The campus where Susan Curtis was abducted

Crime Scene Location in Provo, Utah

This is the college campus where serial killer Ted Bundy abducted Susan Curtis.

It is called Brigham Young University, and it is situated on Campus Drive in Provo, Utah.

On June 27th, 1975, Curtis attended the Bountiful Orchard Youth Conference at the Wilkinson Student Center.

Following dinner, she told her friends that she was heading back to her dorm room to brush her teeth. At the time, the 15-year-old had new dental braces that she needed to keep clean.

After exiting the Wilkinson Student Center, the Bountiful native set off across the BYU campus by herself.

Her destination that evening was a dormitory building called Helaman Halls, which was 0.6 miles to the northwest. Judging by Google Maps, it should have taken her roughly 10–13 minutes to get there on foot.

Despite the short distance, Curtis never returned to the banquet.

Susan Curtis — A BYU professor said that he had seen Curtis trying to sell a textbook at the rear of his class. This false sighting, coupled with her habit of running away, led the police to believe that no abduction had occurred.

At some point during her journey, she crossed paths with Bundy, who was most likely hanging around BYU in search of his next victim. In the past, he had successfully abducted Donna Manson, Roberta Kathleen Parks, and Susan Elaine Rancourt from their respective campuses.

When you consider his behavior in other cases, it stands to reason that he strategically parked his vehicle in the most secluded parking lot that he could find—a lot that was within walking distance but slightly out of the way.

This would explain why no one witnessed the attack.

This aerial photograph of the BYU campus was taken in September 1969. The Wilkinson Student Center is circled in blue. The red circle highlights the dorm building that Susan Curtis was planning on walking to that night. We have marked some of the parking lots in the area with an orange X. As you can see, there were a number of places where Bundy could have parked his car.

After convincing Curtis to help him carry something back to his Volkswagen, it is likely that he struck her over the head with a crowbar. He then hurriedly lifted her unconscious body into his car and drove away.

Bundy was arrested during a traffic stop in West Valley City roughly one month after Curtis' disappearance. Following his arrest, he quickly became the prime suspect in the murders of several women in the Pacific Northwest.

Although he initially maintained his innocence while he was sitting on death row, he eventually agreed to come clean in a desperate bid to delay his execution.

In 1989, he confessed to Curtis' murder and attempted to describe the location where he buried her remains.

Unfortunately, a search of the site failed to turn up anything of note. To this day, she remains listed as a missing person.

Susan Curtis crime scene location

The address and the GPS coordinates for this location are as follows:

Address

Campus Drive, Provo, Utah, UT 84601, USA

Map

To view directions on how to get there, you can use the Google Maps shortcut below:

Google Maps

GPS coordinates

The latitude and longitude coordinates for the campus are:

40.249186, -111.648444

Directions

She was last seen leaving the Ernest L. Wilkinson Student Center on the eastern side of the campus.

Photos

Photos of the campus and other related images.

Curtis' route

This aerial image shows the three routes that Susan may have taken that evening.

Google Maps indicates that the orange route is the preferred one. However, that might not have been the case back in 1975.

We also have to take into account the fact that the young girl wasn't very familiar with the campus.

All of these routes are roughly the same length. Because of this, there is no way of knowing which one she decided to take.

As the 15-year-old was making her way back to the dorm building, Bundy somehow managed to intercept her and lead her off course.

Because it was a busy college campus, it is likely that he used some sort of ruse to lure the teenager back to his Volkswagen. For example, he may have claimed that he was having issues with his car and that he needed someone's assistance to start it.

It is also possible that he was feigning an injury and "struggling" to carry something.

Wilkinson Student Center

This is a Google Street View image of the Wilkinson Student Center in Provo. That evening, a banquet was being held at the center. Curtis was wearing a full-length evening dress.

Initially, the police did not believe that the young girl had been abducted. This is because she had previously gone missing for days at a time.

In November 1974, Curtis attended the exact same high school play that Bundy had abducted Debra Kent from. This means that she was unlucky enough to cross paths with him on two separate occasions. For all we know, the two may have even noticed each other in the auditorium.