Werwolves - real people

A large portion of Werwolves is devoted to 'real life cases' in various locations. It seems safe to assume that very little of this is based in fact. However, there were supposed 'werewolves' of history.
A very extensive page on werewolves.
There is a sad story that is not told behind the real people killed for being werewolves. People admitting to eating children, and supposedly with wounds that matched an attacked wolf. It's impossible to know how much of this is made up, but it's easy to imagine someone creating an elaborate story designed to rid themselves of someone they didn't like. Many of these people were women, (which seems to go against the folk tale tradition,) children, 'feeble minded,' and elderly. Perhaps children were actually killed by wild animals, and the blame had to be put on someone to make the village feel that justice was served.
This seems further evidence that the story was created to explain behavior that was not understood at the time. It's also very similar to the Salem witch trials and other supernatural related persecution of these time periods.