mansion, Versace's boyfriend, Antonio D'Amico, heard the shots, looked out and screamed.

THE MURDERER WALKED quickly down the avenue, then dashed down an alley. He darted into the parking garage where the red pickup, stashed since the cemetery murder, was parked. Police later found a pile of clothes - the gray T shirt, the black shorts - near the truck. Inside they found a folder of newspaper clips about the hunt for Andrew Phillip Cunanan - and his passport.