Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes

Cases covered

After escaping from a jail in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, Ted Bundy traveled to Florida and targeted the Chi Omega sorority house at Florida State University. He attacked four women there, killing Lisa Levy and Margaret Bowman and sexually assaulting Levy. He left behind a double bite mark on Levy's buttocks, which later became key evidence. About a month later, police in Pensacola stopped Bundy due to suspicious driving; they found stolen credit cards, and he gave them his name.

The Chi Omega murders led investigators to link him to a nationwide string of killings of young women. Leon County Sheriff W. Kenneth Katsaris ordered a comparison of the bite mark to Bundy's teeth. Orthodontists made a mold of his teeth, and forensic odontologist Dr. Richard Souviron testified in court that the mark matched. After six hours of deliberation, the jury convicted Bundy of first-degree murder.

Before that arrest, Bundy had kidnapped 12-year-old Kimberly Leach, who vanished from school on February 9, 1978. Her body was discovered in a shed two months later; she had been assaulted and killed. In 1980, prosecutor Bob Dekle tied Bundy to the case using evidence from his van and clothing fibers that matched Leach's clothes. Witnesses had seen a girl walking with a man who looked like Bundy toward a white van.

Another jury found Bundy guilty, and he received the death penalty again. On January 22, 1989, two days before his execution, Bundy admitted to killing around thirty women.

Critical response

The series received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, it holds an approval rating of 54% with an average rating of 5.88/10 based on 24 reviews; the site's critical consensus states, "Laced with troubling irony, Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes skirts introspection, making it just as illusive as its subject." On Metacritic, the series has a score of 55 based on reviews from 6 critics, indicating mixed or average reviews. In Vulture, Matt Zoller Seitz wrote he was a little disappointed, appreciating the weaving of news reports, images, and basic interviews, but noting that Stephen Michaud's inability to figure Bundy's motives did not mean the series lost its purpose.