Applied Criminological Analysis of Ted BundyEssay title: Applied Criminological Analysis of Ted BundyA reign of terror shocked the United States during the 1970s. More and more women students suddenly and inexplicably vanished. During a frantic search for the serial murderer, investigators could not seem to find a link to the perpetrator. The striking similarities of the victims indicated to only one mastermind was behind this scheme. However, when he was caught, America learned that not every serial killer fits the profile. Ted Bundy, a man known to many as intelligent and intriguing, spread his reign of terror throughout the United States by systematically targeting and murdering young women; using the process perspective, it is determinable that his confusing and often tumultuous upbringing as a youth influenced his future behavior one of Americas most notorious serial killers.
Ted Bundy was born with the name Theodore Robert Cowell in Burlington, Vermont, on November 24th, 1946. Bundy, who came from a middle class family, was a Caucasian male that was born to his mother, Eleanor Louise Cowell. Eleanor made a living by working as a department store clerk. His father, who was an Air Force veteran, was not present in Bundy’s childhood or thereafter. For the initial few years of his life, Bundy and his mother lived with his mentally challenged grandfather in Philadelphia. Bundy would later refer to his grandparents as “mother and father”, and to his biological mother as his older sister. Bundy grew older believing that this was true. Using this simulation, Bundy’s mother would not receive any criticism for being an unwed mother. (Wikipedia, 2005)
Soon after they moved to Philadelphia, Bundy and his mother moved to Tacoma, Washington. They both lived with Eleanor’s uncle, Jack, who taught music courses at the College of Puget Sound. Not long thereafter, Eleanor met John Culpepper Bundy, a hospital cook from North Carolina, at church, and married him a few years later. Consequently, Theodore Robert Cowell would be known as Ted Bundy. (Wikipedia, 2005)
Bundy had four younger siblings who he spent most of his time babysitting. Bundy did not like his new father much at all. John unsuccessfully raised Bundy as his own, only including Bundy when going on camping trips and other father-son activities with his other sons. Bundy thought of himself as unique, and he had his own ideas. Bundy’s grandfather was the only man that he respected. Bundy became forlorn when it was time to leave his grandfather and move to another place far away on the other side of the county. (Wikipedia, 2005)
As a young child, Bundy was very shy and was often the target of bullies in his junior high school. In spite of the humiliating experiences he suffered, he maintained a high grade point average. Bundy, who attended Woodrow Wilson High School, was known to be a smart, if not brilliant, young man; friends from high school would later remember him as being a cheerful, normal teenager. He was a more popular figure in high school than he was in junior high. While he was very shy, Bundy was thought of as well dressed and extremely well mannered. However, nobody recalled Bundy ever dating anyone during this time period. He was more interested in other pastimes such as skiing and politics. He was an active leader for his Boy Scouts and was a member in the Methodist Church. Bundy’s interest in politics began to bloom in high school. When he grew older, he was an overenthusiastic worker and campaigned for the Republican Party. Bundy also did volunteer work for the Seattle Rape Crisis Center. (Wikipedia, 2005)
Bundy felt that he had a problem interacting socially, but never thought to seek medical or psychological aid for it. As for his relationship with his parents, he believed his mother did most of the raising in regard to him and his siblings. Bundy did not, however, talk to his mother on personal terms because he believed his mother had a problem with talking on an intimate, personal level. He once quoted, “I didnt know what made people want to be friends. I didnt know what made people attractive to one another. I didnt know what underlay social interactions.” Bundy once told the authors that he had another side to himself, the side that he called “The Entity,” which he kept well hidden from others. Regardless, friends would still remember him as being a striking, eloquent gentleman. One morning, when Bundy was four years old, he appeared in his aunt’s bedroom
‟A long story in the popular book is a fascinating one. The family moved to Idaho in 1893. When they had no money to go to school, they moved to California to work as gardeners.
Bundy would be with his sisters and brothers for a time without speaking to their parents. He took his first step into the world of personal responsibility. At five he decided to move back home to Kansas when he was five years old. That move led to the introduction of personal and communal spaces in which he could experience his sister’s life at once. He eventually had children, one in elementary school, in the United States. Although those children were never truly part of his family, his father worked as a house painter and kept the three children with the boys. And it took a while for them to grow up together, until only the boys were able to sit and learn together.
Despite his close connections to the U.S., Bundy did not seek the protection of law enforcement, as often claimed, or the support of federal law enforcement officers. He was not particularly interested in going to prison as he had been afraid that his life might become a burden. In a 1998 interview, as a child in the early 1900s, Bundy said:
«Now there’s nothing that’s wrong in living. There are no accidents; there’s no violence. They give you a lot of protection, and it takes a lot of work. It’s what I came here to do.«
Bundy’s sister was a little more tolerant than his parents. The only time she would be physically with her sister was when her brother and I were home from school. Bundy said that before school he had an early desire to study:
«We go to school. We go back to school and then we go to school. We go back to school and then go back to school. I’d like to do this very soon, and I had heard about it. But it was almost like I lost it.
‒ Bundy was never charged. However, he never lost his sister, whose father was jailed for robbery after she disappeared.[2]
Bundy would have been in prison at least 30 years. In 1994, his case became so long that the case was put on hold. In an October 2000 interview with the Arizona Sun-Sentinel, Bundy recounted the story in detail:
‟As a child, at the time I went on the run, the FBI agent was in Phoenix. He went to [Bundy’s wife] and tried to get her to give me the keys, and she said she was scared to go back to Arizona so my father put her in handcuffs to put her back in her place because I didn’t like that I wouldn’t be able to work there. Because if I worked there, I would be in the wrong jobs. I got an officer here all the time. And they would pull me over and [My name is] [a government agent] and I would just go around driving around and looking out the window, like the cops had seen me doing. I was kind of intimidated. And then somebody else would come, and they would see me. I could see a lot of people with tattoos, and people with facial tattoos. I was very scared of it. And then at 14, a buddy of mine