Betty Broderick killed Dan Broderick and his wife 28 years ago today

Broderick vs. Broderick

But when Judge Howatt’s decision to bar the press and public was challenged by the Reader's attorney at a January 5 hearing, Betty Broderick reversed herself and told the judge that the courtroom should remain closed. She says her change of heart was prompted by the ability of her husband’s attorney “to turn the entire issue [of courtroom access] around and make it entirely one of whether I wanted to actively harm or not harm my children.”

By Jeannette DeWyze, Paul Krueger, Jan. 12, 1989 | Read full article

Till Death Do Us Part

Betty said that $16,000 a month left her with a discretionary income of just $2000 a month, after she deducted her $4000 monthly house payment, another $4000 for taxes. “Most readers of your paper are going to say, ‘What’s she bitching about?’ ” But one trip could eat up $2000, she pointed out. “Or the kind of clothes I used to wear — I hate to tell you. In my old life, every outfit was like $2000.”

By Jeanette De Wyze, Nov. 16, 1989 | Read full article

Trial and Error

Encounters of the worst kind are with a woman who looks to be getting a start on the life of a bag lady. One day she approaches Betty’s older daughter Kim and Kim’s uncle, Larry Broderick. “You should have taken your mother to County Mental Health,” she says, pressing forward as Kim recoils in distaste. “I was there for 90 days myself, and they really helped me. They coulda helped your mother too.”

By Gene Cubbison, Sept. 26, 1991 | Read full article

Written to Death

She says her advance from St. Martin’s was “not very much.” The initial printing of Hell Hath No Fury was 175,000 copies, and at least 100,000 of them had been sold by early May, according to Taubman. (If her royalty rate was the standard eight to ten percent against gross sales, that would amount to at least $40,000 so far, with a potential of earning up to about $70,000 — for about six months’ work.)

By Jeannette De Wyze, June 17, 1993 | Read full article

Three Bullets and Nine Years Later

She said Brad Wright, her former boyfriend, had once gotten her a subscription to the San Diego Business Journal—a choice she thought was insane. She hadn’t read it when she lived in San Diego. She does get and read the San Diego Union-Tribune, though it often arrives weeks late. Her favorite way of keeping up with the popular culture, however, is to watch Good Morning America and Regis and Kathie Lee.

By Jeannette De Wyze, Nov. 5, 1998 | Read full article

Was Dan Broderick Really a Model of Integrity?

The April 1994 issue of California Lawyer stated as follows: "Six days before Dan left Betty, he wired $175,000 to his brother in Colorado. Three weeks before that, he withdrew $80,000 from a business account. The financial figures he submitted to the court failed to mention these two transactions, as well as a $450,000 personal loan to his brother after the couple separated. Dan Broderick's financial accounts did show a number of disastrous investments....

By Don Bauder, May 13, 2008 | Read full article

Famous Dead Neighbors: Local Gravesites of the (Formerly) Rich and Famous

After hiring a new secretary in 1983, 21-year-old Linda Kolkena, Dan [Broderick] began an affair with her. Dan and Betty were legally separated in 1985, but Betty didn't take it well.... On November 5, 1989, Betty entered the new couple's house with a key she'd stolen from her daughter and shot Dan and Linda to death as they slept in their bed. Dan and Linda Broderick are buried at Greenwood Memorial Park on Imperial Avenue (Olive section, near the roadway).

By Jay Allen Sanford, Oct. 22, 2012 | Read full article