Just when you thought you’ve watched literally every single piece of footage about Ted Bundy, the internet goes and proves you wrong. Amazon just dropped a new docuseries, Falling for a Killer, which probably has you in a serious internet deep-dive right now. (Am I wrong? I’m assuming that’s how you got to this article, right?) It’s from the perspective of his longtime girlfriend Elizabeth Kloepfer and the women who were affected by his crimes. As a refresher, here’s a complete timeline of Bundy’s crimes. This content is imported from YouTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. January 1974 According to Robert Keppel in his book , in 1974, Bundy was just a guy working on his law degree at the University of Puget Sound when he broke into the apartment of a girl at the University of Washington and assaulted her in her sleep. That woman was Karen Sparks, and although she (barely) survived the attack, it left her with permanent disabilities. February 1974 A month later, Bundy did basically the exact same thing with Lynda Ann Healy, another UW student. This time, however, after breaking into her apartment and beating her, he abducted and killed her as well. As Ann Rule recounts in , her book about her experience as Bundy’s coworker (!) at a crisis hotline, Bundy dumped Healy’s body at Taylor Mountain in Issaquah, Washington, as he would go on to do with several more of his victims. This content is imported from {embed-name}. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. March 1974 to July 1974 And who were those victims? Well, there were seven of them : Donna Gail Manson, Susan Rancourt, Roberta Parks, Brenda Carol Ball, Georgeann Hawkins, Denise Naslund, and Janice Ott, all aged 18 to 23 and all murdered in the Pacific Northwest (particularly the South Puget Sound) between March and July of the same year. Most of them were college students, who Bundy routinely targeted. October 1974 to November 1974 Apparently, the University of Puget Sound wasn’t working out for him (or maybe he wanted to get away from the place where he committed, ya know, eight murders? ), because in October of ’74, Bundy transferred to law school at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. Realizing his opportunity for a fresh start, he put his life of crime behind him and buckled down to finish his degree so he could start a meaningful career as a lawyer. JK, he immediately murdered three more women: Nancy Wilcox, Debra Kent, and Melissa Smith, the last of whom was the daughter of an SLC chief of police. This content is imported from YouTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. November 1974 This is when Bundy stopped being quite as slick. He attempted to kidnap (and let’s be real, probably murder) Carol DaRonch, but he accidentally handcuffed her same wrist twice. Nice work, Ted. Thankfully, she escaped. August 1974 to December 1974 Meanwhile, back in Seattle, his longtime girlfriend Kloepfer started to put together the pieces: Wherever her boyfriend went, young women seemed to magically disappear. Coincidence? She thought not. She reported Bundy to the police not once but three times between August and December of ’74…and continued to date him through it all. She later about her experience. Cosmo January 1975 to June 1975 Bundy , this time to Colorado, where he murdered Caryn Campbell, Julie Cunningham, and Denise Oliverson. Shortly thereafter, he paid visits to Idaho and Utah, where he killed Lynette Culver and Susan Curtis, respectively. August 1975 It was in Utah that Bundy had his first run-in with the police. A trooper pulled him over for suspicious driving and found cuffs and a ski mask in his car. Ya know, the normal stuff everyone keeps in their trunk. Bundy was arrested but—and here’s the infuriating part—he was released due to insufficient evidence. Ahem, did his girlfriend not report him three f*cking times?! C’mon, people, investigate!! ! September 1975 Thankfully, Bundy that he used to kidnap DaRonch (yeah, remember her? Ya girl came back to take Teddy down! ), which allowed the police to seize it from the buyer. Inside, they found hair that linked him to several women who had disappeared, and bam: The case was all but closed. This content is imported from YouTube. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. October 1975 Bundy was arrested, obvi, and DaRonch identified him in a police lineup. Still, he was freed on bail... . Ugh! If it were me, I would have set bail at, like, $1 trillion. February 1976 This is when Bundy’s sh*t genuinely hits the fan. He was found guilty of kidnapping DaRonch (le duh) and in Utah State Prison. Kay, good start, but THEN he was charged with murder in the case of Campbell, which got him . So just to recap…he killed, like, a bajillion people over the span of three years and four states and JUST NOW gets sent to jail. 😑 June 1977 With so much on the line, you’d think Bundy would want to lawyer up with the best defense team his money could buy, but instead he decided to serve as his own attorney. If you, the criminal, do not also happen to be an incredibly skilled lawyer, that move is all but a one-way ticket to a maximum sentencing. Unless, of course, you’re like Bundy and you only did it so you could go into the courtroom library on the grounds of needing to “research” your case and then JUMP OUT THE SECOND-STORY WINDOW.<doc-sep>Serial killer Ted Bundy is thought to have murdered at least 30 women, though he's been linked to several other crimes. His confirmed murders took place from 1974-1978, from the Pacific Northwest to Florida. Bundy typically sexually assaulted his victims, then killed them through blunt-force head trauma or strangling. Thirty years after his execution, serial killer Ted Bundy has reentered the cultural consciousness, sparked by the release of Netflix’s biopic Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile. If you've seen the movie, you’re probably wondering just how many of those crimes the dramatized biopic Bundy actually committed. In reality, Bundy killed and assaulted far more women than those mentioned in Extremely Wicked—he confessed to killing 30 women, total, though experts believe he hurt and killed many more. Here, a timeline of all the crimes Bundy’s confirmed to have committed. Be warned—it might make you see Zac Efron in a different light. January, 1974 Bundy’s very first crime was the sexual assault of Karen Sparks, 18, a University of Washington student, according to Oxygen.com. He broke into her apartment while she was sleeping and beat her with a metal rod before sexually assaulting her on January 4, 1974. She survived, but was in a coma for 10 days after the attack, and has suffered disabilities ever since. February 1974 Bundy kidnapped Lynda Ann Healy, 21, from the University of Washington campus in Seattle, Washington, and strangled her to death, according to ABC News. Her remains were later found on Taylor Mountain outside, located about 25 miles outside Seattle. March 1974 Donna Gail Manson, 19, a student at Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, was reportedly abducted and murdered by Bundy, but her body has never been recovered, per ABC News. April 1974 Bundy abducted and murders Susan Elaine Rancourt, 18, a student at Central Washington University in Ellensburg, Washington, per ABC News. Her remains were also discovered at Taylor Mountain. May 1974 Bundy kidnapped Roberta Parks, 20, from Oregon State University. He confessed to raping and killing her at Taylor Mountain, per ABC News. June 1974 Brenda Carol Ball, 22, is taken by Bundy in Burien, Washington. Her skull was found at Taylor Mountain, per ABC News. In that same month, Bundy kidnapped and killed Georgeann Hawkins, 18, a student at the University of Washington. She was knocked out and strangled. July 1974 Bundy abducts and murders Janice Anne Ott, 23, and Denise Naslund, 19, at Lake Sammamish near Seattle. Bundy lured the women close enough to attack them by wearing a sling and asking for help loading a boat onto his car, per ABC News. In September, a hunter found the bodies of Ott, Naslund, and Hawkins in the woods outside Issaquah, Washington. October 1974 After graduating from the University of Washington and attending the University of Puget Sound shortly for law school, Bundy transferred to the University of Utah law school. Once there, he killed Nancy Wilcox, 16, from Holladay, Utah and abducted, raped and strangled Melissa Smith, 17, from Midvale, Utah. Wilcox was never found, and Smith’s body was discovered just over a week later, according to ABC4. Later that month Bundy kidnapped, raped, and murdered Laura Ann Aime, 17, from Lehi, Utah. Her remains were later found in the mountains surrounded the area. November 1974 Bundy attempted to abduct Carol DaRonch, 18, at the Fashion Place Mall in Murray, Utah. Bundy had lured DaRonch into his car (by posing as a police officer) and attempted to handcuff her, but she jumped out of the car, fought Bundy off, and got away. DaRonch later testified against him, leading to his first conviction for aggravated kidnapping and attempted criminal assault. He was given one- to 15-years in Utah State Prison, on March 1, 1976, but later released on bail, according to The Ted Bundy Tapes. After DaRonch escaped the November attack, Bundy fled and later that night abducted Debra Jean Kent, 17, from outside her home and murdered her, according to ABC News. Kent’s body has never been found. This content is imported from {embed-name}. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. January 1975 Caryn Eileen Campbell, 23, is kidnapped by Bundy from the Wildwood Inn in Snowmass, Colorado, and killed by blows to the head. Her body was found a few miles from the inn. March 1975 Bundy abducted and killed Julie Cunningham, 26, a ski instructor from Vail, Colorado. Her body is still missing, per ABC News. April 1975 Bundy killed Denise Lynn Oliverson, 24, from Grand Junction, Colorado. He reportedly left her body in the Colorado River and it has never been recovered, according to ABC News. May 1975 Bundy abducted Lynette Dawn Culver, 12, from Pocatello, Idaho and drowned her in a bathtub. Bundy later said he discarded her body in the Snake River, according to Idaho State Journal, but she's never been found. June 1975 Susan Curtis, 15, was kidnapped from Brigham Young University in Utah and killed by Bundy. He claimed he buried her body near a highway, but she was never found, reports ABC News. August 1975 Bundy was pulled over by police in Granger, Utah, and the officer finds masks, gloves, rope, a crowbar and handcuffs in his car. He was released on bail the next day, but this arrest leads the police to connect Bundy to DaRonch. In October, he was brought in for a lineup and identified by her, according to FBI.gov. October 1976 After the DaRonch trial, Bundy was charged again, this time with Caryn Campbell's murder. He’s later moved to Aspen for the trial, reports ABC News. There, Bundy escaped from jail for the first time, jumping out of the second-story from the prison's law library, where he was allowed to walk around without handcuffs or shackles to study for his own defense. After a week in the mountains, Bundy was captured and back in custody in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, where he was charged with escape, burglary, and felony theft, according to ABC News. December 1977<doc-sep>During his Florida murder trial (as well as his other trials), serial killer Ted Bundy insisted upon his own innocence. But shortly before his 1989 execution, Bundy did confess to dozens of murders, despite previously pleading that he wasn’t guilty. This content is imported from {embed-name}. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. The Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile hacksaw scene didn’t happen in real life. But as the movie’s end credits noted, Bundy confessed to 30 murders . And as various news outlets (and the movie) reported, the true number of his victims was likely even higher than that. Cosmo If you stuck around during the Netflix movie’s credits, you saw the footage of the real-life Bundy, which was absolutely chilling. Like Zac Efron’s character in the film, Bundy laughed and smiled during the trial, despite the gruesome reality of the crimes he was accused of. And Bundy’s acting as his own lawyer didn’t exactly help things in the courtroom. So did Ted Bundy plead guilty or not? As in Extremely Wicked, Bundy never gave a guilty plea during his trials. But as Michael Minerva, one of Bundy’s lawyers, explained in the Netflix documentary Confessions of a Killer—helmed by Joe Berlinger, who also directed Extremely Wicked— Bundy did consider a guilty plea in order to avoid being sentenced to death. He decided not to plead guilty in court, though, choosing to criticize his own lawyers during the trial instead. Giphy When did Bundy actually confess? Journalist Stephen Michaud talked to Bundy while he was on death row, and those interviews formed the basis for Confessions of a Killer. During Bundy’s conversations with Michaud, he started describing the killings in detail , in the third person. But he still didn’t go on to actually confess until his literal last days, Esquire reported. At that point, he confessed to investigators about 30 deaths he was responsible for, including eight murders in Utah . Amazon The Stranger Beside Me: The Twentieth Anniversary Edition by Ann Rule (2000-09-03) amazon.com $26.86 Buy the Book From Michaud’s perspective, it sounds like Bundy still thought he might not receive the death penalty, even after the trials, so he maintained his innocence until almost the last second. “His eventual execution was years and years away, he knew that,” Michaud told Esquire of the interviews. “He had some reason to think he might’ve beaten both cases against him.” Bundy didn’t though. And like in Extremely Wicked, there really were crowds cheering at the news that he’d been executed. The true body count behind Bundy’s killing spree may never be known, but he did admit his guilt before he was sent to the electric chair. Meghan DeMaria Meghan is an entertainment and lifestyle writer based in New York City. This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io<doc-sep>Chances are, you’ve watched Netflix’s Ted Bundy movie, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile. The film focuses on the infamous serial killer from the perspective of his ex-girlfriend, Liz Kloepfer, and it shows Bundy (played by Zac Efron) from the beginning of his relationship with her to his murder conviction. Throughout that entire time period, the real Bundy maintained his innocence and refused to confess to any crimes. But once he was put on death row, it was a different story. During hundreds of hours of interviews with journalists and government agents, Bundy slowly began to expose himself...and finally straight-up confessed right before his execution. This content is imported from {embed-name}. You may be able to find the same content in another format, or you may be able to find more information, at their web site. On guilt Cosmo From the time Bundy was first arrested to his sentencing, he never admitted to any wrongdoing. Despite mounting evidence against him, he insisted he was innocent and was confident his name would be cleared. Even as he sat on death row, Bundy didn’t officially own up to any of his heinous crimes until days before his execution—and even then, he only started talking in hopes of extending his execution date. “No man is truly innocent. I mean we all have transgressed some way in our lives, and as I say, I’ve been impolite and there are things I regret having done in my life, but nothing like the things, I think, that you’re referring to.” “Guilt. It’s this mechanism we use to control people. It’s an illusion. It’s a kind of social control mechanism and it’s very unhealthy. It does terrible things to the body.” “I don’t feel guilty for anything. I feel sorry for people who feel guilt.” “What’s one less person on the face of the earth, anyway?” “I am the most cold-hearted son of a bitch you will ever meet.” On his actions So Bundy didn’t fully admit to his killings until the very end of his life...but he did address them subtly before then. During in-prison interviews with journalists Stephen Michaud and Hugh Aynesworth, Bundy began to speak about his actions in the third person. He speculated about what caused “the individual” to do such awful things and eventually began describing his own crimes. But after a while, he no longer tried to hide behind semantics. “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?” “Murder is not just a crime of lust or violence. It becomes possession. They are part of you…[the victim] becomes a part of you and you [two] are forever one…and the grounds where you kill them or leave them become sacred to you, and you will always be drawn back to them.” “The ultimate possession was, in fact, the taking of the life. And then…the physical possession of the remains.” “When you feel the last bit of breath leaving their body, you’re looking into their eyes. A person in that situation is god!” “I haven’t blocked out the past. I wouldn’t trade the person I am or what I’ve done or the people I’ve known for anything. So I do think about it. And at times, it’s a rather mellow trip to lie back and remember.” “I understand now a lot of stuff about myself that I didn’t understand then. It makes me realize what was going on. The senselessness of it appalls me, although I’m sure not so much as those who were so close to it.” Netflix On serial killers Despite claiming innocence for years, Bundy gave up the act in his last days and actually helped FBI special agent Bill Hagmaier get a better understanding of serial killers. Together they would profile similar cases, and Bundy offered his input on the motivations, behaviors, and actions of the killers. With his personal knowledge, he gave the FBI a rare insight into the chilling phenomenon. “Society wants to believe it can identify evil people or bad or harmful people, but it’s not practical. There are no stereotypes.” “We serial killers are your sons, we are your husbands, we are everywhere. And there will be more of your children dead tomorrow.” “I’ve lived in prison for a long time now, and I’ve met a lot of men who were motivated to commit violence just like me. And without exception, every one of them...was deeply involved in pornography.” “Those of us who have been so much influenced by violence in the media, in particular pornographic violence, are not some kinds of inherent monsters. We are your sons, and we are your husbands. And we grew up in regular families. And pornography can reach out and snatch a kid out of any house today. It snatched me out of my home 20, 30 years ago.” “I deserve, certainly, the most extreme punishment society has....I think society deserves to be protected from me and others like me.” His last words After his last meal—steak and eggs—Bundy was sent to the death chamber on the morning of January 24, 1989. When asked if he had any last words, he said, “Jim [Coleman, his defense attorney] and Fred [Lawrence, his minister], I’d like you to give my love to my family and friends.” After that, he was executed via the electric chair. Amanda Lundgren I’m Amanda, and I’m Cosmopolitan’s Editorial Fellow/Timothée Chalamet’s number one fan. This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io<doc-sep>
Though he had a constitutional right to representation, Ted Bundy—the pathologically controlling serial killer and former law student—was determined to steer his own defense when he was inevitably tried for his many crimes in 1970 and 1980. These trials were at the heart of Netflix’s new film, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, which told Bundy’s story from the perspective of his then-girlfriend, Elizabeth Kendall. And as the film dramatized, America’s first nationally broadcast court case was a complete circus. Though he would later admit to 30 murders, Bundy was convicted of just three killings in two separate Florida trials: a 1979 trial for his attack on four college students at Florida State University’s Chi Omega sorority house, and the 1980 trial for the murder of 12-year-old Kimberly Leach. Events from both trials were condensed into one court case in Extremely Wicked. Bundy Briefly Considered a Guilty Plea While in the Netflix film, Bundy (played by Zac Efron) was adamantly opposed to pleading guilty, the real killer briefly considered a plea deal for the Chi Omega killings. The Extremely Wicked director also helmed the documentary Confessions of a Killer in which Bundy’s former lawyer Michael Minerva said that Bundy initially agreed to plead guilty in exchange for life imprisonment rather than risk the death penalty at trial. But when he arrived in court, ostensibly to plead guilty and save his own life, Bundy instead launched into a pompous speech. It’s my position that my counsel, one, believe that I am guilty. Two, that they have told me they see no way of presenting effective defense, and in no uncertain terms they have told me that. And three, that they see no way of avoiding conviction. Your Honor, if that does not raise itself to the level of ineffectiveness of counsel, I don’t know what does. Bundy later admitted that he never had any intention of pleading guilty. Minerva tried to withdraw from the case, but the judge only allowed him to retreat to an advisory role with Bundy serving as the head of his own defense. Bundy hadn’t even finished law school, and his hubris in thinking himself qualified to act as an attorney would cost him his life. Zac Efron plays Bundy in Netflix's Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile Brian Douglas Netflix Bundy Was Consistently At Odds With His Own Council Bundy spent the entire case fighting not only the prosecution but his own public defenders, who thought that his confidence that he could serve as his own lawyer was proof that he was too incompetent to stand trial. “It was just a very difficult situation,” said one of Bundy's attorneys Margaret Good in Confessions of a Killer, “because there were times where he was just very erratic, impulsive, and strange.” In court, Bundy pulled stunts and grandstanded. He brought insignificant requests before the judge, and asked for both more exercise time and a typewriter. According to prosecutor Larry Simpson, Bundy even filed a “motion for a change of menu” because he was sick of eating grilled cheese sandwiches. Ted Bundy, pictured in court with Margaret Good, one of his court-appointed attorneys. Bettmann Getty Images Bundy Took Pleasure in Cross-Examining First Responders Most disturbingly, the killer seemed to find pleasure in cross examining first responders about his crime scenes. Though overviews of the gruesome details of his murders served only to alienate the jury from him, Bundy seemingly relished in reliving the details of his crimes by demanding that others describe them on the stand. In the most ridiculous moment of his trials, Bundy stood up in court during his sentencing after being convicted for the rape and murder of 12-year-old Kimberly Leach and asked his girlfriend, Carol Ann Boone, to marry him. He’d learned of an obscure Florida law that rendered a proposal accepted in open court constituted a legal marriage. (Boone and Bundy were divorced in 1986.) In the end, Bundy was found guilty and sentenced to death in both his trials. He spent nine years on death row, and only finally confessed before his execution in 1989. Gabrielle Bruney Gabrielle Bruney is a writer and editor for Esquire, where she focuses on politics and culture.