Ex-friend of ‘Freeway Killer’ Describes Role in Breaking Case
by Santa Ana (AP)
A former friend of convicted “Freeway Killer” William Bonin has broken a seven-year silence and recalled helping police bring charges against the slayer of 14 young men. Scott Fraser, 52, of Downey, told the Orange County Register that Bonin had told him of killing one youth, but claimed it was in self-defense, and had sympathized as Fraser followed news accounts of the slayings in 1979 and 1980. “Bill’d bring in the newspaper and say, ‘The guy got another one’ And I’d say, ‘Damn it, Bill, it’s guys like this that give other good gay guys a bad name.” It took a map to convince him Bonin was the murderer, he said. Fraser said two Los Angeles police homicide investigators showed him a map of where one victim, 16-year-old Steven Wood, had vanished off a Downey street. The spot was near a liquor store frequented by Bonin.
“It showed me Bonin’s house, where I lived, where the liquor store was, where he (Wood) was walking. It just clicked, something just clicked,” Fraser recalled, snapping his fingers. “He (Bonin) always liked young guys; he was going out at night.” Fraser looked at the detectives. “I said, ‘Okay, get out your pencils, you guys, get out your pad of paper.’ They looked at each other.” Los Angeles police Detective Kirk Mellecker recalled the moment. “The hair on his arm actually stood up,” Mellecker said. Bonin was sentenced to death in 1983 and is now on Death Row in San Quentin state prison. Fraser, an ex-bank officer, recalled Bonin as smart and imaginative, a man who liked to “cruise” for young men and party at Fraser’s house.
But Bonin chose his victims not from the party, but at random as they hitchhiked, waited for a bus, or in one case, retrieved shopping carts from a supermarket. Each was lured inside a green van, sexually assaulted and strangled. Fraser said he believes the killing spree was triggered in late 1979, 10 months after Bonin’s release from custody for molesting a 14-year-old Fountain Valley boy. Bonin had been jailed again after Orange County sheriff’s deputies caught him at Dana Point with a 17-year-old boy. Fraser drove him home after Bonin was released early because of a records error. “I can remember, he said, ‘No one’s going to testify again,” Fraser said. Los Angeles police detectives put Bonin under surveillance in June of 1980 and arrested him when they found him with a teenage boy.
William Bonin On Death Row at San Quentin Fraser told how Bonin had admitted killing a West German youth in August 1979. Bonin said he killed the youth in self-defense. Today, Bonin accuses Fraser of fabricating his information. Fraser received the last $5,000 payment of a $20,000 reward this year, but denied his help was for financial gain.
