Theodore Bundy, known as Ted, was born in 1946 and was a source of shame to his mother, who was not married when she gave birth. This was considered a scandalous affair by her parents, who were deeply religious. In order to keep their family intact Ted Bundy was adopted by his grandparents and raised to believe that his mother was his sister. Later on he moved to Tacoma with his “sister”, Eleanor Colwell, to Tacoma, Washington. There she met and eventually married Johnnie Bundy. Despite being raised in a stable, working-class home, Ted Bundy still started exhibiting several disturbing quirks by the age of 3 years old. As far as anyone knew he was completely normal.
He was known to peer in windows and even steal items he wanted without a hint of remorse (Piel, 2015, p541), though despite these warning signs nothing was done as he grew up. Bundy was by all accounts charming and easygoing, and grew to be a very personable character. Upon attending the University of Washington he had the chance to gain everything he wanted in life when he met and fell in love with a female student from California. She was an important part of Bundy’s life for as long as their relationship lasted, and when she broke off their relationship he was unable to handle the rejection.
Not too long after his graduation from the University of Washington he entered law school in Utah with a recommendation from the governor of Washington. It was around this time that his victims began to gain notice as many young women went missing from both Washington and Oregon. His gimmick involved luring young women into his car by pretending to be injured. When they showed him kindness by attempting to help he made his move.
In 1974 he moved to Utah, and soon after this women began to go missing just as they
had in Washington and Oregon. It wasn’t until a year after this that Bundy was arrested for
possession of tools that were supposedly connected to acts of burglary. After this arrest police
started making connections to his other crimes. Still, after being released for this arrest Bundy was taken into custody again that same year for the kidnapping of Carol DaRonch. She was one of the only women to ever escape from Bundy.
He received a sentence of one to fifteen years for the kidnapping, but was then indicted for the murder of a victim from Colorado just two years later. During this time he opted to serve as his own lawyer. It was not long after this that he escaped through a window in the prison library. He was caught only eight days later, but in 1977 Bundy managed to escape again.
In 1978 Bundy murdered two sorority girls at Florida University. Less than a month later he kidnapped and murdered 12-year old Kimberley Leach. That same month he was captured by the police, and was sent back to prison. After evidence of his crimes was brought forth he was eventually given the death penalty, which he fought against his case until the late 1980s when he was finally executed. Despite the celebratory mood of those affected by Bundy’s actions his crimes have continued to draw interest from psychologists and researchers alike.
Bundy’s crimes have sparked debate as well as valuable research that has been used since his capture to discover the pathology behind such prolific criminals. A very interesting facet of Ted Bundy’s case is that he was an intellectual psychopath. He was an educated man with training in psychology and the law, making him a very dangerous individual. Despite this though his crimes seemed rather impulsive, not to mention hasty at times.
Many claimed that he was a charming and very manipulative character. He had the
ability to win a woman over so as to better lure her into his company, away from others.
Psychopaths are generally depicted as violent, out of control maniacs that have little real
discipline and go on killing sprees for the fun of it. The media is largely responsible for this
characterization and quite often blows the real definition completely out of proportion. Ted Bundy was a psychopath with antisocial tendencies, and he was violent, but he was hardly a raging, maniacal lunatic.
It was deduced that there were underlying triggers that set Bundy on his path to madness, though being an educated man he knew how to temper his more maniacal tendencies. Finding out the truth about his mother was one reason, and being rejected by the woman he desired was another. It was also believed that there were three core processes (Edelstein, 2015) that were able to explain why Bundy became the way he was. Fantasy became an escape from his normal, mundane life, while dissociation allowed him to keep others from finding out about his twisted desires. Lastly, compartmentalization kept Bundy from revealing his secret by keeping his fantasy life apart from his regular, everyday life.
Unlike many other psychopaths Bundy all but begged for psychiatrists to examine him (Ramsland, 2013, p16), affirming his narcissistic tendencies and providing in-depth analysis of his mental state. His cooperation in allowing mental health experts to assess his methods and the reasons behind them allowed a valuable amount of research to finally come to light about the motivations of those with psychopathic tendencies. Many individuals with such tendencies often find ways to justify their actions. Ted Bundy did not try to justify anything after being caught, he showed no remorse or even a hint of empathy for the families of his victims.
Ted Bundy was, after extensive research and interviews, classified as a High Factor 1
Psychopath (Cline, 2015). A High Factor 1 Psychopath is an individual that shows absolutely no
remorse, is highly intelligent, and is a very capable manipulator. This type of individual does not
believe that rules apply to them and tend to look forward instead of backwards. They also tend to
have a very compartmentalized way of thinking as well as a high level of dissociation that allows
them to continue their behavior without feeling any emotion over the pain they cause.
In a very clinical manner, killers are a necessary evil to discovering the various reasons why any individual commits such violent crimes. A good number of the more prolific killers throughout the world are Americans, which carries an indication that something within the nurture vs. nature effect is especially important within the United States. The psychological makeup of a killer is a highly prized commodity that many researchers have spent many years attempting to discover and analyze. In order to determine why psychopathic killers become the way they are it is necessary to analyze those who have already committed the act.
It was during his time at the University of Washington, when he met and began to date
the young woman named Stephanie Brooks that Bundy eventually became the disturbed
individual that he came to be known as. She ended their relationship after a year or so, and the break was devastating to Bundy. He dropped out college shortly after and became a psychological mess. Eventually he turned his life around and went back to college. He
even had the chance to reunite with Brooks, but did not take it. This is around the time that
Bundy began to rape and murder young women that fit the description of his former girlfriend.
Described as a charming and confident individual by many, Bundy was able to lure many
women into his car by manipulating them before he attacked them. He was the worst sort of killer, one who was highly intelligent and knew how to coerce people into doing what he wanted. Worse than this, he was able to compartmentalize his actions so as to keep his everyday persona well removed from the person he became during his heinous actions. Not a one of Bundy’s early murders were able to be tied to him until later on.
After obtaining a degree in psychology Bundy made his way over to Utah where he enrolled in school once again, seeking to earn a law degree this time. At around the time he enrolled women began to disappear again as they had while he’d still been in Seattle and in various parts of Oregon when he had been attending the University of Washington. Not a single eyebrow had been raised in his direction during those disappearances, and for intents and purposes he’d never been a suspect. Oddly enough Bundy was caught with burglary tools on his person, namely a crowbar, rope, a mask, and a set of handcuffs. He was taken in on suspicion and was only then eventually linked to the disappearances of several women in the Utah area as well as back in Oregon and Washington where he had committed his first crimes.
Bundy was locked up for the first time in 1974, but he wasn’t content to sit still and be
locked away like a common criminal. After deciding to serve as his own legal counsel he made
his first escape while on his way to the prison library. The fact that he was caught never seemed
1977 he escaped again and made his way to Florida where he once again began to delve deeply
into his own psychosis, becoming again the charming, charismatic individual that could easily
manipulate others and get them to do as he wished. His level of violence had at that time moved
on to biting and had increased in its intensity. It had also diversified a bit as he eventually went
after a 12-year old girl before he was caught.
Bundy continued to represent himself in court throughout the next decade and never once wavered in his attempt to defend the fact that he was not connected to the murders that had been found to be his handiwork. He invited researchers and mental health experts to interview him more than once and cooperated with them quite easily. His narcissistic tendencies allowed many researchers to discover just what went on in the mind of a killer. Through this manner Bundy was actually beneficial to the field of psychology, as through his training and own personal issues he was able to provide a service that, while based upon excessively negative origins, was highly valuable to the discipline of criminology.
He is credited with taking down the Green River Killer, and even managed to willingly give his insights and his expertise to many good causes during his time in prison. He was even able to convince a woman to marry him while in prison, and is rumored to have fathered a child with this woman. The effort made to use this to help his case was ineffective as it was never fully proven. So while in prison Bundy was able to do a good many things for good and even questionable reasons. What he was never able to do was convince a jury of his innocence.
The level of Bundy’s psychosis was so great that he attempted to use his addition to hardcore, violent pornography to justify his actions. As the addiction grew stronger, the need to procure more and more material became worse and worse until the fantasy was not enough. At some point he needed the real thing, and went in search of it in his own manner. Being an intelligent, charismatic and manipulative young man he was able to lure many young women into his trap without any of them realizing how dangerous he was until it was too late. Bundy’s use of violent pornography was viewed as debatable in many circles but was eventually proven to be ineffectual in his case.
He appealed again and again to the jury and to anyone who would listen, claiming his innocence despite the evidence that had led police to arrest him. At one point he went so far as to petition to have his case heard by the US Supreme Court, but he was denied. His case became a national media circus as he continued to plead his innocence, his every word becoming something for psychologists and criminologists to pay strict attention to. The mere fact that he became a tool for the criminal justice system to use to their favor is further proof of his manipulative abilities and his need for attention.
Criminals such as Bundy were for a very long time misunderstood and often misdiagnosed due to a serious lack of understanding that hampered the justice system. In the case of Ted Bundy it was widely accepted that he was guilty without question, and that he was reasonably psychotic, not insane. He knew very well what he was doing and did not plead insanity during his own trial. Instead he pleaded his innocence, attempting to blame his problems on pornography and the violent fantasies that were brought forth by the desires he felt while watching such programs.
This type of defense is not only extremely fallible but also brings to light the skewed mentality of Bundy, citing his narcissistic and antisocial tendencies towards women. He was a disturbed individual from a very young age, though as he grew to understand how he could manipulate those around him the threat he posed became exponentially worse. Ted Bundy was the type of killer who would commit murder and turn back into the nice, charming individual that so many people knew and liked. He had no remorse, nor did he believe that the crimes he committed were his fault. He was one of the foremost cases true antisocial behavior coupled with intense narcissism. Worse still he was highly intelligent and knew his way around the law, which made him a threat unlike many others.
References
Cline, M. (2015) "Psychopathology and Crime Causation: Insanity or Excuse?," Fidei et
Veritatis: The Liberty University Journal of Graduate Research, 1(1).
Edelstein, A. (2015). Dissociative Identity Disorder Theory Explaining Serial Murder and
Murderers. Journal of Trauma and Treatment, 4(19).
Hernandez, J., Highsmith, J. Madrigal, S., Mercado, M. (2015). Nature (MA OA) and Nurture in
a Criminal. UC Merced Undergraduate Research Journal, 8(1).
Piel, J., MD, JD. (2015). Serial Killers: The Psychosocial Development of Humanity’s Worst
Offenders. Journal of The American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law Online, 42(4): 541-542.
Ramsland, K., PhD. (2013). Close Encounters With Criminal Minds. Forensic Examiner, 22(4):
16-19.
