Why Ted Bundy? Extremely Wicked? did he work on a suicide hotline?

The stranger next to me: revised edition and update

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But another disturbing (and totally confusing) detail of Bundy's life that is not as widely discussed is the fact that while studying psychology at the University of Washington, Bundy worked at Suicide Hotline Crisis Center in Seattle. Yes, it's true: Ted Bundy has helped save lives. (It was in the center that he met a former policewoman, Ann Rule, with whom he befriended, who would later write one of the seminal books on the real crime of Bundy, The stranger next to me.)

Why would a man unfaithful to death and destruction work on a suicide hot-line? According to psychologist Darrel Turner, clinical and forensic psychologist, all this is due to the psychopathic nature of Bundy.

So, what exactly is a psychopath?

According to Turner, a psychopath attacks others to get what they want, and Ted Bundy is roughly defining the pseudo-psychopath in the manual.

"I say prototypical" because it's not like a universal solution for psychopathy, "says Turner." There are certain traits that we tend to see: a lack of empathy and the defense of interests, even if the interests of others are trampled. But with Bundy, we see a lot of other traits of psychopathy, such as pathological lying and superficial charm. "

Is psychopathy a mental illness?

Technically no. In the United States, health workers use the so-called Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) to diagnose mental disorders, and psychopathy is not their own diagnosis.

However, according to Turner, he often falls under the umbrella of antisocial personality disorder, which is in the manual. "It's so widely recognized that when you say that someone is a psychopath, it means more than antisocial personality disorders and people recognize what you're talking about," Turner says.

Ted Bundy ever been diagnosed with a mental illness?

Turner says it's unlikely. "I'm not aware that he's ever been assessed for his skills or mental health, and I do not think he's ever gone down that road in defense," he says. "They do not just diagnose people to do it because someone has to pay for it."

But, says Turner, given the wealth of information available on Bundy – resulting mainly from interviews he gave before his death in 1989 – he feels confident of diagnosing him as a psychopath. "Nobody will say that," he says. However, any other diagnosis, without examining Bundy or the people who knew him best, would be pure conjecture.

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So, if psychopaths have no empathy, why would Bundy be working in a suicide hotline to help people?

Turner points out some reasons. On the other hand, Bundy was a psychology student. It may only be done to get bonus points at school. "It could be as boring and less sexy than that," says Turner. But he continues by offering some additional explanations that play directly into the psychopathic nature of Bundy.

"I'm not surprised that he was working on a suicide hotline," he continues. "Psychopaths will very often put themselves in a strange position to learn what normal people are in order to better melt into reality by simulating emotions that they have learned from other people." Turner says that Bundy's work there would have allowed him to better understand what people need to hear and feel to be persuaded.

"As a person who has studied life by manipulating other people, I think it makes sense that he gets such work."

Alternatively, psychopaths tend to have a divine complex, so putting people's lives in his hands would have fueled this need. "There is that great sense of self that comes with psychopathy," said Turner. "This feeling that you are someone special, that you are a powerful person, that you need to feel powerful and that you need to feel a control, that's why I think the fact to work at a suicide hotline also met that need at Bundy. "

Wait, does all this mean that working on a suicide line may have made Bundy a more experienced serial killer?

"It's absolutely a possibility," says Turner.

Extremely nasty, terribly bad and vile, with Zac Efron and Lily Collins, is now streaming on Netflix.