Ted Bundy killed Utah girl in 1974, authorities say

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Authorities in Utah say Ted Bundy is responsible for the death of a girl more than 50 years ago, six months after the serial killer was linked to another teen victim in the state.

Melissa Ann Smith’s body was found by hunters in a wooded area in Summit County in 1974 and no suspect was identified.

“Although there was much speculation regarding a suspect at the time, a suspect was never named, and the case was never officially closed,” Summit County Sheriff Kacey Bates said at a news conference Tuesday in Park City, reports The Salt Lake Tribune.

DNA collected from Smith’s body was a strong match from evidence taken from Laura Ann Aime, another Bundy victim whose remains were found in American Fork Canyon the same year, police said.

Authorities confirmed in April that the sadistic slayer killed the 17-year-old Aime after matching his DNA in that cold case.

DNA evidence led to killer

Summit County Attorney Margaret Olson said the DNA evidence, “when considered alongside evidence related to pattern, motive, means and opportunity,” led investigators to confidently say that Bundy was Smith’s killer.

Smith, the 17-year-old daughter of a Midvale police chief at the time of her murder, left a friend in a pizzeria on the night of Oct. 18, 1974, and was last seen at a restaurant in nearby Murray a short time later. Nine days later, her naked body was found by a deer hunter in Summit Park, near Park City.

Utah County Sgt. Mike Reynolds said a highly similar DNA profile linked to Bundy was found in evidence from Smith’s autopsy.

“With every case closure, may we stomp the memory of Ted Bundy out,” Reynolds said, reports PBS.

Other unsolved murders

Earlier in the year, the Utah Department of Public Safety said Bundy was believed to be connected to three other unsolved murders. Those victims include Nancy Wilcox, a 16-year-old from Salt Lake County, 15-year-old Susan Curtis, who vanished in 1975 while attending a youth conference at Brigham Young University in Provo, and Deborah Smith, a 17-year-old runaway whose remains was found near Salt Lake City International Airport in 1976.

In his final days, Bundy gave a series of confessions where he claimed to have killed at least 30 young women, including victims in Colorado, Idaho and Washington state.

It is believed that he murdered at least five, and possibly eight, young women in Utah. Some of the victims’ bodies have never been found.

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While authorities believe he is responsible for at least 36 deaths, the death count could be well into the hundreds.

Bundy was convicted of the 1978 murders of two women, Margaret Bowman and Lisa Levy, at a Florida State University sorority house. He was executed in January 1989 by electric chair in Florida.

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