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Historical records matching William George Bonin
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About William George Bonin
William George Bonin (January 8, 1947 – February 23, 1996) was an American serial killer and twice-paroled sex offender, also known as the Freeway Killer,[2] who committed the rape, torture and murder of a minimum of 21 boys and young men in a series of killings in 1979 and 1980 in southern California. Bonin is also suspected of committing a further fifteen murders.
Described by the prosecutor at his first trial as "the most arch-evil person who ever existed",[3] Bonin was convicted of 14 of the murders linked to the "Freeway Killer" in two separate trials in 1982 and 1983. He spent 14 years on death row before he was executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison on February 23, 1996.[4]
Bonin became known as the "Freeway Killer" due to the fact that the majority of his victims' bodies were discovered alongside numerous freeways in southern California.
Bonin was born in Connecticut in January 1947, the second of three brothers born to Robert and Alice Bonin. Both of Bonin's parents were alcoholics, and his father was a compulsive gambler who was physically abusive towards both his wife and children.[5] Bonin and his brothers were severely neglected as children, and were often fed and clothed by sympathetic neighbors.[6] In addition, the brothers were often placed in the care of their grandfather, a convicted child molester who had molested Bonin's mother when she had been a child and adolescent, and who is known to have sexually abused his three grandsons.[7]
In 1953, Bonin's mother placed her sons in an orphanage in an effort to protect her children from their father's physical violence.[8] This establishment was known to severely discipline the children it housed for both minor and major breaches of conduct, with the punishments administered including severe beatings, enduring various stress positions, and partial drowning in sinks filled with water.[9] Although Bonin later freely discussed many aspects of his childhood and adolescence, he refused to discuss his memories of being housed within this establishment beyond divulging that he consented to sexual advances from older males only if his abuser would first tie his (Bonin's) hands behind his back. He was to remain at this orphanage until the age of 9, when he returned to live with his parents in the town of Mansfield.
At the age of 10, Bonin was arrested for stealing vehicle license plates and was placed in a juvenile detention center for other minor crimes. While housed at this juvenile detention center, he was repeatedly physically and sexually abused by several people, including his adult counselor Four years later, in 1961, facing the prospect of the foreclosure of their home, Bonin's parents opted to relocate to California. The Bonin family settled in a modest home on Angell Street in the city of Downey;[ shortly thereafter, Bonin's father died from cirrhosis of the liver.While living at this address, Bonin is known to have molested both his younger brother, and several neighborhood children. Many of these neighborhood children were lured into Bonin's home with the promise of alcohol, and all his known victims were younger than he was. In addition to these acts of molestation, Bonin is known to have committed several acts of robbery, petty theft, and grand theft in his teenage years.
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William George Bonin's Timeline
| 1947 |
January 8, 1947
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Willimantic, Windham County, Connecticut, United States
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| 1996 |
February 23, 1996
Age 49
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San Quentin State Prison, San Quentin, Marin County, California, United States
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Cremated, his ashes were scattered over the Pacific Ocean.
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