How Linda Kolkena Ended Up Murdered By His Husband’s Ex-Wife

How Linda Kolkena Ended Up Murdered By His Husband's Ex-Wife

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Linda Kolkena was an ambitious mother and housewife in 1983 when she met her future husband, Dan Broderick, at the law company where she worked as his secretary in San Diego.

But Dan was already married when he met Kolkena, and after they divorced so he could be with her.

On November 5, 1989, his spurned ex-wife Betty Broderick killed both of them by shooting them while sleeping in their apartment.

Although their killings were covered in season two of the Netflix television series Dirty John and Betty Broderick’s crimes are well-documented, Linda Kolkena’s story deserves a deeper examination.

Who is Linda Kolkena?

Betty Broderick murdered Linda Kolkena, the wife of her ex-husband. Linda Kolkena was born on June 26th, 1961, and passed away on November 5th, 1989.

Betty’s husband, Dan, had cheated on her with Linda, and she was furious about it. As a result of her great anger and bitterness, she decided to murder Dan and Linda while they were sleeping brutally.

Who is Daniel Broderick III?

Daniel Broderick was born in 1944 in Pittsburgh as one of nine siblings in an Irish Catholic household. 

Once he turned 21, he met Betty and subsequently graduated from the University of Notre Dame.

Betty, who was in town for the weekend with a friend. He told The Los Angeles Times that she initially wasn’t attracted to Dan. Because he “had long skinny sideburns and round tortoise-shell glasses.” 

After Betty’s departure to New York, Daniel persisted in chasing her through the mail. He once taunted her for indulging in Technobabble during their meet-up. “You’re talking geek city,” he chuckled when Betty was visiting with her friend.

The two got back in touch when Daniel moved to Manhattan to attend Cornell University’s medical school on one of the city’s campuses.

Although Dan attended Cornell for medical school, also, he decided not to become a physician. Instead, he applied to and was accepted to Harvard Law School in the early 1970s. 

He continued his education with financial assistance from her in the form of part-time work. That was after moving to Massachusetts with Betty, 

After graduating from Harvard in 1973, Dan went to work for Gary, Cary, Ames & Frye. It was a prominent legal firm in San Diego, California. 

His idea to merge his two medical and law skill sets proved successful. And he was able to capitalize on this success. The family relocated once more.

In 1978, he parted ways with that firm to launch his legal practice, which he eventually built into a highly successful medical malpractice law firm. 

Daniel Broderick III was the president of the San Diego County Bar Association in 1987 and worked as a lawyer in the San Diego area, where he was involved in several high-profile cases.

Who is Daniel Broderick III ex wife Betty Broderick?

Betty Broderick, born November 7, 1947, is a citizen of the United States.

On November 5, 1989, she was responsible for the murder of her former husband, Daniel T. Broderick III, and his second wife, Linda Broderick. 

Betty Broderick was found guilty of two charges of second-degree murder at a second trial that began on December 11, 1991, and she was subsequently sentenced to a prison term ranging from 32 years to life for each crime. 

The case attracted a significant amount of attention from the media. Several books on the Broderick case have been produced, and a two-part television movie has also been aired.

In 2020, a Broderick-centered miniseries consisting of eight episodes was made and broadcast.

Elisabeth Anne Bisceglia was given birth to Betty Broderick on November 7, 1947, and Betty spent her childhood in New York. 

Betty Broderick was the third of six children born to Marita (née Curtin; 1919–2007) and Frank Bisceglia (1915–1998), who had a prosperous plastering business with their relatives. 

Marita passed away in 2007, and Frank Bisceglia passed away in 1998. Her mother was of Irish American descent, while her father was of Italian American descent in the United States.

How did Daniel Broderick III ex-wife Betty Broderick get married?

Dan and Betty married in a chapel close to her parent’s house in Bronxville, New York, four years after their first encounter. 

Dan’s refusal to wear a rented tuxedo and insistence on wearing a less formal blue pinstripe suit caused Betty and her mother to become agitated in the weeks leading up to the wedding. 

What happened after he married Betty Broderick?

According to The Los Angeles Times, Betty claims that after they married, Dan immediately began treating her differently, including firing the maids at their honeymoon house and expecting her to “cook and clean.” 

But she also stated that she was ready to live with this dynamic in which Dan was responsible for the finances.

She was responsible for the household and the children: “If by other people’s perspective, it wasn’t joyful, it was the deal I made. It was the same kind of family that we came from on both sides.”

Dan has been quoted as saying that he and his wife’s marriage was doomed from the beginning. 

According to the San Diego Reader, he commented on her book: “She glosses over a lot when she says we were both happy.” “According to her, my children and I enjoyed a blissful, happy, and healthy marriage until forty, when I suddenly became insane. That is utter and complete fiction! He said they had “real incompatibility problems.” 

He admitted he was “far from the kind of good, loving husband I could have been.” He added that their relationship suffered from “real incompatibility problems.”

How Daniel Broderick III met to Linda Kolkena?

In 1983, Dan recruited Linda Kolkena, then 22, as his new legal assistant.

Soon after, Betty became suspicious that Dan was having an affair, and when Dan refused to terminate Linda, her suspicions got even more vital. 

Betty went home after learning that he had spent his birthday with Linda and burned a pile of his clothes once she found out he had run off with Linda.

Daniel Broderick III revealed the affair with Linda Kolkena in front of his ex-wife Betty Broderick. 

At the beginning of 1985, Dan moved out of the family home and revealed to Betty that her suspicions about the affair were accurate. 

Betty made a snide remark to the San Diego Reader about how he dumped her “three months after his 40th birthday party—with a red Corvette and a 21-year-old…” 

She did it with a condescending tone. I said, ‘You’re it! You’re it! You have been featured on the cover of the magazine Midlife Crisis.

Daniel Broderick III submitted a divorce petition.

In September of that year, Dan submitted a divorce petition, which marked the beginning of what would soon be dubbed “the worst divorce case in San Diego history.” 

Among the highlights was Betty leaving a series of foul-mouthed voicemails on Dan’s answering machine.

Dan sends Betty itemized deductions to her allowance as a punishment for the voicemails; Betty drives her car through Dan’s house’s front door.

Dan has Betty committed to mental institutions due to the events described above. 

The Los Angeles Times reports that Dan made a forecast in the past that turned out to be eerily accurate: “It’s not going to end until one of us is gone.”

They Got divorced

After the divorce between Dan and Betty Broderick was finalized in 1986, Dan was awarded custody of the children and the house, and he was ordered to pay Betty a monthly alimony payment. 

Betty’s act of vengeance was to drive her automobile into the front door of Dan and Linda’s house. Because she was found to have a knife, she was detained for three days in a mental health facility.

Daniel Broderick III proposed to Linda Kolkena and got married.

Linda Kolkena was ecstatic when Dan proposed to her in 1988. She pleaded with Dan to wear a bulletproof vest throughout the ceremony even though she knew her perfect wedding could become a nightmare.

In April of 1989, he declined, although he employed security guards for the wedding at their estate. 

Everything went off without a hitch, just like their upcoming honeymoon in the Caribbean, yet they would both be gone within the next half year.

The wedding took place on April 22, 1989, at Daniel Broderick and Linda Kolkena’s home in the Marston Hills neighborhood of San Diego.

Their wedding ceremony took place in the backyard of their home, which is situated in Marston Hills, a community in San Diego.

Dan married Linda after he had finalized and completed the divorce proceedings with Betty.

Linda, who had developed a growing sense of unease regarding the possibility that Betty posed a genuine risk, advised him to wear a bulletproof vest during the wedding ceremony. 

Even though Dan denied it, he did employ several security personnel to monitor the event.  

She continued to be concerned about Betty’s actions and questioned a close friend about them in various settings. 

To obtain a restraining order against Betty, Sharon Blanchet and her divorce lawyer must prepare the necessary paperwork.  Despite this, Dan did not agree to let his new wife, Linda file the documents. 

Betty Broderick was abusive against Linda Kolkena for beyond the five years that Linda and Dan were together. She routinely left insulting messages on the Broderick answering machine.  

Betty Broderick murdered both Daniel Broderick III & Linda Kolkena.

Betty Broderick broke into the home of  Dan and his wife Linda on November 5, 1989, at approximately 5:30 a.m., using a key she had previously taken from one of her daughters. 

She sneaked upstairs to the couple’s bedroom while carrying a handgun with a 38-caliber caliber that she had acquired eight months before. The screams of Linda Broderick jolted her up.

Betty discharged her weapon five times, striking Linda once in her chest and once in her head, resulting in Linda’s death. 

Before she passed away, she mumbled, “OK, you shot me. ” after she had been struck once in the lung. I’m dead.” 

Betty yanked the phone from the wall and ran, but she turned herself into the police in La Jolla, who was investigating the incident.

The proceedings in the trial of Betty Broderick got underway in the autumn of 1990. 

Broderick said that she only intended to kill herself and let the newlyweds watch, but she was shocked into shooting her gun when Linda Kolkena screamed for help. 

However, by playing the messages she had left on the couple’s answering machine, the prosecution could offer evidence that she intended to kill them.

Betty Broderick was found guilty and given two consecutive sentences of 15 years to life for her crime. 

Funeral of Daniel Broderick III & Linda Kolkena

The funeral service for Dan and Linda Broderick was held at St. Joseph’s Cathedral five days after they passed away, and more than 600 people attended it.

White roses were used to decorate Linda Kolkena’s wooden coffin, whereas red roses were used to decorate Dan’s. 

A stanza of poetry written by William Blake was engraved on the tombstone of Kolkena. It said, “She who kisses the Joy as it flies, Lives in eternity’s sunrise.”

Where is Betty Broderick now?

As per Vizaca.com, Betty Broderick is still doing time in prison for the murders she committed in 1989 against her ex-husband, Dan Broderick, and her new husband’s new wife, Linda Kolkena. 

This takes place in the year 2023. According to reports, Betty has been denied parole not once but twice throughout her sentence. 

The first time was in January 2010; In January 2017, a panel of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation consisting of only two members concluded that she should remain incarcerated.

People estimate that she will be 84 years old by the time she is eligible for release once more in the year 2032.  

In 2017, Deputy District Attorney Richard Sachs told the San Diego Union-Tribune that Betty Broderick is “an unrepentant woman.” 

“She feels no regret and has no insight into the murders; She essentially stated that they pressured her to act this way. “

In the 2017 series lunch, “Murder Made Me Famous.”

People claim that shortly after, the episode of the documentary series Murder Made Me Famous that focused on Betty was broadcast in April 2017.

Betty wrote a letter to the show’s producer Katie Dunn complaining that she was still behind bars.  

“I have no one to speak for me,” Betty reportedly said in one of her letters. “This was a case of domestic abuse: a pattern of coercive control that lasted throughout the entirety of our marriage up until the day that I killed them.”  

The following excerpt from the letter: “I have fulfilled all requirements for parole, and my original release date was in 2010. At this point, all I am is a political prisoner. They have no justification for refusing to grant me release.”  

However, according to her son Dan Jr., his mother is still “hung up on justifying what she did.”  

“In my heart, I know that my mother is a good person,” he stated. “I do not doubt it.” 

On the other hand, she became disoriented along the route. It is possible to make a risky mistake by reintegrating an individual who has become lost into society.