Sara A. Survivor's Blog: "Reconstructing Sara" The Lost Victim of Ted Bundy , page 3
September 14, 2018
1989 "Final" Interview with Bundy Raises Questions About its Authenticity
Arguments it may have been rehearsed:
Skeletal remains were found at Taylor Mountain...this is proven by the original records which were sealed away from the public. These remains were logged in and noted by several people on site at the time the kill site of Taylor Mountain was discovered. I say "kill site" because it wasn't a "dumping ground". It was an active site with evidence of the killer, skeletons of multiple young girls including one girl who was not known at the time [i.e. in addition to the four found there], clothing, weapons, evidence of drugging or plying with alcohol and evidence of animal activity and shallow graves.
These were not "kids" on site at each location of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain; but professional search and rescue personnel from several jurisdictions. There were over 150 pieces of evidence. In the 1989 interview, Keppel never asks a single question related to the evidence present at Taylor Mountain. Not once. Never asks about the unknown young girl found there. Never asks about how long that site had been developed by Bundy. Never asks Bundy how long he kept his victims there alive or whether he had used the abandoned home nearby. [There was one at Issaquah also].
Keppel does ask Bundy about a porno book which was not referred to in Keppel's public discussions about the final interview ....Keppel talks to Bundy about it in this interview [published in its entirety in "In Defense of Denial"] After Bundy's execution, a group of law enforcement met behind the scenes . In this meeting the subject of a sex book came up as it had been part of a witness statement. Keppel states that the witness statement about a sex book was "coerced" by Utah. But in that original transcript of the witness statement which I have, there was no coercion that I could see on the part of the Utah detectives and this seems to be supported by the fact that in the original detective street notes of that era it is noted that two sex books were taken into custody by King County police referenced to be belongings of Bundy. One of these books was described in detail. These were never noted as put into evidence and do not appear to be in the remaining evidence lists. But Keppel's questions to Bundy in the 1989 interview confirm he knew of it and enough so that he asked about it? But why? Who cares? Why was a sex book so important to Keppel? Keppel also makes a comment in the 1984 interview with Bundy in prison that there are "powerful people" in the porn industry who wouldn't like Bundy talking about pornography being an influence. Really? So who were the people Keppel was referencing; why was he bringing it up; was there influence by these powerful people behind the scenes on how this case played out in WA State? So where are these sex books Bundy had now? I requested my memories be compared to one of those books numerous times over the past decade because I remember him giving me such a book when I was hospitalized and I was met with silence.
There is a discussion, quite lengthy in this interview about Ott's bike. Considering the large amount of evidence found at the original site in Issaquah, such as clothing, possible graves, skeletons of Ott and Naslund as well as at least 1-2 other girls by multiple skeletons found, and a bicycle shift cable it makes you wonder why Keppel spends so much time on Ott’s bike when there are other important pieces of evidence that were collected and when a bicycle shift cable was found on site. What about the skeletons of the unknown girls found there in addition to Ott and Naslund? Why not ask Bundy how long this site had been developed? Why not be specific on evidence that Keppel knew existed as he was there on site at both Taylor Mountain and at Issaquah?
Bundy talks of "throwing" items out of the window in a panic while he drove but is that really possible to do? This scenario has been put forward by Keppel and others for years until its nearly become "fact." But is it really? No one saw Bundy do that and nothing at Issaquah or Taylor Mountain suggests that Bundy threw anything away. Clothing and weapons and items and a lean to were all found on site at these locations.
It is implied clothing and things tossed by Bundy were then somehow in the side areas of the road or road shoulders and not immediately visible. How would one do that while driving? For one thing, it would take tremendous effort to toss items of clothing, weapons and a briefcase and possibly crutches out of a window [how do you toss crutches?] and for another in the United States the driver is on or near the center line of the road - that is quite a distance from the side of the road and tossing items out of the driver's side would wind up in the middle of the street. You’d have to drive to the other side of the road into oncoming traffic which would call attention to you….he was left handed so he’d have to use his primary hand for throwing and if he drove to the side of the road on the correct side he’d have to slow way down and try to toss things out the passenger window of the volkswagen and hope they didn’t drop on the road. Or he'd have to stop multiple times to avoid all items being found in one location like a dumping ground of evidence. It just doesn't make sense.
After such a careful selection of kill sites, why would Bundy then carelessly toss items out of a window where they'd land in the street and how would he drive the speed limit and accomplish it? If on a side street or back road why again would he do it when police were supposedly actively looking for the missing girls? It would be like leaving a trail of bread crumbs. No, the evidence [clothing] was there on site. It is noted, logged in, and recovered on site originally by many professionals.
There were multiple clothing items found and documented at Issaquah and at Taylor Mountain. Most important, some of these by description matched the missing girls and also were sent forward to Superior Court as evidence. If they weren’t important why send them forward? The girls were missing and you have girls clothing and even some bras and earrings? That's evidence. There was a lot of it at both Issaquah and Taylor Mountain and those sites were very well developed by the amount of girls found at each one and the tremendous amount of evidence at each location. How do you “lose” so much evidence? How do you “forget” so much evidence was collected? Together these sites contained over 300 pieces of evidence noted by ESAR teams and assigned numbers on evidence lists of the original search days.
Nothing about the final interview in 1989 with Ted Bundy lines up to scrutiny including the fact that there was no decapitation at Taylor Mountain or at Issaquah but rather evidence of animal activity, possible graves, and skeletal remains. Hawkins was never found – her body never located - so there is absolutely no proof of decapitation so why did this scenario ever see the light of day and why wasn't it questioned and why wasn't more attention paid to the actual evidence in these sites and the tremendous size and scope of these sites. You had multiple bodies at both locations. Bundy has been described as a necrophiliac but how does dismembering bodies and moving heads and parts around figure in to that scenario? It doesn't. Nothing of what Keppel puts forward as "fact" matches the actual original records of the crimes scenes at Taylor Mountain and at Issaquah. If Bundy returned to check on the sites it was because he wanted to see the girls, not pieces of them, not heads or skeletons, but the girls...just like Ridgeway had done. To me, granted a lay person, that would be what necrophilia is - not running around looking for body parts and heads in multiple locations. There is nothing to support decapitation at all - DNA confirmed skeletal remains were found initially on site at Taylor Mountain. Clothing was there...evidence of possible shallow graves...evidence of animal activity on remains....evidence of the killer on site....it was all there. Yet today, the AG Office still only shows one or two cars at the Taylor Mountain site. In reality there were many people there every day of the searches and there was air support and Civil Air patrol at the location. Their reports also confirm skeletal remains [human] found on site. These were all sealed away from the public and per internal memo supposed to be held there for 75 years. Meanwhile this 1989 "confession" played out as "fact" for decades. Why?
It makes no sense. Very little of the public scenario in 1989 lines up to the evidence. Yet this is what has been put forward nearly immediately after his execution to the press….where it has been repeated as “fact” for decades. It raises questions about why Bundy makes the comment in this interview...."we talked"....as well as references to his killing starting sooner than 1974. Those parts of the final interview were edited out in publications originally released as the "official" statements but these are now contained in the full interview in "In Defense of Denial."
The Final Ted Bundy 1989 “Confession” Interview : Sealed records suggest it may have been pre-planned….
Background: In 1989, shortly before his execution, Ted Bundy met with Robert Keppel in what would be his final confession to the events that had occurred some years prior in Washington State. Although much of this confession has been published in other forms and through various media outlets, “In Defense of Denial” book is the original version of that confession as provided by an FOIA request made in June of 2015. It was released to me in transcribed form by the King County Sheriff Office. This transcript as it was originally transcribed in full by the WA State King County Sheriff Office raises questions about whether this “interview” was rehearsed. On the surface, the transcript does not appear to contain explosive revelations but when you look at all that was hidden from the public this “final” confession becomes very disturbing from a violation of public trust and accountability standpoint.
Facts from the original records that were hidden and never put forward to the public:
Skeletal remains were found at Taylor Mountain… These remains were logged in and noted by several members of the search and record teams on site at the time the kill site of Taylor Mountain was discovered. I say “kill site” because it wasn’t a “dumping ground”. It was an active crime scene with evidence of the killer, skeletons of multiple young girls including one girl who was not known at the time [i.e. in addition to the four found there], clothing, weapons, evidence of drugging or plying with alcohol and evidence of animal activity and shallow graves. Issaquah also was an active crime scene with nearly the same types and amounts of evidence. They were very similar.
These were not “kids” on site at each location of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain as Keppel claims in “Riverman”; but professional search and rescue personnel from several jurisdictions. There were over 150 pieces of evidence at Taylor Mountain and over 100 at Issaquah. In “Riverman” Keppel claims that Issaquah was more significant but in reality Taylor Mountain was more significant -having a larger number of bodies there and a larger amount of evidence. Interesting that all of the evidence of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain was “lost” [Issaquah – they blamed the ME] or denied its existence [Taylor Mountain]. WA State had Bundy identified by October of 1974 not because of a computer program but due to witness statements and DMV reports [they ran a broad check on all men who drove VWs named Ted after Sammamish].
In the 1989 interview, Keppel never asks a single question related to the evidence present at Taylor Mountain other than to discuss at great length Ott’s bike when a bicycle shift cable had been found at Issaquah and Ott and Naslund remains were known. Not once does he ask Bundy about the unidentified girls found [1-2 at Issaquah in addition to Ott and Naslund and at least 1 at Taylor Mountain in addition to the four known there]. Never asks about how long either site had been developed by Bundy. Never asks Bundy how long he kept his victims there alive or whether he had used the abandoned home nearby. [There was one at Issaquah also]. Never tells Bundy that Keppel himself logged in the skeletal remains found on Taylor Mountain and sent them forward to Superior Court so Keppel knew all along that there was no decapitation at Taylor Mountain – nor was there decapitation at Issaquah.
Keppel does ask Bundy about a porno book – he spends some time on it. Why? I mean at this point with all the missing girls who cares? Keppel also mentions to Bundy in the 1984 interview that there are “powerful” people in the porn industry who wouldn’t want Bundy stating that Bundy was influenced by porn. Why was Keppel so protective of the porn industry? I mean why bring it up at all in repeated discussions when there are girls missing and their cases aren’t solved? In all the public discussions Keppel has made over the years he has emphatically denied that Taylor Mountain had anything of value except skulls and jaws and a few hair samples but that is a public lie and does not reflect the original records that WA State took care to hide from the public. Why was that done? Who were they protecting – Bundy’s association to the political parties and justice departments or Bundy? They never charged him.
Keppel talks to Bundy about the porn book in this interview [published in its entirety in “In Defense of Denial”] After Bundy’s execution, a group of law enforcement met behind the scenes . In this meeting the subject of a sex book came up as it had been part of a witness statement. Keppel states that the witness statement about a sex book was “coerced” by Utah. But in that original transcript of the witness statement which I have, there was no coercion that I could see on the part of the Utah detectives and this seems to be supported by the fact that in the original detective street notes of that era which I believe are Keppel’s it is noted that two sex books were taken into custody by King County police referenced to be belongings of Bundy. One of these books was described in detail. These were never noted as put into evidence and do not appear to be in the remaining evidence lists. But Keppel’s questions to Bundy in the 1989 interview confirm he knew of it and enough so that he asked about it.
The entire “revelation” about Hawkins in this final interview is also very questionable when the totality of evidence is reviewed that had been hidden. There was NO evidence at all of decapitation at either Issaquah or Taylor Mountain. Skeletal remains were found on site at Taylor Mountain and at Issaquah and the remains on site at Taylor Mountain were confirmed in 2005 to be the missing girls with one skeletal set of bones never identified. Keppel knew there were skeletal remains so why did he accept the scenario of Hawkins decapitation and why did he rush to the media with it the minute Bundy was executed? For one thing, it seems highly insensitive to the family and other victims. For another, he knew that scenario did not line up with the evidence that was actually found at the sites. Why didn’t he question it instead of putting it out there as “fact”? Hawkins was never found and while Keppel claims Issaquah is where Bundy told him Hawkins was killed her records that were hidden have her at Taylor Mountain. At Taylor Mountain there were skeletal remains found that included tibias/fibulas which are leg bones. Leg xrays were being requisitioned by several detectives during the original search at Taylor Mountain and a leg bone with a question mark is noted on the map near the stream. These legs bones were sent without any paperwork to the ME in March of 1984 in a box of elk bones. Why? Who did this?
Then there is the whole scenario of Bundy and the clothing. Bundy talks of “throwing” items out of the window in a panic while he drove but is that really possible to do? This scenario has been put forward by Keppel and others for years until its nearly become “fact.” But is it really? No one saw Bundy do that and nothing at Issaquah or Taylor Mountain suggests that Bundy threw anything away. Clothing and weapons and items and a lean to were all found on site at these locations. Clothing was found at Taylor Mountain that matched the description of what at least two of the girls found there were wearing. There were also items like a lean-to, thermos, chemical bottles and food wrappers that suggest the killer spent time there with the girls.
The whole scenario of throwing clothing and items out of the window seems very unlikely. The implication is that these items tossed by Bundy were then somehow in the side areas of the road or road shoulders and not immediately visible. How would one do that while driving? For one thing, it would take tremendous effort to toss items of clothing, weapons and a briefcase and possibly crutches out of a window [how do you toss crutches?] and for another in the United States the driver is on or near the center line of the road – that is quite a distance from the side of the road and tossing items out of the driver’s side would wind up in the middle of the street. You’d have to drive to the other side of the road into oncoming traffic which would call attention to you….he was left handed so he’d have to use his primary hand for throwing and if he drove to the side of the road on the correct side he’d have to slow way down and try to toss things out the passenger window of the volkswagen and hope they didn’t drop on the road. Or he’d have to stop multiple times to avoid all items being found in one location like a dumping ground of evidence. It just doesn’t make sense.
After such a careful selection of kill sites, why would Bundy then carelessly toss items out of a window where they’d land in the street and how would he drive the speed limit and accomplish it? If on a side street or back road why again would he do it when police were supposedly actively looking for the missing girls? It would be like leaving a trail of bread crumbs. No, the evidence [clothing] was there on site. It is noted, logged in, and recovered on site originally by many professionals. Keppel claims in “Riverman” he was carrying empty boxes out to make it look like they’d found things. Really? According to the actual original documents many people found evidence. His statement is false.
There were multiple clothing items found and documented at Issaquah and at Taylor Mountain. Most important, some of these by description matched the missing girls and also were sent forward to Superior Court as evidence. If they weren’t important why send them forward? The girls were missing and you have girls clothing and even some bras and earrings? That’s evidence. There was a lot of it at both Issaquah and Taylor Mountain and those sites were very well developed by the amount of girls found at each one and the tremendous amount of evidence at each location. How do you “lose” so much evidence? How do you “forget” so much evidence was collected? Together these sites contained over 300 pieces of evidence noted by ESAR teams and assigned numbers on evidence lists of the original search days. These sites contained the bodies of the girls. Those unknown girls WA State threw away deserve their justice.
Nothing about the final interview in 1989 with Ted Bundy lines up to scrutiny including the fact that there was no decapitation at Taylor Mountain or at Issaquah but rather evidence of animal activity, possible graves, and skeletal remains. Hawkins was never found – her body never located – so there is absolutely no proof of decapitation so why did this scenario ever see the light of day and why wasn’t it questioned and why wasn’t more attention paid to the actual evidence in these sites and the tremendous size and scope of these sites. You had multiple bodies at both locations. Bundy has been described as a necrophiliac but how does dismembering bodies and moving heads and parts around figure in to that scenario? It doesn’t. Nothing of what Keppel puts forward as “fact” matches the actual original records of the crimes scenes at Taylor Mountain and at Issaquah. If Bundy returned to check on the sites it was because he wanted to see the girls, not pieces of them, not heads or skeletons, but the girls…just like Ridgeway had done. To me, granted a lay person, that would be what necrophilia is – not running around looking for body parts and heads in multiple locations. There is nothing to support decapitation at all – there is nothing to support that no other evidence was found and that Taylor Mountain was anything other than a major crime scene. Yet today, the AG Office still only shows one or two cars at the Taylor Mountain site. In reality there were many people there every day of the searches and there was air support and Civil Air patrol at the location. I have the original documents of all of these reports. Their reports also confirm skeletal remains [human] found on site. These were all sealed away from the public and per internal memo supposed to be held there for 75 years. Meanwhile this 1989 “confession” played out as “fact” for decades. Why?
It makes no sense. Very little of the public scenario in 1989 lines up to the evidence. Yet this is what has been put forward nearly immediately after his execution to the press….where it has been repeated as “fact” for decades. It raises questions about why Bundy makes the comment in this interview….”we talked”….as well as references to his killing starting sooner than 1974. Those parts of the final interview were edited out and are now contained in the full interview in “In Defense of Denial.” (less)
September 11, 2018
Ted Bundy's M.O. with victims he held in captivity in WA State has not been discussed truthfully or accurately with the Public
My memories mirrored what had been done in Utah.
a. The bathing ritual to the best of my recollection was not about destroying evidence but about reviving the victim [and myself] for repeat instance of behaviors. He would bring me to the point of death [I remembered being very cold and shaking] and then bathe me to revive me and repeat it. Iwas never kept for more than a few hours and then I was released before I was noticed as missing but his other victims who he killed he eventually used the semi- conscious state to kill them.
b. Chemical bottles were found at the sites of both Issaquah and Taylor Mountain where the victims were found [skeletal remains]. There was NO decapitation at either site but there was evidence of animal activity and scattered remains. There was also a thermos found by a skull, a lean to and food wrappers as well as many items of other evidence.
c. There was evidence of the killer on site at each location in WA State and evidence of potential bondage and that the victims had been kept alive at each site possibly for at least awhile. At Taylor Mountain a lean to had been found, a thermos, food wrappers, chemical bottles and girls’ clothing including bras. Both locations had abandoned homes nearby and red matter was found on the walls of one of those homes. It was collected but never tested.
d. In the autopsies of victims in Utah, there was evidence of plying with alcohol and one victim at least per autopsy was shown to have alcohol poisoning and she’d been held for several days in his possession. Not unlike my experiences with him. He had been using me as a repeat victim, toying with my life and releasing me in a state of awakening where I was unable to remember what had happened to me and barely able to walk and it was always at night and around parties where people would think my stumbling was due to alcohol and not due to kidnapping and sexual assault.
2. Bundy was known to have weapons. Contrary to what has been put forward by WA State, he was known to have a knife and had been reported to have a gun by at least one witness who was credible at the time.
a. A knife sheath was found on site in WA State at one location. A knife was reported as stolen in WA State and then returned and the person implicated was Bundy. There were gun shell casings found at Taylor Mountain and witness statements that gun shots were heard in that area. Victims in Utah had evidence of wounds in very specific spots in their anatomy when found – their skeletons showed these wounds. The wounds would have had to have been made by a weapon and not a rock or object for “bashing” skulls. The wounds were precisely placed and very specific.
b. I told a person connected to this case that I had an unnatural fear of knives long before I received the records which verified weapons associations to Bundy.
3. Bundy talked behind the scenes to authorities about a woman [I was a girl of 16 when this all started] that he had been kidnapping and releasing to test his skills. I was that woman and I line up to the case in over 50 points of reference, characteristics and proximity and locations over four years.
4. Bundy talked to Bill Hagmaier of the FBI about fantasies he had that the girls would be waiting for him. Bill stated at a law enforcement meeting that Bundy was more interested in semi-conscious and unconscious women probably than living ones. This is entirely supported by the memories I was coming forward with during the years 2001 to 2014 and Hagmaier's comments lined up nearly exactly to what Bundy had been doing to me. He just hadn't killed me during the time leading up to the summer of 1974 but he fully intended to - he spent that summer trying to locate me and tried to run me over and capture me but he just didn't succeed.
5. I had been stating for years that he had been surveilling my parents’ home, that we’d had things stolen, including pots and pans which were expensive and a set of such pots and pans was noticed by Liz and also was found at Bundy’s apartment in Utah. Bundy was known to surveille some of his victims before abducting them and entering their homes ahead of time clandestinely. I could not have known of this back in 2001 when I started coming forward.
a. Records sealed away indicate that Bundy may have been researching victims as early as 1973 and 1972. Evidence shows that there was activity in Linda Healy’s area within a few doors of where she lived before she disappeared. There were break in attempts at several locations on young girls and one time it was called in to the police to come out as there were fingerprints on the window ledge that could have been collected but they did not come out. Keppel knew of these as he had the records of that time period but these records were with the Seattle police and he was with King County and there were some political competitive issues between these jurisdictions back then that make me wonder whether the Bundy cases were compromised in WA State long before the 1974 series of disappearing girls began.
6. Some may feel at this point it is a lost cause to revisit Bundy cases but the truth is, it is very important. This evidence which was sealed away raises questions about policy and procedure and cases that are still open in WA State and not closed. WA State issued an edict stating that only DNA would be considered in 2011 but DNA would degrade in any remnant of a site or remains and evidence found now unless it was in a property room and WA State made sure that would never happen when they ordered evidence to be thrown away per internal memo.
WA State has continued to silence me over the years, coming in behind media, attorneys and other even while it puts out its false narrative. But there is a story here…and it is very important to the understanding of what Bundy did to victims while he held them in captivity during those years 1970 to 1974 because that is what he did to me and it started not in 1974 but in 1970. He was active as a killer and rapist long before 1974. Not only was he raping me during that early time period but records show he had been reported for rape by another woman and that he was already using the method of imbibing with alcohol at that time, perhaps becoming more refined with it as he progressed as a serial killer. That imbibing with alcohol was also in my memories and earliest recollections of him in the years 1970 to 1972. Our statements support each other even though I never knew this witness nor did she know me and even though I’ve never met her. I had never seen the report until I got the records in 2014 and 2015. Her report and the police suppression of it were never made public.
Ted Bundy’s M.O. with victims he had in captivity in WA State more than likely mirrored Utah – Sealed records show evidence does not support Decapitation
He hit me on the head during the initial capture of me, usually coming up on me from behind; but once I was in his possession I was bound and/or restrained until release and I was never fully aware. A few times he did hit me on the head while in captivity if I came to and jolted all of a sudden or if I was coming out of the unconsciousness state and was trying to stand or get away. It was all about control and hitting me once I was restrained and contained during capture, at least by memory, seemed to me by memory and feelings associated to those memories, to be done out of anger and containment of me or out of frustration. I was young and active back then and metabolized any drugs [even antibiotics] rapidly. His dosing of me didn’t always work the way he intended. He also brought me out when there was activity he wanted to do and he needed me to be semi-aware of it and able to be responsive. But I never had control ever – and I was never free, never unbound, until I was eventually released – and there was never any talking. It was always silent. He never told me ahead of time what he was going to do – he just did it. I was never fully aware of all that happened to me when I was released – I could barely walk and my memory was severely impacted.
I was in and out of consciousness nearly all the time while held by him and this is in my memory fragments years before anything about him was released and years before I got the records. He was using date rape drugs and alcohol to ply his victims proven by autopsies, more than likely either home-made date rape drugs or that he’d stolen while working at a medical supply business. My memories date and time stamped going back years refer over and over to loss of consciousness while in captivity and to his actions with me as a victim which included bathing and repeated types of sexual assault which were very repetitive and organized in terms of progression and what he did and how he did it. It was ritualistic.
Records sealed away for decades support me in the above statements. There was no decapitation and I doubt, based on the actual case files, if there was ever necrophilia. His intent to me, having lived through it multiple times, was to keep the victim alive somewhere secured, out of view, and immobilized by drugging or imbibing. I personally was never gone long enough to arouse alarm but I was also never fully conscious during all of it and I was released in a manner where my slurring and staggering would be perceived as part of a party atmosphere and not as anything suspicious.
Chemical bottles were found at the sites of both Issaquah and Taylor Mountain where the victims were found [skeletal remains]. There was NO decapitation at either site but there was evidence of animal activity and scattered remains. There was also a thermos found by a skull, snug tie, and rope. Liz found him with a date rape drug in Utah and that is in her book.
There was evidence of the killer on site at each location and evidence of potential bondage and that the victims had been kept alive possibly for at least awhile. At Taylor Mountain a lean to had been found, a thermos, food wrappers, chemical bottles and girls’ clothing including bras.
In the autopsies of victims in Utah, there was evidence of plying with alcohol and one victim at least per autopsy was shown to have alcohol poisoning and she’d been held for several days in his possession. There was evidence of bathing per a victim autopsy in Utah, something I had been stating for years before that information had been released. There were abandoned homes nearby – I question whether they were ever thoroughly checked for evidence that the missing girls had been held there. My memories clearly included a location that “smelled musty” and this had been stated years before the records were released to me.
My experiences that I had been coming forward with were mirroring what he’d done to victims in Utah and WA State knew it. He had been using me as a repeat victim, toying with my life and releasing me in a state of awakening where I was unable to remember what had happened to me and barely able to walk and the release of me was always at night and around parties where people would think my stumbling was due to alcohol and not due to kidnapping and sexual assault. Bundy told Hagmaier behind the scenes that he was picking up a woman and releasing her unharmed but he never named the person: it was me.
Bundy was known to have weapons. Contrary to what has been put forward by WA State, he was known to have a knife and had been reported to have a gun by at least one witness who was credible at the time. Evidence at the scene also showed weapons.
A knife sheath was found on site in WA State at one location. A knife was reported as stolen in WA State and then returned and the person implicated was Bundy. There were gun shell casings found at Taylor Mountain and witness statements that gun shots were heard in that area. Victims had evidence of wounds in very specific spots in their anatomy when found – their skeletons showed these wounds. A weapon had been used on them, more than strangulation. Strangulation also was done not manually but with a weapon used for that purpose – a very specific type that is noted in the records as found in Utah and also one was found in WA State. That ligature weapon was taken into custody in spring or summer of 1975. It matched by description a similar ligature noted with at least one Utah victim. Again the correlations – WA State had the evidence and failed to act. This is never discussed publicly.
I told a person connected to this case that I had an unnatural fear of knives long before I received the records which verified weapons associations to Bundy.
Bundy talked behind the scenes to authorities about a woman [I was a girl of 16 when this all started] that he had been kidnapping and releasing to test his skills. I was that woman and I line up to the case in over 50 points of reference, characteristics and proximity and locations over four years.
I had been stating for years that he had been surveilling my parents’ home, that we’d had things stolen, including pots and pans which were expensive and a set of such pots and pans was noticed by Liz and also was found at Bundy’s apartment in Utah. Bundy was known to surveille some of his victims before abducting them and entering their homes ahead of time clandestinely. I could not have known of this back in 2001 when I started coming forward.
Records sealed away indicate that Bundy may have been researching victims he took in 1974 earlier than 1974. Evidence shows that there was activity in Linda Healy’s area within a few doors of where she lived before she disappeared. There were break in attempts at several locations on young girls and one time it was called in to the police to come out as there were fingerprints on the window ledge that could have been collected but they did not come out. There was activity in that area noted by police as far back as 1973. Keppel knew of these as he had the records of that time period but these records were with the Seattle police and he was with King County and there were some political competitive issues between these jurisdictions back then that make me wonder whether the Bundy cases were compromised in WA State long before the 1974 series of disappearing girls began.
Some may feel at this point it is a lost cause to revisit Bundy cases but the truth is, it is very important. The evidence sealed away raises questions about policy and procedure and cases that are still open in WA State and not closed. WA State issued an edict stating that only DNA would be considered in 2011 but DNA would degrade in any remnant of a site or remains and evidence found now unless it was in a property room and WA State made sure that would never happen when they ordered evidence to be thrown away per internal memo. Per the records there is not much that remains.
WA State has continued to silence me over the years, coming in behind media, attorneys and other even while it puts out its false narrative. But there is a story here…and it is very important to the understanding of what Bundy did to victims while he held them in captivity during those years 1970 to 1974 because that is what he did to me and it started not in 1974 but in 1970. He was active as a killer and rapist long before 1974. Not only was he raping me during that early time period but records show he had been reported for rape by another woman and that he was already using the imbibing with alcohol at that time. That too was in my memories and earliest recollections of him in 1972. Our statements support each other even though I never knew of her nor she of me and even though I’ve never met her. I knew what car he was driving in 1971 [never released] and I knew other important details never released.
August 28, 2018
No Decapitation in WA Cases - Bundy was NOT dumping heads at Taylor Mountain - records prove it
1-Taylor Mountain was a major crime scene and Keppel's comments that nothing were found there but heads and jawbones is false. His own detective notes show him logging in skeletal remains for evidence tracking. These skeletal remains per the paper trail of original documents show he forwarded them to Superior Court. The skeletal remains found on site at Taylor Mountain were eventually sent to the ME office in March of 1984 around the time he took over the Green River investigation. But why weren't they worked during that 1980 to 1984 period when they knew those skeletal remains existed?
2- In 1980 Keppel asked to get in touch with Bundy after interfacing with Michaud and Aynesworth. This is in his detective notes. He took into his custody in 1980 a 33 page critique of Ann Rule’s book “Stranger Beside Me” that Bundy had written – it was single spaced and which Bundy had turned over to Aynesworth per his detective notes. What did that single spaced large document say about the book? Bundy states he disputed her work. Why wasn't it put into the public record? Keppel also took into custody a transcription from their interview. Instead of noting that he put these into evidence he sent them per his notes to the department psychiatrist who had never met or interviewed Ted Bundy. The psychiatrist put together a profile that Keppel wrote to another jurisdiction was “surprisingly accurate”. Did the psychiatrist only have what Keppel gave him to work with?
3. Shortly thereafter Keppel began working for the AG Office. From 1980 to 1984, there is relatively little in the files related to the cases of Bundy in WA State. There is little if any documentation that evidence from the crime scenes was ever finger printed or actively preserved. A few pieces were sent forward for finger printing but the results were not in the files. They ran a DMV check on all persons named Ted of his age range who drove VWs shortly after Issaquah in 1974. Why wasn't his name on the list and if it was...why wasn't that piece of evidence used as it occurred before Taylor Mountain.
Even though many people were involved in the searches and had taken over 300 pieces of evidence off Taylor Mountain and Issaquah these sites were denied their significance. In fact the AG Office only shows one car at the Taylor Mountain site [or two cars in some photos] but in reality there were air patrols, and many cars from many people from several jurisdictions. Keppel claims nothing was found there even though there were human remains, multiple bodies at both locations, abandoned homes nearby, articles of clothing, jewelry, and evidence of possible grave and animal activity. Even though those human remains were noted by many professionals in the notes and those bones found on site and logged in by Keppel were confirmed by DNA years later to be the girls killed - he never sent them out to an anthropologist and the ME told him the heads were with the bodies. Even though Bundy had been charged in other jurisdictions outside of WA State since 1975. Bottom line - there was no decapitation at Taylor Mountain - so why the interview of 1989? Why didn't Keppel call Bundy out on the story of "throwing things out the window" and "cutting off a head". Hawkins body was never found and the evidence at Taylor Mountain shows conclusively that no decapitation happened there so why has Keppel put forth the false scenario over the years and why wasn't it questioned by those who were there that day? Why the silence and why the push back at me and attempts to hide the truth?
4. The skeletal remains of the victims sat in the ME office until 2005 identified only as “Bundy Bones” when these same skeletal remains, identified by internal documents with specific numbers which were assigned on site at the time of discovery in March of 1975, were sent to TX for DNA testing –DNA tests confirmed they were skeletal bones of at least three of the victims found originally on Taylor Mountain. Keppel also notes in his detective notes during the active investigation of Taylor Mountain in 1975 that he talked to the ME of that time and the ME told him that the heads “were with the bodies”. In other words there was no decapitation. So why the scenario in 1989 final interview that Bundy decapitated his victims and threw clothing out the window while he drove? The evidence doesn’t support it at either Issaquah or Taylor Mountain...so why didn’t Keppel challenge it? Why did he publish the scenario? He wasn't working at covering it up alone - so why sterilize all the evidence from these two crime scenes because that's what it was - a deliberate attempt to circumvent the truth. One oversight I can see, but not multiple and not to the extent that all of these occurred. What I still don't fully understand is the why.
5-The interviews of 1984 and 1988 differ from the public narrative. The interview of 1988 per the record in the sealed area of the Archives shows that Bundy was helping Keppel develop questionnaires. Were these questionnaires to be used in the HITS program?
6-The very act of sealing away evidence in a serial case where girls remain missing and a survivor is coming forward is highly suspect. Failure to disclose to the public all the evidence found at Taylor Mountain, noted by multiple people including those present that day of Search and Rescue, raises serious questions about violations of public trust. Otherwise, why hide it? This moving of evidence into a sealed area out of the jurisdiction of police, where they cannot access it, is proven by internal memos and shows the activity started in 1999 and again in 2012. This was the year I had contacted the FBI a second time complaining of witness and victim intimidation.
7-It has been denied that Bundy wrote a rape paper. He did. It was in 1972 while he served as Assistant Director of the Crime Commission in Seattle. I have the paper. I also have the witness statement of a superior who states and confirms that Bundy wrote it for the Crime Commission.
8-It has been denied that Bundy finished the recidivism study - but he did. I have the final formal report and Bundy was paid several thousand dollars for it. The recidivism study was also known of by the FBI. This is stated in an internal memo. I also have the records of the original contract and the payments to Bundy made by WA State.
9 -It has been denied that any clothing or weapons or jewelry that indicated a crime scene was found at Issaquah or Taylor Mountain and it has instead been put forward that Bundy was throwing items out of his window - was this scenario rehearsed as it isn't supported by the actual evidence and search and rescue logs of that time period.....the evidence was indeed there at Taylor Mountain including clothing found that by description matched at least one of the victims and taken together with the fact that their skeletal remains were found at Taylor Mountain and proven by DNA also raises questions about the public narrative put forth. Was the FBI aware of this?
10-Why did Ted Bundy get so much access to officials once he was in Florida? They circumvented his attorneys – why? Why did Keppel sue the state of Florida to get Bundy’s notes? It was reported in the papers and is part of the public record. He could have had copies. Why sue for the originals?
11-How with little or no money, did Bundy afford law school when he had no source of financial aid noted, no scholarships, and worked only part time random jobs. How did he afford the University of WA? How could he have possibly afforded a summer at Stanford? At the University of Washington, he afforded a private room in a rooming house [no direct room mates] had a car in 1973, and had unusual access to high ranking officials. They never checked his background?
12-Why did he retain a defense attorney in WA State when WA State never charged him with anything and how did he pay for those bills and why and how was he able to retain that attorney in the first place? In Utah and Florida he had attorneys assigned.
13. How does WA State, who never brought Bundy to trial and never prosecuted him for a single crime, and never caught him or tried to extradite him, seemingly able to continue to control the narrative about Bundy? None of this makes any sense when you see the totality of the evidence ...none of this in my opinion has been to serve justice or to help the victims and their families, myself included. None of this is what I think of when I think of what our justice system is supposed to be about. The WA State justice system and the Attorney General office needs to be held accountable for its failure to investigate and resolve what happened during those years. I have been told by authorities in the police jurisdictions that the AG Office did not plan to investigate even though this evidence clearly shows the public has been lied to about those years and I have that refusal in writing. Their response was "not at this time." Meanwhile the false narrative continues...in the media...at universities....and to the public...while the families and myself and those young girls thrown away at Taylor Mountain wait....
August 22, 2018
Ted Bundy New Information: Sealed records show unidentified remains of victims found at Issaquah and Taylor Mountain and skeletal remains that officials were fully aware of at the time
Here is a summary of facts of the case: These records included internal memos, case files on victims including autopsy reports, surveillance records, detective notes and detective street notes, internal documents such as DNA requests and evidence lists generated on site at both Issaquah and Taylor Crime scenes. What they reveal is a contradiction to the story that has been put forth publicly.
1-Taylor Mountain was a major crime scene and Keppel’s comments that nothing were found there but heads and jawbones is false. His statements that only kids were on scene is false. His own detective notes show him logging in skeletal remains for evidence tracking and sending many items of evidence forward to Superior Court. The skeletal remains found on site in March of 1975 per the paper trail of original documents included at least one skeleton that was not associated to the known missing victims per the notes. The skeletal remains found on site at Taylor Mountain were eventually sent to the ME office in March of 1984 around the time he took over the Green River investigation. In addition to the four girls known to have been found there, search and rescue documents and internal documents show that additional skeletal remains were found of a young girl. A young girl who was never identified and her case never worked as the entire truth of Taylor Mountain was denied its existence and sealed away from public knowledge. That’s one additional victim at Taylor Mountain. Who was she?
2– Suppression of information. In 1980 Keppel took into his custody a 33 page critique of Ann Rule’s book “Stranger Beside Me” that Bundy had written – it was single spaced and Bundy had turned it over to Aynesworth per his detective notes. What did that single spaced large document say about the book? Bundy states in the 1984 interview that he disputed her work. Why wasn’t it put into the public record? Keppel tells Bundy in the 1984 interview that he and Rule work together because they are “cooperating agencies”. Rule is an author not an agency. Keppel also took into custody a transcription from the interview done with Aynesworth and Michaud. Instead of noting that he put these into evidence he sent them per his notes to the department psychiatrist who had never met or interviewed Ted Bundy personally. The psychiatrist put together a profile that Keppel wrote to another jurisdiction was “surprisingly accurate”. Did the psychiatrist only have what Keppel gave him to work with? What happened to these documents and what did they reveal about the case and what did they say? Rule and Michaud and Aynesworth are not police and Bundy lied a lot about everything but Keppel knew. of all the evidence and he was a police officer and responsible to the public not to friendships. He had Ann Rule write his foreword, and she told me in an email to me that she had gotten him his first editor. Given the critical evidence of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain that was suppressed and sealed away, it causes concerns for manipulation of the case and trading favors.
3. Shortly after 1980, after Keppel asked to get in touch with Bundy [in his notes], Keppel began working for the AG Office. From 1980 to 1984, there is relatively little in the files related to the cases of Bundy in WA State. There is little if any documentation that evidence from the crime scenes including the skeletal remains were actively worked. A few pieces of physical evidence taken from Bundy such as an axe handle, knife and beaded corded leather necklace, were documented as being taken into evidence but the paper trail after that was not present. There never appears to be a comprehensive list of evidence taken from both sites that became a part of a thorough investigation – if there had been, the skeletal remains would not have been denied and the true pattern of the killings [not dumpings] that occurred at Issaquah and Taylor Mountain would have been analyzed.
4. Investigators ran a DMV check on all persons named Ted of his age range who drove VWs shortly after Issaquah in 1974. His name should have been on that list. A credible witness came forward in October of 1974 and identified Bundy to WA State authorities. The reporting officer called the information over to Utah. Bundy fit the pattern of crimes, he drove a VW which should have shown up on the DMV check, and he was present in both locations where girls were disappearing. Yet Utah and WA State did nothing until summer of 1975. WA State never charged him even though after his arrest for Da- Ronch’s kidnapping they had mountains of evidence against him – all the evidence of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain, witness statements, proximity and locations. They had items that could have been finger printed and they had witnesses who had come forward. Yet they didn’t try to charge him – Utah had less than WA State. Instead, he was transferred to Colorado where there were less cases and less evidence. Was it because Bundy had been embedded into Washington politics? He was also embedded in Utah politics and had gone to a party at a prosecutor’s home there with a woman he’d been dating [in the records per a witness account]. Keppel and Canova had the cases…they knew the evidence they had and what the case implicated in terms of those sites being well developed with multiple missing and murdered girls. It was many homicides…yet they did nothing.
5. There were many people on site at both crime scenes in WA State: not kids as Keppel has stated in his book Riverman but adults, professionals such as law enforcement from several jurisdictions, search and rescue crews and civil air patrol. But WA State doesn’t talk about this fact. Instead, the AG Office to this day only shows one car at the Taylor Mountain site [or two cars in some photos] but in reality there were air patrols, and many cars from many people from several jurisdictions over several days. Keppel claims nothing was found there but skulls and jaw fragments and a few bunches of hair – the case facts prove there were human remains, multiple bodies at both locations, abandoned homes nearby, articles of clothing, jewelry, and evidence of possible grave and animal activity. The FBI was sent multiple hair samples from Taylor Mountain. There were girls missing in two states, why didn’t they step in earlier? What were the results of the hair testing?
6. Why the misdirection of public perception as to what happened at Taylor Mountain and Issaquah? Keppel notes in his detective notes during the active investigation of Taylor Mountain in 1975 that he talked to the ME of that time and the ME told him that the heads “were with the bodies”. In other words there was no decapitation. Then, later, on 8-1-1975 he logs in detective notes which he dates in March of 1975, months earlier but recorded later in August, about calling another ME to inquire as to what would be needed to state there was decapitation at the site. He knew skeletal remains were found. He personally logged them in with evidence numbers and those same bones were confirmed to be the missing girls by DNA in 2005. So why did Keppel maintain over the years and in his book “Riverman” that nothing was found there but skulls and jaw fragments and suggest decapitation. What about the additional skeleton that didn’t match the girls known that is documented in the search and rescue notes of that day by professionals who were well versed in human remains and policies and procedures about search procedure. There was also a criminologist on site who documented that evidence was sent forward to superior court. Why the silence over the years knowing the public story was false. Why the scenario in the 1989 final interview that Bundy decapitated his victims and threw clothing out the window while he drove – Was it rehearsed with Bundy? Keppel never challenged it in the final interview- he spent time instead on the bicycle of Janice Ott when a bicycle shift cable is noted as a find at Issaquah. He let Bundy talk about gruesome details about Hawkins when no evidence of decapitation existed at the time to support that Bundy had done anything like that and in fact evidence found would contradict it and Hawkins remains were never located.
Where is the accountability to the ethics and standards of our justice system and responsibility to the public? What happened in the communications with Bundy and Keppel between 1980 when he noted in his detective notes he was going to ask to get in contact with him and in 1984 when he started meeting with him as a consultant to the Green River Task Force? Why was he allowed to take case files with him and this was confirmed to me by the AG Office. Any communications are not privileged as they always belonged to the public and not to Keppel personally. He was employed by the State of WA. It was then and still is, an open murder investigation as girls are still missing and unaccounted for.
Why did he spend so much time on Hawkins when there were no remains identified specific to her? There was never any proof of decapitation as the other girls found were not decapitated and Hawkins has never been recovered. So why has this scenario become “fact” in the public story? Had they agreed upon some kind of scenario as to what would go down in that final interview? In the actual police files Hawkins is never listed at Issaquah but instead always referred to as Taylor Mountain. She had a deformity of her leg bones and investigators were requesting leg xrays of victims found there shortly after Taylor Mountain was discovered during the initial searches. It is in their detective notes and a leg bone is noted in the initial finds at Taylor Mountain. Why would they do that if as Keppel claims publicly there were only skulls and jawbones and a few bunches of hair?
Why did Keppel publish the scenario that clothing was thrown out of the window by Bundy when clothing was found on site [some of it by description matching that of victims and also sent forward at the time to Superior Court as evidence] ? Keppel wasn’t able to publish this misinformation alone – no one who was there and knew ever challenged it – it was a deliberate effort to circumvent the truth. One oversight I can see, but not multiple and not to the extent that all of these occurred. Police also went out to the Taylor Mountain site about a month later and another human remain was turned over that by DNA in 2005 was verified as human. What I cannot comprehend is the why.
Families were grieving all those years – I was struggling for decades with severe trauma because of what had happened. I could have been helped. The families and myself could have had closure. Instead there was a race to the media and personal profit. Multiple careers were built on a false scenario of events and a suppression of case facts.
7-The interviews of 1984 and 1988 differ from the public narrative. The interview of 1988 per the record in the sealed area of the Archives shows that Bundy was helping Keppel develop questionnaires. Were these questionnaires to be used in the HITS program? Why weren’t Bundy’s attorneys advised at the time about these interfaces with Keppel and other authorities and why weren’t they discussed at Bundy’s appeals and trial? What was going on back then? This isn’t a normal progression of justice at all – even back then – other older cases have not had so many discrepancies, inconsistencies and hidden facts and records.
8-The very act of sealing away evidence in a serial case where girls remain missing and a survivor [myself] is coming forward is highly suspect. It’s called spoilation of evidence. I question whether there aren’t higher legal problems related to moving records of a serial crime case with unsolved homicides into sealed areas.
Records state the evidence was to be sealed for 75 years….that’s a generation and it is the length of a copyright. Failure to disclose to the public all the evidence found at Taylor Mountain, noted by multiple people including those present that day of Search and Rescue, raises serious questions about violations of public trust. Otherwise, why hide it? This moving of evidence into a sealed area out of the jurisdiction of police, where they cannot access it per an internal memo, shows the activity started initially in 1999 and again in 2012. This latter incident was the year I had contacted the FBI a second time complaining of witness and victim intimidation. How much did the FBI know of all this? Were they a partner in it or a victim of it unaware of all that was hidden?
9–It has been denied that Bundy wrote a rape paper. He did. It was in 1972 while he served as Assistant Director of the Crime Commission in Seattle. I have the paper. I also have the witness statement of a superior who states and confirms that Bundy wrote it for the Crime Commission. In that paper Bundy analyzes how rapists are able to get away with their crimes, how rarely the cases are prosecuted, how law enforcement never at the time believed the women, and how the most damaging of rapes to try and report is a rape where the victim knows the perpetrator. This is what happened to me and I had been trying to express that to police for years…coming forward that I had known Bundy in high school, he had violently raped me at that time, and I had been telling police that since 2001. I couldn’t have known of the rape paper or the fact that he had been reported for rape during that time period to police. In the files, police back then knew Bundy had been reported for rape by a woman in 1972. It is mentioned in several places and Keppel even talked about it at a meeting describing her as “imbibed” and “buxom”. The police never looked at this report seriously not even when Taylor Mountain and Issaquah had been found and all the girls were missing.
10–It has been denied that Bundy finished the recidivism study – but he did. I have the final formal report and Bundy was paid several thousand dollars for it. The recidivism study was also known of by the FBI. This is stated in an internal memo. I also have the records of the original contract and the payments to Bundy made by WA State. The recidivism study looked at the probability of repeat offenses by people being released from incarceration. It studied the weaknesses in the current system at that time. Bundy never learned of law enforcement weaknesses and policies by reading Detective magazines as Keppel has claimed – he learned by doing these studies and working among the various aspects of the justice system. That is not the fault of the law enforcement community. His killing was not the fault of political parties. That rests solely with Bundy – so why take such drastic steps to cover up that time period in WA State? Why move evidence into a sealed area? Why deny the crime site of Taylor Mountain for its significance and “lose” the evidence of Issaquah? What else was going on?
11–Why did Ted Bundy get so much access to officials once he was in Florida? In addition to WA State, the FBI was meeting with him and not just Bill Hagmaier. They circumvented his attorneys – one even helped him get in touch with WA State AG Office….why? Why did Keppel sue the state of Florida to get Bundy’s notes? It was reported in the papers and is part of the public record. He could have had copies. Why sue for the originals? That doesn’t even seem legal. Where are those papers? They are supposed to be public property. Police do not have the right to have private files in cases – they are paid by the public and are not privately employed. Keppel refers to “personal files” several times in his works but he is not an author who gained access to material via FOIA – he was a detective who worked a case on behalf of the public so why has this been accepted and not questioned by the public and not corrected over the years by the AG Office. Even now, he is not an “author” but a representative of WA State law enforcement community – he may have retired but he still acts under “color of law”. He needs to be held accountable for the misrepresentations of fact – these have been taught at universities, portrayed over and over in the media but at their core, much of this is simply not true and not factual to the case.
When I came forward as a survivor who was being silenced and shut out by law enforcement in WA State to the AG Office I was told Keppel had taken files with him but they did nothing to help me. This to me, this whole situation with these Bundy cases and WA State, is a primary source of concern as it relates to the role of the justice system and its relationship with community.
12–How with little or no money, did Bundy afford law school when he had no source of financial aid noted, no scholarships, and worked only part time random jobs. How did he afford the University of WA? How could he have possibly afforded a summer at Stanford? At the University of Washington, he afforded a private room in a rooming house [no direct room mates] had a car in 1973, and had unusual access to high ranking officials. They never checked his background? They ran checks on people Bundy knew including a politician at the time, but they never fully investigated his background – his sources of income – ? People leave a paper trail but to hear WA State tell it Bundy never did – yet he worked for high level officials several times.
13-Why did he retain a defense attorney in WA State when WA State never charged him with anything and how did he pay for those bills and why and how was he able to retain that attorney in the first place? In Utah and Florida he had attorneys assigned. He borrowed money from people to pay legal bills. When Bundy was arrested initially in Florida, he told detectives there per the reports, that he knew important people. How much did that play into what happened and how he was treated? He was a serial killer who embedded into politics and the justice system in order to learn about its weaknesses and cultivate friendships that served him later on if caught. Did those friendships serve him? Is that why evidence was denied its existence?
14. How does WA State, who never brought Bundy to trial and never prosecuted him for a single crime, and never caught him or tried to extradite him, seemingly able to continue to control the narrative about Bundy and provide “experts”? Keppel is always part of the narrative especially about Taylor Mountain and the evidence but Keppel per the evidence is not telling the truth and hasn’t been for a long time. Ann Rule is perceived as telling the truth and she may have been per her own perspective as she may not have been privilege to all the evidence that was held behind the scenes but Keppel was. The same is true of Michaud and Aynesworth -it is doubtful they knew of all the evidence suppressed or the fact that Bundy stated behind the scenes that what he gave to them was “a lot of fiction”. He was a pathological liar but regardless of that the official police position should have been to weigh the facts and include the findings in their true extent relative to the sites of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain and not suppress it.
None of this makes any sense when you see the totality of the evidence …none of this in my opinion has been to serve justice or to help the victims and their families, myself included. None of this is what I think of when I think of what our justice system is supposed to be about. The WA State justice system and the Attorney General office needs to be held accountable for its failure to investigate and resolve what happened during those years. I have been told by authorities in the police jurisdictions that the AG Office did not plan to investigate even though this evidence clearly shows the public has been lied to about those years and I have that refusal in writing. Their response was “not at this time.” Meanwhile the false narrative continues…in the media…at universities….and to the public…while the families and myself and those young girls thrown away at Taylor Mountain wait…. And, it makes me very concerned about the tactics that have occurred over the years and whether efforts will be made to pad the remaining evidence. It’s a fair question and a valid concern. You already have proof of evidence moved into a sealed area and critical evidence to cases that are still open and a serial killer where not all is known. No matter what lens you shine on this situation it isn’t right.
Ted Bundy Years Exposed: Misrepresentations of Facts/Evidence For Decades – 3 unknown girls found – “unknown” only because WA State denied their existence and either “lost” or destroyed, per internal memo, their remains
Here is a summary of facts of the case: These records included internal memos, case files on victims including autopsy reports, surveillance records, detective notes and detective street notes, internal documents such as DNA requests and evidence lists generated on site at both Issaquah and Taylor Crime scenes. What they reveal is a contradiction to the story that has been put forth publicly.
1-Taylor Mountain was a major crime scene and Keppel’s comments that nothing were found there but heads and jawbones is false. His statements that only kids were on scene is false. His own detective notes show him logging in skeletal remains for evidence tracking and sending many items of evidence forward to Superior Court. The skeletal remains found on site in March of 1975 per the paper trail of original documents included at least one skeleton that was not associated to the known missing victims per the notes. The skeletal remains found on site at Taylor Mountain were eventually sent to the ME office in March of 1984 around the time he took over the Green River investigation. In addition to the four girls known to have been found there, search and rescue documents and internal documents show that additional skeletal remains were found of a young girl. A young girl who was never identified and her case never worked as the entire truth of Taylor Mountain was denied its existence and sealed away from public knowledge. That’s one additional victim at Taylor Mountain. Who was she?
2– Suppression of information. In 1980 Keppel took into his custody a 33 page critique of Ann Rule’s book “Stranger Beside Me” that Bundy had written – it was single spaced and Bundy had turned it over to Aynesworth per his detective notes. What did that single spaced large document say about the book? Bundy states in the 1984 interview that he disputed her work. Why wasn’t it put into the public record? Keppel tells Bundy in the 1984 interview that he and Rule work together because they are “cooperating agencies”. Rule is an author not an agency. Keppel also took into custody a transcription from the interview done with Aynesworth and Michaud. Instead of noting that he put these into evidence he sent them per his notes to the department psychiatrist who had never met or interviewed Ted Bundy personally. The psychiatrist put together a profile that Keppel wrote to another jurisdiction was “surprisingly accurate”. Did the psychiatrist only have what Keppel gave him to work with? What happened to these documents and what did they reveal about the case and what did they say? Rule and Michaud and Aynesworth are not police and Bundy lied a lot about everything but Keppel knew. of all the evidence and he was a police officer and responsible to the public not to friendships. He had Ann Rule write his foreword, and she told me in an email to me that she had gotten him his first editor. Given the critical evidence of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain that was suppressed and sealed away, it causes concerns for manipulation of the case and trading favors.
3. Shortly after 1980, after Keppel asked to get in touch with Bundy [in his notes], Keppel began working for the AG Office. From 1980 to 1984, there is relatively little in the files related to the cases of Bundy in WA State. There is little if any documentation that evidence from the crime scenes including the skeletal remains were actively worked. A few pieces of physical evidence taken from Bundy such as an axe handle, knife and beaded corded leather necklace, were documented as being taken into evidence but the paper trail after that was not present. There never appears to be a comprehensive list of evidence taken from both sites that became a part of a thorough investigation – if there had been, the skeletal remains would not have been denied and the true pattern of the killings [not dumpings] that occurred at Issaquah and Taylor Mountain would have been analyzed.
4. Investigators ran a DMV check on all persons named Ted of his age range who drove VWs shortly after Issaquah in 1974. His name should have been on that list. A credible witness came forward in October of 1974 and identified Bundy to WA State authorities. The reporting officer called the information over to Utah. Bundy fit the pattern of crimes, he drove a VW which should have shown up on the DMV check, and he was present in both locations where girls were disappearing. Yet Utah and WA State did nothing until summer of 1975. WA State never charged him even though after his arrest for Da- Ronch’s kidnapping they had mountains of evidence against him – all the evidence of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain, witness statements, proximity and locations. They had items that could have been finger printed and they had witnesses who had come forward. Yet they didn’t try to charge him – Utah had less than WA State. Instead, he was transferred to Colorado where there were less cases and less evidence. Was it because Bundy had been embedded into Washington politics? He was also embedded in Utah politics and had gone to a party at a prosecutor’s home there with a woman he’d been dating [in the records per a witness account]. Keppel and Canova had the cases…they knew the evidence they had and what the case implicated in terms of those sites being well developed with multiple missing and murdered girls. It was many homicides…yet they did nothing.
5. There were many people on site at both crime scenes in WA State: not kids as Keppel has stated in his book Riverman but adults, professionals such as law enforcement from several jurisdictions, search and rescue crews and civil air patrol. But WA State doesn’t talk about this fact. Instead, the AG Office to this day only shows one car at the Taylor Mountain site [or two cars in some photos] but in reality there were air patrols, and many cars from many people from several jurisdictions over several days. Keppel claims nothing was found there but skulls and jaw fragments and a few bunches of hair – the case facts prove there were human remains, multiple bodies at both locations, abandoned homes nearby, articles of clothing, jewelry, and evidence of possible grave and animal activity. The FBI was sent multiple hair samples from Taylor Mountain. There were girls missing in two states, why didn’t they step in earlier? What were the results of the hair testing?
6. Why the misdirection of public perception as to what happened at Taylor Mountain and Issaquah? Keppel notes in his detective notes during the active investigation of Taylor Mountain in 1975 that he talked to the ME of that time and the ME told him that the heads “were with the bodies”. In other words there was no decapitation. Then, later, on 8-1-1975 he logs in detective notes which he dates in March of 1975, months earlier but recorded later in August, about calling another ME to inquire as to what would be needed to state there was decapitation at the site. He knew skeletal remains were found. He personally logged them in with evidence numbers and those same bones were confirmed to be the missing girls by DNA in 2005. So why did Keppel maintain over the years and in his book “Riverman” that nothing was found there but skulls and jaw fragments and suggest decapitation. What about the additional skeleton that didn’t match the girls known that is documented in the search and rescue notes of that day by professionals who were well versed in human remains and policies and procedures about search procedure. There was also a criminologist on site who documented that evidence was sent forward to superior court. Why the silence over the years knowing the public story was false. Why the scenario in the 1989 final interview that Bundy decapitated his victims and threw clothing out the window while he drove – Was it rehearsed with Bundy? Keppel never challenged it in the final interview- he spent time instead on the bicycle of Janice Ott when a bicycle shift cable is noted as a find at Issaquah. He let Bundy talk about gruesome details about Hawkins when no evidence of decapitation existed at the time to support that Bundy had done anything like that and in fact evidence found would contradict it and Hawkins remains were never located.
Where is the accountability to the ethics and standards of our justice system and responsibility to the public? What happened in the communications with Bundy and Keppel between 1980 when he noted in his detective notes he was going to ask to get in contact with him and in 1984 when he started meeting with him as a consultant to the Green River Task Force? Why was he allowed to take case files with him and this was confirmed to me by the AG Office. Any communications are not privileged as they always belonged to the public and not to Keppel personally. He was employed by the State of WA. It was then and still is, an open murder investigation as girls are still missing and unaccounted for.
Why did he spend so much time on Hawkins when there were no remains identified specific to her? There was never any proof of decapitation as the other girls found were not decapitated and Hawkins has never been recovered. So why has this scenario become “fact” in the public story? Had they agreed upon some kind of scenario as to what would go down in that final interview? In the actual police files Hawkins is never listed at Issaquah but instead always referred to as Taylor Mountain. She had a deformity of her leg bones and investigators were requesting leg xrays of victims found there shortly after Taylor Mountain was discovered during the initial searches. It is in their detective notes and a leg bone is noted in the initial finds at Taylor Mountain. Why would they do that if as Keppel claims publicly there were only skulls and jawbones and a few bunches of hair?
Why did Keppel publish the scenario that clothing was thrown out of the window by Bundy when clothing was found on site [some of it by description matching that of victims and also sent forward at the time to Superior Court as evidence] ? Keppel wasn’t able to publish this misinformation alone – no one who was there and knew ever challenged it – it was a deliberate effort to circumvent the truth. One oversight I can see, but not multiple and not to the extent that all of these occurred. Police also went out to the Taylor Mountain site about a month later and another human remain was turned over that by DNA in 2005 was verified as human. What I cannot comprehend is the why.
Families were grieving all those years – I was struggling for decades with severe trauma because of what had happened. I could have been helped. The families and myself could have had closure. Instead there was a race to the media and personal profit. Multiple careers were built on a false scenario of events and a suppression of case facts.
7-The interviews of 1984 and 1988 differ from the public narrative. The interview of 1988 per the record in the sealed area of the Archives shows that Bundy was helping Keppel develop questionnaires. Were these questionnaires to be used in the HITS program? Why weren’t Bundy’s attorneys advised at the time about these interfaces with Keppel and other authorities and why weren’t they discussed at Bundy’s appeals and trial? What was going on back then? This isn’t a normal progression of justice at all – even back then – other older cases have not had so many discrepancies, inconsistencies and hidden facts and records.
8-The very act of sealing away evidence in a serial case where girls remain missing and a survivor [myself] is coming forward is highly suspect. It’s called spoilation of evidence. I question whether there aren’t higher legal problems related to moving records of a serial crime case with unsolved homicides into sealed areas.
Records state the evidence was to be sealed for 75 years….that’s a generation and it is the length of a copyright. Failure to disclose to the public all the evidence found at Taylor Mountain, noted by multiple people including those present that day of Search and Rescue, raises serious questions about violations of public trust. Otherwise, why hide it? This moving of evidence into a sealed area out of the jurisdiction of police, where they cannot access it per an internal memo, shows the activity started initially in 1999 and again in 2012. This latter incident was the year I had contacted the FBI a second time complaining of witness and victim intimidation. How much did the FBI know of all this? Were they a partner in it or a victim of it unaware of all that was hidden?
9–It has been denied that Bundy wrote a rape paper. He did. It was in 1972 while he served as Assistant Director of the Crime Commission in Seattle. I have the paper. I also have the witness statement of a superior who states and confirms that Bundy wrote it for the Crime Commission. In that paper Bundy analyzes how rapists are able to get away with their crimes, how rarely the cases are prosecuted, how law enforcement never at the time believed the women, and how the most damaging of rapes to try and report is a rape where the victim knows the perpetrator. This is what happened to me and I had been trying to express that to police for years…coming forward that I had known Bundy in high school, he had violently raped me at that time, and I had been telling police that since 2001. I couldn’t have known of the rape paper or the fact that he had been reported for rape during that time period to police. In the files, police back then knew Bundy had been reported for rape by a woman in 1972. It is mentioned in several places and Keppel even talked about it at a meeting describing her as “imbibed” and “buxom”. The police never looked at this report seriously not even when Taylor Mountain and Issaquah had been found and all the girls were missing.
10–It has been denied that Bundy finished the recidivism study – but he did. I have the final formal report and Bundy was paid several thousand dollars for it. The recidivism study was also known of by the FBI. This is stated in an internal memo. I also have the records of the original contract and the payments to Bundy made by WA State. The recidivism study looked at the probability of repeat offenses by people being released from incarceration. It studied the weaknesses in the current system at that time. Bundy never learned of law enforcement weaknesses and policies by reading Detective magazines as Keppel has claimed – he learned by doing these studies and working among the various aspects of the justice system. That is not the fault of the law enforcement community. His killing was not the fault of political parties. That rests solely with Bundy – so why take such drastic steps to cover up that time period in WA State? Why move evidence into a sealed area? Why deny the crime site of Taylor Mountain for its significance and “lose” the evidence of Issaquah? What else was going on?
11–Why did Ted Bundy get so much access to officials once he was in Florida? In addition to WA State, the FBI was meeting with him and not just Bill Hagmaier. They circumvented his attorneys – one even helped him get in touch with WA State AG Office….why? Why did Keppel sue the state of Florida to get Bundy’s notes? It was reported in the papers and is part of the public record. He could have had copies. Why sue for the originals? That doesn’t even seem legal. Where are those papers? They are supposed to be public property. Police do not have the right to have private files in cases – they are paid by the public and are not privately employed. Keppel refers to “personal files” several times in his works but he is not an author who gained access to material via FOIA – he was a detective who worked a case on behalf of the public so why has this been accepted and not questioned by the public and not corrected over the years by the AG Office. Even now, he is not an “author” but a representative of WA State law enforcement community – he may have retired but he still acts under “color of law”. He needs to be held accountable for the misrepresentations of fact – these have been taught at universities, portrayed over and over in the media but at their core, much of this is simply not true and not factual to the case.
When I came forward as a survivor who was being silenced and shut out by law enforcement in WA State to the AG Office I was told Keppel had taken files with him but they did nothing to help me. This to me, this whole situation with these Bundy cases and WA State, is a primary source of concern as it relates to the role of the justice system and its relationship with community.
12–How with little or no money, did Bundy afford law school when he had no source of financial aid noted, no scholarships, and worked only part time random jobs. How did he afford the University of WA? How could he have possibly afforded a summer at Stanford? At the University of Washington, he afforded a private room in a rooming house [no direct room mates] had a car in 1973, and had unusual access to high ranking officials. They never checked his background? They ran checks on people Bundy knew including a politician at the time, but they never fully investigated his background – his sources of income – ? People leave a paper trail but to hear WA State tell it Bundy never did – yet he worked for high level officials several times.
13-Why did he retain a defense attorney in WA State when WA State never charged him with anything and how did he pay for those bills and why and how was he able to retain that attorney in the first place? In Utah and Florida he had attorneys assigned. He borrowed money from people to pay legal bills. When Bundy was arrested initially in Florida, he told detectives there per the reports, that he knew important people. How much did that play into what happened and how he was treated? He was a serial killer who embedded into politics and the justice system in order to learn about its weaknesses and cultivate friendships that served him later on if caught. Did those friendships serve him? Is that why evidence was denied its existence?
14. How does WA State, who never brought Bundy to trial and never prosecuted him for a single crime, and never caught him or tried to extradite him, seemingly able to continue to control the narrative about Bundy and provide “experts”? Keppel is always part of the narrative especially about Taylor Mountain and the evidence but Keppel per the evidence is not telling the truth and hasn’t been for a long time. Ann Rule is perceived as telling the truth and she may have been per her own perspective as she may not have been privilege to all the evidence that was held behind the scenes but Keppel was. The same is true of Michaud and Aynesworth -it is doubtful they knew of all the evidence suppressed or the fact that Bundy stated behind the scenes that what he gave to them was “a lot of fiction”. He was a pathological liar but regardless of that the official police position should have been to weigh the facts and include the findings in their true extent relative to the sites of Issaquah and Taylor Mountain and not suppress it.
None of this makes any sense when you see the totality of the evidence …none of this in my opinion has been to serve justice or to help the victims and their families, myself included. None of this is what I think of when I think of what our justice system is supposed to be about. The WA State justice system and the Attorney General office needs to be held accountable for its failure to investigate and resolve what happened during those years. I have been told by authorities in the police jurisdictions that the AG Office did not plan to investigate even though this evidence clearly shows the public has been lied to about those years and I have that refusal in writing. Their response was “not at this time.” Meanwhile the false narrative continues…in the media…at universities….and to the public…while the families and myself and those young girls thrown away at Taylor Mountain wait…. And, it makes me very concerned about the tactics that have occurred over the years and whether efforts will be made to pad the remaining evidence. It’s a fair question and a valid concern. You already have proof of evidence moved into a sealed area and critical evidence to cases that are still open and a serial killer where not all is known. No matter what lens you shine on this situation it isn’t right.
January 1, 2018
To the Readers - A Public Thank You
All I had was broken memories and fragments due to the brain damage from repeated concussion and from extreme trauma. People can't see brain damage so it is harder to explain it and even harder to come forward as a witness or victim with delayed memory. It doesn't mean it isn't true...it's just a bigger barrier. If you see someone with a broken leg you understand why it can't bear weight or why they struggle...but with brain damage or memory fragmentation you can't see it.
It's okay....I am very grateful to each and every person who took the time to read the book....to me it is the beginning of a chance for fostering understanding of severe PTSD and the fragmentation, disjointed memory, that occurs with it. I mean that sincerely. I don't want anyone to feel bad that they didn't like it or that they may struggle to believe me .... to me it is the start of a conversation. You took your time to read it and I appreciate that investment of your time. It is a chance that given time, the understanding of what happened to me back then will grow.
If that understanding grows, it could help others who are suffering from the same type of memory problems that I am.
November 13, 2017
Severe PTSD Symptoms
Bundy not only restrained victims [and he did me] he also experimented with plying them with alcohol and drugs. Chemical bottles were found at the kill site at Taylor Mountain and small bottles were found at Issaquah. This was never released publicly and these details were contained in my memories dating back years - I stated that I felt like I was being drugged and that I heard bottles moving at the place I was held captive.
My memory fragments contained these details of the chemical bottles - items that had been found at the kill sites and evidence which had been sealed away.
I still only have fragments of memory. I have an overall story of what happened that I can tell you, but some of the pieces are missing or I am not sure of where they go in the overall story...just that they happened. Further, I still am impacted after all these years by the trauma - I cannot fly, I cannot be in enclosed settings where I have no escape readily available and if I go to a movie or an event or even a work meeting I have to sit by the door or I suffer extreme anxiety. It is very deep seated. Severe PTSD, the form I have, results in memory fragmentation and you can read more about it online. It is not a mental health issue solely but a combination of psychological trauma and physical brain injury. Recent studies have shown that under severe stress, such as the kind I was under back then, the brain cannot encode memories in a normal way and in fact is physically damaged due to the emotional distress. That is recent knowledge. But it supports me.
In all other aspects of my life, I am "normal" but not in that part of my life in terms of memories and the foundation they provide for who you are and who you become. We build our lives on our experiences and when those are broken and shattered it impacts you - it did me. I am hoping that my case gets proven beyond doubt so that I can address more about what severe PTSD feels like because I think there are victims out there, like me, who have suffered captivity trauma and extreme stress as well as head injury and who struggle like I do to put the pieces together in a coherent way. It makes me seem unbelievable but in reality it is actually an authentication of my experiences.
November 6, 2017
Skeletal Remains Were Found at Taylor Mountain
It is a tragedy that deserves a public discussion. Not only for Sara, who identified items in her memories that were found at those sites and which could have helped prove her experiences back then, but also for the families of the girls whose identity we will never know.
Ted Bundy was an experienced serial killer in 1974 - officials only just realized he was a serial killer at that time. As he specifically told Keppel in one of his prison interviews while discussing serial killing in general, no one just wakes up one day and starts killing. The first discovery cops make is rarely the first murder site. Ted Bundy had two very well developed murder sites: Issaquah and Taylor Mountain. The earliest victims missing were found at Taylor Mountain and the most recent victims known at the time were found at Issaquah. He also had told people that he first knew he was sick in 1969 or before that, and these two sites that we know of, support that he had been active for longer than the time known.
There's been an injustice done in this case, to families, to victims, to the understanding of serial killers in general. There are some efforts going on behind the scenes to bring public awareness of the events back then back into focus through the evaluation of this evidence that was sealed away.
It is my hope that people can remain patient for a short while and objective and try to understand rather than react and judge. I can't emphasize enough that "Reconstructing Sara" is not a book as much as it is testimony and while difficult to read, it is based on truth and lines up to the case in more ways than simply coincidence.
"Reconstructing Sara" The Lost Victim of Ted Bundy
- Sara A. Survivor's profile
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