Lorena Bobbitt shot to fame for all the wrong reasons when she sliced off her husband John Wayne Bobbitt’s penis.
The story grabbed press headlines worldwide in June 1993.
In a shocking twist, both Lorena and John Wayne Bobbitt ended up facing charges in court.
Her case is mentioned in the Netflix documentary Killer Sally, and happened three years before Sally McNeil murdered her husband.
So who were Lorena Bobbitt and John Wayne Bobbitt, what happened to them, and where are they now?
Here’s everything you need to know.
***Warning: Contains distressing details of Lorena Bobbit’s crime ahead***
Who is Lorena Bobbitt?
Lorena Bobbitt was born in Ecuador. She moved to Venezuela with her parents when she was seven.
When she was 16, she visited the USA and fell in love with the country.
She moved to Virginia when she was 18 on a student visa, stayed with a family friend and learned to speak English.
Lorena wanted to live the American dream.
When and where did Lorena Bobbit meet John Wayne?
Lorena met John Wayne Bobbitt in September 1988 at a bar on the Quantico military base.
At the time he was a Lance Corporal in the Marines.
She was just 19.
They started dating and married just 10 months later, in June 1989.
According to Lorena, the domestic violence began soon after they married, and escalated.
Over the years, she had called the police to the house several times, claiming he had assaulted her.
What happened to John Wayne Bobbit’s penis?
On June 23 1993, in Manassas City, Virginia, John Wayne Bobbitt stumbled into the local hospital in agony.
His manhood had been sliced clean off with an 8-inch kitchen carving knife.
He told the hospital staff his wife Lorena had suddenly cut it off as he lay dozing.
There was blood everywhere.
Surgeons said they could try and reattach it – but they urgently needed the penis.
So police were dispatched to his house to look for the missing member, and to arrest his wife, Lorena.
They searched the entire house for the penis, even looking in the freezer and dishwasher.
But there was no sign of it.
Meanwhile, Lorena was missing, having fled the scene in her car.
After driving to her boss’s house for help, she went to the police station and accused John Wayne Bobbitt of raping her.
She admitted cutting off his penis, and they asked if she could remember what she did with it.
Lorena recalled throwing things out of the car window near a 7-Eleven store.
Police raced to the area to search it and found his penis in the grass.
Did surgeons manage to reattach John Wayne Bobbit’s penis?
One policeman recalls that the officer who found John Wayne Bobbitt’s penis in the long grass accidentally trod on it.
Firefighters picked it up and took it into the 7-Eleven store where they put it in a brown paper hot dog bag with ice.
Back at the hospital, John Wayne Bobbitt had lost a third of his blood. But a microsurgeon and urologist managed to reattach this penis, in a complex operation taking 10 hours.
It wasn’t until they removed the tourniquet and saw it “pink up” with blood flow that they knew the operation was a success.
Was Lorena Bobbitt charged?
Lorena Bobbitt was taken to hospital and examined for signs of rape – the same hospital where her husband was being treated.
She claimed he had repeatedly raped and sexually assaulted her since their wedding in 1989.
Following her statement, John Wayne Bobbitt was charged with marital sexual assault.
Lorena was also charged with malicious wounding.
Both would face court trials.
Did John Wayne Bobbitt rape Lorena?
John Wayne Bobbitt’s trial for marital sexual assault began in November 1993.
He faced a jury of nine women and three men.
During the trial, the judge only allowed evidence linked to a five-day window around the alleged attack. So this excluded any history of abuse.
On November 10 1993, the jury found John Wayne Bobbitt NOT guilty of sexually assaulting Lorena, citing “discrepancies” and a “lack of evidence”.
Of course, this does not mean that John Wayne Bobbit had never raped his wife.
What happened at Lorena Bobbitt’s trial?
Having lost her case against her husband, Lorena Bobbitt’s trial for malicious wounding went ahead in January 1994.
An immigrant from Ecuador, she had become the butt on jokes on TV and the media, and labelled a “social climber”.
The judge allowed cameras to show the trial live – unlike her husband’s.
Meanwhile, John Wayne Bobbitt had become a media celebrity, appearing on TV and radio.
At the trial, Lorena claimed “temporary insanity” caused her to cut off his penis after years of abuse.
The judge offered a plea bargain. If she admitted the attack was premeditated, she’d get four months in jail.
Lorena refused.
In court, witnesses reported seeing him use violence, and seeing bruises on her body.
Lorena testified he regularly raped her.
Former friends of John Wayne Bobbitt testified he had told them he liked “forced sex”.
But John Wayne Bobbitt denied this. He claimed Lorena was jealous and attacked him because he was going to divorce her.
The trial lasted eight days – and the jury found her not guilty of malicious wounding by reason of temporary insanity.
Where is Lorena Bobbitt now?
After the trial, Lorena spent 45 days in a psychiatric unit for assessment. Then she was free.
Four years later, she returned to the same courthouse accused of assaulting her mother.
Lorena’s mother wanted the charges dropped, and the judge decided there was insufficient evidence.
Today, Lorena uses her maiden name – Gallo – and still lives in Manassas, Virginia.
She lives with new partner, David Bellinger, and their teenage daughter.
Lorena still works as a manicurist and hairstylist.
She runs a charity for those who suffer domestic abuse.
Where is John Wayne Bobbitt now?
John Wayne Bobbitt appeared in several porn films after the trial.
He moved to Nevada, where he worked in a brothel, and then to New York.
His second wife and an ex-girlfriend both accused him of domestic violence and he eventually served time in prison.
The judge ordered him to undergo domestic violence counselling.
Reports state he now lives alone in Las Vegas.
He has tried to contact Lorena on many occasions – even suggesting they get back together.
Lorena wants nothing to do with him.
Read more: Was Jeffrey Dahmer’s hernia operation to blame for his violent criminal behaviour?
Killer Sally streams on Netflix from Wednesday November 2 2022.
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