"It All Began in Washington State": Ted Bundy's Death-Row Tape with Robert Keppel, 1989

Name: "It All Began in Washington State": Ted Bundy's Death-Row Tape with Robert Keppel, 1989
Uploaded: 2011-02-23
Duration: 12 min 2 s
Description: Four days before his execution, Ted Bundy told the Washington detective who had pursued him since 1974 how he lured Georgann Hawkins up a Seattle alley with a briefcase and crutches. This is the sound of that tape.

Four days before his execution, Ted Bundy told the Washington detective who had pursued him since 1974 how he lured Georgann Hawkins up a Seattle alley with a briefcase and crutches. This is the sound of that tape.

Subject: Ted Bundy
Recorded: January 20, 1989
Runtime: 12:02

Content warning: Bundy describes in his own words the abduction and murder of an 18-year-old student and what he did with her remains.

The Interview

In January 1989, with his execution days away, Ted Bundy began to talk to investigators from the states where he had killed. On January 20 he sat down at Florida State Prison with Robert Keppel, the Washington investigator who had worked on the "Ted" murders since 1974, and Keppel recorded the session. This twelve-minute audio, posted online in 2011, is an edited selection from that tape. In it Bundy says that "it all began in Washington State", describes a site near Issaquah where remains were found, and gives a detailed account of how he abducted and killed a young woman he calls "the Hawkins girl".

Historical Context

Georgann Hawkins, 18, a University of Washington student, disappeared in the early hours of June 11, 1974, in an alley between her boyfriend's residence and her sorority house in Seattle's University District. Her body was not recovered at the time. On September 6, 1974, the remains of Janice Ott and Denise Naslund, who had vanished from Lake Sammamish State Park in July, were found near a service road outside Issaquah, together with bones that could not then be identified. Bundy was later convicted of murders in Florida and sentenced to death. He was never tried for any Washington killing. He was executed in the electric chair at Florida State Prison on January 24, 1989.

Circumstances of the Interview

Keppel, then chief criminal investigator for the Washington State Attorney General, had been a King County homicide detective on the 1974 cases. The January sessions took place while Bundy's lawyers were seeking a stay of execution, and the typescript, published here as text, describes them as a negotiation conducted as an interview rather than a sworn confession. Officers were present; Bundy says their presence is "a little bit unnerving" and offers to write down or whisper names rather than say them aloud.

What the Interview Covers

Bundy describes the Issaquah site, saying it held the remains of "three individuals, two identified and one not". He then says that "the Hawkins girl's head was severed" and buried on a rocky hillside up the road. He describes moving up an alley on crutches with a briefcase, asking a young woman to help him carry it to his car, knocking her unconscious with a crowbar and handcuffing her. He says she spoke of a Spanish test the next day and told him "everybody called her George". He describes strangling her, throwing the briefcase, crutches, rope and clothing from his car as he drove, and returning by bicycle the next day to pick up a shoe and earrings left in the parking lot.

What Makes the Recording Significant

Bundy's last-week confessions are usually known from typescripts and later accounts. This recording preserves his own voice describing a specific Washington killing, with its hesitations, and with details, like the Spanish test and the nickname, that he offered as proof that he was the killer.

Archival Importance

The full text of the Keppel interview is published separately here, transcribed from the King County Archives typescript, which notes that the tapes themselves were not heard. This audio allows part of that text to be checked against the recording.

Important Caveats

Everything Bundy says here is his own account, given while he was trying to delay his execution. The upload is an edited selection; it is not the complete session, and its first words begin mid-sentence. How this audio reached the public is not documented. The uploader's dates ("Friday 20 or Sunday 22") and description ("Bob Keppel from Seattle") are his own; Keppel was with the Washington Attorney General's Office in 1989. Most of Keppel's questions are not audible in the machine transcription.

Ted Bundy: [Clip begins mid-sentence.] ...and this is, I guess, where it counts, is, to me, that means that we go over things in great detail, but not just the incident itself. Ultimately, whether it's to you or to somebody else. Because basically it all began in Washington State. That is, that's where I was living, that's where I grew up as a kid, and that's where I grew up as a young man. And, and those kinds of, uh, images, impulses and behaviors which ultimately led to the violent behavior, you know, occurred, if you will, in Washington State.

Ted Bundy: That kind of, uh, broad understanding that I'm looking for is, uh, going to come, you know, during those years I lived in Washington State. Uh, you know, unfortunately, I guess from your standpoint, it was basically in Washington State where those first crimes, incidents, murders took place.

Ted Bundy: Well, let's just do one here. I mean, to start. Obviously we've got to start somewhere. And I think it might, we might, it's a long shot, it's a pretty long shot, that you might be able to get something out of it. At least some of that so-called tangible, uh, evidence that might be of some value not only to you but to others. And maybe a bit of information. Even if you don't find anything else, it might be of some value to families.

Ted Bundy: Okay. So we'll do, I understand that at the Issaquah site, which I could describe to you, would describe to you if you want, there were three, uh, remains of three individuals found, two identified and one not, because of the, the, uh, so few, the kinds of remains that were found were so few, unidentifiable. Okay. What do you want? A description of the site first, how you get there? I mean, you just don't, you just don't make this up.

Robert Keppel: Right.

Ted Bundy: Maybe half a mile, quarter of a mile down this, uh, little side road. If you turn, if you kept on [unclear: "flying" / "going"] all the way down... Oh, well, Lord knows what the, what the little creatures up there did, what the animals would have done. But I think...

Ted Bundy: Well, let's, let me start with one. Let me start this way. Um, the unidentified remains. This is where I'm a little bit, the presence of the officers down here is a little bit unnerving. Some of it, some of the stuff I don't mind talking about, because they wouldn't know from Adam. But I, but names, I will, I can write it down, or I can whisper it to you, or whatever. I just don't want the police getting any kind of names at this point.

Ted Bundy: Well, if you can, can you hear that?

Robert Keppel: I can hear it, yeah.

Ted Bundy: Okay. I just wrote, I just said that the Hawkins girl's head was severed and taken up the road about 25 to 50 yards and buried in a location about 10 yards west of the road on a rocky hillside. Did you hear that?

Robert Keppel: Mm-hmm.

Ted Bundy: Yeah, but not anything you would have found that I know of. If you'd, you would have found, probably, you would have found the damage to the head, the jaw in particular, probably broken.

Robert Keppel: Mm-hmm.

Ted Bundy: But if you'd found that, you would have known who it was. But anyway, I don't know. Is there any reason you asked me that question?

Ted Bundy: Um, I was moving up the alley, uh, using a, uh, a briefcase and some crutches. And a young woman walked down. I saw, saw her round the, the north end of the block into the alley, and stop for a moment, and then keep on walking down the alley toward me. And about halfway down the block I encountered her and asked her to help me carry the briefcase. Which she did. We walked back up the alley, across the street, turned right on the sidewalk in front of, I think, the, well, fraternity house on the corner there, uh, rounded the corner to the left, going north on 47th.

Ted Bundy: Well, midway in the block there used to be a, you know, one of those parking lots that they used to make out of burned-down houses in that area. Let's see. We were to the, to the car. All right. Um, and basically, when I reached the car, what happened was I knocked her unconscious with the crowbar.

Robert Keppel: Where did you have that?

Ted Bundy: By the car.

Robert Keppel: Oh, right outside?

Ted Bundy: Outside, in back of the car.

Robert Keppel: Did she see it?

Ted Bundy: No. No. And then, uh, there was some, there was some handcuffs there along with the crowbar, along the crowbar. And, uh, I handcuffed her and put her in the driver's, I mean the passenger side of the car, and drove away.

Robert Keppel: Alive or dead?

Ted Bundy: Oh, no, no. She was quite, not, she was unconscious, but she was very much alive. One of the things that makes it a little bit, among the things that makes it difficult, is that at this point she was quite lucid, talking about things about some... It's funny, it's, it's not funny, but it's odd, the kinds of things people say under those circumstances. And she thought, she said that she thought that she had a Spanish test the next day, and she thought that I had taken her to help tutor me for a Spanish test. It's kind of odd, odd thing to say.

Ted Bundy: The long and short of it, I mean, I'm going to maybe try to make this get there by degrees, the long and short of it was that, that I again knocked her unconscious and strangled her, and drug her into, about 10 yards into the small grove of trees that was there.

Ted Bundy: [In answer to a question not picked up by the machine text.] Cord. An old, an old piece of, an old piece of rope. Yeah, something was in the car.

Ted Bundy: Then I, uh, packed the car up. By this time it was almost dawn. It was just about dawn, sun was coming up. And I went through my usual, I say usual routine, I went through this routine where I was just absolutely... I would go through this, but on this particular morning I, I was just absolutely, again, just shocked, kind of scared to death, shocked, horrified.

Ted Bundy: And I went down the road throwing everything that I had, had, the briefcase, out the window. Throwing the briefcase, the, the, the crutches, the rope, the clothes, just tossing them out the window. This was just, I was in a sheer state of panic, of just absolute horror, you know. It's like at that point in time, this consciousness of what has really happened, it's like you break out of a fever or something. I would, that is. And so I would, I drove north on 90, not, northeast on 90, at some point throwing articles out the window as I went. Articles of clothing, shoes, et cetera.

Ted Bundy: What? Well, after we got out of the car, initially? Okay. Well, I skipped over some stuff there, and we'll have to get back to it sometime, but I don't feel, I just, it's just too hard for me to talk about right now.

Ted Bundy: [In answer to a question not picked up by the machine text.] Oh, sure. Yeah, I threw away the briefcase, and the crutches, and all that stuff, and the crowbar, everything, handcuffs, everything. I, I get mad at myself a few weeks later because I'd have to go out and buy another pair. I mean, it's not comical, but that's what would happen.

Robert Keppel: Well, I think the Spanish test, pretty darn good, [unclear: "ask me" / "if you ask me"].

Ted Bundy: That's what she said, unless she was hallucinating. She said her, everybody called her George. That's what she said. Or how about that she used a safety pin because apparently her blue slacks were a bit too big. Or, that's about all I know. I mean, I mean, I suppose there, there's, you know, I'm sure there are bits and pieces that'll come back to me. But there wasn't a lot, you know. Obviously there wasn't a lot of conversation.

Ted Bundy: But talk about details coming back: I couldn't find one of the shoes. So I thought it was there, but it wasn't. So I went back. This was, this was the next day. Got on my bicycle, rode back to that little parking lot. I knew there were police all over the place by that time. But I was kind of nervous, 'cause, and I'll tell you why in a minute, 'cause I'd left, and my car been parked there. So I may have seen it. Now, something was found there that might connect me. So I went back to that parking lot and I found both pierced, the, the pierced earrings and the shoe laying in the parking lot at about five in the afternoon. So I surreptitiously gathered them up and rode off.

Robert Keppel: Was that after the police had checked that area?

Ted Bundy: Well, you can tell me. I'd seen them, I'd seen whole streams of them driving around all over the place. But they were concentrating on places like, uh, the park, uh, nearby park. I don't know if, I don't, I'll bet you they couldn't have looked in that parking lot and missed the, the patent leather, white patent leather clog and the two white pierced earrings, [unclear: "little hoops" / "through hoops" / "who wrote hoops"]. [Clip ends.] ---