Patrick Duffy Remembers His Parents and Reflects on Grief

On November 18, 1986, Terence and Marie Duffy were killed inside their Boulder bar. Speaking on the Still Here Hollywood podcast, their son Patrick recalled how his father had expelled two disruptive teenagers, who later returned carrying shotguns. Citing court testimony, Duffy said Terence began saying, “I told you to…” before being shot. Marie was killed after running toward her husband. Sean A. Wentz and Kenneth A. Miller, both 19, were subsequently convicted of deliberate homicide.

Sean A. Wentz was sentenced to 180 years behind bars (Image: Montana Department of Corrections).

For Duffy, then 37, the loss reached far beyond the headlines surrounding a television star. His parents were remembered as welcoming neighbors who proudly displayed his photographs and never missed Dallas. In discussing his grief, he credited the Buddhist practice he had followed for 15 years before their deaths. Its understanding of life’s continuing cycle helped him process the tragedy. Four decades later, his emotional recollections reflect both enduring sorrow and the faith that helped him carry it.

Duffy’s recollection brings together the public and private parts of his life. Television audiences remember him through the characters he played. In the interview he was speaking as a son who received devastating news and then had to tell his own children. That is a different kind of account from a career retrospective, even when the same career is part of the setting.

The passage of time is visible in the way he tells the story. He can describe what he remembers doing that night, and he can also speak about what he came to understand afterward. Those are different perspectives. The immediate memory concerns a family facing a sudden loss. The later reflection concerns the beliefs and relationships that helped him live with it.

His account of his parents includes ordinary details. He remembers their business and the place they held in his life. Those memories have their own value even though coverage naturally focuses on how they died. The interview gives him an opportunity to put some of the details of their lives back alongside the details of the crime. The people he describes were parents, grandparents and business owners long before their deaths became part of a news story.

Speaking about grief also allows him to explain why faith became a source of support. He describes the significance his Buddhist practice had for him after the loss. That is a description of his own experience. Other people may respond to bereavement differently, including members of one family. The interview is particularly clear when it leaves room for his recollection of what helped him without making a broad claim about what another person should do.

The story has been reported again because Duffy agreed to revisit it publicly. His account is about both the shock of receiving the news and the much longer experience of carrying that memory. The personal details give the interview a focus beyond the fact of the crime itself. They show what he chose to remember about his family and put into words many years later.