STARKE — Confessed mass murderer Ted Bundy showed remorse as he prepared to die on Monday night after a weekend spent confessing to brutal sex slayings of at least 22 young women in Western states.
Bundy, 42, America’s most notorious Death Row inmate, was scheduled to die at 7 a.m. today at Florida State Prison for the 1978 kidnap-murder of Kimberly Leach, 12, of Lake City. He also was sentenced to die for killing two sorority sisters at the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University in Tallahassee in 1978.
Late Monday night, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to stay the execution, only after hours after the Florida Supreme Court denied the appeal.
Three state psychiatrists were prepared to examine Bundy in case of a last- minute claim of insanity, but it was unlikely the execution would be halted.
U.S. Supreme Court justices voted 5-4 to reject an emergency request aimed at keeping Bundy alive until a formal appeal could be filed with the nation’s highest court. The justices had four times rejected formal appeals from Bundy.
Bundy’s lawyers argued that jurors in the Leach case were misled about the importance of their role in determining whether Bundy would receive the death penalty or life in prison for his crime. In Florida, juries in capital cases recommend a punishment, but the presiding judge is free to accept or reject the recommendation.
The justices rejected a related argument by a 6-3 vote, and they voted 7-2 to turn down a request to delay the execution until the high court could hear an appeal claiming that Bundy’s death sentence was tainted because his lawyers were not shown all the information considered in the sentencing.
The attorneys also filed an unsuccessful appeal in state Supreme Court, claiming the jury instructions were improper, and the court denied related requests for stays so that higher courts could review it, Supreme Court deputy clerk Tanya Carroll said.
After confessing during the weekend to two Colorado murders, he talked with Colorado investigators again on Monday, but disclosed no information about three unsolved slayings in the state, officials said. He also confessed to two murders in Idaho in which he had not been a suspect.
Bundy also met with James Dobson of Pomona, Calif., who has campaigned against pornography through his organization called “Focus on Family.”
Bundy, he said, told him his execution will protect society from further danger from Bundy, “but at the same time, he said that there are many, many other people out there addicted to pornography.”
Dobson said Bundy described at great length his feelings of guilt and anguish for six months after his first murder, but said that eventually the feelings went away. “He killed a second time, only this time the agony was easier to cope with,” Dobson said. “He got to the point where he didn’t have that remorse.”
But Hugh Aynesworth, who spent 100 hours interviewing Bundy, said the serial killer blamed his behavior on a genetic or chemical abnormality.
Aynesworth said he was not suprised at Bundy’s recent demeanor. “He’s scared to death,” he said. “He’s always put on a facade. When people thought he was in control, he wasn’t.
“He once said to me that if a person didn’t have to go to work, he could kill hundreds,” said Aynesworth, a veteran jounalist who wrote The Only Living Witness, a book on Bundy.
In addition to more than three dozen women he is thought to have killed in five states, Bundy has now admitted to killing women in Philadelphia, Burlington, Vt., and Palo Alto, Calif., said Bob Keppel, and investigator with the Washington attorney general’s office.
Keppel headed the investigation into the sex slayings thought committed by Bundy in Washington beginning in 1974. He spent several hours interviewing Bundy since last Friday about those and other homicides.
Bundy’s revelations about three new murders pre-date the Washington slayings which authorities thought were the earliest of Bundy’s crimes.
“I think he was born to kill,” Keppel said on Monday. “I don’t know if it was a bad seed or what. This was totally consumed by murder 24 hours a day.”
Some of Bundy’s murders may have been committed as early as 1969, Keppel said. Bundy told him he murdered a young woman in July 1971 in Burlington, Vt., who worked next door to a home for unwed mothers were Bundy was born, Keppel said.
Bundy was there to obtain information about his birth, Keppel said.
He also admitted killing a Temple University student in Philadelphia about the same time, Keppel said. Bundy’s mother moved with him to Philadelphia when Bundy was a small child. He grew up in Tacoma, Wash.
Keppel was one of several law enforcement officials from states where Bundy is thought to have killed to interview him in recent days.
With his execution drawing near, Bundy has confessed anywhere from 30 to 50 crimes, prison officials said.
The interview with the pyschiatrist was arranged by Bundy’s lawyers who hoped for an 11th-hour declaration that he was mentally incompetent to be executed.
Florida Department of Corrections spokesman Bob Macmasters said he observed Bundy during the interview with Dobson. Bundy appeared tearful at times, he said.
“He was quiet most of the time,” Macmasters said. “He was depressed some of the time, it appeared to me that he realizes the finality of the situation.”
Later in the evening, Bundy ate a dinner consisting of a burrito, rice and a salad. He was then visited by a Methodist minister, James Boone, his wife’s son by another marriage, and John and Marsha Tanner. John Tanner is a northern Florida lawyer who befriended Bundy.
Bundy’s wife of nearly nine years, Carole Boone, has not visited him since 1986, Macmasters said. She gave birth to a girl in 1981 that Bundy claimed he fathered during a prison tryst.
Boone’s son by a earlier marriage, James, is now in his early 20s and has been a frequent Bundy visitor. He has visited Bundy three times in the past week, and also saw him last Christmas eve.
Boone and the Tanners were to be Bundy’s last civilian visitors.
Bundy has been in a Death Watch cell under 24-hour guard since Gov. Bob Martinez signed his death warrant — Bundy’s fourth — last Wednesday.
If the execution goes as scheduled today, Bundy then will be showered, have his head and lower right leg shaved and be dressed in dark blue suit pants and a white shirt.
Wearing manacles on each wrist, he will be escorted to the death room by three correctional officers. Twelve civilians and 12 news media witnesses will watch him.
Bundy then will be strapped into the chair by the arms, legs, waist and chest. Another strap will be secured to his chin and a metal cap placed on his head. His right pant leg will be partially rolled up.
He will be asked if he has last words. Then, having said them, or having kept his peace, a black veil will be placed over his head.
This report was supplemented by Sun-Sentinel wire services.
VICTIMS
Women who Ted Bundy has confessed to killing and cases in which he remains a suspect:
CONVICTIONS
— Margaret Bowman, 21, and Lisa Levy, 20, bludgeoned and strangled on Jan. 15, 1978, at the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University in Tallahassee. Bundy was convicted of murder.
— Kimberly Leach, 12, who disappeared on Feb. 9, 1978, from her junior high school in Lake City. Her strangled body was found in an abandoned pig sty in April 1978, 32 miles west of Lake City. Bundy was convicted of rape and murder in her death.
CASES IN WHICH HE IS A SUSPECT IDAHO
— On Sunday, Bundy confessed to killing two women in 1974 or ’75. “One seems to be fairly possible. The other is tough to tell at this time,” Idaho Attorney General Jim Jones said on Sunday, after Bundy confessed to Jones’ chief investigator.
COLORADO
Bundy confessed to the slayings of:
— Caryn Campbell, 24, a nurse from Dearborn, Mich., who was vacationing in Aspen and disappeared on Jan. 12, 1975, from Wildwood Lodge near Snowmass. Her body was found five weeks later. Bundy had been charged in this slaying.
— Julie Cunningham, 26, a ski shop employee in Vail. Disappeared on March 15, 1975, in Vail.
Bundy is suspected in slayings or disappearances of:
— Denise Lynn Oliverson, 24, of Grand Junction. Disappeared on April 6, 1975, while riding her bicycle near her home.
— Melanie Suzanne Cooley, 18. Disappeared on April 15, 1975, in Nederland. Body found May 3 in Coal Creek Canyon.
— Shelley K. Robertson, 24, Denver. Disappeared on June 30, 1975. Body found in Berthoud Pass mine shaft.
OREGON
He is suspected in the deaths of:
— Rita Lorraine Jolly, 17, who vanished from West Linn in June 1973. Her body was never found.
— Vicki Lynn Hollar, 24, who disappeared from Eugene in August 1973. Her body also was never found.
UTAH
Authorities said Bundy has confessed to eight slayings, including:
— Melissa Smith, 17, Midvale, last seen at a restaurant near Fashion Place Mall, October 1974. Her body was found on Oct. 27, 1974.
— Laura Anne Aime, 17, Salem, who disappeared on Oct. 31, 1974. Her body was found that November in a canyon between Salt Lake City and Provo.
— Nancy Baird, 23, a mother who disappeared on July 4, 1975, from a Layton service station where she worked.
— Nancy Wilcox, 16, a cheerleader who was last seen on Oct. 3, 1974, in a yellow Volkswagen driven by Bundy. Her body was never found.
— Debi Kent, 17, who disappeared on Nov. 8, on 1974, when she left a high school play in the Salt Lake City suburb of Bountiful to pick up her brother.
— The Salt Lake Tribune quoted unidentified sources on Monday as saying authorities were adding the names of Sandra Weaver, a Wisconsin native who had lived in Tooele until her death in 1974, and Brigham Young University student Sue Curtis, who disappeared in 1975.
— Salt Lake police also have asked authorities to question Bundy about Debbie Smith, 17, whose body was found on April 1, 1976, near the Salt Lake City Airport.
WASHINGTON
He has confessed to the slayings of:
— Roberta Kathleen Parks, 20, who disappeared on May 6, 1974, from Oregon State University in Corvallis, Ore. Her body was found a year later east of Seattle; authorities said she had been bludgeoned.
— Lynda Ann Healy, 21, a University of Washington student who vanished from her basement bedroom near the Seattle campus on Feb. 1, 1974.
— Donna Gail Manson, 19, who left her dorm room at The Evergreen State College near Olympia about a month later to attend a campus jazz concert and never returned.
— Susan Rancourt, 18, of Anchorage, Alaska, a student at Central Washington State College in Ellensburg, who left a meeting of prospective dorm counselors on April 17, 1974, and disappeared.
— Brenda Ball, 22, was last seen leaving a Seattle tavern on June 1, 1974, looking for a ride.
— Georgann Hawkins, 18, a University of Washington student who vanished on June 11, 1974, as she walked down a brightly lit alley to her sorority house.
— Janice Ott, 23, and Denise Naslund, 19, who disappeared on July 14, 1974, from Lake Sammamish State Park, east of Seattle.
Bundy is suspected in slayings or disappearances of:
— Carol Valenzuela, 20, disappeared in August 1974 from Vancouver. Her remains were found a few miles south of Olympia along with the remains of a young woman in her late teens or early 20s whose identity was never determined. Authorities are uncertain whether Bundy is connected with the murders. The Seattle Times reported on Sunday that Bundy told investigators he may not be responsible for some of the slayings attributed to him, such as the Valenzuela killing.
— The bones of five of the young women were found in late 1974 and early 1975 in two sites east of Seattle. Medical examiners said they had been bludgeoned. The remains of Manson and Hawkins were never found.
— Authorities want to question Bundy in the death of Ann Marie Burr, 8, of Bundy’s hometown of Tacoma, Wash., who was killed when Bundy was in his early teens; the death of an Olympia girl, 15, and several deaths of girls or young women in Vancouver more than a decade ago.
