Dirty John season 2: Who was the real Betty Broderick?

The latest season of true crime series Dirty John has arrived on Netflix.

The anthology series, whose first season was based on the podcast of the same name, returned for a second outing on Friday (14 August) with a whole new story to tell.

While season one told the story John Meehan (Eric Bana), a conman and pathological liar who wormed his way into the life of Debra Newell (Connie Britton), season two focuses on the life of Betty Broderick.

Amanda Peet stars in Dirty John as Broderick, who was convicted in 1991 of killing her ex-husband Daniel (played by Christian Slater) and his wife Linda (Rachel Keller).

The real-life Broderick was born Elisabeth Anne Bisceglia in 1947 and met husband Daniel Broderick III, who was training to become a lawyer, while the pair were both studying at university.

They married in 1969 and went on to have five children together, the youngest of whom died just two days after he was born.

Things started to go downhill in 1982, when Broderick’s husband hired Linda Kolkena, then 21, to be his legal assistant. Broderick began to suspect that the pair were having an affair - something he later confessed to - which resulted in his moving out in 1985.

He was forced to take custody of the children after his ex-wife left them on his doorstep one at a time.

During the divorce process, which took four years, Broderick’s behaviour became increasingly erratic, leading to multiple restraining orders which she ignored.

The divorce was finalised in 1989, with Daniel Broderick and Kolkena marrying in April of that year.

On 4 November 1989, Broderick drove to the couple’s home with a gun she had purchased eight months prior.

Entering the house with a key she had stolen from her daughter, she shot the pair. Kolkena died instantly while her husband died shortly after, with Broderick later admitting that she spoke to him after he was shot.

Broderick turned herself into the police, but claimed at the trial that she had not intended to kill either party and had only shot in retaliation to Kolkena waking. The initial trial resulted in a hung jury, but a retrial found her guilty of two counts of second-degree murder.

She was sentenced to two terms of 15 years to life and is still incarcerated in the California Institution for Women.