The Final Hours Of America's Most Notorious Serial Killers

Outside Florida State Prison at Starke, the sun had not come up, and a crowd of several hundred people was already celebrating. There were sparklers. There were homemade signs. Somebody was selling T-shirts. People held up frying pans. A radio station had been running jokes all week about the voltage. Inside, in a cell on death watch, Ted Bundy had refused the special last meal the state offered him. A standard tray — steak, eggs, hash browns, toast, juice — was brought anyway. He left it untouched. He had been one of the most recognizable faces in America for more than a decade. Law student. Campaign volunteer. Twice an escapee from custody. And in the final thirty-six hours of his life, the man who had spent years insisting on his innocence spent nearly every available minute talking.