Paul Snider

Paul Leslie Snider (April 15, 1951–August 14, 1980) was the estranged husband and manager of Playboy model Dorothy Stratten, whom he murdered before killing himself the same day.

Biography

Snider was born in Vancouver, British Columbia to Jewish parents. By the mid-1970s he was a night club promoter and erstwhile pimp. In 1977 Snider met Dorothy Stratten at a Vancouver-area Dairy Queen, where she was working part-time while still attending high school, and he romanced her. In 1979 he sent professionally taken nude photographs of Stratten to Playboy magazine, and she was chosen as a monthly Playmate for August of that year. Snider and Stratten moved to Los Angeles and were married that June in Las Vegas.

While Stratten worked as a bunny at the Century City Playboy Club and got a few television and film roles, Snider had sundry money-making schemes, including building and selling exercise benches. Stratten help support Snider financially throughout their short-lived marriage (as he was a Canadian with no working visa, and was not allowed an income with the U.S.) In 1979, Snider partnered with Steve Banerjee to form what would become the male strip club format of Chippendales.

In 1980 Stratten was named Playboy’s Playmate of the Year and had been cast in a major motion picture, They All Laughed directed by Peter Bogdanovich, with whom she began...
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