Bitch Chasity & The Sun Dance Kid

By

Bonnie M. Wells

www.starlightinnerprizes.com

Note: Some names have been changed from nick names to actual names:

All Women Are Bitches

Sindee Davis and I had watched Wild Bill pick up so many women that if we had not carried a note book around with us, we would never have been able to keep track of them. Even then, as I discovered years later, there were several we missed.

Between the years of 1994 and 1997 Wild Bill moved two different women into his home. He promised to marry both of them, but after a few months in his presence I don't think a person could have paid either one of them enough money to marry him.

Living with a woman and supposedly being engaged to her obviously meant nothing to the man because his woman chasing continued at the same rate as before the women moved in with him. He considered all women bitches .... his favorite nickname for me was ....The Married Bitch! "There goes the married bitch," he'd say as I drove past. Of course I couldn't hear his words ... otherwise I might have stopped my vehicle and gave him a full demonstration of just how much of a bitch I really could be! But I was told of his comments by both of his live-in's after they had fled from him and his cruelty. I learned a lot from those two women .... one of which had the same first name as me.

I remember the day I was standing in the other Bonnie's yard, talking to her about something Wild Bill had done to her, when he came driving past and yelled something to her about her whore friends!

"Park that car right now," I yelled back at him and immediately started toward the vehicle. He pulled over to the curb and I walked up beside the car, reached in and took hold of his beard and turned his head toward me .... "You didn't just call me a whore did you?" I all but whispered.

He stammered something about Bonnie's "other friends" and I informed him that her "other friends" were not the ones standing in her yard when he screamed the insult, and it had best never happen again, otherwise he was going to see just what I was made of. He apologized and drove away.

Later that day Bonnie said he came back and harassed her some more, and when she asked him why he acted like a little whipped pup around me .... why he didn't push me around like he did her .... she said he told her .... "No, I won't f--- with Bonnie Wells. She's got too much on me." !! This statement said more than all my words put together has ever been able to say about the man. Whether law enforcement ever believes anything that I have reported about the man or not, is no longer of any importance to me. His own words convinced me that I am right about him. In how many cases I'm right, we will probably never know.

Never the less, when Roda Snyder was murdered in February of 1996, I warned Winstanley that -- "if Roda Snyder's killer had people living in his home .... [like Wild Bill did at the time] .... then they would surely have to come up with an explanation concerning the marks. He couldn't "stay away" from his wife or girlfriend long enough for the injuries to heal without her seeing them.

March 1st, 1996

As soon as Roda Snyder's murdered body was found, I contacted Detective John Winstanley and told him to be alert to Wild Bill landing in jail. I suspected he had some scratches and marks on him that he needed to explain.

Sure enough, within days of the Snyder murder, Bonnie H. had Wild Bill arrested on domestic violence charges.

She said he tried to smother her to death with a pillow from their bed! When I learned this information, all I could think of was the still unsolved murders of Kimberly Fulton and her little boy Daniel. Whoever killed them had choked Kimberly to death and then used a pillow from the child's own bed to smother him to death with. We had at least one cold blooded son-of-a-bitch in our midst, but no one could find him ..... or so they say.

Bonnie had a restraining order against Wild Bill after he tried to kill her. He wasn't allowed back on his own property, but that didn't bother him any. He went directly home as soon as he was released from jail, and Sindee and I were the only people watching to see if that's what he did. The cops could have cared less.

It didn't take Wild Bill very long to talk Bonnie H. into dropping the domestic violence charges against him, and I told Sindee to watch him close, and see what he did to her as soon as he knew he was safe. I was right again.....

As soon as those charges were dropped he flew into a rage and ran Bonnie and her boys out of his house and off his property. Well, it wasn't really 'his' property, but he rented it from his brother and obviously had total control over it and could do as he pleased.... {for awhile, that is. See The Old House for update}

Strangely enough, my words to Winstanley appeared to have panned-out again, but as usual, turned out to have no connection to Wild Bill because Sammy Davis was arrested, tried and convicted of the murder of Roda Snyder. Meanwhile, Wild Bill rode supreme. He beat the hell out of Bonnie H. whenever he wanted to, and he picked up women whenever he wanted to.

Sindee and I had seen him bring several women across state lines for the purpose of sexual exploitation, but in this area I guess that isn't against the law. In fact, nothing the man done seemed to be against the law.

I remember a van he once owned that he drove for months without a license plate on the front of it. In Ohio it is mandatory to have a license plate on both the front and back of a vehicle, but apparently that law didn't apply to Wild Bill because when I mentioned it to a Belpre police officer I was told in no uncertain terms that I should mind my own business because a lot of people chose to only use one license plate!

I was so stupid back in those days that I actually thought the laws were for everyone and when anyone saw a law being broken, it was their business. Guess I was wrong. Although, come to think of it, I'm still wondering why Wild Bill's girlfriend got a ticket for not having a license plate on the front of that same vehicle! He drove the van 99% of the time, and it's nobody's business, but his girlfriend gets in the vehicle and makes a short trip and gets pulled over almost immediately. Sounded a little strange to me. Sounded similar to discrimination against women .... neah, I must be wrong again. Couldn't be anything like that in this area.

New Vehicle - New Woman

Wild Bill went through vehicles about as fast as he went through women. And every time he brought home a different vehicle, I'd tell my friends to watch him and see how long it takes him to find a new woman to haul around in it. I was never wrong. Strange how I could predict his every move and never be wrong, and yet, as far as law enforcement was concerned, I was never right..... or so they say.

Along about the time of Roda Snyder's murder Wild Bill came home in a dark red Plymouth Sundance.

"Oh watch me now ... now that I can dance," I sang the words to the song as Sindee and I drove past his house and looked the vehicle over.

"Woman, you are without a doubt the strangest person I've ever known," Sindee laughed.

She was probably right. No matter what Wild Bill did, I just took it right in stride and kept on truckin'. I had little choice but to make a few jokes about his actions, even though I was reasonably certain his actions were no "joking matter." Still, if he really wasn't doing anything illegal .... with the exception of the few things I've mentioned on this web site .... then the rest of it all had to be coincidental in nature, and I guess that is rather amusing when you stop and think about it.

Still, just to cover my own hide, I wrote to Winstanley and reported each and every vehicle trade or purchase. The only vehicle that seemed to remain a constant in his life was the little white Toyota truck that Judy and I had helped him purchase back in 1991.

I had several 'nicknames' for my guy. Detective Winstanley was aware of all of them. Sometimes he was Wild Bill, sometimes Billy Boy, and sometimes "Billy The Kid." When he got the Sundance I remember writing to Winstanley and telling him that I was adding a new name to the already long alias list ..... "The Sundance Kid!"

"Wonder if he's looking for a partner? Maybe he plans on teaming up with Butch Cassidy," I joked to Winstanley and my friends.

It wouldn't be long until those words would come back to haunt me, as most of my words did, sooner or later.

In A Rage & On The Loose

March 1st, 1996

Wild Bill's "1996 Rage" actually began in December of 1995, but no one noticed .... except me, and the other Bonnie who was trying to live in the same house with the man. She noticed because he became ever more abusive, secretive and sneaking. Often times he'd leave for work and not come home for two or three days. He was telling Bonnie that he was staying at work. I knew better. I figured he was stalking someone; picking up hookers, and perhaps acting out fantasies, perhaps in an effort to stop his urges and obsession. It wouldn't work. Someone else was going to die, and I knew it. But, try as I might, I could not get anyone to go proactive and try to get ahead of the crime for once.

As soon as I learned that the domestic violence charges had been dropped, I told Sindee to watch and see what Bonnie's reward was for being so forgiving to him. I knew he would retaliate against her and the kids, so I tried to keep an eye on his activities.

Sure enough, a few minutes before midnight on March 1st, 1996, I sat in a dark alley and watched as Bonnie and her boys piled into the little silver Escort that Wild Bill had bought for her and fled his property. I was a few car lengths behind them.

They checked into a local motel right at midnight, and Sindee asked .... "What's next?"

"I have to get this car out of sight and watch the boulevard, because he shouldn't be any more than 30 minutes behind them!" I replied.

Right again .... about 15 minutes after Bonnie checked into the motel he went sailing past my hiding spot. We watched him cross the bridge into Parkersburg, West Virginia and disappear out of sight.

We gave him a half hour or so and then went to Parkersburg ourselves. And we checked every night spot in Parkersburg and even the outskirts of Parkersburg. He was nowhere to be seen.

"Should we head for Huntington or Charleston?" Sindee asked.

I felt he'd gone 'south' but I was tired and besides that, after we hit those other cities I wouldn't have a clue as to where to go to look for him. I didn't know the cities like he did. And I didn't think it wise for two women to become lost in the rough part of any city and possibly have car trouble or have to ask strangers for directions. No, I'd just go on home and get some sleep. He'd be back in a day or so .... probably tomorrow. Then he'd go after Bonnie H. again; apologize, promise her the moon and drag her back into his house so it could start all over again.

Lookin' For Butch Cassidy

"What's the next strike date?" Sindee asked as we discussed Wild Bill's disappearance on the evening of March 2nd.

"Well, tomorrow is my mother's birthday {3-03}, and I don't know that it will be a strike date, but it might. We've seen several birthdays in my family acted upon, and back when Wild Bill and I were friends he always insisted on taking mom out to dinner for her birthday, so I know he remembers it.

Actually he didn't have to 'remember' any of the birthdays within my family and friends because he'd written them all down in his diary as well as on his calenders. Never the less, it had been a couple of years since we'd been friends, so he may have gotten rid of the dates ..... something told me this was not the case though.

"Perhaps we'd better pick up a news paper and watch the evening news on March 3rd and 4th, just to be safe," I told Sindee.

And so we did, and when I read the article about the murdered fifteen year old hooker in Charleston, West Virginia who was killed on my mother's birthday, I wasn't exactly surprised.

Her name was Chasity Dawn Cottrell, and the news paper said her nude body had been found behind a dumpster in Charleston. It said she had not been stabbed, had not been shot, but the cause of death was unknown until an autopsy was performed.

I didn't wait for an autopsy report. I wrote to Winstanley immediately and told him she was beaten severely about the head and the final assault was strangulation.

There would be no more articles in our news paper about Chasity Cottrell, and I would never know exactly how she was killed because even though I wrote to detectives in Charleston, there was never any response from them.

"Dammit Sindee, the story was Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid. Did that moron convert it to Bitch Chasity & The Sundance Kid?"

"What would be so surprising if he did?" Sindee replied.

And she was right. We'd already watched several nursery rhymes and short stories warped into unbelievable situations, and of course we were well aware that all women, regardless of their occupation or social standing were 'bitches' as far as Wild Bill was concerned.

Little did I know in March of 1996 just how many 'conversions' and warped dramas lay just ahead of us. By October of 1996 I was actually in a state of shock, and could not understand why no one within the field of law enforcement could see what was happening. How could I be so consistently right about what was going to happen, the direction in which it was going to happen, the date on which it was going to happen, and yet ALWAYS be wrong about WHO committed the crime? How?

A Memory Stirs

When Chasity Cottrell was murdered the first thought that crossed my mind was of another Cottrell girl who had disappeared from Charleston, West Virginia in August of 1992.

I remembered it as if it were only yesterday.

Wild Bill had been our friend back at that time, but even then several of my friends were beginning to question his bizarre actions, and unexplained absences, sometimes for days at a time.

August 23rd, 24th and 25th, 1992 was just such a time. I had no idea what set Wild Bill into a rage, but he was certainly in one.

Sunday, August 23rd, 1992: We were supposed to go to a cook-out at a nearby island with several friends and most of his family members, but something set him off and we ended up not going. He didn't call to cancel the plans or to explain anything. He just didn't show up.

"Maybe he changed his mind about us going. Maybe he found a date last night and wanted to take her," my cousin said.

Maybe, but I got the feeling that he had not gone either. A phone call to his sister confirmed my feeling.

Monday, August 24th, 1992: Wild Bill had not came home.

I pulled my car off to the side of the road and watched the movement of the crane. That was not Wild Bill operating it. Whoever was operating it did not have the speed and experience he had. He was one of the best crane operators I'd ever laid eyes on, and an excellent boat pilot too, although he didn't have his pilot license.

Tuesday, August 25th, 1992: It was my husband's birthday. We hadn't actually planned any activities for the day, but even so I bought him a cake and prepared a baked steak dinner for him and the family.

About the time we sat down to dinner the phone rang. "Guess the wild one's returned," I laughed as I reached for the phone.

Sure enough, it was Wild Bill, wanting to wish Mike a happy birthday, and more than anything else wanting to tell me that he'd taken "yesterday {the 24th}" off from work and took the motor cycle to Huntington and Charleston, West Virginia in search of "women." I wasn't surprised, but I wondered how many women he thought he could get on the back of that motor cycle!!

I knew he was "out of town," because no one could find him locally, although we put several hundred miles on all our vehicles looking for him!

It was while Wild Bill claimed he was in the Charleston area that 17 year old, 5'4" Robin Cottrell with blue eyes and reddish-brown hair had disappeared from Charleston. The report was in the paper one time only. To this day I have no idea if the girl was ever found or not. I assume she was because her picture is not on the West Virginia State Police's web site.

Regardless, I didn't have much time to think about a Charleston girl because on the morning of August 25th, 1992, 18 year old Ronda Ellen Manley was found murdered in Marietta, Ohio.

Early reports told of a witness who had heard a woman scream and then saw a white, dolled up, Toyota or Chevy S-10 truck racing from the cemetery. I didn't know anyone who drove a white Chevy S-10, but I certainly knew someone who drove a dolled up, white Toyota truck .... and who was not home during the time that Ronda was murdered.

The Cottrell Coincidence

May 2004

Chasity Cottrell's case had lay unsolved in Charleston, West Virginia for eight solid years. There were never any updates on the case that I was aware of ..... although it's possible they could have appeared in the Charleston papers and I would not have known about them.

Although I inquired about the case a few times, there was never an answer.

Then, when I least expected it, I received an email one evening concerning Chasity's case. I will not post the emails that were sent back and forth concerning her case, at this time. But I will tell my readers that the information came from a person who claimed to be a relative of Chasity's.

I will not give details at this time because the case is still active, and hopefully, with a lot of luck it can be solved one day soon.

About The Title Of This Story

It is not my intent to lay more heartache and grief upon those who knew and loved Chasity Cottrell by calling the kid a bitch. I would never do that, regardless of any information I'd gathered concerning her life style. There are several stories on this web site about women and teenage girls who were hookers or part time hookers. To me, this is of no more importance than their hair color, or whether they wore nail polish. It's completely irrelevant, with the possible exception that their lifestyle and profession puts them at the mercy of every vile, twisted form of humanity, and exposes them to every disease known to mankind.

This story was titled as it is because I watched Wild Bill "act out" my entire name, and everything around me.

Bonnie M. Wells