Deborah Spungen was born into a Jewish family in Philadelphia. She has been the owner of a natural foods store, a direct mail consultant, a member of the Philadelphia Crime and Elderly Coalition, and she founded the Philadelphia chapter of Parents of Murdered Children. She was married to Frank Spungen, until his death in 2010. She is the mother of Nancy Spungen, who was the girlfriend of punk rocker Sid Vicious. In addition to Nancy, the couple had two other children, Susan and David. Deborah became known for her autobiography And I Don't Want to Live This Life which tells how she raised Nancy, describing her as disturbed from a young age, and also covers her own life following Nancy's murder in regard to her and her family's treatment by the judicial system and the press. She later obtained a Master's Degree in Social Work from Bryn Mawr College. In 1998, she wrote another book, Homicide: The Hidden Victims.