Skip to playerSkip to main content
dmdmdtvs
  • 20 hours ago
World's Most Evil Killers S05E02 William Bonin
Transcript
00:00On the 22nd of March, 1980, the bodies of two teenage boys
00:06were discovered dumped together beside a freeway in California.
00:11Sadly, they weren't the first, and they wouldn't be the last.
00:15You've got this killer, and he is almost ghost-like.
00:18He is dumping bodies, and then he's
00:20disappearing into the night.
00:23Bodies of young boys, most of them hitchhikers,
00:26had been discarded like trash.
00:28The victims had all been tied up and sexually assaulted
00:33before being strangled.
00:35He was incredibly violent.
00:37He was evil, and he would hurt you just to hear you scream.
00:42The killer was a local truck driver called William Bonin.
00:46This sadistic predator, together with a small band of accomplices,
00:51spread fear amongst the community.
00:53It seemed that no young man was safe.
00:56He enjoyed having the boy at his mercy and hearing the boy cry and plead for his life.
01:06And Bill felt powerful when he was in the act of murdering a kid.
01:11In just 13 months, the monster dubbed the Freeway Killer was responsible for the murders of up to 21 young
01:19boys and teenagers.
01:21William Bonin had been revealed as one of the world's most evil killers.
01:46During the summer of 1979, the naked bodies of young boys were being discovered beside freeways and other major roads,
01:56across Southern California.
01:58It started very slowly.
02:00There would be a dead body found on the side of a road.
02:04It started out there was maybe one, maybe two.
02:06And then when it got to like the fourth body that had been found, then we started saying, wait a
02:12minute, is there a pattern here?
02:14Victims were being targeted at an alarming rate and a wave of fear spread within communities across Los Angeles.
02:23These murders were very close together.
02:25It's almost like a killing spree at times.
02:28And he does it because he can.
02:30These people are there for the taking.
02:32They are vulnerable.
02:34And when he figures out that nobody's coming after him, well, he just carries on.
02:39This was a man who premeditated everything.
02:43It was all carefully thought out, carefully planned, and then executed meticulously.
02:50After his arrest in 1980, William Bonin confessed to 21 murders.
02:55His youngest victim was just 12 years old.
02:59Prison psychologist Wander Pelto spent many hours talking to the killer.
03:04I asked him one time about a killing.
03:07How did it feel when you killed him, when he was crying and pleading for his life and saying, please,
03:14please don't kill me?
03:15Did you feel anything?
03:17And Bill said, I didn't feel anything.
03:20I couldn't understand that.
03:23And I said, well, was it like killing an animal?
03:26And Bill said, oh, no, I have a lot of feeling for an animal.
03:32This killer story begins on the 8th of January, 1947.
03:37William George Bonin was born in Willimantic, Connecticut, to parents Robert and Alice.
03:43He was the middle of three brothers.
03:45Their father was an alcoholic, and it was an unhappy, abusive upbringing.
03:51Neighbors recall the Bonin boys were always hungry, dirty, and ill-clothed.
03:55Bonin was then put in the hands of Alice's father, who had abused her as a child, and he went
04:03on to abuse her sons.
04:07Bonin experienced a lot of sexual abuse during his childhood, and sadly, it was something that he just came to
04:13expect.
04:14But he also learned that sexual abuse was a way of gaining power and control over other people.
04:20When Bonin was six, he was sent to an orphanage.
04:23His mother, Alice, claimed this was to protect her sons from an abusive home life.
04:30Bill and his younger brother were put in the Catholic-run orphanage.
04:34And the parents never did come to see him, he told me,
04:39and said that for sure he thought they had died because they didn't come to see him.
04:45From the orphanage, young William Bonin was sent to a youth detention center.
04:51The reason why is unknown, but what is certain is that during his time there, at the age of just
04:58eight,
04:58he was subjected to yet another sexual assault, this time by an older boy.
05:04Allegedly, he asked for his hands to be tied during this, and that signifies to me that this is somebody
05:10who has been sexually abused. There is a familiarity with that kind of behavior,
05:15and that is something that's incredibly disturbing for me, especially at such a young age.
05:23By 1969, 22-year-old Bonin had reconnected with his mother and was living with her in Downey,
05:30California. After a brief career in the army, he turned to a life of crime.
05:36He was arrested for sexually assaulting five boys, and it also later emerged that Bonin had
05:42raped two soldiers at gunpoint during his military service.
05:46RACHEL STERLING- He hasn't just turned into a sexual predator overnight.
05:51This is behavior that would have developed over time, but it's probably gone undetected up until this
05:56point. And to me, this is somebody who is on a very clear trajectory to becoming a very dangerous
06:02and a potentially homicidal offender.
06:06It's the oldest question in the book, isn't it? What came first? Was it nature or nurture?
06:14In this case, I think it was both. Together, they created a formidable combination.
06:22RACHEL STERLING- Bonin's deviant behavior would inevitably land him in hot water. Instead of serving time in prison,
06:30the young man wound up in a state hospital where he actually honed his predatory instincts.
06:36RACHEL STERLING- Now, during this time, he gets to learn about the institutional environment.
06:41He gets to know the kind of things he needs to say to staff at that facility, the type of
06:46things that
06:47they need to hear to secure his release. He's becoming more dangerous now because he's developing that manipulativeness.
06:53RACHEL STERLING- After five years of incarceration, William Bonin was a free man. Far from rehabilitated,
07:01he was ready to strike again. In early September 1975, David McVicker was a 14-year-old schoolboy
07:10enjoying the last long warm days of summer break. Life seemed free and easy, and there was no problem
07:18getting around to catch up with his friends. RACHEL STERLING- Everybody hitchhiked. There
07:22was no buses or anything like that. At the beach, at the end of the day, it wasn't unusual to
07:28see 150
07:29kids down there with their beach towel and their thumb out. RACHEL STERLING- Whilst the youth of Los
07:34Angeles focused on making the most out of their time off, they were blissfully unaware of the potential
07:40danger they were putting themselves in. At 5.30 PM on September the 8th, a sadistic sexual predator
07:48was looking for a boy to pick up. RACHEL STERLING- I just said goodbye to my friends. I left
07:54their house
07:55and gone to hitchhike home, and as soon as I crossed this major street, a car pulled up next to
08:01me,
08:01and this guy says, hey, can you tell me where Euclid Street is? I said, it's about a mile ahead.
08:07RACHEL STERLING- He goes, well, where are you going? I said, I'm going to go to Brookhurst
08:10and go towards the beach. And he said, well, why don't you jump in, and I'll give you a ride.
08:15And I thought, cool, that's perfect. RACHEL STERLING- But this kind motorist wasn't at all
08:20what he seemed. RACHEL STERLING- I got in the car, and everything was cool at first. He was really
08:25nice.
08:25He would have never thought anything was wrong. And then about maybe five minutes into the ride,
08:30he said something to ask if I had ever tried anything like a gay act or something like that.
08:37RACHEL STERLING- And I was kind of in shock. I was like, no, no, I would never do that,
08:41you know? RACHEL STERLING- And then I immediately tried to get out of the car.
08:44RACHEL STERLING- I said, do me a favor. I said, pull over and let me out of the car.
08:47RACHEL STERLING- And he didn't. He started going faster.
08:49RACHEL STERLING- So I got really scared. And I opened up the door, and I went like that,
08:53and I turned around. There was a gun right here. He goes, get back in the car. I'll shoot you.
08:57RACHEL STERLING- The driver was 28-year-old convicted rapist and paedophile William Bonin.
09:03He drove around for some time, all the while holding a gun pointed straight at David. As the
09:10light faded, Bonin parked up in a field. RACHEL STERLING- I was scared to death. I was
09:15petrified. I knew that something really bad was going to happen. I didn't know if I was going to live
09:20or die. I was fighting for my life to try to get out of the car. He grabbed me and
09:25started to beat me
09:26up. I knew that if I didn't do what he said, I was going to die.
09:33RACHEL STERLING- David's ordeal that summer evening was the stuff of
09:37nightmares. RACHEL STERLING- He had my T-shirt around my neck with the tire iron,
09:42you know, that just changed the tire. He had that going through the sleeves of my shirt,
09:45and he was twisting it, strangling me while he was raping me.
09:49RACHEL STERLING- And then with what I thought was my last breath,
09:51because I couldn't breathe in anymore, I just kind of went, God help, like that,
09:56and he stopped. RACHEL STERLING- Amazingly, Bonin let him go.
10:01Later that day, 14-year-old David and his mother reported the assault to the police.
10:08Several months later, David's school day was interrupted by a visit from the sheriff's
10:13officers. He was taken to the Orange County jail, where they'd arranged a lineup.
10:18RACHEL STERLING- We went into this little dark room,
10:20and these six guys come streaming out. And before they even stopped, I saw the guy,
10:26I knew it was him. So I said out loud, that's him number three.
10:31RACHEL STERLING- In December 1975, 28-year-old William Bonin was found guilty of lewd and
10:38lascivious conduct and sentenced to up to 15 years in prison. Bonin had made a mistake. He'd let a
10:46victim live, and that victim had testified against him. It was a lesson he would soon learn from,
10:52and it would lead him to murder.
11:03October 1978, Los Angeles, California. Convicted paedophile William Bonin had been jailed for the
11:11vicious sexual assault of a 14-year-old boy. Despite being sentenced for up to 15 years,
11:17for unknown reasons, he was released on parole after serving less than three.
11:24The 31-year-old settled back into the community.
11:28RACHEL STERLING- He appears to be creating some semblance of a normal life,
11:34but what he's doing is putting in place the structures that will make him into a more
11:38successful offender. So he has this veneer of normality, this veneer of respectability.
11:44RACHEL STERLING- And when you look like a normal member of society,
11:48you're more likely to go unnoticed.
11:51RACHEL STERLING- Bonin secured a job as a truck driver and rented an apartment.
11:56However, the following year, he was arrested yet again for molesting a teenage boy.
12:01He'd violated his parole and should have been returned to prison.
12:06RACHEL STERLING- There's an administrative error.
12:08RACHEL STERLING- Bonin is not sent straight back to jail. He's set free.
12:14RACHEL STERLING- When he's released, Bonin is picked up by a friend.
12:19And he tells the friend, this is never going to happen to me again.
12:25RACHEL STERLING- The friend thought that that meant he was never going to commit a crime again.
12:31RACHEL STERLING- Tragically, grotesquely, it meant that he was never going to leave a victim alive again.
12:39RACHEL STERLING- The string of sexual convictions to his name
12:43didn't seem to affect Bonin's social life. In fact, he was starting to explore his sexuality.
12:49RACHEL STERLING- He's gay, and at this time, the late 1970s, this is still quite a stigmatized
12:56social identity in the United States. So, the fact that he's trying to make connections with people
13:01like him is something that could appear to be quite positive.
13:05RACHEL STERLING- He became a regular at one of his neighbor's parties.
13:11RACHEL STERLING- Bonin's meeting up with people who were after exactly the same as he is.
13:16RACHEL STERLING- Sex, drugs, a great deal of alcohol, and adventures.
13:22RACHEL STERLING- And it's at the friend's house that he first encounters a 21-year-old young man
13:27called Vernon Butts, who is a part-time magician and works in a porcelain factory.
13:34RACHEL STERLING- He's been described as being fascinated by and terrified by Bonin,
13:40and that rings an alarm bell for me in terms of coercive control.
13:44RACHEL STERLING- When you have a perpetrator who basically tries to take away the identity
13:49and the personhood of the individual they're in a relationship with, and this sounds incredibly
13:55familiar when we look at this description, so that's very concerning for me.
14:00RACHEL STERLING- Bonin was never going to resist the urge to assault a young boy for long.
14:05RACHEL STERLING- On the 5th of August 1979, Bonin and his new friend Vernon Butts
14:12were out cruising in Bonin's van. Bonin spotted Marcus Grabs, a 17-year-old German tourist who was
14:20hitchhiking beside Newport Beach. They pulled over and offered him a ride.
14:25RACHEL STERLING- At this point in time, a lot of people traveled around hitching lifts with other people.
14:30RACHEL STERLING- It was a cultural norm, so I think to realize that this everyday mode of
14:35transport has put you in a situation where you're going to lose your life, that must have been
14:40absolutely horrendous for him. RACHEL STERLING- 17-year-old Marcus was subjected to
14:45an horrific assault in which he was tied up and raped by Bonin. Years later, Bonin described the
14:52attack in detail to prison psychologist Vonda Pelto.
14:57RACHEL STERLING- Marcus Grabs was laying there in the back of his van,
15:03and Bonin had a knife, and he said, you know, I just got to thinking. I could kill him.
15:11And then Bonin said, I just started stabbing him wildly. He said, I just stabbed and stabbed and stabbed.
15:20RACHEL STERLING- He was stabbed 77 times in an outburst of violence
15:26that's almost unimaginable. RACHEL STERLING- The lifeless body of Marcus Grabs was found
15:31the following day in nearby Malibu. The 17-year-old was naked and had orange cord still wrapped around
15:38his head. Marcus had been raped and murdered by William Bonin, watched on by his macabre cheerleader,
15:46Vernon Butts. RACHEL STERLING- Butts admitted later that he positively enjoyed watching Bonin in action,
15:55that he was both terrified of him and yet hypnotized by him. The perfect accomplice,
16:04the sorcerer's apprentice. RACHEL STERLING- The deadly duo had made their first kill.
16:12RACHEL STERLING- There's almost a sense in which they're waiting to see what's going to happen.
16:15RACHEL STERLING- Are the police going to catch up with them? Is anybody going to come looking for them?
16:20And when they realize that that's not going to happen, they get that sense of power and that sense
16:25of invincibility and think, well, why not do it again? RACHEL STERLING- Over the next five weeks,
16:31two more young men would die at the hands of Bonin and his sidekick Butts. 15-year-old Donald
16:38Hayden and 17-year-old David Murillo were both sodomized, strangled, and discarded along the Ventura
16:46freeway. RACHEL STERLING- He was very clever so that the police were confused. He would just
16:53scatter these kids all over the place. They were trash. Once they were dead,
16:59they were trash, Dave. They were nothing. RACHEL STERLING- The bodies of young male victims
17:05were being discovered in various different counties in and around Los Angeles. Noticing
17:10a similarity between the murders, investigators at the LAPD began to contact other agencies.
17:18Larry Malmberg was investigating the murder of 17-year-old Mark Shelton,
17:23who'd been found beside a freeway in the DeVore area of San Bernardino County.
17:29RACHEL STERLING- LAPD brought it to my attention that the one case in DeVore fit the cases from L
17:35.A.
17:36County and Orange County. And then that's what made me realize that, you know, we were dealing with a
17:43serial killer. And we all met together, all the agencies exchanging information on murder cases,
17:51especially any type of murder cases that involved a body being dumped anywhere near a freeway.
17:57The multi-agency investigation identified at least five possible victims, all of them boys under the
18:04age of 17. News of the man the press were calling the freeway killer soon spread. Over the next three
18:12months, four more young victims were found that matched the killer's M.O. Reporter Dave Lopez remembers
18:20that the community was on a knife edge. There were a lot of bodies being found. All of Southern
18:25California was terrified. I mean, here was a guy running around and they knew it was a van
18:31picking up kids and these kids were found dead. I mean, it was a very, very terrifying time.
18:38And tragically, there would be many more victims. At the turn of the decade, the freeway killer had no
18:44intention of stopping. But William Bonin wasn't working alone. Over the course of his murderous career,
18:52the 32-year-old had a number of accomplices.
18:56When you've got a team killing situation, there's a participation and spectator element to this.
19:03And there's a sense of power in watching somebody else kill. And there's also a sense of power in
19:09performing a murder before an audience. Growing up, Bonin didn't have any friends.
19:17And so these young killers were his friends and also his sexual partners.
19:25Another individual who was to become one of Bonin's chosen few was an 18-year-old from Texas called
19:32Gregory Miley. He was illiterate and made money as a casual laborer.
19:39In February 1980, Bonin, this time with Miley, who had met at one of those parties,
19:46was out searching for a victim.
19:50Later, Miley described that night's events to prison psychologist Vonda Pelto.
19:56Gregory Miley had this pretty long blonde hair, I remember,
20:00and he had an IQ of about 57, I think. And he was definitely led by Bill.
20:09As Miley recounted to Vonda after his arrest, Bonin brought up the subject of murder.
20:16Everyone would go out and pick somebody up and have sex with.
20:19He said, hey, have you ever, uh, killed anybody?
20:23And I said, no, I never had. I'm high, you know.
20:28And we went to the hallway and we were driving down the street and saw some bikini.
20:34Their victim was 15-year-old Charles Miranda.
20:38Bonin threw me down on his stomach. I started tired of mine.
20:43Bonin said, take off my shirt, place it around his neck, and Bonin started twisting.
20:50Bonin goaded Miley, asking, can you do it? Let me show you how to do this.
20:56Charles was raped and strangled in the back of the van.
21:08But the night was just getting started.
21:12Miley told me that I was ready to go home. I was tired after we killed the first one.
21:19But Bonin said, no, I need another one. And that's when they picked up the 12-year-old,
21:24the youngest of all.
21:27They found James McCabe waiting at a bus stop. He wanted to get to Disneyland.
21:34They lured him into their vehicle under the premise that they were going to take him to
21:38Disneyland, but they didn't. Bonin raped him whilst Miley drove the vehicle,
21:43and he was beaten and he was strangled. So you now have two murders in one day,
21:50and I think Bonin feels a real sense of accomplishment as a serial killer now.
21:55The police soon discovered the lifeless bodies of both boys, taking the number of the freeway
22:01killers suspected victims to at least 12. As the media reported the latest slayings,
22:08David McVicker found it all very familiar.
22:11It was like every time that I read about these kids in the newspaper, it was like I just felt
22:15this
22:15pit in my stomach, right? And it was like, that happened to me, that happened to me. You know,
22:20I just had this feeling it was him, right? But I knew in my heart it couldn't be him,
22:24because he's still in prison, right?
22:28But he wasn't. By 1980, William Bonin had been free for 16 months,
22:34in which time he'd claimed the lives of many boys.
22:37And the sadistic serial killer was only just getting started.
22:5015th of March, 1980, Los Angeles, California. The naked body of another young man had been
22:58found beside a freeway in LA County. 33-year-old truck driver William Bonin was targeting young
23:05boys and teenagers. He had so far involved several accomplices, and he was about to recruit another.
23:13He'd been introduced to a 17-year-old called Billy Pugh at one of his neighbor's parties.
23:20So this individual could just as well have been one of Bonin's victims, as well as an accomplice.
23:26So he got a ride home with him from a party, and Bonin propositioned Pugh, and Pugh turned him down.
23:34He was quite shocked at this. And during this encounter, Bonin tells Pugh that he likes to
23:40abduct and kill young boys. And what Bonin is essentially saying here is,
23:46I could kill you if I wanted to. And Pugh was quite fascinated, but also quite terrified by this.
23:54On the 20th of March, less than a week after his last killing, Bonin, together with young Billy Pugh,
24:01went to Hollywood on the hunt for a victim. They lured 15-year-old runaway, Harry Todd Turner,
24:08into the van. Harry Todd Turner was prey for the pair of them. Once again, the boy is forced to
24:17strip.
24:17He is beaten, sodomized, and strangled with a ligature.
24:22It wasn't enough to satisfy Bonin's growing desires. The following afternoon,
24:28he was yet again cruising the streets. This time, he was alone.
24:33DR. He's been killing with accomplices for quite a long time now, and I think he wants to
24:38mix it up and make things interesting. And he also has that confidence, because he hasn't been caught.
24:44So he decides, I'm going to try killing on my own. And I think he feels quite confident he's going
24:50to
24:50get away with it. He came across 14-year-old Glenn Barker hitchhiking in Westminster.
24:56DR. Glenn Barker's mother had been hearing about other boys who had been turning up dead,
25:01and she was rightly incredibly worried about this. So in order to encourage Glenn not to hitchhike,
25:07she gave him money so he could take the bus instead. But like any young lad, he's not going to
25:13spend his money on the bus. He's going to save it up for other things.
25:16It was a mistake which cost Glenn his life, but claiming one young victim wasn't enough for Bonin
25:24that afternoon.
25:25DR. Bonin comes across a young man of 15, Russell Rue, who was on his way to an after-school
25:32job.
25:33But he'd called his employer to tell him that he was running late. Tragically,
25:38he was hitchhiking and was offered a lift by none other than William Bonin.
25:45DR. Glenn and Russell's bodies were found dumped together in a remote location,
25:5170 miles out of the city in Orange County.
25:54DR. I think the fact that Glenn Barker and Russell Rue's bodies were dumped together
25:58is incredibly significant, because what the killer is doing in terms of whoever finds those bodies is
26:05saying, look, I've killed two people. I've done this on my own. I am displaying these bodies for you to
26:11see.
26:11So there's a real sense of a performance here.
26:14Forensic investigators discovered distinctive green carpet fibers on both victims' naked bodies.
26:21This firmly linked these murders with four of the freeway killer's earlier victims.
26:26By late April 1980, the body count attributed to the mysterious freeway killer had reached a staggering 19,
26:34and there was no sign of him slowing down. It was all proving too much for David McVicker,
26:41who'd survived an assault by Bonin in 1975.
26:45DR. I knew just something in my stomach just told me, this is him. And these stories just kept going
26:52on and on.
26:53And finally, one day on TV, one of the news reporters said that if you have any idea,
26:58even if it's a guest who could be doing this, call. And I thought, yeah, I have a guest. I
27:03have a good guest.
27:04I finally called the sheriff's department and said, what happened to me?
27:08The net was closing in on William Bonin. His name had been firmly put on the police's radar,
27:14and someone else was about to name him as a suspect too. One of his accomplices, Billy Pugh,
27:21had been arrested for vehicle theft. While on remand in prison, he tells the authorities that if he can
27:29make some kind of deal with them, he knows who the freeway killer is, and he points them towards William
27:37Bonin.
27:38DR. Looking at this from the outside, it would appear to be completely bizarre,
27:42but he is out of Bonin's clutches now. That coercively controlling dynamic has been broken down.
27:48He's getting a sense of himself back, and he wants to protect himself.
27:54Unaware that he was about to be under the spotlight, Bonin was recruiting yet another accomplice,
28:00an 18-year-old named James Monroe, whom he'd taken under his wing.
28:05DR. Bill picked him up, got him a job, took him to live with him at his mother's house,
28:11and Bonin just said to Jim Monroe, what do you think about us going out and picking up
28:18somebody, having sex with him, and then killing him? What do you think? And Jim Monroe told me he
28:25thought he was kidding. And Jim said he didn't want to sound like, you know, he was afraid to do
28:32that.
28:32On the 2nd of June, whilst the LAPD began to organize a 24-hour surveillance operation on
28:39William Bonin, their new prime suspect for the freeway killer, Bonin and James Monroe had picked
28:46up another young man. What stands out about this is that it didn't just happen in the back of a
28:52van,
28:53down a road somewhere. Stephen Wells was taken to the house where Bonin's mother lived. Now,
28:58taking a victim to a house where you live is incredibly risky, so Bonin really does feel
29:05completely invincible at this point in time. They killed Stephen Wells in Bonin's house
29:12and then took him over to Vernon Butt's house. And they said to Vernon, hey, Vern, come on out in
29:19the
29:19van and look what we've got. And Vern went out there and kind of poked the kid and said, oh
29:27yeah,
29:27that's a good one. And Bill said to Vern, what do you think we ought to do with him? Vern
29:35said,
29:36well, you could keep him as a souvenir or just dump him off. And hey, no big deal,
29:43you could always get another one. The surveillance team set up outside Bonin's house,
29:49just in time to witness him and Monroe return in the van after disposing of Stephen's body.
29:56As investigators watched the callous duo jovially enter the house, they had no idea what horrors had
30:03happened there just hours earlier. All the police could do was watch and wait. Nine days later,
30:10on the 11th of June, they got their opportunity. The police had witnessed him talking to a number
30:18of young men on street corners as they were following him, and one 17-year-old actually
30:23got into his van. The detectives who had been standing watching the van could see it moving.
30:30They could also hear sounds, groans. A physical attack could be about to take place. And at that point,
30:37they decide to get into the van. They caught him literally right in the act,
30:43right smack in the act. They saved the kid, and they caught Bonin red-handed.
30:49Finally, William Bonin was in police custody. The man who was believed to be responsible for
30:55the murder of 21 young men and boys was safely behind bars. As the news broke, the whole of LA,
31:02and one keen viewer in particular breathed a huge sigh of relief.
31:07We were watching the news, and all of a sudden, this flash comes on. Freeway killer arrested.
31:12And it was him. William Bonin was charged with a sodomy and oral copulation of the teenage boy
31:20who was rescued from his van. He was due in court for a preliminary hearing, and unless investigators
31:27could prove he was also a murderer, it was likely he would be released on bail.
31:33At the very last minute, officers searching Vernon Butts' home discovered large amounts of blood
31:40in his shower.
31:42VIRGINIA BARNES- Butts had probably been told by Bonin,
31:44don't worry. There's no evidence. Deny everything. It's fine. But then the luminol shows up, this blood,
31:52which is completely unexpected. Now, up until this point, everything had been planned. Everything had been
31:57predictable. It was going fine. But this is a real curveball, and this is when things start to unravel.
32:04Butts immediately started talking. He confirmed that he and Bonin had been responsible
32:10for several of the murders. Bonin was kept in jail. In the meantime, forensic investigators had been
32:18examining every inch of Bonin's van. They'd had a breakthrough. The rear had been lined with green carpet,
32:25which was a match for the distinctive fibers that had been found on eight of the victims.
32:31VIRGINIA BARNES- They lift up the green carpet in the back of the van and discover blood.
32:37Now, there are convincing links between the killings.
32:42VIRGINIA BARNES- As the case against William Bonin mounted, the news that so many boys and
32:47teenagers had been savagely abused and killed was difficult for David McVicker to hear.
32:53DAVID MCVICKER- I can only imagine what those other kids went through,
32:56because I know that at first they would have seen the same person that I saw. They would have seen
33:01somebody who wants to have fun and inviting and be your friend and maybe smoke a joint or something,
33:07you know. And then right after, they would have found out that they had messed up really bad. And he
33:15was incredibly violent. He was evil. And he would hurt you just to hear you scream.
33:22VIRGINIA BARNES- The police finally had their man, and before the year was out, William Bonin would be ready
33:28to talk. His secret life was about to be revealed once and for all.
33:42VIRGINIA BARNES- On the 16th of December 1980, William Bonin, the man known as the Freeway Killer,
33:48tried to make a deal with investigators. He would give them information about his numerous victims
33:55on the understanding that his confessions could not be used as evidence against him. He was hoping that
34:02if he helped, the prosecutors wouldn't seek the death penalty. Detective Larry Marmberg received
34:08a call from the LAPD.
34:10VIRGINIA BARNES- They said, hey, Bonin is going to talk to us,
34:14and you're invited to come down. And I went down to the courthouse, and there were officers from
34:21a tremendous amount of agencies that all had victims.
34:25VIRGINIA BARNES- The LAPD had prepared charts with profiles of dozens of victims
34:31they had reason to believe may be connected to the case.
34:35VIRGINIA BARNES- Bonin went through them by date and name
34:40and photographs and identified the ones that he had murdered.
34:45VIRGINIA BARNES- He even went on to describe where he dumped the body of a young boy
34:50that had never been found. VIRGINIA BARNES- He told us that it was out here in San
34:54Bernardino County off the 10 freeway. So arrangements were made to bring Bonin out the next day
35:00by LA County Sheriff's pointing out an area where the body had been dumped. They set up a grid and
35:07started doing a search and ultimately found bones. VIRGINIA BARNES- Bonin identified the victim
35:11from a photograph as being missing teenager Sean King, who was 14 years old. His mother had been waiting
35:19anxiously for news of her son for seven months. Larry remembers that Bonin was a wolf in sheep's
35:27clothing. VIRGINIA BARNES- If you walked into a bar and sat down and he was sitting in a chair
35:31next
35:32to you, he would think he's a nice guy. It hurt emotionally talking to him and seeing that he is
35:40actually the kind of person you could carry on a conversation with and not even realize what an evil,
35:47no good rotten piece of garbage he is. VIRGINIA BARNES- Without being able to use Bonin's
35:53confessions as evidence in court, the confirmation that he had indeed been responsible for so many
35:59killings was of limited help to the prosecution. However, as the year came to an end, several of his
36:06accomplices agreed to plead guilty and testify against Bonin in return for leniency in their sentencing.
36:15VIRGINIA BARNES- Meanwhile, journalist Dave Lopez had been visiting Bonin in jail.
36:20On the 9th of January 1981, he had another opportunity to meet with the killer.
36:26VIRGINIA BARNES- There had been a lot of speculation about what was going to happen with
36:28the trial and what have you. And I said, you know, there's a rumor that you're going to cop out
36:36to all
36:37this. And he goes, I don't know if I'm going to do that or not, but you got a little
36:41bit of time?
36:42I go, yeah. And he says, yeah, I did it. I said, I said, you did what? He says, I
36:49killed him.
36:49And I go, how many? And he said, 21.
36:53VIRGINIA BARNES- It was a confession that Dave had not been expecting.
36:58VIRGINIA BARNES- It was just a weird feeling knowing that he was telling me all this.
37:02VIRGINIA BARNES- And here I'm just sitting right across from him and saying to myself,
37:08you know, he didn't have the look of a wild murderer, but boy, he sure talked like one.
37:15VIRGINIA BARNES- Two days later, on the 11th of January, Vernon Butts Bonin's accomplice,
37:21who'd admitted his part in the killings and been charged with six of the murders,
37:25VIRGINIA BARNES- committed suicide in jail. It was a massive blow for the prosecution.
37:31VIRGINIA BARNES- Now, Butts has agreed to testify against Bonin,
37:35providing the death penalty is taken off the table. But the moment that Butts hangs himself,
37:41VIRGINIA BARNES- All those confessions become inadmissible in court.
37:46VIRGINIA BARNES- Bonin was in jail at the time, but in order to keep him there,
37:50the prosecution needed to prove his guilt. Now, they couldn't use his confessions against him,
37:55because that was the agreement. They couldn't use Butts' testimony either. So both of these
38:00murderers have admitted to their crimes, but the evidence can't be used to prove them guilty.
38:07VIRGINIA BARNES- Six months later, in June, there was a revelation.
38:10VIRGINIA BARNES- Dave Lopez went public with the news that Bonin had confessed to him.
38:16VIRGINIA BARNES- We put together the story and broadcast the fact that he confessed to me,
38:2021 killings. Went in a little bit of detail, not a whole bunch. And then the proverbial,
38:28you know what, hit the fan. VIRGINIA BARNES- It made the reporter a vital witness,
38:33and he was put under pressure to give evidence in court. VIRGINIA BARNES- Everybody and their brother
38:38was coming after me, and they were trying to subpoena me. Now, at the time, California had
38:43what they call a shield law, which basically protected reporters from having to testify
38:49in a court of law. If you want it, you can subpoena them, but they can only testify to what
38:55they had reported on the air or what they had written. And the state of California tried like
39:01the devil to try to get me to testify, and I wasn't going to testify.
39:04VIRGINIA BARNES- As prosecutors tried every trick in the book to get Dave on the witness stand,
39:10Bonin seemed happy to spill the beans on his life of crime to prison psychologist Von de Pelto.
39:16Over the coming weeks, he went into detail about the depraved killings.
39:22VIRGINIA BARNES- He said that he went out and picked up these kids
39:26because he wanted sex. He wanted to rape them. And then he said that he had like this epiphany,
39:35I guess, where he realized and admitted to himself, it wasn't the sex at all. He enjoyed the killing.
39:44He enjoyed having the boy at his mercy and hearing the boy cry and plead for his life.
39:54VIRGINIA BARNES- On the 4th of November 1981, at the Los Angeles Superior Court,
40:00Bonin's trial began. He was indicted for 12 murders in Los Angeles County.
40:06VIRGINIA BARNES- The trial was a sensation.
40:09VIRGINIA BARNES- People queued for hours to get into the public gallery.
40:12It was the most extraordinary spectacle.
40:16VIRGINIA BARNES- Without any of Bonin's confessions on the record,
40:19there was a real chance that he could get away with murder. After six weeks of trial and testimony,
40:27the fate of the freeway killer hung in the balance.
40:31VIRGINIA BARNES- Once they started closing arguments,
40:33that's it. The case is over. You know, there's no more testimony, no more nothing.
40:37And I hadn't testified yet. And I got a phone call saying that the closing arguments were delayed.
40:44VIRGINIA BARNES- I go, why? Well, because Bonin was in the holding cell with another inmate.
40:50The inmate realized who he was, and he beat the living crap out of him,
40:53to the point where Bonin was physically unable to go to court.
40:57VIRGINIA BARNES- This unexpected news had a profound effect on Dave.
41:02VIRGINIA BARNES- I do believe that there are sometimes when you get signs,
41:06may they be subtle or whatever, however you want to believe it. But the way I looked at it,
41:10I said it was so unusual for a guy to be beaten up the day of the closing arguments,
41:17and the closing arguments were delayed. I said to myself, you know, I better not ignore this.
41:23So I called the prosecutor and I said, hey, look, you know, you still need me? I'll testify.
41:29VIRGINIA BARNES- Dave Lopez was on the stand for two days.
41:32He detailed the 21 murders Bonin had confessed to him.
41:37VIRGINIA BARNES- In many ways, it was a controversial
41:40decision because, as a reporter myself, and I've covered many trials,
41:45you're supposed to be there as an observer and to remain impartial.
41:50It is extremely rare for someone to leave the press box for the witness box.
41:57On the 6th of January, 1982, 33-year-old William Bonin was found guilty of 10 murders
42:04in Los Angeles County and given the death penalty. The following year, Bonin was tried and found guilty
42:12of a further four murders in neighboring Orange County. He received a second death sentence.
42:19VIRGINIA BARNES- You know, a lot of people said, well, I was the main reason that he got
42:23convicted. I don't think that at all. I think, if anything, I was just icing on the cake for the
42:28jury.
42:28VIRGINIA BARNES- All of Bonin's surviving accomplices were also found guilty and sentenced
42:34to time in jail. Despite taking the police directly to the location of 14-year-old Sean King's body,
42:41Bonin was acquitted of that crime. Without being able to use his confession in court,
42:46there was insufficient evidence for conviction. VIRGINIA BARNES- The sad thing is that he admitted
42:51doing 21 murders, but they only busted him or convicted him for killing 14. So there were seven
42:58families that didn't get their cases solved or justice, even though the guy said he admitted it.
43:05VIRGINIA BARNES- In 1996, after 14 years on death row, William Bonin became the first
43:12prisoner executed by lethal injection in California. David McVicar was present during those final moments.
43:20VIRGINIA BARNES- It was probably like six feet away from him, something like that,
43:24and he just eventually turned purple, and he went like that, and that was the end of it. But
43:33it was, for me, total release. It was like these demon nightmares were just coming out.
43:40VIRGINIA BARNES- William George Bonin was pronounced dead at 12.13 a.m. on the 23rd of February 1996.
43:49VIRGINIA BARNES- He never showed any remorse for his crimes.
43:53VIRGINIA BARNES- He said, there are some guys that were born on this world to do certain things.
43:56I was born to be a killer. VIRGINIA BARNES- There were all kinds out there.
44:00VIRGINIA BARNES- And Bonin was one of the most evil ones,
44:04in my opinion. VIRGINIA BARNES- Certainly the most evil I ever dealt with.
44:07VIRGINIA BARNES- I asked Bill one time, do you have any regrets?
44:14VIRGINIA BARNES- And he said, well, I did kill two in one day,
44:19but he said, I always wanted to kill three. And he said, I really regret not having that opportunity.
44:28VIRGINIA BARNES- Bonin was a sexual predator who killed for sheer pleasure.
44:35VIRGINIA BARNES- He was convicted of murdering 14 boys,
44:38but is believed to have been responsible for many more lost lives.
44:42VIRGINIA BARNES- He targeted those who were vulnerable,
44:45and by his own admission, would have continued to kill if he hadn't been caught,
44:50VIRGINIA BARNES- Making William Bonin one of the world's most evil killers.
45:20VIRGINIA BARNES- Thank you.