Did Ted Bundy Kill In NJ?

It all seems to add up, Christian Barth says. And he hasn't been able to let go since he first heard about the so-called "co-ed" murders off the Garden State Parkway in South Jersey that happened 50 years ago.

Barth, 53, believes the two 19-year-olds who were stabbed to death after Memorial Day weekend in 1969 were likely killed by serial killer Ted Bundy. "You find facts that certainly match up," Barth told Patch.

Barth, an attorney and author, has recently completed a true crime book tentatively titled, "The Garden State Parkway Murders: A Cold Case Odyssey." In addition to Ted Bundy, Barth's book examines other suspects and persons of interest.

Barth is arguing that Bundy may have been in the area at the time of the "co-ed murders" soon after finishing up his semester at Temple University.

For Barth, it's something that helps him come full-circle after his parents first told him about the murders when he was a young boy. It's long bugged him that the crime wasn't solved.

It also happened in an area where Barth has often visited, and as somebody who writes and investigates crimes, he's felt a need to get some closure – or some answers, at least.

"I've uncovered an extraordinary amount of information about Ted Bundy which hasn't been made public," Barth told Patch. "Much of what I've written about dispels several commonly held misperceptions about him and his upbringing."

He's writing the story just as Bundy’s been the focus of a Netflix documentary and a movie, “Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes” and “Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile.”

What puzzles Barth, however, is that the Ocean City murders were never mentioned in either Netflix production.

"I found this glaring omission to be strikingly odd, especially since 'The Ted Bundy Tapes' shows a picture of Ted as a toddler, standing with his mother in front of what appears to be the 14th Street fishing pier in Ocean City," Barth said. "I emailed the producers in April 2019, and they never replied."

Indeed, the Atlantic County Prosecutor's Office and State Police have pursued leads that, in the past, have run into dead ends, authorities have said.

"They couldn't find anyone who knew him," Barth said.

But for Barth, there is possible evidence out there – some of which may have come from Bundy's own mouth.

Indeed, after Bundy was executed in 1989, Barth noted that forensic psychologist Arthur Norman told The SandPaper in Ocean City that the serial killer admitted to killing both women, and that they may have been his first two murders.

Also, four years after the execution, the families of the two victims, Elizabeth Perry and Susan Davis, told The Deseret News in Utah – where Bundy committed many of his murders – that they believe the two women's deaths were avenged when the serial killer was executed in Florida in January 1989.

Bundy biographer Richard Larsen, a close friend of Elizabeth Perry's parents, was quoted as saying he was convinced the women's deaths were the serial killer's "first adult, planned crimes," and that what followed was "a complete circle from the East Coast to the West Coast, back to the Rocky Mountains and then down to Florida."

"There was never enough to say for sure that he did it," Maj. Thomas Kinzer, one of the original detectives on the murders, told The Deseret News. "It remains an open investigation."

Kinzer also was quoted as saying he located Bundy's aunt in Philadelphia who told him that her nephew could not have gone to the Jersey Shore that weekend because he had been in an auto accident and had a cast on his leg.

But it was Bundy who used a leg or arm cast or sling to lure victims.

Perry and Davis, both college students, visited Ocean City for several days over the Memorial Day holiday in 1969, according to The Press of Atlantic City. They stopped at the Somers Point Diner for an early breakfast, and they were never seen again until Monday, June 2, when their bodies were found off the Parkway.

Jon Katz, who was a 22-year-old reporter for The Press of Atlantic City at the time and wrote about the murders, said police were frustrated with little to go on — no pictures or DNA evidence, according to The Press.

To Barth, that would be consistent with how Bundy operated. The serial killer who may have murdered more than 30 women was considered an expert in making sure that little to no forensic evidence was found.

Barth said he also interviewed at least two people who claimed they saw a man that holiday weekend who matched Bundy’s description.

"It's my hope that these revelations bring much needed exposure to the case and ultimately help solve the murders," Barth told Patch.

Barth also noted that Norman said Bundy was in Ocean City when he saw "young women lying on the beach. It was like a kind of overwhelming kind of vision."

"Evidently he found himself tearing around the place for a couple of days," Barth said Norman told The SandPaper. "Eventually, without really planning anything, he picked up a couple of young girls, and it ended up it was the first time he had ever done it. "

"There just has to be something to that," said Barth. "It's all very sad."