Wondery Presents: The Execution of Bonny Lee Bakley

Dark House

House Beautiful/Hearst

Religion & Spirituality, True Crime, Society & Culture

4.4 • 757 Ratings

🗓️ 20 June 2022

⏱️ 6 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On May 4, 2001, Bonny Lee Bakley was found fatally shot in a car on a dark North Hollywood street. The prime suspect was her husband, famed actor Robert Blake. But Bonny, a longtime con artist, had plenty of enemies. She left behind a trail of men she’d scammed, and she had a volatile relationship with Christian Brando, the troubled son of movie star Marlon Brando. Not since the O.J. Simpson case had the eyes of the nation been so fixated on a homicide. The search for Bonny’s killer took detectives on an eleven-month odyssey across the country and through Hollywood's underbelly of hustlers, drug addicts, and would-be hitmen. It would be the most expensive murder investigation in LAPD history to date. This is the story of Robert and Bonny’s toxic relationship, her shocking murder, and his chaotic trial. Did actor Robert Blake kill his wife? Or was the murder someone else's vendetta? From Wondery, and the team behind the hit series Hollywood & Crime (The Dating Game Killer, The Wonderland Murders, Death of Starlet) comes a six-part series about love, obsession and fame gone wrong. Co-hosted by Tracy Pattin and Josh Lucas. Listen by subscribing to Wondery Plus in Apple Podcasts or the Wondery App: http://wondery.fm/DarkHouse_TEOBLB Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	For a celebrity-obsessed Bonnie Lee Bakely, marrying her 10th husband, actor Robert Blake, was a dream come true.
0:09.4	But just a year into the marriage, Bonnie's dream came to a tragic end when she was found fatally shot outside of a diner in North Hollywood.
0:17.3	Police immediately identified Blake as their prime suspect.
0:20.3	But when the media learned of Bonnie's
0:21.7	history as a con artist, she went from victim to villain, and the list of suspects grew.
0:27.1	In what would become the LAPD's most expensive murder investigation to date,
0:31.1	detectives set out on a year-long journey raking through Hollywood's underbelly of drug addicts
0:35.1	and would-be hit men to uncover the truth about who killed Bonnie. Was it Robert Blake? Or was it one of the many men she scammed before him?
0:43.1	The execution of Bonnie Lee Bakeley is the latest chapter in Wondry's hit podcast series,
0:48.1	Hollywood and crime. You're about to hear a preview of the first episode. While you're
0:52.5	listening, be sure to follow the execution of Bonnie Lee-Bakely on Apple
0:56.3	podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, or you can listen ad-free by joining Wondry Plus in the
1:02.0	Wondry app.
1:08.8	It's a little after 9.30 p.m. on May 4th, 2001.
1:13.6	Fireworks flash across the sky in Studio City just over the Hollywood Hills.
1:19.6	Cinco de Mayo has come a day early this year.
1:23.6	Inside a small yellow house on a quiet street,
1:28.3	Sean Stanick sits at a desk in his robe.
1:31.6	He's spending Friday night hunched over his keyboard,
1:34.7	writing a screenplay,
1:36.2	hoping to become the next Quentin Tarantino.
1:40.1	But tonight, Stanick won't write another word.
	...

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