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Ted Bundy
Ted Bundy
Ted Bundy
Source: Salt Lake County (Utah) Sheriff's Department
Ted Bundy is perhaps the most infamous and oddly popular serial killer of
all time. Millions of people are still fascinated by Bundy thirty years after his
death by execution. This is due in no small part to the Conversations with a
Killer: The Bundy Tapes documentary and the fictionalized Extremely
Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile feature film about Bundy both on Netflix.
Bundy was patient and he normally killed his victims slowly to prolong his
own sadistic pleasure. Such behavior is empowering because Bundy got to
decide when, how, and under what circumstances his victims would die.
Bundy sexually assaulted his victims but it was not motivated by lust.
Instead, rape was another means of dominating and controlling his victims.
Also, Bundy did not lose interest in his victims after they were dead.
Sometimes, he would return to have sex with the decomposing corpse of a
victim long after the murder to perpetuate his domination and control of the
deceased.
Ted Bundy observed, “The fantasy that accompanies and generates the
anticipation that precedes the crime is always more stimulating than the
immediate aftermath of the crime itself.” When a serial killer like Bundy is
disappointed by a failure to experience his ultimate fantasy in real life
exactly the way he envisioned it in his mind, he will continue to kill in an
attempt to achieve the ideal fantasy. Such is the obsessive, compulsive
and cyclical nature of serial murder.
Bundy kept souvenirs or trophies from his crimes which served to sustain
and refuel his violent and sexual fantasies. When Ted Bundy was asked
why he took Polaroid photos of his victims he said, “When you work hard to
do something right, you don’t want to forget it.”
The former FBI profiler John Douglas has said that keeping mementos from
a victim such as a lock of hair, jewelry, ID card or a newspaper clipping of
the crime helped to prolong and even nourish Bundy’s secret fantasy. In
between his murders and while targeting future victims, Bundy would often
take out his trophies to help him relive his past murders through fantasy.
Trophies helped the prolific killer to recall each one of his many victims.
In particular, Bundy would give an item of jewelry to a woman in his life and
say, “Look at what I found on the street. I want you to have it.” When Bundy
later saw the trophy being worn by his female friend, it became part of his
secret game. He would look at her wearing it and fantasize about the victim
he raped and murdered to acquire it. Bundy said that in such moments he
would think to himself with much delight, “If she only knew that the
necklace she is wearing came from someone I murdered.”