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How Ted Bundy Help Catch a Serial Killer
In the early 1980s, the King County Sheriff’s Office formed the Green River Task Force to investigate the series of murders of teenage girls in the Seattle and Washinton area. Green River serial killer whose identity was later revealed to be Gary Ridgway was responsible for 49 murders of teenage girls and young women in the Washington area in 1980–1990. The investigation team included criminal investigators Robert Keppel and Dave Reichert. While waiting for his execution in Florida, Ted Bundy wrote a 22-page letter to the criminal investigators to help paint the profile of the killer. Keppel and Reichert went to prison to interview Bundy in 1984. According to Keppel, “Bundy was right on the money all the way around. He knew what to expect out of this guy. That’s the experience of a real killer.”
The profile given by Bundy was:
“He lives alone. Never married and failed in relationships with women.” Bundy was close. Gary Ridgway had been married twice. Most of his killings were done between 1982 and 1984 when he was divorced. During some of the murders, Ridgway would have his son in the truck. Around 1985, Ridgway began dating Judith Mawson, whom he eventually married in 1988. The killings stopped around 1990. Mawson knew nothing of the Green River Killer as she…
