Bright Young Women

Ted Bundy was an American serial killer who murdered girls and women in multiple states before he was arrested in 1978; he was executed in Florida in 1989. How many victims he killed in total remains unknown. While Bundy may have committed previous murders, his earliest confirmed killings took place in the Seattle area beginning in early 1974. A consistent pattern of women, often college students, vanishing or being attacked created public concern over the next six months; in July 1974, Bundy abducted two women from a crowded beach at Lake Sammamish State Park (an incident that Knoll incorporates into her novel’s plot).

In August 1974, Bundy moved to Utah; attacks stopped in the Seattle area, but women began to go missing or were found murdered in the Salt Lake City area. Meanwhile, police in Seattle continued to investigate the string of cases. In November 1974, Bundy attempted to kidnap a woman who escaped and later described his identity to police; he was arrested on kidnapping charges in Utah in October 1975. Although there wasn’t enough evidence to charge him with any of the Seattle murders, investigators from that region came to question him. Investigation during this time also revealed substantial evidence linking Bundy to a murder committed in Colorado; after he was tried in 1976 and given a 15-year prison sentence in Utah, he was extradited to Colorado in January 1977.

In June 1977, Bundy escaped from a prison in Aspen, Colorado, and was at large for several days before police caught him. In December 1977, he escaped for a second time and was able to make it to Florida. On the night of January 15, 1978, Bundy broke into the Chi Omega sorority house on the campus of Florida State University, where he attacked four young women who were sleeping in their rooms: Margaret Elizabeth Bowman, Lisa Janet Levy, Kathy Kleiner, and Karen Chandler. Although severely injured, Kleiner and Chandler both survived, while Bowman and Levy died as a result of their injuries. Bundy fled the house after headlights from a passing car cast light into the room; as he fled, another woman living in the sorority house, Nita Neary, glimpsed him. A few blocks away, Bundy broke into another apartment and attacked and injured a woman living there.

Bundy remained at large for weeks after the murders at Florida State University. On February 9, he abducted and killed a 12-year-old girl named Kimberly Leach. He wasn’t arrested until February 15, 1978. In 1979, he was put on trial for the murders at the sorority house and was found guilty and sentenced to death. He was executed in 1989.