| Paul Snider | |
| Birth Name: | Paul Leslie Snider |
| Birth Date: | 15 April 1951 |
| Birth Place: | Winnipeg Manitoba, Canada |
| Death Place: | Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Death Cause: | Suicide by gunshot |
| Resting Place: | Schara Tzedeck Cemetery, New Westminster, British Columbia |
Paul Leslie Snider (April 15, 1951 – August 14, 1980) was a criminal Canadian nightclub promoter and pimp who murdered his estranged wife, Playboy model and actress Dorothy Stratten. Following her murder, Snider killed himself.[1] [2]
Snider was born in Vancouver. By the mid-1970s, he was a nightclub promoter and pimp.[1] In 1977, he met Dorothy Stratten at a Vancouver-area Dairy Queen, where she was working part-time while still attending high school. In 1979, Snider sent professionally taken nude photographs of Stratten to Playboy magazine and she was chosen as a Playmate for the month of August that year. Snider and Stratten moved to Los Angeles and married on June 1 in Las Vegas.[3]
While Stratten worked as a "bunny" at the Century City Playboy Club, and was cast in a few television and film roles, Snider had engaged in numerous get-rich-quick schemes, including building and selling exercise benches. Stratten supported Snider financially throughout their short marriage.
In 1980, Stratten was named Playboys Playmate of the Year and was cast in the movie They All Laughed (1981) directed by Peter Bogdanovich, with whom she began an affair. Stratten and Snider separated and he hired a private investigator to follow her.
On August 14, 1980, Dorothy Stratten was shot and killed in the West Los Angeles house she had shared with Snider, whose body was found next to hers. Police believed Snider raped and murdered Stratten, and then killed himself with the same shotgun.[1] [4]
Snider's remains are buried at Schara Tzedeck Cemetery in New Westminster, British Columbia.
Snider has been portrayed in three films. The first was a made-for-television movie about the murder titled (1981), which starred Jamie Lee Curtis as Stratten and Bruce Weitz as Snider. Bob Fosse's film Star 80 (1983) dramatized Stratten's life and death. Mariel Hemingway played Stratten, and Eric Roberts portrayed Snider. In the series Welcome to Chippendales, he was played by Dan Stevens.