US3 min(s) read
Published 13:42 14 Jul 2026 GMT
Death row survivor Nick Yarris has opened up about what it was really like sharing prison space with notorious serial killer Ted Bundy.
Yarris, who was sentenced to death in 1982, spent 23 years imprisoned before being exonerated by DNA evidence.
Yarris said he wasn't immediately sent to a conventional death row unit, but instead to what he described as an especially brutal disciplinary block inside Pennsylvania's Huntington Prison, before being moved to death row at Florida State Prison.
During that time, he said he found himself incarcerated alongside some of America's most infamous killers, including Gary Heidnik and Ted Bundy.
Asked what Bundy was like, Yarris didn't hold back. ”He was a little b****," he said. "He was a braggadocious idiot."
According to Yarris, Bundy frequently boasted about his exploits, including allegedly getting "one of his groupies pregnant in the visiting room."
"He wasn't allowed to speak to anyone," Yarris recalled. "See, out on the street men who prey on children and women are monsters. Put them in prison around real men? They shut right the f*** up and know their place."
Yarris also claimed he inadvertently triggered one of Bundy's prison beatings.
He said Bundy had tried offering him legal advice and encouraging him to believe he could overturn his conviction.
"I finally told him I didn't get off on killing little girls and obsessing over my bad mommy."
According to Yarris, Bundy immediately lost his temper.
"The vein in his forehead popped out like a worm. He lost his mind."
When Bundy ignored officers' orders to calm down, Yarris said guards intervened.
"They dragged him out of the law library and beat the hell out of him."
As Bundy was taken away, Yarris remembered shouting after him: "Hey Teddy... don't forget to spit."
"He'd spat on me," he added.
Reflecting on Bundy's personality, Yarris described him as deeply narcissistic.
"Everything had to be about him. Bundy was insane. He had something snide to say about everything. He was on this glorification mission. He was a megalomaniac, he made everything grandiose. He bragged about making judges stutter. He was just a self-absorbed a**hole."
Yarris, who was officially vindicated in 2005 and released from prison, has now turned his story in a force for good, including writing a play, a screenplay, and a television series, as well as addressing the Geneva Convention about the death penalty — arguing that it should be abolished in the United States.
