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Madison Summit

Weddle

English 3

24 September 2019

Madison Summit Research Essay Over Ted Bundy

Ted Bundy was highly famous in the 1970s because he was the most dangerous serial

killer of his time. He admitted to killing a thirty-six women, although he was believed to have

allegedly raped and killed over a hundred. What made Bundy different from other serial killers

was he not only a murder, but he had a nact for escaping the police, several accounts of burglary,

grand auto theft and identity theft as well. Ted Bundy is notable due to his motive, sly

personality and controversy over death row.

Bundy made his way from Washington all the way down to Florida stopping in many

states in between to rape and kill innocent women along the way. Bundy used many false

identities to bring women close enough to abduct them. He fronted as a police officer and would

offer to walk women home at night because there was a serial killer on the loose in America, but

little did the women know that he was the killer. Also, he would pretend to have car trouble and

ask a lady nearby if she could help look at it, then he would shove her into the passenger side of

his car, a 1968 off white Volkswagen that was missing a passenger seat. Other times he would

use stolen or false identities such as Chris Hagen, Kenneth Misner, Officer Roseland, Richard

Burton and Rolf Miller. Bundy was arrested twice on accounts of suspicion of burglary and
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fleeing from police. Due to his scheming personality he was able escape according to writer,

Charles Montaldo, “Bundy escaped both times by jumping from a library window and crawling

his way through a hole he created in the jail plumping.” (Charles Montaldo The Capture, Escape

and Recapture of Serial Killer Ted Bundy) Ted Bundy is so memorable because of the vast

number of women he killed and how long it took the police to finally catch him.

Bundy had a difficult childhood, “his mother, Elizabeth Cowell gave birth to him when

she was sixteen out of wedlock. The father’s identity was unknown, but believed to have been

Samuel Cowell, her father who was very abusive.” (Psychological Analysis - Factors that led to

Ted Bundy’s Murders) Elizabeth's family was ashamed of her, so they sent her to Pennsylvania

to live with family while they raised Ted. He was shy and kept to himself in grade school. Bundy

never had a girlfriend, but at an early age got addicted to pornagraphy. Later, Bundy found out

the truth about his mother and felt betrayed. Many people believed because of the abuse from his

grandfather, betrayal from his mother and lack of friends in school his upbringing was the motive

for his killing. Others believe that Bundy had mental illnesses, High Factor 1 Psychopath and

Antisocial Personality Disorder (APSD). “A high factor 1 psychopath means the person is very

intelligent, shows no remorse, manipulative and thinks highly of oneself.” (Psychological

Analysis - Factors that led to Ted Bundy’s Murders) Bundy contained all these qualities such as

being smart enough to escape from police and manipulating women. Bundy had no regret for the

women he killed, he just moved on to the next one as if he were going through a checklist. In one

of Bundy’s first trials he was so confident he’d win his case he represented himself proving his

sense boastfulness. Even to the day of his execution he was self-seeking, Bundy’s only request
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was for them to scatter his ashes on the mountain where he buried his victims. Ted Bundy’s

motive coulf of been his troubled childhood, but his personality showed multiple signs of mental

illness as well.

On June 25, 1979 Bundy was finally caught and put on trial for the killing of two sorority

women. Bundy was his own attorney in the trial where he was eventually found guilty and

sentenced to two accounts of the death penalty. On January 7, 1980 Bundy went on trial again

for the murder of Kimberly Leach, this time he was accompanied by an attorney who encouraged

him to the insanity plea. The result of this trial was another death penalty which many agreed

with, but few including Bundy did not. Days before Bundy was killed crowds and riots formed

outside of the jail chanting “Burn Bundy, Burn” (Joe Berlinger, Netflix’s Ted Bundy Tapes) , in

fact people made profit from the riots. T-shirts, key chains, flags and food were sold while the

crowd waited for Bundy to be executed. The people were excited for Bundy’s death and wanted

him gone, so they could go back to their secure lives. But Ted Bundy saw the people differently

he told an FBI agent, “They want to kill me, the State of Florida wants to kill me.” (Joe

Berlinger, Netflix’s Ted Bundy Tapes) Bundy felt that the people who wanted him dead were no

different than him. A person who wants someone dead, then follows through with the action is

considered a murder. Bundy believed that the everyone wanted him dead, the judge, the jury, the

citizens all wanted him gone. The question that soon aroused was “Does wanting a killer dead

make you a killer too?” If you lock someone away in jail, they are no longer on the streets

anymore making a world a safer place. Others were concerned that Bundy would escape like he
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did the times before. The only ways you can contain a disease is to get rid of it completely. If

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try to control it, such as the jail did with Bundy one day it will reoccur to the surface. The best

way to keep Ted Bundy from killing again was to get rid of him completely.

Ted Bundy made a huge impact on the legal system, because of him they added

computers to be able to compare crimes, more officers were put on the streets and in jails to

ensure safety and women became more aware of their surroundings. Bundy was so memorable

because of his sly personality and the amount of women he raped and killed.
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Works Cited

Berlinger, Joe, director. ​Ted Bundy Tapes.​ Netflix, 25 Jan. 2019

Montaldo, Charles. “How One Notorious Serial Killer Got Caught.” ​ThoughtCo,​

ThoughtCo, 19 Sept. 2018, ​www.thoughtco.com/ted-bundy-gets-caught-973179​.

“Motive.” ​WORST SERIAL KILLERS: THEODORE ROBERT BUNDY - Home,​

serialkillertedbundy.weebly.com/motive.html.

“Psychological Analysis.” ​Ted Bundy​,

tedbundyproject.weebly.com/psychological-analysis.html.

“Ted Bundy.” ​Biography.com​, A&E Networks Television, 10 Apr. 2019,

www.biography.com/people/ted-bundy-9231165​.

Sederstrom, Jill. “How Did Ted Bundy Escape From Authorities - Twice?” ​Oxygen Official Site,​

28 Jan. 2019,

www.oxygen.com/martinis-murder/ted-bundy-how-did-he-escape-how-many-times.