Pygmalion: Dr. Anthony Pignataro

True Crime Campfire

True Crime, Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 1.5K Ratings

🗓️ 12 November 2021

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In 1997, a 26 year old woman named Sarah Smith went in for a routine breast augmentation procedure. It should have been an easy, outpatient surgery for this healthy young woman, but it didn't turn out that way. Sarah went into cardiac and respiratory arrest on the operating table, slipped into a coma, and died a few days later. Investigators soon discovered that Sarah wasn't the first of cosmetic surgeon Dr. Anthony Pignataro's patients to die after routine surgery. And the more they investigated this flashy, Lamborghini-driving, safari-hunting doctor, the more skeletons they found in his closet--from a long list of butchered patients to an audacious fraud. Pignataro would face justice for Sarah Smith's death, but that wouldn't be the end of his story. There was an even darker chapter still to be written, this time much closer to home. Join us for a twisting tale reminiscent of "Dr. Death," a stark example of what happens when narcissism and recklessness meet greed.

Sources:
Ann Rule, Last Dance Last Chance
Buffalo News: https://subscribe.buffalonews.com/e/limit-reached-bn?returnURL=https://buffalonews.com/news/pignataro-a-profile-in-deceit-how-the-failed-west-seneca-surgeons-disastrous-professional-life-brought/article_3ec7b800-b1d0-5287-a981-c9790c18380f.html
WSVN News: https://wsvn.com/news/investigations/disgraced-doctor-who-poisoned-wife-spotted-on-elder-care-website/
Oxygen: https://www.oxygen.com/license-to-kill/crime-news/anthony-pignataro-surgeon-resurfacess-florida-new-name
Forensic Files Now: https://forensicfilesnow.com/index.php/tag/anthony-pignataro/
Oxygen's "License to Kill," episode "Killer Surgeon"
"Forensic Files," Episode "Bad Medicine"

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello campers, grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire.
0:04.9	Wear your camp counselors, I'm Katie, and I'm Whitney.
0:08.4	And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction, or roasting
0:12.5	murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire.
0:23.0	In Greek mythology, there's a guy called Pigmalion, a sculptor who carved himself a perfect
0:28.1	woman out of marble.
0:30.1	And while he was working on her, he started falling in love.
0:33.7	Just as he was putting the finishing touches on his creation, she came to life.
0:37.2	It's kind of a romantic story on one level, but if you really think about it, it's also
0:42.4	kind of creepy.
0:44.0	She's his creation.
0:45.8	She exists solely to please him, and who wants a relationship like that?
0:51.0	A narcissist, that's who.
0:52.6	We're about to tell you about a man whose whole life was a metaphor for the Pigmalion
0:57.0	story, a man whose massive ego drove him to create a life that looked like pure perfection,
1:02.8	a spectacular career as a cosmetic surgeon, money to burn, a bright red Lamborghini, a loving
1:09.4	wife, and girlfriends on the side.
1:12.0	But as we've seen so many times before, underneath that shiny veneer, there was nothing
1:16.5	there.
1:17.8	Just a bunch of set pieces made of cardboard, flimsy enough for a strong wind to knock
1:22.1	down, and the wind was coming fast.
1:25.6	This is Pigmalion, the story of Dr. Anthony Pignataro.
	...

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