True Crime With Caledonian Kitty

I have written about Ted Bundy a few times on this blog which may come as no surprise if you are a regular reader. I don't think there is anyone in the true crime community who hasn't written about him. Whenever we think about Serial Killers, the likes of Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dahmer are maybe two of the first infamous murderers that we think of when quickly put on the spot. 

[Check out my previous two posts about Bundy for the full background on his crimes: The Many Faces of Ted Bundy and 10 Facts You May Not Know About Ted Bundy] 

One of the many things that was disturbing with Ted Bundy was his way with words, he could be as charming as charming could be one minute but then switch to this cold, unfeeling and sinister character the next. He certainly knew how to play people and get them under his control to some extent and that wasn't just with women, he was able to manipulate men too. 

Listed below are some of Ted Bundy's quotes, straight from the horses mouth or so the saying goes. It makes for some chilling reading so please be aware.... 

''I am the most cold-hearted son of a bitch you will ever meet.''

''I don't think anybody doubts whether I've done some bad things. The question is what, of course and how and, maybe even most importantly why?''

''When you feel the last bit of breath leaving their body, you're looking into their eyes. A person in that situation is God''

''We serial killers are your sons, we are your husbands, we are everywhere. And there will be more of your children dead tomorrow.''

''I didn't want to hurt them, but I had no other choice.''

''I am not a monster, I am just misunderstood.''

''I am not the person everyone thinks I am, I am something more''

''I don't feel guilty for anything. I feel sorry for people who feel guilt.''

''I didn't know her name, she was just a faceless victim to me.'' 

''I am not an animal, I'm not crazy, I just wanted to kill.'' 

Further Reading & Sources:

Thank you for checking out my latest post and I hope you will join me for the next one. Please stay safe and take care x 

 Ted Bundy collage. Picture credits: britannica / wikipedia / gq / denverpost / cosmopolitan / palmbeachpost

As you may be already aware I, like millions of others over the years have already written previously about Ted Bundy. I've talked about the horrendous details of his crimes, the victims, the trial and the aftermath but is there anything else that hasn't been covered when it comes to him? I've always said that, in my opinion he is the most over-glamourized serial killer in history (so far, at least). I've personally lost count of how many books, articles, podcasts, documentaries and movies have been made about him. Despite there being so much out there about his crimes, a lot of people are still unaware of other bits of information about him. I have put together a new series on my blog which focuses on some of the unknown facts of the Serial Killers that many of us know from the endless books and movies. 

[If you are not familiar with Ted Bundy and his shocking crimes, please check out my previous post on him]

So let's get into it in this first instalment of this series '10 Facts You May Not Know About Serial Killer.....Ted Bundy'.

1) Ted (full name Theodore Robert Bundy) confessed to the murders of 30 young women but the true number of his victims is unknown. He constantly toyed with investigators right up to his execution that there may have been more victims. 

2) Ted once worked on a crisis hotline as a volunteer with the best selling true crime author, Ann Rule. The pair became close friends and Ann would later write a book based on her friendship with him, his trial and his crimes. In her book 'The Stranger Beside Me', Ann recalled how Ted would be 'wonderful' on the phone with people who were depressed and suicidal, she said it was ironic that he had saved lives during those moments. 

3) Some people who knew Ted were shocked and in disbelief when his crimes were exposed. He was able to adapt his persona to whoever he was with at any given time. One of his ex girlfriends who had a young daughter, explained that Ted was a great father figure to her little girl and would often make breakfast for them in the morning. 

4) When Ted was a young child there were some red flags beginning to show including the time that he was staying with an aunt who had woken up to find that he had placed knives around her whilst she had been asleep in bed. She was shocked and disturbed by the discovery and also to Ted's reaction to it for he could not stop laughing. He found this strange act to be very amusing. 

5) Ted has a secret daughter whom he fathered whilst in prison with a groupie who would attend his trial. Carole Ann Boone was obsessed with Ted and was one of many of his 'fan girls'. He would write to many women in prison but Carole was the one he gained the most out of (obviously he was using her for his own gain). His daughter changed her name and has continued to live a private life. 

6) Ted Bundy was 42 years old when he died in the electric chair on the 24th of January 1989. 

7) Ted Bundy's youngest known victim was 12 year old Kimberly Leach 

8) The run up to Ted Bundy's execution was like a national event, t-shirts were printed, banners were made, countdowns to his death were arranged. Crowds of people and media were camped outside of the prison chanting ''Burn Bundy Burn''. When his death was announced and the hearse containing his body was being driven out of the grounds, people cheered and sang songs in celebration. 

9) 42 people reportedly came to watch the execution of Ted Bundy, many of them were relatives of the victims. 

10) Ted Bundy's brain was examined for any signs of abnormalities but none were found. Scientists were nowhere near any closer as to trying to understand Ted's remarkable intelligence but also his sickening and cruel thirst for violent sexual murder. 

So, I have covered just some of the facts about Ted Bundy in this piece along with my original post about him. If you would like me to write more future articles about Bundy please let me know. I always welcome comments below or emails: jocaledoniankitty@gmail.com 

RIP to Ann Marie Burr, Lonnie Trumbell, Lisa Wick, Joni Lenz, Lynda Ann Healy, Donna Gail Manson, Susan Elaine Rancourt, Brenda Baker, Roberta Kathleen Parks, Brenda Carol Ball, Georgeann Hawkins, Janice Ott, Denise Naslund, Caryn Campbell, Julie Cunningham, Denise Lynn Oliverson, Melanie Cooley, Shelly Robertson, Nancy Wilcox, Melissa Smith, Laura Aime, Debby Kent, Nancy Baird, Sue Curtis, Debbie Smith, Rita Lorraine Jolly, Vickie Lynn Hollar, Lisa Levy, Margaret Bowman, Kimberly Leach, Lynette Culver, Rita Curran & many unidentified others. 

Further Reading & Sources:

- The Many Faces of Ted Bundy | True Crime With Caledonian Kitty

- Hunting Humans | Book by Michael Newton

- The Encyclopedia of Serial Killers | Book by Susan Hall

- The Big Book of Serial Killers | Book by Jack Rosewood

- The Killer Book of Serial Killers | Book by Michael and Tom Philbin

- Journey Into Darkness | Book by John Douglas & Mark Olshaker

- The True Crime Dictionary | Book by Amanda Lees

- Serial Killers of The 70s | Book by Jane Fritsch

- Ted Bundy | Documentary | Born To Kill

- Ted Bundy | Wikipedia 

- Ted Bundy | Murderpedia

- Ted Bundy | Trial Playlist - YouTube

- The Stranger Beside Me | Book by Ann Rule

Thank you as always for taking the time to check out my latest post and the first instalment of this series. I hope you found it informative and an interesting read. If you would like to help support my weekly content by buying me a coffee, you can do so here or via my PayPal. Thank you so much!

Stay safe and I hope you'll join me in my next post x 

Apparently the word 'Serial Killer' didn't exist until Ted Bundy, we had dangerous killers roaming around but there wasn't a specific name for them and so when Ted's crimes came to light, the phrase apparently became a thing and we've been using it ever since to describe these types of monsters. In this series where I have been focusing on a select number of serial killers from the 1970s, I've spent the past week focusing on Ted Bundy. This will be my fifth installment in the series and of course he had to be included (especially as so many of you have been asking me to write about him for years now). He has featured on my blog very briefly but in this post we'll be talking more about him. 

I'm lucky enough to have a vast number of books and quite a lot of encyclopedias of Serial Killers, as you can imagine, Ted Bundy features quite a lot in those books. Some people believe that he is the most infamous Serial Killer in American history but that is up for debate as we often hear others sharing that title, especially Jeffrey Dahmer. I knew about his case like so many people but I wanted to approach my research as if I was only discovering his story for the first time and even though I may have felt that I knew a lot about him before, I did come across details that I had never heard before. 

I spent many hours reading books about him, watching all the trial footage that I could find, interviews with him, newspaper articles, court documents and listened to various books on audible (I'd actually go to bed with my headphones on and wake up in the morning with the narrator still yapping away in my ears). Not surprisingly I ended up dreaming about Ted Bundy (not in a romantic way but his face just appeared in my dreams) which came as a surprise because I've written about a lot of serial killers and never do I have them pop up in my dreams. 

I'm not attracted to Ted Bundy, when well dressed he could appear to be handsome. Certainly not what people in the past would consider to be a dangerous Serial Killer based on looks. He broke the mold in that respect and woke everyone up to the reality that anyone, no matter how successful or good looking they may be, could be capable of such evil things. On the surface he had a lot going for him and had the ability to draw people into him. Even the footage of the interview that was recorded the night before his execution, if you look at the comments underneath the video you will see so many people saying similar things. They were taken in by him, forgetting what he had actually done. They found him interesting, well spoken and charismatic. 

When I watched the footage of the Chi Omega trial where Ted had represented himself, I watched in amazement as he single handedly held everyone in the courtroom (even the judge) in the palm of his hand. When he spoke, people listened, People couldn't take their eyes off of him. Usually trials can be long and exhausting to get through but the utter fascination of watching this individual, who had done the most horrendous things imaginable, was quite interesting. Ted would just stand there full of confidence and intelligence, talking in such a manner with a calmness, so self-assured and it was like he was hypnotizing everyone. The people in the courtroom would hang on every word as well as the viewers like myself who watched the footage on YouTube, all transfixed wondering what he was going to say next. 

I think that's why the fascination with Ted Bundy continues to this day because we just can't get our heads around how he could be so many people in one person. I titled this post 'The Many Faces of Ted Bundy' because he was able to adapt his personality (of which he had multiple) to whatever situation he was in and whoever he was with at the time. Some people knew him as a monster, some knew him as a life saver who comforted people who were having mental health difficulties. Some people saw him as a promising politician, a future lawyer. Some people saw him as a family man who was a great cook and great with kids. Some people saw him as a creep. 

Like Richard Ramirez, Ted Bundy had this neverending line of adoring female fans who are still obsessed with both of them to this day. I've seen tattoos dedicated to these killers, coffee cups with their faces on, valentine's cards and fridge magnets with their images on....pure madness! Even I get messages and emails from people who assume that I am a fan girl who's obsessed with such serial killers like Bundy and just jumping on the true crime bandwagon. When the reality is that I'm working on my own book and plan to be a published true crime writer. Both Richard and Ted had no problems with the opposite sex and many women found them attractive so what was this incredible evil that drove them to hurt as many women and people as possible? And why would some women find this attractive?, to be drawn to a dangerous man that has done the most unspeakable things? I spoke recently about the young boy, Jason Moss who wrote to serial killers in prison and how that had psychologically scarred him to the point that he ended up taking his own life. I have also mentioned before about one of Richard Ramirez's fans who thought she was in love with him. She visited him in prison for the first time after months of letters to find that the sexy fantasy that she had in her mind, was not what she thought. The guy was a complete and utter psycho and scared the hell out of her so much, that she cut off contact with him from that moment on. 

So, in this post you will be familiar with the timeline and other details may ring a bell but I do hope you are able to take away something from this that you may not have heard before. I always inject a lot of my own personality into my posts so it's not supposed to sound like a run-of-the-mill boring script. I always want my readers to feel that I'm there with them telling them about these cases over a cup of coffee. That's the feeling I always get whenever I pick up an Ann Rule or Reg McKay book. 

Before I go any further I have to warn you (which you won't be surprised, I'm sure) that I will be sharing disturbing details. I don't think it's possible not to talk about Ted Bundy without sharing horrifying details but these are his crimes and this is what he did to innocent people and they deserve their stories to be heard. Also, talking about Ted Bundy in posts such as mine is important for reminding some people that this guy was not a comedy character or just some guy off of the TV to admire, he was a monster who destroyed lives. He may have done some good for other people at some points in his life and he may have been handsome and talented at certain things but the reality is, he was a very sick and evil individual. 

• His interests were Psychology, Asian studies, Politics and Law and he did go to and fro with Universities, spending a semester here and a semester there. Sometimes Ted would start things and fail to complete them and this would be a sense of frustration for some people close to him. He was dating a girl at the time who he considered to be his ultimate dream girl. She was pretty, intelligent and was from a highly respected and wealthy family. His confidence soared when he was with her and he had aspirations of being wealthy and successful for himself but also to impress her and her family. He still had his heart set on law school but his applications kept getting rejected. He decided to do some voluntary work for a crisis helpline as well as work on some political campaigns to help make connections and he viewed this as a foot in the door to law school. It was at the crisis helpline center that he met the late, best selling true crime writer, Ann Rule. Ann previously worked in law enforcement but was now a single mother and aspiring writer. She would volunteer at the helpline once a week and she would sit for hours taking phone calls and chatting to Ted. They grew close, not in a romantic way but they had a mutual respect for each other. 

• Ann would later describe those late nights of working with Ted and claimed that he was always very good at putting people at ease and helped save a number of lives. Ted would beam as he told Ann about his girlfriend but on one evening she noticed that he wasn't being his usual self. It turned out that his girlfriend broke up with him because she felt that he didn't have any proper goals or plans in place. He would talk about becoming a lawyer and all of these other great things but nothing was actually happening and months and months would go on with no new development. Ted was utterly heartbroken but it pushed him to try harder and eventually he got into law school and was doing so well in the politics field that he was being painted as this up-and-coming star. Months had passed since his girlfriend had dumped him and he was moving on but seeing how well he was doing, she was suddenly back on the scene again. They gave their relationship another chance but Ted had other ideas. 

(Ann Rule. Picture credit: storey-lines)

• Ted became a bit of an injustice collector and never forgot how she made him feel. It was difficult enough for him to try and impress her before because of the wealthy background she had but for him to be dumped out of the blue, was a massive bruise to the ego for him. So he set about a ridiculous plan that actually produced the results that he wanted. He waited until she was comfortable in the relationship and made her endless promises about marrying her, going for holidays with her and moving in together. He basically 'Love Bombed' her (emotionally setting her up for a downfall by promising her all of these romantic things and love) and then suddenly without warning, he dumped her, leaving her hurt and confused. He wanted to make her feel how he felt. The strange thing is, that he never stopped loving her in a way, but too much water had gone under the bridge at that point and he had moved on. Some people believe that the disintegration of this relationship was what started Ted on this horrible path to serial murder. 

• Around this time in 1974, Ted was reported to have started his horrific campaign of attacking young women and girls. He would peep through girl's windows and watch them get undressed whilst he would pleasure himself. He would break into their apartments, in many cases he would render them unconscious by hitting them violently over the head with an object, strangle them and sexually assault them. Some were able to survive these evil attacks, some died from these devastating ordeals and some seemed to vanish into thin air with only traces of blood left on their bedsheets which indicated that all was not well. He didn't just break into apartments, he would drive around in his Volkswagen Beetle equipped with a missing passenger seat and a brown satchel which contained his rape kit (items included a ski mask, ice pick, large plastic bag and a pair of stockings with holes cut out of them which he would use to either wear as a mask or strangle his victims) as well as a crowbar under his seat. He always had everything planned right down to how he was going to trick the girls to come with him. He would stalk college campuses and parks abducting girls by posing with his arm in a cast pleading for them to help him get his canoe either on to or off of his car. Girls were vanishing and nobody knew what was happening to them. He moved around different states and started to be careless, being seen talking to girls who would later go missing, mentioning his name was Ted and the fact that some witnesses were aware of the type of car he drove.

• Whenever his name came up during an investigation into a horrific sex attack, girl's disappearance or murder, his file was cast to the side and he wasn't looked at as a person of interest in the beginning because he was deemed to be too 'squeeky clean'. The cops thought he was a well spoken, university educated and handsome young man so they thought there was no way that he would have had anything to do with what happened to any of these poor girls. When two girls had gone missing from a popular park, witnesses had provided information to authorities who put together a sketch which matched Ted's profile, people who knew Ted personally had seen it and agreed that it looked and sounded like him but they didn't believe he could be capable of such a thing, not the Ted they knew.

• Ted would abduct girls by his method of using a cast on his arm (an idea which was also used by the character Buffalo Bill in the movie The Silence of The Lambs) to gain sympathy and encourage them to help him put some books or something into his car, he would then hit them over the head with a crowbar and bundle them into the space where he removed the front passenger seat. The girl would be subjected to a horrendous ordeal before being murdered. He later confessed to taking the girls deceased bodies to various woodland areas, he would return repeatedly to the remains to record the progress of decomposition. Sometimes he would put makeup on the heads which would (in many cases) be decapitated. He claimed animals were responsible for the heads being detached from the rest of the remains. And just when you thought all of that wasn't sickening enough, he would pleasure himself sexually using the decomposing remains until they had become too putrid. Some of the heads would be brought back to his apartment and he would do the same routine of putting makeup on them, even washing the hair. He would use the heads for sexual gratification before they had decomposed to the point that it was no longer possible. 

(Ted Bundy. Picture credit: peacocktv)

• Like a lot of serial killers, there comes a point where they are so careless that they end up making a slip somewhere. Ted Bundy claimed that alcohol helped fuel his actions, he needed it to give him the confidence and nerve to carry out his evil acts. He made a huge mistake which was to lead him on the path to downfall when he tried to abduct a pretty young woman by the name of Carol DeRonch from a shopping mall in Salt Lake City. He followed Carol and approached her claiming to be a police officer. He told her someone was trying to break into her car and told her to come to the police station to file a report. Alarm bells started ringing for Carol, she'd seen the state of the inside of his car and could smell the alcohol. She attempted to get away from him but there was struggle and he managed to handcuff one of her wrists but she managed to get away and he sped off. Through Carol, the police were able to get some information but it would be months before the cops caught up with him.

• On the same day as the attempted abduction of Carol DeRonch, another young girl went missing some hours later. A key was found near to where the girl went missing. The cops tried the key in the lock of the handcuffs that Ted had slapped on Carol's wrist and the key fit the lock perfectly.

• On the 16th of August, Ted Bundy was up to his old tricks again, driving around in his car looking for potential victims and he ended up in a random neighbourhood. A local policeman spotted him and chased after him. Eventually Ted stopped the car and got out, playing Mr charming as usual. The policeman noticed the brown satchel and searched it and judged it to be items used for an attempted burglary. He was arrested and put in a lineup where he was identified by Carol DeRonch as her attacker. He was charged with attempted kidnapping but the police believed he was responsible for more abductions and murders, they believed that they had a serial killer on their hands. He was taken over to Colorado to face charges for the murder of a girl in Snowmass. If convicted of his crimes he was due to go down for the rest of his life in prison but he came up with a plan as he always did. He asked to be allowed to represent himself at trial and requested access to the law library which was granted. On the 7th of June 1977, Ted Bundy managed to jump out of the library window and escape for a period of 8 days. He slept in abandoned cabins, ate leaves and stole food wherever he could but he couldn't stand it anymore so he went into town to steal a car and ended up being caught by the cops and taken back into custody.

(Ted with Elizabeth. Picture credit: marieclaire)

• In his private life during these horrendous attacks and murders, he was busy playing house with a single mother named Liz. With Liz and her daughter, he played the perfect family man. He cooked and cleaned, acted caring and protective. Liz was even there in the early stages of the investigation and both she and Ann Rule originally believed that Ted Bundy was innocent in the beginning. I was reading Liz's book this past week and I was cringing at a lot of what she had written, especially when she'd said that she met Ted Bundy in a nightclub, took him home with her that same night and he was there with her and her young daughter. She fell asleep and basically left him alone with her daughter on more than one occasion. I'm not saying that every guy is a potential Ted Bundy, I'm not even a parent yet but even I know, you don't have strange guys around your children, not even yourself. Anything could have happened and she was really lucky that nothing did. It was clear thought that she had been hoodwinked by Ted as a lot of women who had known him personally seemed to have been. 

• Ted Bundy's vanishing act from police custody was not a one-off, he came up with another plan. He noticed there was a hole in the ceiling of his cell right next to a light fixture. He studied the size of the hole and managed to chip some of the ceiling away. He started to starve himself so that he could lose enough pounds to be able to fit through the gap. He would practice climbing through the gap late at night and on one evening he decided to make a real go of it. He stacked some books on his bed and threw a sheet over them, then he climbed through the gap and managed to get to what looked like closet space, he climbed down in and it ended up giving him access to a prison official's apartment. The apartment was quiet as nobody wad home so he put on some clothes and carried on with his escape plan. He managed to get away with it and spent New Years Eve at a bar before fleeing to Florida.

(Ted Bundy. Picture credit; abcnews)

• Once he was in Tallahassee, Florida, he managed to find some accommodation using what money he had. He was staying right at the heart of the student area. In January 1978, Ted Bundy struck again in the wee small hours at the Chi Omega Sorority House. Earlier that evening he'd been spotted by some of the female student that lived there, in a nightclub. Ted had been acting creepy, staring at all of the girls but not in an appreciating way, more of a angry sort of way. His sickening actions in those early morning hours at that student household were something that nobody who heard about it back then or even hears about it now, can ever comprehend such pure evil. Like a psychotic wild animal he broke into the house and headed straight for one of the rooms to where a girl named Margaret Bowman was sleeping. Margaret had been hit so violently over the head with a blunt object that her skull had been completely shattered and some of her brain was exposed. She was then strangled with a nylon stocking which was later found tight around her neck. He then moved on to the room of Lisa Levy. Lisa has been beaten, strangled and sexually assaulted. Her nipple was almost bitten off and she had bite marks on her buttocks. Two girls were also subjected to a horrendous attack but by some miracle they managed to survive. They had been beaten so badly that they had no recollection as to who or how it happened. one of the victims later recalling that she went to bed that night and the next thing she knew, she was being lifted into an ambulance. 

• After the horrific events at the Chi Omega Sorority house which all happened so fast that it literally took Ted Bundy just around 15 minutes to brutally attack four girls, two fatally and the other two almost at the brink of death but were saved just in time. He then broke into another young students bedroom and subjected her to an horrendous assault leaving her alive but permanently disabled. 

• Days and weeks passed after those horrible incidents and nobody knew who was responsible but some of the people who lived at the same accommodation as Ted, noticed how strange he had been acting. He seemed to keep looking over at the Chi Omega house all of the time. A short while after this, a white van was reported stolen from the University and it had been taken by Ted. He must have known that this deadly trail of beautiful young girls who had been so cruelly murdered, would lead the cops to him so he had to get out of there. The nightmarish scenes at the Chi Omega house and the student he attacked a few blocks away seemed to be not enough for Ted Bundy, he was ready to find another victim. 

• His next and final victim was little 12 year old Kimberly Leach, she had been at school and was due to take a PE lesson but had left her kit at another part of the building so she was on her way to retrieve it. Ted Bundy had already attempted to abduct another child previously to spotting Kimberly but that attempt failed and the child was able to get away. Sadly, Kimberly was to fall into Ted Bundy's evil clutches. Witnesses say that they saw Kimberly getting into the white van looking really upset. Ted reportedly had an angry look on his face. Another witness claimed to have seen Ted Bundy driving the white van and shouting in the direction of the passenger seat. The van was discovered abandoned a few days later and under inspection it was clear that a lot of trauma had taken place within that vehicle. Investigators also found a receipt for a hunting knife which they believed to have been the weapon he used to murder Kimberly. Ted Bundy was nowhere to be seen, he dumped the van and took off. Kimberly's remains were found dumped in an unused pig pen in some woods. 

• It seemed that Ted Bundy's time had now come, he was spotted driving around in his macabre VW Beetle, erratically, psychotic, full of adrenaline and alcohol. The police took him into custody and finally, Ted Bundy was removed from the streets and nobody was going to have to suffer this monster anymore. 

• In 1979, the man of many faces, the cruelest of killers and sickest of individuals, finally was going to be put to task for everything he had done. He put on the performance of a lifetime as the promising, wannabe lawyer but it was just another role to play for him. The trial itself was gripping and watching this demon in action was both disturbing and fascinating. He really thought he could get away with anything but none of his games worked this time. He was sentenced to death for the murders of Margaret and Lisa at the Chi Omega Sorority house and later tried and sentenced to death for the murder of Kimberly Leach. For 11 years he continued pretending to be innocent despite the mountains of evidence against him. Investigators and the victim's families were desperate for answers and there were missing girls who's families wanted to know if he knew of their whereabouts. Ted Bundy kept his mouth shut and didn't say a word. Even being the psychotic monster that he was he always seemed to be in some sort of relationship with someone and his final relationship was with a woman named Carol Ann Boone. Despite the fact that this guy was a raving lunatic and total monster who tortured, sexually assaulted and brutally murdered various young women and a 12 year old child, Carol still thought he was a bit of a catch. Carol was clearly desperate. 

• So he and Carol had this long term relationship and she'd even had sexual intercourse with him on one of her prison visits which resulted in pregnancy. Ted Bundy had one biological daughter as a result of this relationship. Carol was in deep denial due to Ted's ways of persuasion and actually thought he was an innocent man. However, three years before he was due to die by electric chair, they broke up. Apparently she finally realised that the numerous amounts of evidence proving his guilt was actually real. His daughter would later change her name and live a quiet life not wanting anyone to know who her biological father was, who could blame her? 

(A member of the public selling Ted Bundy execution t-shirts. Picture credit: etsy)

• When it was clear that no appeal was going to work and there was no doubt that he would be facing the electric chair, Ted Bundy decided to start talking but it was too late, nobody cared, they'd had enough of him. As the day of death grew closer, members of the public threw parties, it was like a holiday event. 
• His mother (who came across as a total nutcase herself) had been in denial for years about Ted and practically worshipped the ground he walked on. She stood by him all the way and wouldn't hear a bad word said against her precious boy. He finally told her the truth that he did it all but that didn't do anything, she still attempted to defend him and make excuses. 

(Ted Bundy's last interview. Picture credit: pinterest)

• The night before his execution, Ted gave an interview putting on another performance. He was in denial himself, he was always able to try and get out of any situation but this time there was no stopping it and I think that shocked him. In the interview you can see it in his eyes how scared he was. He thought he could use the victims as a bargaining tool to buy himself more time on death row. He claimed he could help solve cases, work with the police to identify victims etc but nobody was interested. They knew what he was trying to do. 

(People celebrating Ted Bundy's execution. Picture credit: aenetworks)

• For his last meal, he was so nervous he didn't want to eat anything but it was part of the rules that he was to have some sort of dinner. They brought him in some steak and eggs but he didn't touch any of it. In a movie based on Ted Bundy, there is a scene where he has to bend over and cotton wool is inserted into his anus being forced to wear an adult diaper as well as other indignities. Sadly this didn't happen. It's a wonder why this scene was put in the movie, maybe because it was the sort of justice that we all wanted to see? Ted Bundy being humiliated after everything he had done to those poor girls. He was scared and his last word were simply ''Give my love to my family and friends.''

(Members of the public celebrating Ted Bundy's final hours. Picture credit: The Sun)

• Ted Bundy was executed on the 24th of January 1989 by electric chair. The time of death was 7:16 am. 

(The Newspapers after the execution: Picture credit: rarenewspapers)

(Another newspaper article about Ted Bundy's execution. Picture credit: The Sun)

• In the weeks and days leading up to his execution, Ted Bundy confessed to the murders of 36 women and girls. He said that he was not willing to talk about any murders that had happened to younger girls or murders that had happened closer to home. He never admitted any involvement in the disappearance of 8 year old Ann Marie Burr who lived in his neighbourhood when he was 14. Was she his first victim? 

(Some of Ted Bundy's victims. Picture credit: inews)

• In the 1980's, Ted Bundy reached out to investigators and offered his help and advice on how to catch the infamous serial killer known as The Green River Killer. At the time nobody knew where this guy was or that he was indeed, Gary Ridgeway. Ted offered his advice on the case but the killer's identity was finally revealed in 2001 due to the advances in today's DNA technology

• Ted Bundy was cremated and his ashes were scattered in the Cascade Mountains of Washington. This was another unpleasant fact about the case since we know that some of his victims remains were placed there.

• Ted Bundy's mother, Louise passed away on the 23rd of December 2012.

(Ann Rule. Picture credit: nytimes)

• Ann Rule sadly passed away on the 26th of July 2015. Her true crime books continue to fly off of the shelves. She continues to be an inspiration to me and other aspiring true crime writers. The judge who presided over the Chi Omega trial, Edward Cowart, sadly passed away on the 3rd of August 1987. He was a highly respected man and well liked by all who knew him and who did not know him personally. Everyone still talks about that moment during the Chi Omega trial where he accosts Ted Bundy for shaking his finger at me ''Do not shake your finger at me young man.''

(Judge Edward Cowart. Picture credit: imdb)

• The Infamous picture of Ted Bundy in the courtroom was one of the most used pictures that was printed in the newspapers at the time and is still used to this day. Ted was not happy with the picture and said that it was taken completely out of context because the newspapers wanted to paint him as a monster. The shot was taken during a joke as Ted had been doing a Laurel and Hardy impression at the end of one of the court sessions. See the picture below: 

(Ted Bundy. Picture credit: cosmopolitan)

• Ted Bundy's 1968 Volkswagen Beetle can currently be seen on display at the crime museum of Alcatraz East. 

• Some people believe that there were plenty of red flags in Ted's childhood of things to come. Rumours have played out for years that his grandfather was a violent man who had a severe addiction to pornography and would show indecent images to Ted. Ted never spoke of this and never claimed to have been molested by his grandfather although some people believe that to be the case. Psychiatrists who have worked on the case and studied his behaviours believe that something else must have happened in Ted's childhood (such as possible molestation and exposure to violent pornography) because just the upset from learning the truth about Louise being his biological mother was not enough to have set him on the path to the pure evil monster that he became. 

• I would like to take a moment to pay tribute to the young women and girls who lost their lives at the evil hands of Ted Bundy. There are those that we know about, the ones that he had been convicted of killing, the brave survivors and the girls who remain unidentified to this day. He has been linked to so many other murders and often hinted about other possible victims but he continued to play games and refused to elaborate further. We may never know the true number of his victims but investigators believe that the number could be close to 100. RIP: Ann Marie Burr, Lonnie Trumbell, Lisa Wick, Joni Lenz, Lynda Ann Healy, Donna Gail Manson, Susan Elaine Rancourt, Brenda Baker, Roberta Kathleen Parks, Brenda Carol Ball, Georgeann Hawkins, Janice Ott, Denise Naslund, Caryn Campbell, Julie Cunningham, Denise Lynn Oliverson, Melanie Cooley, Shelly Robertson, Nancy Wilcox, Melissa Smith, Laura Aime, Debby Kent, Nancy Baird, Sue Curtis, Debbie Smith, Rita Lorraine Jolly, Vickie Lynn Hollar, Lisa Levy, Margaret Bowman, Kimberly Leach, Lynette Culver, Rita Curran & many unidentified others. 

• Ted dumped the remains of five of his victims on Taylor's Mountain and this became known as 'Bundy's Graveyard'.

• Like some of his fellow murderers, Ted Bundy's brain was removed after death to be examined. Nothing abnormal was found which added a further sinister twist because there just didn't seem to be any answer or explanation for his level of depravity and evil.  

UPDATE: In April 2026, it was confirmed that Ted Bundy was responsible for the unsolved murder of Utah teenager, 17 year old Laura Ann Aime who vanished after a Halloween party in 1974. Her body was later found in the American Fork Canyon. This information closes a cold case which took 51 years to solve. 

''I'm perfectly happy with the person I am and I've always been. I don't pay my telephone bills on time and I don't write my mother as many letters as I should. There's all kinds of things I could improve about myself...so...but weirdo? No! I feel good about myself. I am happy with myself.'' - Ted Bundy 

Further Reading & Sources:

- Hunting Humans | Book by Michael Newton

- The World Encyclopedia of Serial Killers | Book by Susan Hall

- The Big Book of Serial Killers | Book by Jack Rosewood & Rebecca Lo

- The Killer Book of Serial Killers | Book by Michael Philbin & Tom Philbin

- Journey into Darkness | Book by John Douglas & Mark Olshaker

- The True Crime Dictionary | Book by Amanda Lees

- Serial Killers of The 1970s | Book by Jane Fritsch

- Ted Bundy (Documentary) | Born To Kill

- Ted Bundy: Conversations With A Serial Killer (Series) | Netflix

- Ted Bundy: Article | Facts.Net

- Ted Bundy | Wikipedia

- Ted Bundy | Murderpedia

- Ted Bundy: Trial Playlist | Youtube

- Ted Bundy: Article | Britannica

- The Enigma of Ted Bundy | Book by Kevin Sullivan

- The Stranger Beside Me | Book by Ann Rule

- The Stranger Beside Me | TV Movie

- Serial Killers & The Phenomenon of Serial Murder | Book by David Wilson, Elizabeth Yardley & Adam Lynes

- The Anatomy of Evil | Book by Michael H. Stone

- The Encyclopedia of Serial Killers | Book by Michael Newton

- The Only Living Witness | Book by Stephen G . Michaud & Hugh Aynesworth

- The Phantom Prince | Book by Elizabeth Kendall & Molly Kendall

- Facts & Information | Death Penalty Information Center

- Laura Ann Aime: Article | BBC News

If you have made it all the way to this point in the post, I thank you so much! It was a lot to get through but I hope you found it informative and maybe learned a few new things along the way as well as any myths you've heard about Bundy, being cleared up? As always, I welcome any comments either in the comments section below, elsewhere on my socials / Instagram or simply email me at jocaledoniankitty@gmail.com 

If enjoy my weekly content and would like to donate to help keep my blog running, research materials, my upcoming boom etc, please donate here, thank you do much!

I will be back with my last installment of my 1970s Serial Killer series next time. But all is not lost because I will be moving on to the decade of the 1980s after that which I hope you will find interesting. 

See you in the next post x