Betty and Dan Broderick - Part 3 of 3

Betty and Dan Broderick were a golden couple in San Diego, CA. He, a powerful attorney; she, a devoted, fun-loving wife and mother of four. But when Dan turned 40 he became a cliche. He bought a Corvette, fell for his much younger legal assistant, and left Betty after 16 years of marriage. Their bitter six-year divorce became the most contentious in San Diego County history, a battle over money, custody, and control. On November 5, 1989, it ended in shocking violence when Betty walked into the couple’s home and killed Dan and his new wife, Linda, as they slept, turning a local divorce drama into one of the most infamous true crime cases of the century.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, I'm Tina and I'm rich. Welcome to love, Mary Kell.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Just the facts?

Speaker 1 (00:20):
Can you give us a summary?

Speaker 3 (00:22):
Betty and Dan Broderick married in nineteen sixty five and
went on to raise four children while Dan built his
law career. Betty devoted herself to motherhood but grew resentful
of Dan's long hours and emotional distance. By the time
they settled in La Joya, the family was wealthy and respected,
but their marriage was crumbling. After a three year affair

(00:42):
with his assistant Linda Kulkina, Dan filed for divorce following
years of gaslighting that left Betty emotionally wrecked. Devastated, Betty
lashed out in impulsive, irrational, and sometimes dangerous ways, leaving
her children caught in the middle and often neglected by
both pairs parents. What followed was a bitter five year

(01:03):
legal war that ended with a financial settlement Betty considered
devastatingly unfair. In Part one, we covered the early years
of the Broaderick's marriage. In Part two, we explored the
divorce and its fallout, and today, in Part three, we'll
talk about the murders and the aftermath.

Speaker 1 (01:20):
I wanted to mention this next thought at the end
of episode two. But I completely forgot wanted to talk
about single mothers. A lot of divorced women Betty included,
call themselves single mothers, and technically that's true. They're no
longer married and they're raising their kids without a partner
in the home. But there's an important distinction to make.
Betty had resources that many single mothers can only dream of,

(01:43):
even in the midst of a bitter divorce. She had
access to financial support, She lived in a comfortable home,
and she was never in danger of not being able
to feed her children or keep a group over their heads.
For many women, being a single mother looks very different.
It can mean working multiple jobs to cover rent, child care,
and groceries. It can mean choosing between paying the electric

(02:03):
bill and buying new shoes for the kids. It can
mean no safety in that at all, no college degree
to fall back on, no savings account, no family able
to step in and help, all while dealing with the
same feelings of loss and despair that Betty did. But
they have no choice but to soldier on. So while
Betty certainly struggled emotionally and financially compared to the life

(02:23):
she'd known as missus Dan Broderick. It's important to recognize
that her version of single motherhood was not the same
as the harsh reality so many women face. For most,
single motherhood isn't about losing status or identity. It's about
pure survival. Very well said, I wanted to mention that
because people throw around the term single motherhood a lot. Yeah,

(02:44):
and you know, it looks differently for other people. And
I just empathize with single mothers alive. And I know
I use the word single mother in the last script,
and I just wanted to make that clarification, so I
understand that it's two different, very.

Speaker 3 (02:59):
Situation different situation that she was in.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
For sure. Last night I finished the book by Kim Broderick,
Betty's Daughter, and the scene with Betty hitting Dan's house
with the suburban. Do you remember that, Yeah, So Kim
put it in a different perspective for me, and I
wanted to mention that because I think I kind of
made it sound like she tapped the house.

Speaker 3 (03:20):
That's what she made it sound like when she.

Speaker 1 (03:22):
Didn't make it sound like that. But no, when Betty
hit Dan's house, she didn't just tap the front door.
There was a lot of damage. Kim said, it felt
like that there was a major earthquake inside the house,
and it sounded like an airplane. The landscaping was demolished,
windows broke, and the door was knocked right off its hinges.
Betty put the car in rivers and repeatedly rammed the

(03:44):
house with her suburban, and she did pull a butcher's
knife on Dan. Kim and Lee were both terrified inside
the house, and they thought that they could have been killed.
As Betty drove away in the police car, she stuck
out her tongue at Kim and gave her the finger
and true Betty fast so. Kim went on to say
that she felt every important detail in her young life

(04:04):
was overshadowed by Betty and her antics. All of the
children engaged in at risk behaviors when they were very young,
and their parents didn't seem to notice. She said, like
even when like Rhett and Danny were like nine and
ten years old, they weren't like drinking and smoking all
the time, but they you know, sometimes yeah, would go.

Speaker 3 (04:25):
Do that, and they just had all surprising They had a.

Speaker 1 (04:28):
Lot of destructive behaviors and their parents either turned a
blind eye or just didn't notice.

Speaker 3 (04:34):
Yeah, they were just too busy dealing with their own stuff.

Speaker 1 (04:36):
Yeah. After the disappointing divorce settlement, Betty had no choice
but to sell the once red infested house that she'd
carefully remodeled over the years. It was now a show
place and she was devastated to sell it, but it
was the only way she could pay off the mountain
of debt. She bought a modest, two bedroom condo for
two hundred thousand dollars. That was really hard for her

(04:57):
to let go of all the status of owning a
billion dollar home for her.

Speaker 3 (05:02):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (05:03):
While Dan lived in his mansion planning trips to the
unmalthy coast with his new wife, Betty sat alone in
her crabby condo, all by herself with her pathetic excuse
of a life. In the fall of nineteen eighty eight,
Betty purchased a thirty eight Smith and Wesson five shot revolver,
a small, snubnosed pistol she jokingly called her teeny weeny

(05:23):
lady's gun. Betty carried it often tucked in her pocket
or capacious bag. She liked its weight, the way her
fingers wrapped around the cool, solid barrel. It gave her
comfort and a sense of controlling, and a life otherwise unraveling.
She mourned the life she once had. That Dan would
toss it all away for Linda felt like the final insult,

(05:43):
so painfully cliche. She had expected something more from her
genius husband, some twist worthy of his intellect. Instead, he
chose the secretary. Betty told herself Linda could have him,
but the children were different. They were her life, her identity.
She drew the line there in her mind. Dan had
never truly been a father anyway. She had raised them alone.

Speaker 3 (06:06):
Didn't she drop the kids off?

Speaker 4 (06:08):
Like?

Speaker 3 (06:08):
Didn't she take it upon herself to take them over
there and just leave them?

Speaker 1 (06:12):
She did? Yeah, so she.

Speaker 3 (06:15):
Obviously she regretted it later, but she did.

Speaker 1 (06:18):
And she didn't want full custody of them either. But
I think she wanted the kind of life where she
could drop in on them whenever she wanted, and she
really couldn't do that right. Two envelopes arrived in the mail,
more legal paperwork. One carried a thinly veiled threat of
another jail sentence if she failed to comply with court orders,

(06:38):
and cited a report from her doctor that described her
emotional disturbance and mental disease as worsening rather than improving.
The other letter flatly denied her most recent request to
amend the custody arrangement of the boys. By this time,
the girls were almost adults. I think Kim was eighteen

(06:58):
and Lee was seventeen. The words on those pages ignited
her fury, sending her into overdrive. She couldn't bear the
thought of stepping into another courtroom, facing another judge, or
hearing another lawyer dissect her life and tell her what
was wrong with her. She was finished, done and dusted
that weekend. The papers remained on her kitchen counter, but

(07:21):
her mind never left them. She obsessed over every word,
every sentence, every denial. She resolved not to allow Diana
and Linda to torment her any further. She scrawled a
note on the bottom of one of the letters, I
can't take this anymore. I forgot to give a content warning.
There's more bad language in this episode. One Linda Kulkina

(07:45):
the khant interfering with what little contact I have left
with my children. She's been doing it for years. We've
litigated it continually. Two constant threats of court jail, contempt, finds,
et cetera, which is very scary to me, and no
matter what the evidence, I always lose. Three them constantly

(08:05):
insinuating that I'm crazy. Was this a suicide note, a
concise manifesto, or murder threat? We'll never know for sure.
On Sunday, November fifth, nineteen eighty nine, Betty rose from
her bed after another sleepless night. Ten year old RHTT
had slept beside her. Danny was on the couch. Just

(08:27):
before sunrise, Betty got into her car and drove fifteen
minutes to the new mansion that Dan shared with his
former mistress and now wife of six months, only twenty
eight long limbs, flowing blonde hair, and the youth that
Betty could no longer compete with. She slid him through
the door using her daughter's key. She crept up the
stairs and found them in bed sleeping. Betty knew that

(08:48):
Dan wanted to start a new family with Linda, and
the thought sickened her. She watched them sleep for a
few moments before removing the pistol from her pocket. Five
shots fired off in an instant, Two of them missed
before a bullet struck Linda in her chest. As she turned,
she took another bullet to the back of her neck
that lodged in her brain stem. She was dead almost instantly. Later,

(09:11):
Betty said that Linda yelled call the police to Dan
before she was shot. A bullet hit Dan in the back,
nicking a rib and perforating his lung, filling it with
blood as he scrambled off the bed, reaching for the
phone to call for help, before Betty heartlessly ripped the
cord from the wall and took it with her so
he couldn't call nine one one. She took the cord

(09:32):
in her hands and ripped it in two Later, she
told her daughter that his last words were okay, okay,
you shot me. I'm dead. Betty claimed if there had
been another bullet in the gun that she would have
used it on herself, but she fled from the house.
Betty panicked, she didn't know what to do. She went
to a payphone and made several calls. First to her

(09:53):
friend Diane, I shot Dan, she blurted out. She swore
that hadn't been her intent intention. She just wanted to
talk to danil Linda about the custody agreement. Diane hung
up and called Brad Wright, Betty's sometime boyfriend, who was
still sleeping at her condo with the boys. Brad and
a friend drove to Dan's house together, discovered the bodies,

(10:14):
and then called the police. Betty called Lee and reportedly said,
I shot your dad. I shot the son of a bitch,
and then the bitch is dead. She showed up at
her apartment at about eight a m. Lee made a
cup of tea, which Betty promptly vomited up. She later
claimed that she had told her daughter that she'd shot
the gun, but wasn't sure if she hid any one

(10:36):
or not. She gave her purse containing the gun to Lee.
She called her dad, who was very confused as to
what Betty was saying. Then she called Kim and Arizona.
I finally fucking did it, she said. She again claimed
she didn't know if she'd hit anyone, just that she'd
fired the gun. After the call, a wave of nausea
hit Kim as she remembered the week before when she'd

(10:57):
been home and she'd misplaced her keys, that he helped
her look for the keys. But now Kim realized that truth.
Her mother hadn't been helping at all. She had taken
the keys and hid them from her. Here's Kim talking
to Oprah about that day.

Speaker 5 (11:11):
Well, for a long time, she had to defend herself
because she was a trial, and understand that she had
to tell this story over and over. But now it's
all over with and I wish she could just tell
us herself won't really happen. It doesn't make any sense
to me. When you were talking to her, she says,
I have this intention, and then somewhere it changed. I
just don't understand she had an intention of killing herself,
not that I wanted her to kill herself, but where

(11:32):
did that change to killing bad and Linda. I don't
understand where that how that occurred. And I don't understand
how she did tell me that she emptied the gun,
so she knew she emptied the gun.

Speaker 1 (11:43):
I chose that clip because I agree with Kim, it's
a very confusing story. She's like, I don't know how
I got there. I ended up there, and there were
five bullets in the gun, and then they were gun
and I guess I shot them. It was very confusing.

Speaker 3 (11:56):
Betty's mind overall just seems very muddled and very She
just seems very chaotic inside her head. So I'm not
surprised that she didn't seem to know what she did.

Speaker 1 (12:09):
Yeah, Betty was in a state of shock, but she
managed to strip off her jewelry and place it on Lee.
She scroreled down a quick will, leaving her remaining possessions
and investments to her children to be divided evenly among them.
Later that day, Betty turned herself into the police. At
her arraignment two days later, on her forty second birthday,

(12:29):
she pleaded not guilty. She was denied bail. The kids
were heartbroken, especially the boys, with Dan's eight siblings and
Betty's four. There were lots of aunts and uncle who
could take them in, but most of them were on
the East Coast, and the boys wanted to stay as
close as they came to California. The children clung together,

(12:49):
feeling very alone. Kim flew home and promised Betty that
she would take care of everything. She was only nineteen
and where was home now? Both of her parents' houses
were active crime scenes and off limits. The coroner later
said that it may have taken up to thirty minutes
for Dan to die. Had he received immediate medical attention,
his life may have been spared. That's really sad to me.

Speaker 3 (13:13):
That is really sad. Yeah, it's horrible to think that
he was there for thirty minutes dying and no one
there to help him.

Speaker 1 (13:22):
Betty said that when he spoke his last words to her,
that he spoke very clearly. That's why she alleged that
she didn't think he was hurt. So had the phone
been there, yeah, he may you know, he may have
been saved.

Speaker 3 (13:35):
Yeah, I don't believe a word, Betty says.

Speaker 4 (13:37):
So.

Speaker 3 (13:38):
Yeah, who knows what really happened or what his last
words really.

Speaker 1 (13:41):
Were exactly, But Linda was killed instantly. Interestingly, in the
autopsy report, the health of Dan's liver was noted. He
had a healthy liver. Was he not the chronic alcoholic
that Betty claimed him to be? Oh interesting, Yeah, we'll
be back after a break.

Speaker 3 (14:06):
Over a thousand people attended the joint funeral of Linda
and Dan. Their caskets stood side by side, hers covered
in white roses, his and red. Several eulogies were given.
US District Court Judge William Enwright said Dan Broderick was
all that we could hope for in a lawyer, a
brilliant mind, a magnificent and eloquent speaker, a man of

(14:28):
unquestioned integrity. His word was his bond, his reputation his
most prized possession. He made us all proud of our
profession of lawyering. He represents the best of what we
are and what we ever hoped to be. Paralegal Laurel Summers,
a close friend of Linda and Dan, said quote Linda
offered a new life, a second chance. She gave him

(14:48):
the optimism to marry again and to hope for a
second family. Together they were such a delight with their
broad smiles, twinkling eyes, rich laughter, and sweet terms of endearment.
Their life among us has ended, but all of us
here will be together on days and nights in the
future to drink and sing and laugh. Without Danny and Linda,
the wine will never be as wet, the songs will

(15:10):
never be as pure, and the laughter will never again
be as joyous. Dan Broderick was a proud irishman, and
Danny Boy was sung in his honor. His four children
sat front and center at the funeral, weeping throughout the service.
Their profound grief and tears broke the hearts of everyone
in attendance. Absent was their mother, who was in jail

(15:32):
her request to attend the funeral was denied. Can you
imagine that takes a lot of gall Yeah, I want
to come to the funeral of the people that I killed. Wow.
Linda's tombstone was etched with the words of poet William Blake,
she who kisses the joy as it flies lives in
Eternity's sunrise. Dan's with Oh Danny boy, we love you.

(15:53):
So Betty had an opinion about the funeral, of course,
quote the son of a bitch hadn't stepped foot a
church in all the years he'd been in San Diego,
and they bury him like he's the pope. Why is
he being buried like a good Catholic father when he
deserted his family. He should have been buried like the
asshole he is. My children are glad I did it.
They hated him, They're glad he's dead.

Speaker 1 (16:16):
That is not the case.

Speaker 3 (16:17):
I just say that is not true at all. Linda
and Dan were buried together at Greenwood Memorial Park in
San Diego. That he was a polarizing figure while she
was in jail awaiting trial, A hero to some, but
to others, she was a spoiled, rich lady. She spent
a lot of time in protective isolation in an eight
x twelve cell after receiving threats from other inmates, but

(16:40):
she adjusted to prison quickly except for two things, the
lack of real coffee and dental floss. I would be
okay without the coffee, but dental flaws. That surprises me
that they don't I guess. I guess he's probably a danger.

Speaker 1 (16:53):
Do you think it's an outrage, Well, you love your
dental floss.

Speaker 3 (16:56):
I do love my dental floe.

Speaker 1 (16:57):
You are a religious floss.

Speaker 3 (16:59):
I was just trying to think of why they wouldn't
allow it. But I guess theoretically, maybe you could hang
yourself or show somebody.

Speaker 1 (17:05):
With her wherever. Yeah, it's probably the latter. I didn't
really think about it that way. Yeah. But also, once
you're in prison, I don't think you get regular dental checkups.

Speaker 3 (17:14):
Oh that's true.

Speaker 1 (17:15):
Really. One thing that I learned at the end of
the case Betty has really bad teeth now, and she
hates it.

Speaker 3 (17:21):
Later, Betty said quote, I was glad to be in
that little room away from everything, where nobody could get
at me. For the first time in years. I felt safe.
In fact, some people described her demeanor as cheerful while
in jail. Bella Stumbo described Betty as a chameleon in
her book, and the comparison fits whether she was sitting
across from Oprah, chatting with a fellow inmate, or talking

(17:44):
to one of her grandchildren. Betty had an uncanny ability
to adapt, shifting her tone and personality to meet the
moment and speak on their level. But it's chilling that
she seemed satisfied with her decision to commit the murders,
describing them as an act of public service. In her mind,
she had stood up to the courts and the patriarchy

(18:05):
and she had won. Quote. It was the most sincere,
honest act of self defense that there can be in
the world. It was justifiable homicide against a weapon you
can't see, and nobody can tell me. Dan Broderick and
his cheap little bitch sidekick didn't have a weapon. His
weapon was the legal system. I was under constant attack.
You show me a soldier or a policeman, or anybody

(18:27):
that acts in self defense, is he going to be
held accountable for murder? Wrong? Once again, Betty placed the
blame squarely on Dan for his own death. Quote, if
not for his actions. I would have been fine. I
would have had my house, my kids. I would have
still worn a size six. I could have done my
superior dance. She just loves to play the victim, doesn't she. Yeah,

(18:51):
everything's about her and all the wrongs done to her right.

Speaker 1 (18:54):
Absolutely.

Speaker 3 (18:56):
Kim and Lee were Betty's lifeline in prison fulfilling her
long list of requests from the outside world. Most important
was Clarss two O two palist ash blonde hair color,
along with, in order of importance, sunglasses, Estay Lauder makeup,
bright four piece jogging suits, tweezers and nail clippers from

(19:17):
Revlon Chanelle, number five lotion, and spray Copper Tone or
band Disolay tan lotion. She also asked that the rest
of the box be filled with food and stationery. Four
payday candy bars, one bag of mints, canned coconut, skinless
boneless sardines, and triskits.

Speaker 1 (19:37):
Oh, I blew it. I really should have given you skinless,
boneless sardines and triskits. Darn it.

Speaker 3 (19:43):
Wow, that is quite a list of things for someone
in jail.

Speaker 1 (19:47):
It's rough in jail, and if you have someone on
the outside that is able to fulfill your packages. That's
really a gift.

Speaker 3 (19:55):
She wrote to her boyfriend Brad and asked him to
pay her bills. Betty received hundreds, if not thousands, of
letters from other scorned women who sympathized with her plight,
but her favorite letters came from male suitors. A local
architect visited her in jail and gave her a kiss
through the glass. Betty's parents eventually came to see her,

(20:15):
but it took them a year to accept the fact
that their daughter had killed two people. The media was
captivated by Betty Broderick, a bold, funny, strange, intelligent woman
who was equal parts self deprecating and biting. She relished
the attention, even savoring when she was called the Lahoya socialite,
though the real socialites of Lahoya bristled at the idea

(20:38):
that Betty would ever be welcomed into their elite inner
circle if not for the shocking murders she openly admitted
to committing. Betty could be charming, even delightful. Her defense team, however,
constantly struggled to rein in her brazenness. When she spoke
to reporters, Betty insisted she was the true victim. Often
repeating that if Dan hadn't tormented her, she'd never would

(21:00):
have killed him. While the Broadericks were still locked in
their bitter divorce, both Oprah and sixty Minutes reached out,
but at first Betty was too frightened to appear. Wait
til Oprah and sixty minutes reach out before the.

Speaker 1 (21:12):
Murders because their divorce was so messy. They made a
lot of headlines, and they were even before the murders,
people were very intrigued by their story.

Speaker 3 (21:21):
Interesting. Around that time, she also learned that Dan had
sealed their court records, preventing journalists from digging into the settlement,
only for the file to later vanish altogether interesting. Huh yeah.
Eventually Betty leaned into the spotlight. Her first appearance on
Oprah became the second most watched episode of the show,

(21:41):
surpassed only by Oprah's famous weight loss reveal. She equipped
to twenty twenty, Where's Mike Wallace? I want sixty Minutes?

Speaker 1 (21:49):
Crazy to me that she was in jail and she
was appearing on not just Oprah, but tons of shows.
You used to be a show called hard Copy. There
was a bunch of shows like that, kind of like
you know, like news magazine shows, and she appeared on
a bunch of those.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
That's wild? Did she appear on them? From jail? Okay? Wow,
it's crazy. Hollywood too seized on her story. Meredith Baxter
portrayed Betty and two made for TV movies, A woman
scorned the Betty Broderick story and her final fury Betty
Broderick the last chapter. Betty even wrote to Baxter after

(22:25):
the first film, complaining, quote, wish you'd have called me.
Movie would have been a lot better if you'd had
a better understanding of exactly what it was that I
couldn't cope with. Come see me, call or write. Even
though it's now a little late, I am interesting, happy face.
Despite Betty's criticism, Baxter won an Emmy for the role.

Speaker 1 (22:46):
I watched about an hour of the first film and
it was very good, was it?

Speaker 4 (22:51):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (22:51):
It was excellent. If you go to YouTube, just search
for like Betty Broderick movie and you'll find parts one
and two.

Speaker 3 (22:58):
Uh, that's good.

Speaker 1 (22:58):
Meredith Baxter did do fabulous job portraying Betty.

Speaker 3 (23:01):
Sometimes those made for TV movies are so cheesy and bad,
so that's nice.

Speaker 1 (23:05):
I really didn't feel that cheesy today. It felt like
a pretty good production.

Speaker 3 (23:09):
Cool did Betty inspire Hollywood? That might be giving her
too much credit, But La Times journalist Amy Wallace had
a relationship with Betty and wrote several articles about her.
She pointed out that in nineteen ninety one, the same
year as Betty's trial, Hollywood served up several movies of
women seeking justice, striking back at the patriarchy, Susan Sarandon

(23:32):
and Gena Davis in Thelma and Louise, Julia Roberts escaped
an abusive husband in Sleeping with the Enemy. When the
First Wives Club hit theaters in nineteen ninety six, one
newspaper columnist quipped that it might as well have been
called the Betty Broaderic Club. The fascination with Betty hasn't faded.
In twenty twenty, Dirty John The Betty Broaderick Story introduced

(23:54):
her saga to a new generation of true crime fans,
reigniting interest in her rise, her downfall, and the violent
end of her marriage. All of the attention and fascination
in Betty's mind validated her decision to murder Linda and Dan.

Speaker 1 (24:10):
Did you ever watch The Dirty John The Betty Broaderick Story,
which is such a weird title.

Speaker 3 (24:15):
No, I don't think I watched that one.

Speaker 6 (24:17):
That was.

Speaker 3 (24:18):
They had an initial season of Dirty.

Speaker 1 (24:21):
Dirty John Story based on the podcast. It was strange,
but it wasn't as good as the Meredith Baxter movie.

Speaker 3 (24:28):
And I didn't think.

Speaker 1 (24:29):
I didn't love Amanda Pete portrayed Betty and Christian Slater
portrayed Dan. I just didn't think they really captured the lessons.

Speaker 7 (24:38):
No.

Speaker 1 (24:39):
One more thing. I wanted to mention. I have so
many Betty facts that I need to get out to
you guys. The first the movie with Meredith Baxter. Dan's
brother Larry was a consultant on the movie, so some
people and Betty's family were really at a rate that
it was told from Dan's perspective more than Betty's, like

(25:00):
it vilified her more maybe than she did look but
seemed like a pretty accurate portrayal to me. But Betty
Broderick's trial began in October nineteen ninety, less than a
year after the murders of Dana Linda. Before Betty's trial began,
her attorney Jack Early considered using an insanity plea, but
instead used a batter woman defense. He also moved to

(25:22):
disqualify every judge in San Diego County from presiding over
the trial. The motion was struck down from the start.
The courtroom was a media circus, cameras lining the sidewalks,
reporters scrambling purceipts, and the public eager to see the
woman who had turned one of San Diego's nastiest divorces
into a double homicide.

Speaker 3 (25:42):
It is a really interesting point about trying to get
the judges struck down, because being that he was so
active in legal circles and knew every judge right, it
does seem like it would be a little difficult to
find an impartial judge.

Speaker 1 (25:56):
Dan's brother Larry called for Betty to get the death
penalty that was never on the table because the DA
did not want to put Kim, Lee, Danny and rapped
through losing both of their parents. Kim and Lee sat
on different sides of the courtroom. Lee testified for the defense,
while Kim testified for the prosecution for two long days.
She was called the star witness. Kim testified that the

(26:19):
children are often targets of Betty's cruelty. She often told
them that she hated them, but Lee described their childhood
as not too bad.

Speaker 3 (26:27):
And Lee was the one and remind me that was
most like Betty. I think you said, okay, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (26:32):
The prosecution's case was straightforward, Betty had acted with premeditation
and intent. They painted her as a bitter, vengeful ex
wife who refused to move on with her life, who
had harassed and terrorized Dan and Linda for years before
finally killing them in cold blood. They emphasized the early
morning break in the stolen key and the fact that

(26:53):
Betty had brought a loaded thirty eight revolver into their
bedroom while they slept. She fired five shots, two and
to Linda, went into Dan and two that lodged into
the wall. Dan was found wedged between the bed and
the night stand, phone in hand, and the cord rip
from the wall. The defense told a different story. They
argued that Betty was the victim, emotionally abused, financially manipulated,

(27:16):
and driven to the breaking point by a man who
had all the legal power and wasn't afraid to use it.
They described years of humiliation, the abrupt end of her
marriage after sixteen years, the replacement of a wife and
mother with a twenty one year old legal assistant. In
the psychological toll of the long, ugly divorce that followed.

(27:36):
Betty took the stand herself, testifying for three days. She
admitted to pulling the trigger, but claimed she had gone
to the house to confront Dan and Linda, not to
kill them. According to her, the shooting happened in a
blur after Linda woke up screaming, and she acted without thinking.
Do you believe that Betty went to their home, walked
inside their home while they were sleeping, just to confront them.

Speaker 3 (28:00):
No, I don't believe it for a second.

Speaker 1 (28:02):
The jury deliberated for six days before they found themselves
deadlocked at ten to two. The two holdout jurors believed
Betty was guilty of manslaughter and had acted in the
heat of passion. The rest were convinced it was first
degree murder. The result was a mistrial, an unsatisfying end
to a trial that had gripped the whole country, but

(28:23):
the prosecution vowed to try Betty again, certain that the
next jury would deliver a conviction. San Diego was so
enthralled with Betty's trial that during her testimony, regular programming
was interrupted to broadcast it live on TV.

Speaker 3 (28:39):
Wow, It's like before OJA O day before OJ exactly.

Speaker 1 (28:44):
The seven week retrial of Betty Broderick began in October
nineteen ninety one, just a year after the first jury deadlocked.
It was broadcast on Court TV. Court TV was just
kind of getting started then. It was I think one
of the first trials to be aired in its entirety.
This time, the atmosphere in the court room felt a
little different, less sensational, more focused. The media was still

(29:06):
there in full force, but both sides had learned from
the first trial, sharpening their strategies. Burb round two, the
judge would not allow testimony from a battered woman's expert,
as he did in the first trial. The prosecution stuck
to the same core argument Betty's actions were calculated. She
had stolen a key, entered the house in the pre

(29:26):
dawn hours, and brought a loaded revolver into the bedroom
where Dan and Linda slept. The DA emphasized that Betty
fired two shots at Linda, won at Dan, and two
more at the wall, proof in their view of control
and intent, rather than a panicked reaction. They were minded
jurors that after the shooting, Betty had removed the phone
court from the wall, ensuring no one could call for help.

(29:49):
I had said a few minutes earlier that she took
the phone court and ripped it into That's crazy strength,
isn't it.

Speaker 3 (29:55):
I think it would be very hard to rip a
phone cardet too.

Speaker 1 (29:59):
The defense, led by Jack Early, again doubled down on
portraying Betty as a woman pushed beyond reason. Early argued
that Dan had methodically stripped Betty of her identity, her
financial security, and her relationships with her children. Years of
psychological manipulation, public humiliation, and legal battles had left her
emotionally unstable. When she entered that bedroom, Early claimed she

(30:24):
was consumed by rage and despair, not premeditation. They sought
a manslaughter verdict, arguing that the killings were the result
of heat of passion, not cold blooded murder. Betty again
took the stand for five days, her testimony echoing her
earlier claims that she had not gone there intending to kill,
that everything happened in a blur, and that she'd been

(30:46):
living in a constant state of emotional collapse. But unlike
the first trial, the chury seemed less swayed by her explanations.
Her tears seemed more performative than genuine.

Speaker 4 (30:57):
The only way I know how to describe it now
is so there was all this these thoughts just churning
in my head, and there was so much going on
inside my head. Is that's kind of like my eyeballs
were turned backwards and the whole world was inside my
head because all this anguish, and so I wasn't seeing

(31:18):
where I was going, and I wasn't.

Speaker 7 (31:20):
It was like I was just.

Speaker 4 (31:21):
Inward and there was all this anguish and kind of
darkness and crazy thoughts.

Speaker 7 (31:29):
Felt like you were in hell.

Speaker 6 (31:30):
Actually, when you got to the house, went in the
back door.

Speaker 4 (31:34):
Do you remember where you went? I got upstairs, I
know that, but I don't know which route I took.

Speaker 7 (31:41):
Do you remember were you holding the gun at that time?

Speaker 8 (31:44):
I don't remember, I guess so.

Speaker 6 (31:47):
And what did you do when you went into their bedroom?

Speaker 4 (31:49):
Well, the motion that I made, although I don't think
it was a big motion, the movement that I made
into their bedroom woke them up, and they moved and.

Speaker 7 (31:59):
Somebody's screamed call the police, and I said no, and
I just fired the gun and this thing noise went off,
and then I grabbed the phone and got that pill
out of there. But I wasn't even in that room.

Speaker 1 (32:14):
I mean, it just was an explosion.

Speaker 5 (32:17):
Just im mold.

Speaker 4 (32:18):
They molded, the gun went off and it was like
heaven and it was that fast.

Speaker 3 (32:23):
I'm with the jury on this one performative.

Speaker 1 (32:27):
After just two days of deliberation, the jury returned with
a verdict guilty of two counts of second agree murder
along with a legal use of a firearm. Betty Broderick
was sentenced to thirty two years to life in prison
with the possibility of parole. The woman who had once
been a fixture in San Diego's upper social circles, would

(32:47):
spend the foreseeable future behind bars. The verdict closed one
of the most infamous chapters in California's legal history, but
it didn't end the fascination with Betty Broderick. Her story,
equal parts tragedy and skin dal would continue to capture
public attention for decades. We'll be back after a break.

Speaker 3 (33:13):
Betty, now seventy seven, resides in the California Institution for
Women in Corona, California. Her first parole denial came in
January twenty ten, and then again in twenty eleven and
January twenty seventeen, she was called unrepentant and lacking remorse
for the murders. Larry Broderick, Dan's brother made sure she

(33:34):
received the maximum possible denial of parole, fifteen years until
the next hearing. At her parole hearing in twenty seventeen,
Danny said, quote, in my heart, I know my mother
is a good person, but along the way she got lost.
Releasing a lost person into society could be a dangerous mistake.

(33:55):
Lee and Rhett support her release, while Kim and Danny
oppose it. Betty's next parole hearing is set for twenty
thirty two. She'll be eighty four.

Speaker 1 (34:04):
So what do you think about that? Her sentence was
for thirty two years. It's been thirty three years since
she's been in prison, so.

Speaker 3 (34:11):
Her sentence was thirty two years to life to life. Yeah,
I never know how those things work, but I do
think from everything I've seen so far, I don't know
the whole story yet, but she does seem like she
lacks remorse, so like she feels like she is the victim.
And if she still feels that way, and she's going
to these parole hearings and not expressing remorse. Then I

(34:34):
think she should still be in prison.

Speaker 1 (34:36):
Okay, Well, Betty's going to be coming for you in
twenty thirty two, when she's eighty four. I'm going to
get that rich guy.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
I'll be okay. Betty is popular in prison. She gets
along well with everyone. She mentors younger women and helps
them with their ged studies. She enjoys cooking and tending
to the vegetable garden. Quote. I am basically happy in here.
I'm safe, and there's a kind of freedom in that,
and in knowing what to expect each day. I talk
to and see my children and grandchildren. I suppose I

(35:06):
live in a gated community like lots of seniors do,
because in an odd way, I have maids, cooks, gardeners,
and even chauffeurs. If I need to go somewhere free
rent and no taxes, free food, laundry services, wardrobe consultants,
along with a free wardrobe and medical. Ah, she's really
looking on the price on the side. In twenty twenty,

(35:29):
letters to Brad from Betty were found in an abandoned
storage locker. In one, she wrote, quote, if I had
a penny for every time I think of you, I'd
be a millionaire many times over. In another, Betty asked
him to send her money. Quote, I check the obits regularly.
So far I have not seen yours. Where are you
and where is my money? Help? I need to see you.

(35:52):
It's been too long. No Halloween card boo, no B
Day card, no Thanksgiving, no Christmas, no New Year? How
about Valentine's Day?

Speaker 1 (36:03):
It was kind of odd that these letters were just
found in this storage unit, along with a lot of
canceled checks and other things. So Brad had been sending
her money and then he must have stopped at some point. Okay,
he got married. I think Betty was very unhappy about that,
but she had always treated Brad not so great. Okay,
the fact that he even stuck around after, you know.

Speaker 3 (36:23):
She killed a little surprised.

Speaker 6 (36:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (36:27):
I think Brad needs to be more worried about when
Betty gets released. That I need to be worried about.

Speaker 1 (36:32):
Frankly, Dan Broderick was not a good husband to Betty,
but he didn't deserve to die. He loved making people laugh.
His favorite movie was Gone with the Wind, which it
would explain why their son is named Reth.

Speaker 6 (36:44):
Oh.

Speaker 1 (36:44):
Okay, if Dan had lived, he'd likely be a judge
or a politician today, some friends thought he could be president.
Each year, a group of Dan's friends gather at the
cemetery and sing, Oh Danny Boy, and pour a bottle
of Irish whiskey on his grave. His friends insists that
he was fair to Betty in the divorce settlement. Linda

(37:05):
Calquina Broderick tragically lost her life at the hands of Betty.
She is remembered by friends and family for her warmth, intelligence,
and dedication. Her death was a shocking end to a
life with so much potential. Though her story is tied
to a violent tragedy, those who knew her remember her
for the person she was, not just The events that ended.

Speaker 3 (37:25):
Her life remind me how old Linda was when she
was killed.

Speaker 1 (37:29):
Linda was twenty eight, and it was just a couple
of weeks before Dan's forty fifth birthday. Gotcha Betty and
her biting humor wrote in her book, I'm offended that
no one has cared enough to build at least a
smaller version of the Lincoln Memorial in his honor, or
to enact an eternal flame over his grave, and why
not a rendering of his likeness? Say on the San

(37:49):
Bernardino Mountains a La Mount Rushmore.

Speaker 3 (37:53):
Oh boy, the.

Speaker 1 (37:55):
Real tragedy of the Broderick case lies in what happened
to the four children caught in the cross fire of
their parents' toxic war. Here are Kim and Dan with Oprah.

Speaker 6 (38:04):
And how have you handled Dan? How have you, too,
Kim handled the fact that your mother killed your father,
because now you both are left with no parents.

Speaker 5 (38:14):
I don't know how you handle it. You're just happy
that you really don't have a choice. She just seems
to think that we're better off. She still thinks we're
better off, and that's definitely untrue.

Speaker 6 (38:26):
Does it bother you to bother the two of you?
Because I spent a lot of time with your mom,
and I talked to her for quite a while, and
the thing that really surprised me the most was she
doesn't seem to have any remorse about this. Not only
doesn't seem she told us she didn't have any remorse
about this, and that's still surprising to me. And I

(38:49):
don't know if that's zet upsetting to you, that she
doesn't seem to be remorseful abetting.

Speaker 5 (38:54):
I understand if she doesn't feel bad about killing dad
if she could at least feel remorse about leaving us
parentless or at least feel bad about the situation that
we're all in now.

Speaker 6 (39:03):
But she doesn't, because what situation are you all? You
all are all living with different people right right.

Speaker 5 (39:09):
It was just we just got chipped out of a
nice life that we could have had, and she doesn't
feel bad for being the cause of that.

Speaker 1 (39:18):
Kim, the eldest, had been a straight A student, but
nearly flunked out of high school as the chaos consumed
her home. When she became pregnant at age eighteen, she
turned to Linda, not Betty, for support, the betrayal that
her mother never forgave.

Speaker 3 (39:31):
I can imagine yeah.

Speaker 1 (39:33):
Despite Betty's own history of abortions, she judged Kim harshly,
even writing letters to family and friends about her daughter's
private struggles. When Kim invited Linda to her high school graduation,
Betty's response was swift and cruel. I'm not coming. I
just remembered how much I hate you. Kim tried her
best to keep her family together. When she got married,

(39:53):
Danny walked her down the aisle and gave the toast
lee spiraling from the trauma, dropped out of high school
and read away. She turned to drugs and alcohol to
numb the pain. Dan eventually wrote her out of his
will and kicked her out, though by the time of
his death they were attempting to rebuild their fractured relationship.
Out of the four children, Lee has probably struggled the most.

(40:15):
She continued to battle addiction and abusive relationships, unable to
hold steady employment, although in Kim's book that I read
it sounds like she had gotten a college degree and
was doing better.

Speaker 3 (40:29):
Oh that's good. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (40:31):
The two boys, Danny and Rhett, bore witness to horrors
no children should see. Rhett once told a therapist, I
want to run away and kill myself. My heart is broken.
Both boys begged the judge to let them live with Betty,
saying she was fun and took good care of them,
while complaining that Dan was never home and Linda was
bossy and mean. Betty's manipulation continued even then. She told

(40:54):
Danny to pour boiling water on Linda and make it
look like an accident, and then she was mad when
he didn't do it. When Dan gained sold custody of
the boys, their lives deteriorated visibly. Teachers noticed they were
often laid inappropriately, dressed for weather, and arriving at school
in days old clothing. Betty maintained constant contact through a

(41:15):
phone line at Dan's house. Her influence never truly severed.
After the murders, the children were scattered. Kim dropped out
of college to accompany her brothers to Colorado, where they
lived with Dan's brother Larry. The arrangement was far from stable.
Larry and his wife were having their own marital problems
and separated soon after the children arrived. Larry doesn't seem

(41:38):
like the best guy in my opinion. Actually, he's kind
of a slimeball. I think that he wanted the kid
like he and his wife had actually separated and they
were not living in the same house. But after the
murders happened, the boys came with a lot of money,
like they had like a stipend, and he moved back
in with his wife and they tried to make it work.

(41:59):
But I think it was somewhat motivated by money.

Speaker 3 (42:01):
Interesting, it took.

Speaker 1 (42:03):
Three years before the children were allowed to visit Betty
in prison. Three years.

Speaker 3 (42:08):
That's a lot of time.

Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah, when the family finally reunited at the Central California
Women's Facility in the summer of nineteen ninety three. They
were twenty three, twenty two, seventeen, and fourteen, no longer
the children who had been torn apart by their parents' war.
During that weekend, Betty offered no apologies for murdering their father.

(42:29):
This was kind of a nice thing. But the prison
allowed them to come and visit, and they have like
this little house that they were able to stay in,
and they stayed for the whole weekend, and they were
able to like barbecue, and you know, they were there
was like barbed wire around, and it wasn't like a
lovely family home or anything, but it was still a
good opportunity for them to, you know, have time together

(42:51):
as a family. Each child carried the scars differently into adulthood. Danny,
always the rule follower, managed to graduate from UC Berkeley. Rhett,
who had been the most bonded to Betty, struggled with
rebellion and substance abuse, cycling through boys homes and boot
camps before eventually pulling himself together to graduate as class

(43:11):
president and also attend UC Berkeley years after the tragedy.
Rhett appeared on OPRAH. Reflecting on his chaotic upbringing. He said, quote,
I constantly felt like I was under the microscope. Like
everything I did, they were trying to blame on my
parents' situation. Despite everything, He advocated for his mother's release,
saying that she wasn't dangerous to society. The only two

(43:35):
people she has a danger to are dead. The children
had been Betty and Dan's ultimate weapons against each other.
In the end, they became the war's most devastating casualties.
They still visit Betty, along with their spouses and children.
Kim and Rhett live in Idaho. Dan lives in La
Joya with his wife and three daughters. His wedding was

(43:56):
featured in an online magazine. It was really cool to
see pictures of all together. It was a beautiful wedding.
Danny out of all the kids. He's definitely thriving financially
at least, but it looks like he's very They all
looked great. They all beautiful people. They all looked in
the pictures I saw, they all looked healthy and happy.

(44:16):
Lee also lives in La Joya and Kim is a
teacher and she has two daughters. RT coaches football and
teaches high school history, geography, and English in Idaho, and
he's also married with two daughters. I'm always amazed by
the kids in the cases that we cover and how
so many of them just rebound and thrive, and I'm
sure they still have a lot of issues, but you know,

(44:38):
really trying to you know, live their best lives despite
of everything that they have been through.

Speaker 3 (44:44):
Yeah, it's really amazing and impressive that everything they went through.
It's just that they went through a lot of horrible
trauma at really bad ages, like all of them, even
the oldest was still you know, fairly young, and just
everything that they went to through to be able to
get through that and you know, leave productive lives and

(45:04):
hopefully find happy amazing, amazing, for sure.

Speaker 1 (45:07):
We are wrapping things up here. Betty wrote letters to
her sons when they were still young. When she was incarcerated.
She knew that they were censored by their Denver therapist,
Thomas Meehan. She addressed them as dear Danny wrhat an
asshole me hand. When she heard that Danny had grown tall,
she said, I always wanted him to be big enough

(45:28):
to beat up his dad, but I took care of
that for him.

Speaker 4 (45:31):
Ha ha.

Speaker 1 (45:32):
Brad Wright, her ex boyfriend, was the only person to
visit her in prison during her first year there. She'd
signed over her condo to him, but after he married
another woman, Betty demanded that he signed it over to Lee,
which I think he did. Friends who had turned their
backs on Betty after the contentious divort wrote her letters
in prison. By then, many of their husbands had left

(45:54):
them for younger women, and they possibly understood. Yeah, he
has maintained her sense of humor. On April Fool's Day
one year, she called several friends and told them I've escaped.
I'm at the seven eleven. Come and get me.

Speaker 3 (46:09):
That's pretty funny.

Speaker 1 (46:10):
Betty has never apologized or expressed genuine feelings of remorse
for killing her husband, but did say this about Linda's life.
I have great remorse and guilt. I didn't like her
in life, and to say otherwise would be a lie.
But I should not have taken her life. That was
a horrible and demented, sickening and wrong thing to do.
And I do understand is inasmuch as one can understand

(46:32):
another's grief the agony I have caused her family If
I could change what happened. I would. Here's a clip
of an interview with Betty.

Speaker 9 (46:41):
Do you feel remorse for what you did?

Speaker 4 (46:43):
Betty?

Speaker 8 (46:44):
I feel such terrible remorse for what we've all been
through from nineteen eighty three. It'll almost be ten years now.

Speaker 1 (46:51):
Ten years.

Speaker 8 (46:52):
I find it so meaningless, what we've all been through.
What was the point of it? What was the point
of any of this? Was the point of them conducting
all this and lying? I mean, I just never saw
the point in it. I didn't know why they felt
so compelled to destroy me. The story they were telling

(47:12):
and trying to put over on people wasn't the truth.

Speaker 9 (47:16):
It doesn't sound like in October nineteen ninety two that
you're sorry that you did it.

Speaker 8 (47:21):
I'm sorry about everything, sorry about the whole thing. I mean,
two people are dead that could have had wonderful lives,
and I should have been ten years down the road.
To ten years is a long time to an entirely
new life. I mean, we all had so much potential
and possibilities. Why was this so destructive of everyone?

Speaker 9 (47:41):
Anti Betty Broderick people say she had a million dollar
house and sixteen thousand dollars a month alimony. Why didn't
she go live her new life and a boyfriend for
that matter, why didn't she go away and live her
life and leave them alone.

Speaker 8 (47:54):
I may leave them alone. I would have loved to
have done that, and that would have been the plan,
is to be left alone and have a million dollar
house and a boyfriend in a car and anything. But
that's not the truth. The house was in his name
when I finally got it in late nineteen eighty nine,
in my name. I didn't have enough monthly money to
stay there, so the first thing I did was put
it on the market. It was on I couldn't stay there.

(48:16):
And all the years of this, when he was telling
people he brought me a house, it was a total lie.
The house was in his name, and the money that
he gave me every month to make those payments because
it was in his name, was really back in his pocket.
The logistics of it has been difficult, but they're able
to come as much as they want. I'm able to
talk to them a lot more. We have a lot

(48:36):
more freedom to be with each other.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
Oh boy, I'm sorry that Clipper ended abruptly.

Speaker 3 (48:42):
That is like somebody apologizing by saying I'm sorry if
you were offended by what I.

Speaker 1 (48:47):
Said, sir, if you were offended when I killed my husband,
I know. Yeah, she still to this day cannot say
I'm sorry I took Dan Broder's life. He did not
deserve to die. In Betty's mind, she believes that he
deserves to die for what he did to her.

Speaker 3 (49:02):
It bothers me so much.

Speaker 1 (49:04):
I'm going to end with the final words from Bella
Stumbo's book, a quote from Betty quote. Me and God
are old friends. He guided those bullets that night, he did.
Do you seriously think that I could have killed Dan
Broderick by myself without his help?

Speaker 3 (49:18):
Wow?

Speaker 1 (49:19):
As usual, she didn't even mention Linda. Then, with an
odd little pause, a hollow giggle, you know, I still
can't believe it that just one little bullet could kill
Dan Broderick. That was the story of Betty and Dan Broderick.

Speaker 3 (49:34):
Wow. What a wild ride, right wild ride. I can't
believe she after all that, she's now blaming God for it,
as if things couldn't get.

Speaker 1 (49:44):
Worse, like God was on her side.

Speaker 3 (49:46):
Yeah, oh boy.

Speaker 1 (49:47):
Before we move on to discussion, I wanted to talk
about the sources that I used. I talked about this
book a few times, but it's called The Twelfth until
the Twelfth of Never by Bella's Stumbo. She was a
reporter for the Los Angeles Time. It's a true crime classic.
It's very well written and impressively researched. Bella dictated the
book over the phone to her sister, who was also

(50:09):
her editor. She died in the year two thousand and
two from cancer. Again. I really enjoyed the book, but
I take issue with some of the descriptions of Betty.
She talks about her being fat and you know, ugly,
and Betty was only forty two years old when the
murders occurred, so it reminded me a lot of the

(50:29):
Jenny er Gerardo case. And Jennyer was like, you know,
I'm forty seven and you know, I have nothing left
to live for. Two is very young. And Betty was
such a dynamic, interesting woman, and it breaks my heart
that she, you know, couldn't have found another outlet for

(50:50):
all of her passion.

Speaker 3 (50:52):
Yeah. Absolutely.

Speaker 1 (50:53):
I also read Betty's autobiography titled Telling on Myself. It
was a pretty good read, and I imagine she swept
a lot of things under the carpet, and you know,
it just made him seem like it wasn't really a
big deal. The book made me realize that she clearly
has a lot of mommy issues and she really is

(51:14):
not sorry for what she did to Dan.

Speaker 3 (51:16):
Yeah, it doesn't seem like it.

Speaker 1 (51:17):
I also read the book Betty Broderick, The Mother the Murderer,
written by Charles Dennis, but I think it was originally
released as written by Kim Broderick. But I'm not sure
if Charles Dennis rewrote it or.

Speaker 3 (51:32):
What happened but legal issues or something.

Speaker 1 (51:35):
Yeah, it's definitely Kim's story. Okay, So those are all
really good reads that I recommend.

Speaker 3 (51:39):
He did a lot of reading.

Speaker 1 (51:42):
Do you think it was possible for Betty to receive
a fair trial in San Diego?

Speaker 3 (51:46):
Kind of No, we talked about it a little bit already,
But I mean, Dan was very well connected in the
San Diego legal community, right, so I'm sure every judge
knew him, probably fairly well.

Speaker 1 (51:58):
It's surprising that they didn't allow the case to be moved.
I think in most circumstances, I think that shows that,
you know, the judges were like, Nope, she's going to
be tried here in San Diego. Yeah, although I didn't
see anything in the trial that was overtly unfair.

Speaker 3 (52:13):
Yeah, I mean the fact that the jury found her guilty.
I think that was the right call.

Speaker 1 (52:18):
Yeah. Dan One's told Betty that juries don't decide trials,
but judges do by what they allow into evidence and
who is allowed to testify, which I think is true.

Speaker 3 (52:29):
I think there's a lot of truth to that.

Speaker 1 (52:31):
Should Betty have been released after thirty two years was
served in prison, which was the minimum of her sentence.

Speaker 3 (52:39):
Well, we talked about this already as well, But I
think no, Like I think, I think unless she showed
genuine remorse for her actions, then I don't think she
should have The sentence was thirty two years to life,
So to me, the thirty two years should be only
if you are genuinely remorseful and you've kind of rehabilitated yourself. Yeah,

(53:00):
do you think what do you think?

Speaker 1 (53:02):
This is going to sound like a cop out? But
I am too close to the story at this point
to see anything objectively as a cop out. You know,
I'm just having a hard time reconciling everything that I know,
and it's a very complicated case. Do you think that
someone has to say, I'm so sorry that I committed
this crime to be released.

Speaker 3 (53:24):
If your sentenced to if your sentence is thirty two
years to life, that is the range, and to me,
you should get out on the low end of that
range only if you have admitted to what you did
and not admitted to it, but that you're sorry for
what you did, and she obviously isn't.

Speaker 1 (53:40):
Do you think that she was a battered woman that defense?
Does that work for you?

Speaker 3 (53:45):
I mean, I'm not one hundred percent sure what the
definition of a battered woman is. I think Dan was
a terrible husband. I think he was not a good guy.

Speaker 1 (53:54):
Well, there's different forms of abuse, right, you know, there's
physical abuse, there's you know, just control, right, and you
know Dan did control her financial as the financial aspect
of her life.

Speaker 3 (54:07):
Yeah, Dan was not a good guy. There's no question
about that in my mind. But I don't think that
excuses what she did.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Do you think that she was guilty of first degree murder,
second degree murder or manslaughter? What would you have found
her guilty of.

Speaker 3 (54:22):
I mean, I think that you could make a case
for first degree murder because of the fact that she
stole the key, she went there with the gun. I mean,
it sort of seemed like it was planned, but at
the same time, just getting a glimpse inside of Betty's mind,
knowing that she is there's a lot going on up there.
I could also see that she went there with the

(54:43):
intent of like just threatening or you know, doing something else,
and then she pulled the trigger. So I don't know.
I think I think the jury got it right. I
think second degree murder seems reasonable to me from what
I've heard.

Speaker 1 (54:56):
I think I would have found her guilty of first
degree murder, which probably surprises you. But I do believe
that there is premeditation. She stole Kim's key a week
before the murders. She had bought the gun a year before. Well,
I do think that she bought the gun for protection.
She had told many, many people that she was angry
enough to kill Nan.

Speaker 3 (55:14):
Yeah. Yeah, Like I said, I could definitely see a
case for first screen murder.

Speaker 1 (55:18):
As well from this case. I learned from all of
these cases that we do if you want to end
a long term relationship, especially when children are involved, leave
your partner with dignity, be fair, give them what they Deservegreed.

Speaker 3 (55:35):
This is sort of a minor question, But do you
know if Betty profited from her book at all? Did she?

Speaker 1 (55:41):
That's a very good question. I'm so glad you asked,
because I forgot to mention it she any proceeds from
her book she gave to her children, anytime that she
received money for anything.

Speaker 3 (55:52):
When did she do that because she had to or
because she chose to?

Speaker 1 (55:55):
She chose to, I believe she probably had to, but
that was something that she wanted to do. Another thing
I forgot to mention. Remember, Lee was written out of
the well by Dan's life insurance policy. That was part
of the divorce agreement. He did get over a million
dollar life insurance policy and twenty five percent of that
did go to Lee, which was, you know, at that time,

(56:18):
a fair amount of money.

Speaker 3 (56:19):
So all the kids financially at least ended up okay.

Speaker 1 (56:24):
I think they ended up okay. They got their money,
I believe, at least in two different chunks. The one
that I can speak for that I know of because
I read the book is Kim. And when she got
the money, she was really young. She got married kind
of young, so they used the money for like a
down payment on a house and things like that. But
she also admits that she was young and some of

(56:44):
the money she squandered Lee we know, had you know,
a little bit of a drug problem, so I think,
you know, her money kind of went away to Danny.
I think did really well financially in his career. And
I always feel like a stalker, but I know, I
feel he lives in a very nice house, the very

(57:06):
very nice house.

Speaker 3 (57:06):
He had a very nice wedding too.

Speaker 1 (57:08):
Yeah, so he's doing really well. And I think Rutt
also is doing well. But he's a teacher, so you know,
he has a teacher's salary. But I think I'm not
sure how much money they ended up getting. One thing. Also,
I'm sorry, there's so many stories to tell. Uncle Larry
kind of screwed the kids over. He took a big
salary for being executor of the state. Remember, during the

(57:32):
divorce settlement, Betty accused Larry of like trying to help
Dan hide money. Dan gave Larry. He had a trucking
business and he was he declared bankruptcy. But before he
declared bankruptcy, Dan gave him a huge loan. I read
that it was like five hundred thousand dollars. But in

(57:52):
Kim's books, she said it was a million dollars and
the estate eventually sued Larry to try to get that
money back, but I don't think they ever got that
money back. So that was a huge amount of money
that also should have gone to the children and it didn't.

Speaker 4 (58:07):
Well.

Speaker 1 (58:07):
Before we wrap up, I wanted to talk about post
divorce equity. On paper, divorce settlements are supposed to be fair,
but was it ever really possible for Betty to get
a fair deal. Dan wasn't just an attorney, but he
was one of the most powerful, feared lawyers in San Diego.
He knew the system inside and out and used that
knowledge to his advantage. Betty, meanwhile, was unraveling. Her anger,

(58:32):
outbursts and bad behavior only reinforced the idea that she
was unstable, while Dan appeared calm, polished, and professional. The
deck was against Betty from the start, but her struggles
weren't just about money. It was about her identity. Her
entire life had been built around being missus Dan Broderick.

(58:52):
In the early years, she carried the financial and emotional
weight while he pursued first medical school and then law school.
Betty worked, She worked really hard. She raised the children
and kept the household running so he could focus on
his future. His success was built on that foundation. Yet
when he reached the top, Betty was no longer part

(59:13):
of the picture, and when the marriage ended, she had
no career to fall back on, no professional identity of
her own, just the fading role is Dan's wife. This
is where Betty's story echoes the reality of so many
divorced women. On paper, the settlement may look equal a
share of the house, some savings may be spousal support

(59:34):
for a time, but in practice it rarely feels equal.
Women who stepped away from their own careers to raise
children or support their husband's ambitions often find themselves starting
over in middle age with fewer opportunities and less earning power. Men,
on the other hand, usually leave their careers intact, their
income growing, and their professional identities unchanged. The statistics bear

(59:58):
this out. Studies showed that after divorce, a woman's standard
of living drops by an average of thirty percent, while
men often see theirs increase by about ten percent. For
women divorcing later in life, the impact is even more severe.
Their standard of living can fall by nearly forty five
percent compared to about twenty one percent for men, and

(01:00:19):
while women might get the house and the divorce, what
she's really getting as a mortgage, taxes, and maintenance costs,
and she may not be able to afford it. If
the house is sold, her share of the equity often
disappears quickly into the costs of starting over, rent deposits, furniture,
legal fees, day to day expenses. What looks stable on
paper often translates to survival mode and real life. Meanwhile,

(01:00:42):
men statistically bounce back faster, They're more likely to keep
career momentum and build new wealth, while women are loved
trying to re enter the workforce, often at lower wages
than their ex husbands. So even if the split looks
balanced in court and reality, women are carrying the heavier
financial burden. For Betty, those losses were magnified by Dan's

(01:01:02):
power in her own unraveling state of mind, but the
feelings that fueled her fear of irrelevance, financial instability, the
loss of identity are not unique. Many women, especially those
who invested their best years into someone else's success, walk
away from divorce feeling erased, watching the life they helped
build continue on without them, while they are left picking

(01:01:25):
up the pieces. I just mentioned this because I feel
like that's what Betty, That's why she was so angry.
She had so much resentment because she had done so
much of the hard work in the beginning of their
marriage under the promise that she would get the fruits
of all of that back to her, and she didn't
see that, right, So you can kind of understand why

(01:01:48):
she was so irate. Yeah, she should have been on
easy Street, but then she had to start all over.
Oh and it's so much worse for so many other
women when they go through divorce.

Speaker 3 (01:01:57):
Yeah, you can absolutely understand how she would be. I rate,
it's very similar to the Carol Kennedy and Steve Democher
case that we did just recently as well. It just
the divorce just ends up being really, really hard on
the whole family. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:02:12):
So my parents got divorced when I was young, and
it was a very contentious divorce. Yeah, it wasn't Betty
and Dan, but it was pretty bad. There were It
was because of an infidelity and there was some violence,
and you know, I saw that violence growing up and
it's not something that I like to talk about, but
my mom called my dad his rottenness and my dad

(01:02:35):
called my mom motormouth. Never again referred to each other
by their first names after the divorce, which I think
it took a while. I don't really remember because I
was fairly young, but it dragged on in court. You know,
the division of assets I think was a big deal.
And you know, like I just was talking about the
inequity of divorce. I think it was really hard for

(01:02:56):
my mom to start over and she hadn't worked and
she had to go back to work. But I don't
think they ever again spoke after the divorce, which was
really hard. And you know, you were at my wedding
to you and you know, it just added to the
stress of the event.

Speaker 3 (01:03:13):
So, yeah, that's very rough.

Speaker 1 (01:03:15):
Yeah, it's just really hard when the people that gave
birth to you hate each other absolutely. And I think
it's you know a lot of people end up getting divorced,
so a lot of people are in my story is
not unique at all.

Speaker 3 (01:03:27):
Well, some people that get divorced they are able to
at least work together and cooperate when.

Speaker 1 (01:03:31):
It's come a long way for sure, But you know,
when there's an fidelity involved.

Speaker 3 (01:03:36):
I think it makes a lot of anger.

Speaker 1 (01:03:38):
Right, Well, thank you if you're still here after these
three long episodes, we hope you enjoyed this case. It
was a fascinating case. It's a blessing and a curse
when these some of these cases are very prominent cases,
and there's so much information to try to put into
three episodes, it can be kind of challenging. I tried

(01:03:59):
to consume as much of it as I could. It
was a really interesting case. Thank you so much for
listening to this episode of Love Mary Kill.

Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
Please rate, review, follow, and subscribe. Find us on social media,
or send us an email at Lovemarykill at gmail dot com.

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
Please consider supporting us on Patreon dot com slash Lovemrykill
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Speaker 3 (01:04:31):
Join us next Monday for another episode of Love Mary Kill.

Speaker 2 (01:05:00):
The Accompany the co