Was Ted Bundy a product of incest?

In the previous post I linked an article about Ted Bundy to substantiate his work at a suicide hotline. The article, Six Little-Known Facts About Ted Bundy That Every Bundyphile Should Know, contained two other tidbits I'd been unaware of.

First:

Ted Bundy, born Theodore Robert Cowell, grew up living a lie. Ted’s mother, Louise Cowell, was single when she gave birth to him and in the 1940’s that was a serious no-no. Ted’s grandparents took their daughter in, telling young Ted that his grandparents were his parents and his mother was his sister.

As if that wasn’t messed up enough, Ted’s grandfather, Samuel Cowell, is rumored to be his biological father. Although it was never confirmed, if the rumor is true, that would make Ted Bundy the product of incest.

Here's the picture they provided of a young Ted with his grandfather (and maybe father):



If the rumor is true, then Ted inherited three-quarters of his genes from Samuel Cowell. And Louise Bundy never gave up the name of Ted's father, which tends to lend credence to the rumor.

The incest also raises the possibility that Ted's mental problems were organically-caused. Ted wasn't inbred-looking, in fact was often described as handsome. But that doesn't negate the possibility that the incest resulted in brain defects.

I had always assumed that Louise was a cold, harsh woman whose lack of love for her son turned him into the monster he became. But if she had been raped by her father, Louise was just another victim herself.

In addition to the shame of bearing a child out of wedlock, Louise must have worried about how the inbreeding would affect Ted. And all of those feelings must have been subtly communicated to Ted from the moment he was born. 

Louise Bundy was evidently steadfast in her defense of her son up until he started confessing. It sounds as if she actually believed in his innocence, too, which, while the height of naivete, is understandable in a mother. 

On the day he died, she told him twice, "You'll always be my precious son." Which makes it sound as if she actually did love him. 

Most of the pictures I've seen of her, like the one above, showing her lean, tough face, and the severe hairdo she kept all her life, gave her a somewhat stark and forbidding demeanor. But reading about her has softened my view of her. And what can you do if, as a young girl, you're raped by your father?

None of Louise's other four children -- all fathered by her husband John Bundy -- ever got into any significant trouble. Which would indicate that it was Samuel Cowell, and not Louise, who put the curse on Ted.

The other thing I hadn't known was that Bundy had helped take down the Green River Killer:

It’s surprising to see the words “help” and “Bundy” in the same sentence. In a surprising move, Bundy contacted the detective that helped put him behind bars, Robert D. Keppel, while he was on death row. Keppel was working on the “Green River Killer” investigation, desperately seeking to stop the infamous killer. Bundy was able to help Keppel understand the inner workings of a serial killer’s mind, ultimately helping the detective identify Gary Ridgway and bring him to justice.

This is a little reminiscent of Clarice Starling going to visit Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs in order to obtain his help in tracking down the serial killer "Buffalo Bill."

Bundy's probable motivation for helping out was to prevent the Green River Killer from surpassing him. (Bundy, like many serial killers, took a certain proprietary pride in the number of his victims.) 

I had known of Bundy's job at the suicide hotline before. But his motives for doing so weren't purely to appear noble. Sociopaths savor other people's pain. And where better to experience that than on a phone with someone who is so distraught they want to take their own life?

Ted Bundy is probably the most famous serial killer in history, the first person people think of when they think of serial killers. He's the archetype, the bogeyman whose name is shorthand for everything evil and twisted. Much has been written about him over the years, a lot of which I've read. I'm surprised I'd never heard the incest rumor before, or about how he'd helped find the Green River Killer.