Bundy was responsible for the kidnapping, murder, and sexual assault of several women and girls. He confessed to 30 homicides.
Theodore Robert Bundy was a brutal American serial killer responsible for the kidnapping, sexual assault, and murder of numerous young women and girls. In 1989, he confessed to 30 homicides he committed between 1974 and 1978 in seven states. However, before he was executed for his heinous crimes, he fell in love, married a woman, and had a child. This is the story of his unusual proposal.
In 1974, Bundy was helping search for women who were going missing in Washington while working at Washington State Department of Emergency Services in Olympia, WA. However, by night he was the one committing those crimes. As is quite well-known, Bundy was smart and charismatic which possibly could've been the reason Carole Anne Boone was attracted to him.
According to Refinery29, she was working at the Emergency Management when she met Bundy but didn't know anything about him. Twice-divorced and mother of a son named James, Boone found herself falling head over heels for the serial killer. In the book, The Only Living Witness: The True Story of Serial Sex Killer Ted Bundy, Boone said, “I liked Ted immediately. We hit it off well."
"He struck me as being a rather shy person with a lot more going on under the surface than what was on the surface. He certainly was more dignified and restrained than the more certifiable types around the office. He would participate in the silliness partway. But remember, he was a Republican.”
Even though Bundy was dating long-time girlfriend Elizabeth Kloepfer at the time, who dreamed of starting a family with him, and Boone was in a relationship too, she found herself bonding intensely with the handsome killer in disguise. After Bundy was imprisoned in Utah for aggravated kidnapping and attempted criminal assault in 1977, Boone met Bundy once again.
In the same year, Bundy managed to escape the prison and run to Florida which, according to Rolling Stone, was with the help of Boone. In 1978, after he was arrested in Florida for the kidnapping and murder of Kimberly Leach and the Chi Omega sorority house murders, Boone moved to Florida as well, to attend his trial.
The woman was too loyal to Bundy and believed that he was innocent. According to ATI, in the Netflix documentary, Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes, Boone said, "I don’t think that Ted belongs in jail. The things in Florida don’t concern me any more than the things out west do.” She added, “I don’t think they have reason to charge Ted Bundy with murder in either Leon County or Columbia County."
She soon started visiting Bundy in prison weekly, which was often conjugal in nature, as their relationship had become more serious. Even though it wasn't permitted, Boone revealed that one of the guards was "real nice. After the first day they just, they didn’t care."
Bundy and Boone had reached the stage where they wanted to tie the knot with each other but there was a small catch - the notorious serial killer was in prison. However, Bundy, an ex-law student, found a loophole in Florida law to marry Boone which stated that as long as a judge was present in the courtroom during the declaration of marriage, the alliance would be considered legal.
Author Stephen Michaud, who visited the killer and wrote Ted Bundy: Conversations With a Killer admitted during an interview with Inside Edition that he helped Bundy arrange the surprising courtroom proposal. "I went to a men's store and bought Ted a pair of khakis and a bow tie and some Argyle socks so he could look spiffy for the occasion."
When Bundy, who was acting as his own attorney during the trial, invited Boone to take the witness stand and describe him as a person, Boone claimed that he was “kind, warm and patient.” She said, “I’ve never seen anything in Ted that indicates any destructiveness towards any other people. He’s a large part of my life. He is vital to me.”
Then, in the middle of his murder trial, Bundy popped the question to Boone. "Carol, do you want to marry me?" he asked to which Boone replied, "Yes." He asked the woman blinded by love, if he wanted to marry her as well, to which she once again replied, "Yes." Bundy finally said, "And I do want to marry you," as per Bustle. However, according to ATI, the killer had to rephrase his reply to “I do hereby marry you," to form the union officially. Two years later, their daughter Rose Bundy was born.
Bundy was sentenced to death for the sorority murders following which he spent nine years in jail. Just three years prior to Bundy's execution by electric chair, Boone divorced him, “deeply betrayed” and “devastated by his sudden wholesale confessions in his last days,” as per Women's Health magazine. She then moved out of Florida along with her children for good.
References:
https://allthatsinteresting.com/carole-ann-boone-ted-bundy-wife
https://www.insideedition.com/what-happened-ted-bundys-wife-and-daughter-50748]
https://www.womenshealthmag.com/life/a27379040/ted-bundy-wife-carole-ann-boone/
