Rose Bundy or Rosa Bundy as some call her, is widely regarded as American serial killer Ted Bundy’s daughter. There are doubts about Rose’s real biological father as we shall see in this article, but her mother officially named Ted Bundy her father.
Here we look at facts about Bundy, what she is doing now as well her family background and the circumstances surrounding her birth. Below, we summarised ten top facts that you must know about Rose Bundy.
Rose Bundy top ten facts
- Rose Bundy or Rosa Bundy was born on 24 October 1982 to Carole Ann Boone and Ted Bundy.
- She lived in Florida until the age of four and has spent most of her adulthood in Washington since then.
- She never met her father who was serving a death row sentence during her conception, birth and childhood.
- Ted Bundy had confessed to the gruesome murder of 30 women with who he sometimes performed necrophilia acts on multiple occasions.
- Her father, Ted Bundy, was executed in 1989 after he was sentenced to death back in 1980, which was two years before she was born.
- In 1986, her mother Carole Boone divorced her father and took her and her half-brother James to Washington.
- Boone is said to have started a new life with her children and even changed their names to avoid stigma.
- Rose Bundy’s mother died in January 2018 in a Washington retirement home at the age of 70 from septic shock.
- There has been no publicised media sighting of Rose Bundy since her mother took her to Washington in 1986.
- Rosa is said to still be living under a new name and identity in the US and will be 39 years old in 2021.
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Early life
Rose Bundy or Rosa Bundy was born on 24 October 1982 to Carole Ann Boone. Boone claimed that she was Ted Bundy’s daughter despite the serial killer serving a death row sentence at the time at the Florida State Prison (FSP), otherwise known as Raiford Prison.
There are some reports that claimed that while the Raiford Prison did not allow conjugal visits for inmates, it was common knowledge that guards allowed private and intimate visits, in exchange for bribes. Thus, this was likely how Boone came to be carrying Bundy’s baby.
Although, she never really opened up about it. In a newspaper article in The Deseret news, she replied to an inquiry into her conception with the flippant tone; “it’s nobody’s business.” Decades later, a lot of people are still interested in how Boone came to give birth to Rosa Bundy for Ted Bundy.
Rose Bundy spent her early childhood in Florida where she lived with her mother Carole Boone and half-brother James. There is no record of her ever meeting her father, who was on death row at the time of her birth. In 1986, her mother divorced her father and moved to Washington where she changed both Rose’s and James’ name to avoid stigma. Before we go on, let us take a brief look at Rosa’s family background.
Family background
Theodore ‘Ted’ Bundy
Her father Ted Bundy was a serial killer who kidnapped, raped and murdered numerous young women and girls during the 1970s. Ted was the adopted son of Johnny Culpepper Bundy, and his mother was Eleanor Louise Cowell. Jack Worthington was alleged to be his father.
There are investigators who believe that he had started his crime even earlier. Despite Bundy eventually confessing to more than 30 homicides, they say that the number of cases may be higher.
His mode of operation was usually to approach his victims in public and leverage his good looks and charisma to win their trust. He sometimes pretended to be injured or disabled to get them to interact with him or even act as an authority figure.
After he lured his victims to a quieter place, he knocks them unconscious and takes them to his hideouts where he rapes and strangles them. He mutilated his victims severely and may even sometimes revisit their remains to perform sexual acts. A finding uncovered 12 decapitated victims and heads that he kept in his apartment.
There are other times when Ted Bundy broke into people’s home and viciously attacked them while they slept. He killed many with some barely escaping with their lives.
Ted Bundy private life
Before his arrest, he had been involved with Elizabeth ‘Liz’ Kendall and acted as a father to her daughter, Molly, from a previous marriage. Then, he met Carole Ann Boone in 1974 during their time together at the Department of Emergency Services in Olympia, Washington.
At the time, Boone was going through her second divorce and already had a son named James. Initially, she refused to date Bundy when he approached her on several occasions. However, over time, they became closer and started a romantic relationship.
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He was still in a relationship with Liz Kendall at the time as well who continually collaborated with the police after their description of a wanted serial killer matched his. She was not alone as Boone also contacted the police about the match, but only once.
In 1975, he was arrested in Utah due to suspicious behaviour but was released because the police did not have enough evidence to hold him. However, they spoke to Kendall and she gave them enough information to increase their suspicion. They in turn told her about his relationship with Boone and another woman named Brooks. She continued dating him until 1980 when she broke all ties with him.
In 1976, Bundy was placed on trial and found guilty of kidnapping and assault. He was sentenced to one-to-15 years in the Utah State Prison. He escaped in June 1977 during a trial where he had elected to serve as his own attorney. The police later recaptured him six days later.
In December 1977, he escaped from prison with help from Carole Ann Boone, according to several reports. He committed more murders and assaults until he was apprehended again in February 1978. During his trial, Boone believed he was innocent and served as his character witness. She also moved to Florida to be with him during the trial and his time in prison.
On 24 July 1979, Ted Bundy was sentenced to death by trial judge Edward Cowart for the Chi Omega House murders of 1978, the first of three death convictions.
Ted Bundy and Carole Ann Boone marriage
In January 1980, he was again sentenced to death for the murder of 12-year-old Kimberly Dianne Leach. Kimberly Leach was a student at Lake City Junior High School who went missing on 8 February 1978 and her remains were found in March, seven weeks later.
It was during the Kimberly Leach trial that Ted Bundy took advantage of an obscure Florida law providing that a marriage declaration in court, in the presence of a judge, constituted a legal marriage. He was questioning Boone, who was testifying as his character witness and then asked her to marry him right there in the middle of the trial. She accepted his marriage proposal and they were declared publicly married. He was sentenced to death by electrocution a month after his court marriage.
It was likely during one of her several court visits that she conceived Rose ‘Rosa’ Bundy. An online article claims that during these visits, Boone smuggled drugs for Bundy in her v----a.
Ted Bundy trial
Throughout his trial, and before he began his confession, Bundy tried to establish his innocence. He was backed by the fact that the police never found his fingerprints at any of the crime scenes nor any other physical evidence that could not be argued in court.
There are several Ted Bundy trial videos online that show that he was defiant in the face of certain defeat because he always believed he was ‘the smartest person in the room’. See one such clip here.
Divorce
Six years after their dramatic courtroom marriage, Ted Bundy confessed to the crimes he had been accused of and more. It turned out that, unlike many had thought, Boone did believe that he was innocent and was not an accomplice.
Hearing his confession, Ted Bundy’s wife filed for divorce. Then, she took her two children – James and Rose – and moved back to Washington. Bundy for his part continued his confessions which eventually included 30 victims.
The Ted Bundy interview became popular as he revealed more details including cases that the police had not tied to serial killing. However, while he made more revelations, he withheld information which many believed was a tactic to delay his execution.
Ted Bundy’s execution date was initially fixed in 1986 but it was moved to 1989 when he was finally executed. Before his death, a young Florida attorney named Diana Weiner allegedly fell in love again and tried to delay his execution along with several of his supporters.
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First, Ted Bundy supporters called for executive clemency, this tactic failed. Weiner also asked the families of Bundy’s victims to sign a petition to then Florida Governor Bob Martinez for an execution postponement to give Bundy time to reveal more information. The families refused and so did the governor.
Carole Boone refused to attend his execution despite him requesting it and she did not take his phone call on the day of his execution. She was allegedly both heartbroken over his shocking deception and sudden confession as well as his romantic relationship with Weiner.
At Ted Bundy’s execution, hundreds of people were gathered on a pasture across the prison perimeter and they sang, danced and set off fireworks to celebrate it.
Where is Rose ‘Rosa’ Bundy today?
According to many news sources, after Boone left Bundy and returned to Washington, she changed her name and those of her children as well. This move is conceivable because of the negative light in which Ted Bundy crimes and life will cast on all who knew him personally.
Even the popular biographer Ann Rule, who wrote the most widely read pieces on Bundy, revealed that she did not want to follow up on Boone’s life. On her website, which is now no longer available, Rule explained her rationale:
“I have deliberately avoided knowing anything about Ted’s ex-wife and daughter’s whereabouts because they deserve privacy. I don’t want to know where they are; I never want to be caught off guard by some reporter’s question about them. All I know is that Ted’s daughter has grown up to be a fine young woman.”
Rose Bundy will be 39 years old on her birthday in 2021 and she has managed to stay out of the public eye. Meanwhile, Film Daily claims that Carole Boone died from septic shock in a Washington State retirement home at the age of 70 in January 2018.
During her time in the home, no one knew who she was until her passing. She was only said to have two interests – knitting and watching nature programs. Women’s Health Mag also corroborated this claim in a January 2020 online publication on her.
There are many who still ask questions like: is Ted Bundy alive? Ted Bundy died in 1989 aged 43 after nine years of being on death row. There are other serial killers who are still alive like the Green River Killer, Gary Ridgway but definitely not Ted Bundy.
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