Lake Sammamish State Park

This is the park where serial killer Ted Bundy abducted Janice Ann Ott and Denise Marie Naslund.

It is located at 2182 NW Sammamish Road in Issaquah, Washington.

Bundy targeted Ott and Naslund in broad daylight on Sunday, July 14, 1974. Approximately 40,000 people visited Lake Sammamish State Park that afternoon to enjoy the sunny weather. The warm conditions provided a welcome respite from the Pacific Northwest's typically damp and gloomy climate.

Failed attempts

Bundy arrived at the park with a prepared ruse, wearing a beige sling and planning to ask victims to help him unload a sailboat at his parents' house.

His first attempt occurred earlier that afternoon when he approached 22-year-old Janice Graham near the bandstand. After politely introducing himself, he asked Graham to assist him in loading a sailboat onto his car. She agreed and accompanied him toward the parking lot.

As they walked across the grass, Bundy stopped three times to clutch his arm, explaining that he had injured it during a racquetball game. When they reached the parking lot, Graham saw a Volkswagen Beetle but no boat. Noting her confusion, Bundy gestured toward the passenger-side door and claimed the boat was at his parents' house "just up the hill."

Graham refused to enter the vehicle because she was due to meet her husband and parents. Upon learning she could not leave, Bundy calmly responded, "Oh, that's OK. I should have told you that it wasn't in the parking lot." He walked Graham back toward the bandstand, apologized again, and veered to his right.

Ott's abduction

After parting ways with Graham, Bundy noticed Ott sunbathing alone.

A police report indicates she was on the beach:

At about 12:30 hours, Sylvia Valint was laying on the beach at the park with her two friends. Jerry Snyder was about 15 feet from Valint with his wife. Theresa Sharp was with her family about 10 feet from Valint. They were all on the beach, about 200 yards directly in front of the east restroom. The above three witnesses all observed Janice Ott arrive on the beach and position herself between them.

Off-duty DEA agent Kelly Snyder saw Bundy approaching Ott at approximately 12:30 p.m.

Snyder described the interaction:

"I kept watching him, and he eventually ended up being right in front of me, where he approached a young girl. She was a young and attractive blonde girl. And he asked her, words to the effect of, 'I need some help.' She's saying she just got here. So obviously, what's going through her mind is, 'I'd like to help you out, but I'm here to relax.' He kept on and on, and he talked her into whatever he talked her into. He said something about a catamaran. And ultimately, she gets up, reluctantly, because her head is down and she is like, 'I can't believe I'm doing this.' And the end result is she's no longer with us because she was a nice person."

At roughly 12:30 p.m., Bundy led Ott to his Volkswagen in the parking lot.

Once she entered the car, Bundy drove four miles east to a secluded dirt road in Issaquah.

Naslund's abduction

Bundy returned to the park three and a half hours later to find a second victim. At 4:30 p.m., Naslund left her friends to visit the restroom near the parking lot.

Her boyfriend and friends realized something was wrong when she failed to return. The group was aware of a potential predator in the area, as several women, including university student Georgann Hawkins, had recently gone missing in Seattle.

Initial aftermath

Although photographs taken on July 14 show police at Lake Sammamish, they were not investigating the abductions. Instead, officers were responding to reports that a group of bikers were disturbing the peace.

The victims were not officially reported missing until the following day.

Investigation

Investigators later learned that a man calling himself "Ted" had approached multiple women at the park. After interviewing witnesses, police released a composite sketch of the suspect.

Bundy's girlfriend, Liz Kloepfer, began to suspect his involvement after seeing the sketch and learning that witnesses described the suspect as driving a Volkswagen and using the name "Ted." Her suspicions deepened because Bundy had dismissed her earlier that afternoon, claiming he had "other things to do." When she pressed him for details, he had angrily replied, "Just things, Liz."

The witness report described the suspect's vehicle as metallic brown, whereas Bundy's Volkswagen was tan.

Despite this discrepancy, Kloepfer reported her suspicions to police. When she later called for an update, a detective told her that a witness believed Bundy was too old to be the man seen at Lake Sammamish.

Discovery of remains

Two months later, a pair of grouse hunters discovered the skeletal remains of Ott and Naslund in Issaquah. Bundy had left the victims in the dense foliage and undergrowth near a service road.

Investigators identified Ott through a mandible (jawbone), while a skull was determined to belong to Naslund.

While speaking in the third person to journalist Stephen Michaud in 1980, Bundy described the double abduction as an "extraordinary departure" from "the killer's" modus operandi.

He speculated that the abduction of Ott may have failed to fulfill his urges, forcing him to return to the park in search of a second victim.

Bundy described the killer's state as "overexcited, over-aroused, driven," and noted that the desires driving him that day "seemed to be stronger than usual."

During an interview with FBI agent William Hagmaier, Bundy reportedly confessed that Ott was still alive when he returned with Naslund and that he forced one to watch the assault and murder of the other. However, he later denied this specific claim while speaking to Dr. Dorothy Otnow Lewis.

A noticeable gap exists between the 12:30 p.m. abduction of Ott and Bundy's return at 4:00 p.m. Accounting for the travel time to Issaquah, he was absent for two to three hours. This duration casts doubt on the theory that he purposely held one victim alive while seeking a second.

Another point of contention about the abductions involves a photograph taken in the park that shows a Volkswagen Beetle in the background.

While some media outlets claim the car belonged to Bundy, evidence suggests otherwise. The Beetle was a popular model in the 1970s. Furthermore, Bundy's vehicle had a roof rack installed that day, which is missing from the car in the image.

Bundy denied the car was his during an interview with Detective Robert Keppel:

"You would have never seen me in Lake Sammamish State Park again with all that heat. [laughs] That's a lot of heat there."