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Ted Bundy: The Charming Killer · 10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories

• 0:25
  In nineteen seventy nine, a courthouse in Miami overflowed with a captivated audience.
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  Those who couldn't fit inside sat and watched from their televisions at home, but
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  those fortunate to make it into the courtroom that day witnessed first hand one of
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  the most notorious and infamous criminals in our collective history brought to justice. He
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  stood between the judge and the jury, confidently representing himself against his multiple charges
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  of brutal and callous first degree murder. His name was Theodore Robert Bundy.
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  Ted Bundy came into the world as Ted Cowell on November twenty fourth, nineteen
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  forty six, at the Elizabeth Lundholme for Unwed Mothers. Given the name of
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  the facility, it's perhaps no surprise that Ted Bundy never found out who his
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  biological father really was, but his birth certificate stated that his father was a
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  salesman and a United States Air Force veteran. Ted actually spent the first three
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  years of his life living with his maternal grandparents. The Cowles raised him as
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  their own so their daughter and his mother, Louise Cowell, could avoid the
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  scandal of everyone knowing that she'd had a child out of wedlock. For all
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  Ted knew himself, his grandparents were his parents, and his mother was actually
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  his older sister. Ted Bundy's story has been through various stages of embellishment,
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  but if accounts are to be believed, he began showing signs of his future
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  tendency for violence at a very young age. His aunts recounted a time when
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  he was only three years old and she woke up from a nap to find
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  herself surrounded by kitchen knives while her nephew smiled down at her. Perhaps this
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  is a case of truth being stranger than fiction. But where Ted's childhood begins
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  to get a little bit clearer is when it comes to his grandparents. Ted
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  adored his grandparents, the people who at the time he still believed to be
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  his parents. But if rumors and accounts are to be believed, Ted's particular
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  attitude towards women could have been something that he picked up from his maternal grandfather,
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  Samuel Cowell. Ted and other members of the family would later admit that
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  Samuel had a mean and vicious temper. He was allegedly racist and xenophobic.
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  He was known to beat his wife Eleanor, and their dog and to swing
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  neighborhood cats around by their tails. Literally. He once reportedly threw his younger
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  daughter Julia down a flight of stairs and would sometimes talk to people in the
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  room that no one else could see. In comparison, his wife Eleanor was
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  quiet and timid, and was known to go for electrotherapy to cure her depression.
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  In nineteen fifty, when Ted was around three years old, his mother
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  Louise, changed her surname to Nelson and took Ted to Tacoma, Washington for
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  a fresh start. There, she met a hospital cook named Johnny Culpeper Bundy
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  and that was that. A year later, the two were married and Johnny
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  officially adopted Ted. That was how Ted Cowell became Ted Bundy, But he
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  still had a long way to go before he would become the infamous serial killer
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  that the world would come to know again. Ted's childhood growing up in the
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  Bundy household has been subjected to years of gossip and rumor, many of which
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  started with Ted himself. Some accounts say that he had a picturesque childhood.
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  Some say that Ted would stalk the streets and the dead of the night and
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  seek out opportunities to spy on neighborhood women. A friend and neighbor, Sandy
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  Holt, claimed that Ted was a bully. She later said that he would
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  take younger neighborhood children into the woods. There he would allegedly strip them down
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  and take their clothes. She said, quote, you'd hear them screaming for
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  blocks. I mean, no matter where we were, we could hear them
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  screaming. In nineteen sixty five, Ted studied at the University of Puget Sound
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  for one year before transferring to the University of Washington, and it was there
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  that he would meet a woman that would change Ted Bundy forever. Diane Edwards
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  was, in Ted's own words, the only woman I ever really loved.
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  Bright and sweet, Diane got a hold of Ted's heart, and the young
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  man was smitten. For three years. They were joined at the hip until
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  nineteen sixty eight, when Diane left for San Francisco. Still deeply in love,
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  Ted dropped out of his his own studies and followed Diane. He worked
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  a series of odd jobs and even volunteered at the Seattle office of Nelson Rockefeller's
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  presidential campaign. But for Diane, things had changed now that she had graduated
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  from her own studies, she found Ted's lack of direction and ambition frustrating and
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  infuriating, and she called the relationship off. For many who have studied Ted
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  Bundy and his life, this was the pivotal point of his story, because
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  the breakup absolutely devastated Ted. Untethered, Ted left to travel the States,
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  and it was during this period of relentless change that some biographers believe that Ted
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  was hit with one more unsettling piece of information. Some accounts say that it
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  was only now that Ted found out about his real parentage. The story goes
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  that Ted had been trying to track down his biological father and had recovered his
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  birth certificate, only to find out the truth about Louise. His childldhood had
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  been a complete lie that Ted could never really forgive. Ted's world had now
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  officially turned upside down, and many believed that his anger and resentment towards his
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  biological mother, Louise, is what spurred on his later actions. By the
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  autumn of nineteen sixty nine, Ted had returned to Washington, where he met
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  and began dating a secretary and single mother, Elizabeth Klepfer. Elizabeth's daughter,
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  Mollie, was only three years old when she was introduced to Ted, a
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  man who would stay in her life for the next seven years. According to
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  Molly, Ted began abusing and molesting her shortly after she'd turned seven, although
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  these were accusations that he would never be officially charged with from the outside looking
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  in. Returning to Washington and his relationship with Elizabeth seemed to put Ted back
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  on track. He graduated from college and managed to find work as an assistant
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  to the chairman of the Washington State Republican Party, Ross Davis, and it
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  was then that Ted was in California on official party business that he met Diane
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  Edwards. Once again. What Diane saw in Ted then was a man completely
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  changed. Ted had an education, a good job, and he was as
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  characteristically charismatic as ever. This time it was Diane who fell head over heels
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  for Ted. The two of them picked up right where they left off,
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  with Ted conveniently failing to mention his girlfriend Elizabeth back in Washington. He kept
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  both of his romantic relationships going for a long while, and even introduced Diane
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  as his fiancee to his boss, Ross Davis, and then overnight Ted stopped
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  all contact with Diane. A month went by of missed calls and unanswered letters,
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  and finally Diane managed to get Ted on the phone. He then denied
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  ever having rekindled their relationship. Before hanging up. He later said, quote,
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  I just wanted to prove to myself that I could have married her.
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  After that, Ted began missing classes at the law school he had recently enrolled
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  in, and young women began vanishing across the state. The first one that
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  investigators can officially attribute to Ted was on February first, nineteen seventy four,
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  shortly after Ted had called things off with Diane. Her name was Linda Ann
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  Healy, a twenty one year old student at the University of Washington. According
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  to testimony, Ted broke into her apartment in the middle of the night.
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  He beat her until she lost consciousness, dressed her in blue jeans and a
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  white shirt before driving her to a remote and secluded area. There, Ted
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  claimed he raped and murdered her. This was a cycle that would continue four
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  years. Ted Bundy showed an incredible capacity for evading law enforcement and suspicion.
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  His crimes were committed across states and over a huge area, making it harder
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  for law enforcement offices to communicate and compare notes. It was actually only when
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  the victim count ranged in the twenties that multiple sets of investigators realized they were
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  actually looking for the same perpetrator. Ted also had a knack for eliminating forensic
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  evidence. He killed his victims either through strangulation or with blunt force trauma,
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  specifically to avoid ballistics. His technique was silent and usually involved common household items,
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  items that no one would find suspicious or unusual at first glance. He
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  also often lured his victims in by feigning injuries or asking for help in busy
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  and highly populated areas, making himself look harmless and unassuming. He was also
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  known to use accents to further throw and disorientate witnesses, who would then give
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  misleading descriptions to law enforcement. In the first half of nineteen seventy four alone,
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  about one female college student students disappeared every month. One witness remembered seeing
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  a man with his leg in a cast and using crutches while trying to carry
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  a briefcase. Another recalled a man matching that description to help her carry his
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  briefcase to his car in a light brown Volkswagen Beetle with the news of missing
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  girls spreading across Washington and Oregon. The news began to tighten. Women were
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  on high alert. They stopped hitchhiking and traveled together to watch out for each
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  other. Ted tried to cover his tracks and sold his Volkswagen Beetle to a
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  local teenager. By then, the investigators had him on their radars and impounded
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  the car. Inside it, they found hair samples that matched evidence found on
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  one of the victims. Ted was arrested and a whirlwind of trials and several
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  states began. Ted flip flopped between denying all charges and making startling detailed confessions
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  that shocked the nation and shone a light on even more of his crimes.
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  He became infamous for his charm and charisma. He made waves and media headlines
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  as the man with a career in politics and the beginnings of a law degree
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  who was adamant about defending himself at trial. There were escape attempts, a
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  rumored child sired from behind bars, and a media frenzy that would put modern
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  media scandals to shame. And by the end of it all, Ted Bundy
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  had confessed to over thirty homicides. His true victim count is still unknown,
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  as is the true date that he became an active serial killer. Some say
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  that, as possible, he started as soon as Diane broke up with him
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  back in nineteen sixty eight, but as it always seems to go with Ted
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  Bundy, it's difficult to separate fact from fiction. The truth is that,
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  even though there was forensic evidence that tied Ted to several of the victims,
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  he never left any fingerprints or any other kind of defining forensic evidence on any
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  of their remains or at the scenes that they would later be found, despite
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  his constant self incriminating confessions. This was a fact that Ted would often use
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  in his own defense, both at trial and when talking to the media.
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  Many believed that it was his insistence on defending himself that led to his sentence,
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  and that this fact could have actually spared him from his fate if it
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  had only been used properly. But Ted did insist on defending himself, and
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  he was sentenced to death for his crimes. He was executed by electric chair
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  on Tuesday, January twenty fourth, nineteen eighty nine. Outside the prison,
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  people gathered, played music and set off fireworks to celebrate the occasion. That
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  is ten minute Murder for today brief and bingeable true crime. I'm Joe.
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  I'm the host, and thank you so much for taking the time to listen
• 12:56
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• 13:01
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• 13:15
  If you'd like to get in contact with me, you can send me
• 13:16
  an email Joe at ten minute murder dot com and here is one. Hi,
• 13:22
  Joe, I have a question. Have you ever met or talked to
• 13:26
  a serial killer? If not, would you be interested in doing that?
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  That is Louise Npa and Louise No, I have not, not to my
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  knowledge anyway, And if you are a serial killer or a killer and you've
• 13:39
  talked to me, please don't tell me. I do enjoy the little bit
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  of sleep that I do get so no, I haven't, and no I
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  don't want to. I know that there are some podcasters and there's some people
• 13:52
  that do what I do. They are interested in talking to these killers themselves
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  and getting to the bottom of what they've done and getting inside their minds and
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  things like that. I'm cool with just reading about it, so Louise,
• 14:03
  that is a big inn oh from me. Thank you for the email,
• 14:07
  and like I said, if you'd like to get in touch with me Joe
• 14:09
  at ten minute Murder dot com. And that's it. That's your episode for
• 14:13
  today. Thank you so much for listening to ten Minute Murder. Bye.