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Show Bundy sours Bahamas sojourn No matter how far away I travel, I always find a reminder of home. Last week I'm lounging in a deck chair in the Bahamas and I'm talking talk-ing to an older man who solemnly acknowledged I was from Utah. The man, now retired, was a cop in Seattle. BRYAN GRAY Columnist computers to link the name with the car models. In a way, the Bundy case caused police departments to upgrade and professionalize their operations. But still, it's difficult to track down a serial murderer." The man paused for a few seconds and then continued, his thoughts trickling amid the humid Caribbean sun. "A lot of people don't know that Bundy was offering to help provide some insight into our worst serial murder case. You've probably heard of the Green River killings." I told him I had. After killing more than 50 victims, the man has never been caught. 44 Well, Bundy was trying to buy time from his electrocution by helping help-ing us with the Green River case. He didn't know anything specific, but some of the media people thought Bundy could zero in on the mentality of the killer. I didn't agree with that, but I often wonder if we could have caught the man if Bundy had been more cooperative. As normal human beings, we have a hard time thinking like a serial killer." I asked him if any progress had been made in the Green River case. The national publicity, I said, had all but dried up in recent years. "He's probably vanished by now," said the officer. "But the Green River guy was smarter than Ted Bundy. Unlike Bundy, this guy left very few clues. The media was jumping all over us to find the guy-but guy-but that's like finding a needle in a haystack. We figure that the guy killed for about two years in King County, then killed some girls in the Portland area, and later killed some in San Diego. Every time we hear of a rash of prostitute killings in some part of the country, we figure our man is responsible. But he's left no more clues in the other areas than he did in Seattle. Right now he's somewhere out there eyeing a couple of young girls. He's probably prob-ably up to 100 by now. ' The man learns that I'm a writer. 'I hate to criticize your profession," profes-sion," he says, "but the news media is a real problem when it comes to serial murder investigations. investiga-tions. The media expects instant results, and reports about our investigation in-vestigation can alert the killers to what we're planning. I'm not saying say-ing the news media stopped us from finding the Green River killer, but they certainly didn't help us." Then, suddenly, the man shifted topics. "Enough of this talk, though. We're out here to relax and enjoy this beach and the sun. Some things you can't dwell on." But he couldn't ever forget, I suggested. "No, I can't forget. There would be a lot of girls alive in Utah today if we had stumbled onto Bundy. We weren't that far away from catching him." And what if he had been the arresting ar-resting officer? He smiled. "That would have been the best moment of my entire police career. Possibly intrigued by this delightful thought, the man turned to a waiter and ordered a pina col-oda. "Whenever I think of Utah," he mused, "I always think of Ted Bundy. Some of the guys who worked with me still have feelings of guilt that we didn't catch him when he was murdering in Seattle. ' Heck, we had a lot of information, but there was no system then to catch cat-ch a guy like him. " I told him I remembered that Bundy s name had been on a list of prime suspects, but the detectives were still working their way through the list when Bundy moved to Salt Lake. "Oh, we would have eventually caught him," said the man. "Bundy has come across as a bright guy in the media, but he really wasn't very smart. For instance, friends of the victims heard him introduce himself as Ted. Now how smart is it to go around using your real first name? We also knew the murderer drove a Volkswagen, but we didn't have the |