Murder in America
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What do all attractive, bright women with dark brown hair and a slimbuild have in common? They are targets for Theodore Robert Bundy. America’s most notorious serial killer of the 1970s confessed to killing at least 36 women. Bundy was a man known to his friends and family as charming and nice, but deep down he was disturbed and psychologically damaged.
“Ted, what did you do all this for?” corrections Officer Paul Decker had asked Bundy.
“I liked it.”
In 1946, Eleanor Louise Cowell gave birth to Bundy at a home for unwed mothers in Burlington, Vermont. Ted Bundy’s grandparents were highly religious and ashamed, so when Louise came home with her baby boy they pretended to be his parents and Louise became his sister. Forensic psychologist Dr. Helen Morrison speculated that this is where it all went wrong for Bundy; he would grow up living a lie
Cowell took her child when he was 10, moving the pair to Washington where she met and married Johnnie Bundy in 1951. Ted Bundy despised his stepfather, even when Johnnie Bundy thought of him as his own child. Bundy thought of him as too uneducated and resented him for his lowly working class as a military cook.
Ted Bundy had been bullied in school. He was a shy kid and, as he grew older, he couldn’t hold down a job which led to his becoming trouble for the police. But in 1966 when he left home and enrolled in the University of Washington’s Psychology program, he turned his life around. He cleaned up nicely, became popular and was excelling in his classes.
This man just didn’t act like a cold and thoughtless serial killer.
During his time at Washington University, Bundy told Rule he had met the girl of his dreams. She was attractive, slim with beautiful dark brown hair and she was rich to boot. They had dated for a year when she finally came to terms that Bundy was going nowhere. He talked a big a game: how he would become a great lawyer and his politics were sound, but he never did anything about it. And with that, she left him.
Bundy wanted to woo her back and prove her wrong, and that’s just what he did. In 1974, Bundy convinced her to come back and they talked about marriage. Then, suddenly, Bundy broke it off. Whatever happened was the catalyst for Bundy to take his first life.
In February 1974, Lynda Ann Healey was a 21-year-old college student. Healey was due at a radio station before classes, but she never made it to the station or her classes. When she failed to show up for a family meal the police were called; they discovered Healey’s bed was covered in blood as was the nightgown she had been wearing when she went to bed. Bundy had gotten her out of her night gown and dressed her up. With the amount of blood, police were certain she was either in critical condition or already dead.
For the next six months, Bundy went on a killing spree. Nineteen-year-old Donna Manson was last seen leaving for a concert to which she never showed up. Eighteen-year-old Susan Rancourt was last seen on the Lansbury College campus after dark. Roberta Parks had been at the Oregon State University when she disappeared. She was 22 years old. Brenda Bull was last seen leaving the Flame Tavern, and she was 22 years old. Georgann Hawkins had disappeared when she left her sorority house to go home just a couple houses down the street, but was never seen again. She was only 18 years old.
All these women resembled Bundy’s perfect woman: dark hair, slim and attractive. And he had taken them all without leaving any evidence or witnesses.
On July 14, 1974 Bundy made Lake Sammamish his new hunting grounds. Witness Dawn Sanders said she and a group of friends had gone out to the lake as usual for a bit of fun. A man matching Bundy’s description had approached the group. He had his arm in a cast, so when he asked Sanders’ friend if she would take something off the roof of his car it did not seem usual. Luckily for Sanders’ friend she did not go with him. Unluckily for Janice Ott, she did.
Another woman on the lake, Denise Naslund, went missing as well. Naslund had vanished on her way to the restroom – her boyfriend couldn’t find her anywhere. He had been distraught when police arrived, blaming himself for her disappearance. The police used dogs and helicopters to search the surrounding lake area but came up with nothing. But they were able to get descriptions from witnesses about the man going around with the cast asking women for help.
Mid-September 1974, Bundy took off to Salt Lake City and enrolled in at the University of Utah. There, four more girls disappeared from their suburban homes.
In November, Bundy made his first miscalculation. He approached Carol DaRonch and told her he was the police, explaining that he witnessed someone trying to break into her car. He took her to a mall where there was a supposed sub-station. When he couldn’t get them in through a back-door, Bundy took her for a car ride. When he attempted to put cuffs on her, DaRonch jumped out of the moving vehicle.
For the next seven months he evaded the police, kidnapping six more girls in Utah and Colorado in the process. When they finally caught up with him, Bundy was arrested for the attempted kidnapping for DaRonch. But just as quickly, he was turned over to the Colorado police for the murder of Caryn Campbell. He would likely have been convicted and sent to life in prison had he not escaped.
With the permission of the courts, Bundy was able to defend himself, allowing him access to the public prison library to do research. This library happened to have a window from which Bundy could escape.
Bundy then fled to the mountains, stealing from local campers for food and taking shelter in empty cabins. This only lasted a couple of days before he returned to town. He stole a car in attempt to flee, once again, but was caught by police at a roadblock and returned to jail.
On December 30, after 18 months of imprisonment, Bundy discovered yet another way to escape. He removed a neon light fixture and slithered his way through the ceiling and into a closet. By the time they discovered he was gone, Bundy had made it to Chicago. He spent New Year’s Eve in a bar in Mississauga. Before long, he finally landed in Tallahassee where he rented a room at the Oak Boarding house – not far from the Florida State University campus.
On January 14, a week after he arrived, Bundy broke into a sorority house and killed two girls, injuring two more. Margaret Bowman had been strangled with a nylon stocking and was clubbed with a stick that shattered her skull. Lisa Levy had also been strangled, but Bundy had bitten her on the butt and breast before tucking her into bed.
The two girls who survived, Karen Chandler and Kathy Kleiner, had been bludgeoned.
Bundy once again fled, this time taking a white van from Florida State University. It would show up four days later with traces of blood and hair samples belonging to Kimberly Leach. Leach had been 12 years old, attending high school, when she was kidnapped by Bundy. A witness said they saw Bundy forcing a crying Leach into the van but interpreted it as an angry parent disciplining their child. The van was later seen swerving about the road, Bundy wrestling with a hysterical Leach. The van would be found days later in Tallahassee, and Leach’s body would be found 12 months later in an unused pig’s pen 25 miles away.
On February 5 at 1:30 a.m., Bundy would be spotted by police in Pensacola acting suspiciously. When police tried to grab him, he fled, leading up to a struggle and a police officer firing his gun. He barely missed Bundy’s head.
After being arrested, Bundy would put the world through hell for another 11 years. Bundy, naturally, chose to defend himself yet again when he took the stand on June 12 . The man proclaimed his innocence for the next 11 years, even after he had been convicted and sentenced to the electric chair.
When the 11 years were up and Bundy was facing his last few days on earth, he confessed to his mother and his wife all of what he had done. Both women had been adamant he was innocent up until that day. Bundy confessed to the murder of 36 women, though experts believe there to be more than 100 to which he did not confess. When Bundy couldn’t buy more time, he stayed quiet. He told police he had dumped the bodies in the mountains and in the woods, where he would sometimes revisit them and commit necrophilia. He admitted that sometimes he would cut off their heads and bring them home.
On January 24, 1989, Theodore Robert Bundy was put in the electric chair.
Sources:
Kitty Snapp:
As a person who loves the arts, she especially loves the art of writing horror. Being able to make people jump with just the written word is the sign of a truly great writer. That's what she aspire to be.
