Broderick was sentenced to life with the possibility of parole after being convicted of second-degree murder with an enhancement for the use of a firearm
Credit: Jerry Mcclard/San Diego Union-Tribune via ZUMA
NEED TO KNOW
- Convicted murderer Betty Broderick has died at 78 years old
- Broderick gained national notoriety after she killed her husband and his new wife in their bed on Nov. 5, 1989
- Broderick had been serving a life sentence in California since she was convicted of second-degree murder in 1991
Betty Broderick, widely known for murdering her husband and his new wife in 1989, has died while serving a life sentence. She was 78.
Broderick, whose real name is Elizabeth A. Broderick, died on Friday, May 8, at 3:00 a.m. local time, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) said in a statement shared with PEOPLE.
Three weeks before her death, Broderick was moved from the California Institution for Women to an outside medical center "for a higher level of care," the CDCR said. The details of her health condition are unclear.
A medical doctor determined that her initial cause of death was natural. The San Bernardino County Coroner will officially rule on her cause of death at a later time, per the CDCR.
Broderick was transferred to the California Institution for Women on Feb. 26, 1992. Before that, she was held in San Diego County after being convicted of second-degree murder with an enhancement for use of a firearm. She was serving a life sentence with the possibility of parole when she died, the CDCR said.
Broderick gained national notoriety after killing her husband, Dan Broderick, and his new wife, Linda Kolkena, on Nov. 5, 1989.
Betty and Dan wed in 1969 and shared four children. In the early 1980s, Dan began an affair with Kolkena, a former flight attendant whom he had hired to work as his legal assistant amid marital woes with Betty. Though he denied the affair following Betty's suspicions, Dan eventually left Betty and filed for divorce in 1985, and the two battled over the sale of their family home and custody of their four children. Dan had been granted custody, and Betty was given visitation rights. Their court dispute often included their children, which drove Betty into a depression.
Dan and Kolkena married in 1989. Later that year, Betty shot and killed the couple in their bed.
Broderick's first trial ended in a mistrial. Betty was officially convicted of two counts of second-degree murder and sentenced to two consecutive terms of 15 years to life plus two years for illegal use of a firearm in 1991.
Though she was eligible for parole, she was denied several times.
Credit: Howard Lipin/The San Diego Union-Tribune via Getty
Want to keep up with the latest crime coverage? Sign up for PEOPLE's free True Crime newsletter for breaking crime news, ongoing trial coverage and details of intriguing unsolved cases.
In 2017, San Diego County Deputy District Attorney Richard Sachs said Betty was "completely unrepentant" and described her as "defiant."
However, Betty claimed that she met the requirements for parole and should have been released years before.
“I have no one to speak for me. This was a case of domestic abuse: a pattern of coercive control that lasted throughout our marriage until the day I killed them,” Betty alleged in a letter to Murder Made Me Famous producers. “Now I am only a political prisoner. They have no reason to deny my parole.”
She was scheduled to be up for parole again in 2032. She would have been 84 years old.
Born in 1947, Betty was raised in a strict Catholic home in Westchester County, just outside of New York City. She often took care of her four siblings and wrote in her 2015 memoir Telling On Myself that her parents had primed her to grow up to be a housewife. After trying her hand at modeling and working at a restaurant and a department store, she enrolled at the University of Mount Saint Vincent in 1965, where she studied English and early childhood education.
Read the full article here
