Hello Murderfam. Alyssa Carroll here and this is going to be a little bit different. Just the audio for today, but today I'm actually really excited to introduce to you the latest book on the Ted Bundy case, written by Crime Piper blogger Aaron Banks, who also happens to be a friend of mine. The title of the publication is Ted Bundy Examining the Unconfirmed Survivor Stories and it is available on Amazon for Kindle and as paperback.
Now, to better understand the purpose of this publication, I will read a shortened version of the preface first and then move on to reading the chapter about Debbie Harry's supposed Bundy abduction. So let's get started. Why this publication? Because of and for those who were unfortunate enough to have met Ted Bundy yet fortunate enough to elude him and naturally all confirmed as well as all unidentified and undiscovered victims.
Also the Bundy family, the Boone family, the Kloepfers, AKA Kendall's, all victims families and friends, all who were victimized by 10 Bundy in some way or another due to his lies, his deceit, his manipulation, his theft, emotional, physical and sexual abuse. Lastly, every single law enforcement officer, agent and psychologist who spent years working to bring justice to the victims and their families to the point of irrevocably impacting their physical and mental health. There may be many more survivors whom we have not yet heard of, may never hear from, in part because it is possible they remain unaware of how close they came to being murdered. I am, for instance, reminded of the young woman bestselling author Kevin M.
Sullivan wrote about in his second Bundy book, quote the Trail of Ted Bundy Digging up the Untold Stories unquote. On the night of June 11, shortly before abducting Georgian Hawkins, Bundy had been spotted walking along Greek Row by co ed Steve Burnham. He had deliberated, offering the man on crutches and visibly struggling with his briefcase his help. But another young woman was quicker.
Burnham watched her disappear into the darkness with Ted Bundy. And yet we know that she survived because she re emerged walked back from carrying the briefcase to his vehicle unharmed. Now, there have been other women to come forth in recent years who claim to have survived Ted Bundy. In the majority of cases, they did not report these crimes perpetrated on them to the proper authorities.
They waited up to several decades to speak up, and instead of contacting law enforcement agencies, they chose to contact the news media or publish their putative encounters and memoirs. Some are of the opinion that they chose attention or fame over their civic duty. Unfortunately, this means that there is no substantial evidence that would confirm their stories. All evidence was either destroyed or corrupted, if indeed it existed.
However, there is also no concrete evidence to the contrary. Yet it certainly is of interest to the Bundy community to examine these stories quickly, with logic and reason, weighing their statements against known facts. All that which we know to be true beyond the shadow of a doubt about the serial killer, including his modus operandi and the timeline of events as thoroughly recorded by law enforcement. Where were these women when their descriptions of Bundy and his VW would have aided law enforcement in apprehending him so much faster?
None of them seem particularly bothered by possibly contributing to Bundy having had more victims than would have been necessary. Where were they in all these years when Bundy was but a fringe interest and the community Transparent, small in numbers, and there were no annual book publications, new documentaries, movies with Hollywood beaus portraying Bundy as a heartthrob. I sought to explore these questions and many more, and set out to do so, being completely neutral about their cases, particularly as I was still relatively new in the Bundy community. When I first heard the names and stories of these women, I had neither the preconceived notion to want to debunk them nor to confirm them.
But one thing has become painfully clear. While some, if not all, of these victims may have suffered through a violent event in their lives, I cannot say in good conscience that Bundy is a realistic suspect for several of them. Which brings us to the final and most crucial why? Why may they have fabricated their stories, elements of their stories, or cast blame on a high profile offender such as Bundy?
I will attempt to answer this question as best I can by detailing a few more prominently known cases in this publication. Friends have repeatedly asked me whether I was sure I wanted to publish at all, as the subject matter was even more controversial than I apparently am. They feared it would be a metaphorical death sentence for me. In a climate in which a mere allegation is enough for the public to determine the accused is guilty and in which those who ask questions are considered accomplices.
One thing I have never been is a coward concerned with a bad reputation and equally bad Kindle or good readings ratings. The question is not whether I want to publish. Rather, it's a necessity for me to do so. Because an allegation of any kind may never be enough, but must be rigorously investigated.
These women and men chose to publicly divulge their stories to us and keep retelling them in various formats. We who have written about them on our blogs or in our groups are not the ones who dragged them into the spotlight. We merely adjust that spotlight and shine it into corners of their stories that previously remained in the dark. Sometimes humor is necessary to point out precisely how unlikely certain components of the story are.
This humor is not meant to defame, ridicule, or harm the alleged survivors. However, this publication is my way, limited as it indisputably is, to contribute to a correction of course as it pertains to how we approach the unconfirmed survivor stories, and it is my sincerest hope that it may help end the incessant mythicalizing of Ted Bundy. Now I will also read a chapter of the book, namely Debbie Harry's Story, which will give you a good look into how these cases were tackled and how thoroughly looked into Debbie Harry, lead singer of the punk pop band Blondie, is adamant that Bundy attempted to abduct her in the, quote, early 70s. Although she had remained firm about this statement since the late 1980s, a recent 2020 interview now quotes her as saying that the event took place in 1970 sharp.
Harry also mentions that this incident occurred long before she was active in any band. Her story took place in the late evening hours in New York City's Village neighborhood. Harry attempted to hail a cab to head to an after hours club. According to Harry, a little white car pulled up next to her.
After circling the block several times, the driver finally stopped to offer her a ride, remaining persistent until she relented upon climbing into the passenger seat. She immediately noticed his foul body odor. She is quoted as saying that she was aware of how unbearably hot it was inside the vehicle. It was then that Harry observed that all of the windows were rolled up despite the heat of the summer evening.
When she moved to roll the window down, Harry realized that there was no inside door handle in the car and that the entire back of the car was stripped out. There were no back seats, no panels, nothing. When Bundy allegedly noticed that Harry had rolled down the window and was trying to reach the outer door handle to escape, he violently yanked the car around to turn a corner, possibly to have her slammed back into the passenger seat. Instead, Harry was catapulted from the car and Bundy simply kept driving, leaving her behind on the asphalt.
Approximately 15 years later, Harry saw footage of Bundy on television and realized that he had been the man who nearly abducted her. There's already a problem with the years given because Debbie Harry joined the folk rock band, quote, the Wind in the Willows as a backup vocalist and Tambourine player in the late 1960s, releasing the band's only album with them in 1968. That she was, quote, not yet in a band at the time of her Bunny experience simply cannot be true. Likewise, Bundy's whereabouts up until 1968 are well accounted for, and it would be years before he began his serial killing activities.
Bundy's curriculum and the jobs he worked on the side did not allow for expansive travel between the late 60s and early 1970s. We know he had a dedicated list of employment from 1968 through 1972, which gives reason to believe it was not likely he was in New York at the time of Harry's accusation. And then, side note, guys, this is when Aaron includes a list of Bundy's jobs at the time, which I will leave out here. However, I wanted to make note of that.
As for his university studies, Bundy transferred to the University of Washington in 1968 in order to study Chinese, an endeavor he aborted several months later. Instead, he enrolled at Temple University in Philadelphia while visiting family in Pennsylvania. During that time, he may also have visited Burlington, Vermont to procure a copy of his birth certificate. He returned to the UW to study psychology and remained in Seattle until September 2, 1974, when he moved to Utah to study law.
So his movements across the United States have been thoroughly documented throughout these years. Is it possible that he went to New York City while visiting with his family in Philadelphia without telling anyone, without us being aware of it? Perhaps why this seems highly unlikely, however, is the fact that Bundy habitually purchased gasoline or much of anything else via credit card. There are no credit card statements or gas receipts that place him anywhere near the Big Apple or the State of New York at any given time.
Harry does not identify the, quote, small white car as a VW Bunny's infamous tan Beetle was purchased from one Mrs. Martha Helms in March of 1973. Before that, he owned a blue VW. Bundy may have stolen or, quote, borrowed a vehicle.
He had, after all, racked up an impressive juvenile record for breaking into cars to take them on joyrides. His mother had aided him in having his record expunged when he was 18, so it would not influence his later college choices and career. A stolen vehicle is also far more easily detected than serial murder, and Bundy remained free of auto theft charges until the mid-1970s. We cannot determine it with absolute certainty, but it's at least questionable he would have dared steal a car during that time frame, as it may have led to the discovery of his murderous acts.
If that holds true, then this further indicates that it was not Bundy who offered Harry a ride. From all those who confirmed to have eluded Bundy, as well as witness statements from Lake Sammimish, it is known that Bundy was not in the habit of acting persistently, but rather nonchalantly, easily backing off from one potential victim to try and secure another. Anything else could have drawn negative attention to him. So while he may have been adamant Harry entered his car, it would have been a deviation from his usual behavior.
It is difficult to accept that Bundy had a pungent stench about him in light of what everyone who knew him personally has confirmed about his obsessive compulsive cleanliness and neatness. His apartments were usually spotless for a man his age. As Utah detective Jerry Thompson once remarked, while in the process of searching Bundy's abode for evidence, even his hangers were evenly spaced apart in his closet. Elizabeth Kleppfer, Bundy's fiance, did not mention once in her autobiography, quote, the Phantom Prince, that Bundy ever struggled with personal hygiene either.
Now, the term, quote, body odor is of course a very general one, and we must also take into account reports of Bundy allegedly having wreaked, quote, like burnt carpet or even sulfuric while being interrogated. So, being highly stressed, I shall once more point to my previously mentioned article, quote, metaphysical Myths and the Entity unquote, which explains any and all of the above. What is far more concerning is Harry's allegation that the inside door handle was missing. I have repeatedly written about this myth, which was debunked by the best and brightest Monday researchers, but here's yet another thought that cast some doubt on this statement.
If the inside door handle was missing, how did Harry close the door from the inside? Not being aware that the door handle was not in place until she attempted to roll down the window, Bunny would have had to get out, open the door for Harry, and also close it for her. Yet this is not part of her story. It is the next part which truly baffles the fact aside, that had the window been rolled down enough to fit her entire arm and shoulder through it so she would be able to open the door from the outside.
It would have been enough to let enough cool air in. In this instance, it would have made more sense to ask the driver to roll down his window a few inches to achieve proper air circulation. There was no need to roll down the window all the way. But of course, the story would not quite work without this crucial detail.
I have looked at weather charts from the summer months between 1970 to 1972, the average temperature being approximately 75 degrees Fahrenheit, so a somewhat moderate temperature. Unfortunately, Ms. Harry has not provided us with a specific date and only a roundabout time frame for what would have been a traumatic event in her life. But we know that she was on her way to an after hours club, so it must have been later in the evening when temperatures had already somewhat dropped.
How hot could it have been in the car? In that case, my friend Katie Markram helped me recreate the scenario with her own 1968 VW Beetle. Additionally, my mother and I did the same with her vehicle. I'd like to point out that none of us was driving at the time the car was parked.
I also strongly recommend not reenacting this stunt. While driving, it was entirely impossible for me to reach my arm through a crack in the window without my head being in the way and bumping into the roof of the car. In order to bend my arm the correct way to reach towards the outer door handle, I had to have my shoulder outside of the car window. And even then I could not reach the door handle.
But the window sadly sustained a crack because I had to shift my weight downward. Only when I'd rolled the window more than halfway down was it possible to reach the door handle. Now I must take into consideration the fact that Harry Sands, 5 foot 3 while I am 5 foot 8 and a half, and that with approximately 102 pounds, she also weighed less than I do. It may be possible that when she leaned outside of the window, which she would have had to do, it was left undamaged.
Her head and shoulders would have still made reaching out of the window to pull the latch of the door handle impossible. The next problem I encountered when the door did open was that being in the position I was in, it was impossible to control the swing of the door. The door swung open with me clinging to it and I was pulled outside the my feet barely on the floor of the car anymore. Had my mother been driving, I would with almost certainty have ended up underneath the wheels of the car.
Another question I asked myself was how fast was Bundy driving? The speed limit in New York city in the 1960s through 1970s was set at 30 mph or 50 km per hour. Investigating accidents involving people exiting a car while it was in motion determined that it would have been very questionable that Harry would have gotten away without injury or with only scrapes and bruises, which she did not mention sustaining after her adventurous stunt. Certainly Ms.
Harry would have had to check into an ER or a doctor's office in order to determine whether she had suffered any internal injuries or or fractures. And yet she does not report having done so either. Lastly, here's a thought that kept popping into my mind about the reported encounter. Would Bundy not have taken great glee in relaying this story to investigators?
On the eve of his execution, he had begun confessing to murders, some of them in chilling detail. He even went as far as confessing to murders no one had linked into, such as Pocatello, Idaho victim Lynette Don Culver or the unidentified Idaho hitchhiker. He had even confessed to Bob Keppel the murders of three additional hitchhikers in Washington and one in California. For someone as narcissistic and grandiose as Bundy, a high profile victim such as Debbie Harry would, I believe, not have gone unmentioned.
And those were some short excerpts from my friend Aaron Banks new book quote ted Bundy examining the unconfirmed survivor stories. Now I will leave a link to the Amazon Kindle or paperback on Amazon in the descriptions or the podcast notes below and I highly recommend you get the book. Aaron. I've known for quite a while and if there ever was an everyday Ted Bundy expert, Aaron would be it.
I highly recommend this. Erin thanks you and I thank you for listening. You guys have a great day.