Gary Ray Bowles started his eight-month murderous binge in Daytona Beach by killing John Hardy Roberts on March 14, 1994, inside the victim’s beachside home and now he is set to be the 99th death row inmate executed in Florida in modern times.
The killing spree began here, in Daytona Beach.
Eventually, in 1994, six men were savagely beaten and choked. One was bludgeoned with a discarded toilet.
Each man fought for his life, but lost.
In every case, the victims had something crammed down their throats — a towel, wads of toilet paper, a fistful of dirt.
On Thursday, their killer, Gary Ray Bowles, is scheduled to be executed by lethal injection.
Executions mark the end of some of society's most heinous killings, but they also elicit objections to the practice of state-sponsored death. Holding the opposing view may become more difficult when it is argued on the behalf of an unrepentant serial murderer like Bowles, but there is still no end to the debate about the death penalty's value.
Bowles, 57, started his eight-month homicidal binge by killing John Hardy Roberts, 59, on March 14, 1994, inside the victim's beachside home in Daytona Beach. He was arrested a few days after killing his sixth victim, Walter Hinton, 42, in Jacksonville on Nov. 20, 1994.
Bowles committed three murders in Florida — in Daytona Beach, Jacksonville and Hilliard. He killed two other men in Georgia — one in Savannah and the other in Atlanta. He also murdered a man in Wheaton, Maryland.
He would say to the world during a television interview years later how remarkably easy it was to kill someone. Yet every killing he carried out was a bloodbath.
"Each of the murders was brutal," said Bernie de la Rionda, a long-time Jacksonville-area homicide prosecutor who sought and attained a conviction and death sentence for Bowles.
De la Riona said in every case the victims fought vigorously while suffering from "unexplainable pain" at the hands of their killer.
"It was not an instant death," he said. "It (wasn't) like somebody getting shot and dying from that gunshot. ... It was a life-and-death struggle."
De la Rionda, 62, has tried close to 100 homicide cases during his career, with roughly a third of them resulting in death sentences. He attended his first execution in August 2017, when Mark Asay was put to death. Barring any last-minute reprieves, Thursday will be his second.
Few of de la Rionda's successful prosecutions involved anyone who compared to Bowles' notoriety. The elusive serial murderer, dubbed the "I-95 Killer" during a months-long manhunt, was profiled on TV's "America's Most Wanted" five times and was added to the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.
Bowles did not answer a News-Journal request last week for an interview.
Gary Ray Bowles was born Jan. 25, 1962, in Clifton Forge, Virginia, but he wasn't raised there. His father died from black lung disease six months before he was born.
While a child, he moved from place to place as his mother married again and again. At least two of Bowles' stepfathers physically and mentally abused him, according to court testimony.
He told an interviewer in 2013 that he fought back against the last stepfather who beat him, but it didn't end well. His mother came to the defense of her husband and not her son. Overflowing with resentment, Bowles left home at 14.
With only a middle school education, Bowles discovered a way to earn money. Starting in his teen years, he prostituted himself to gay men.
Tom Youngman, a retired homicide and crime scene investigator with the Daytona Beach Police Department, was one of a battery of investigators who interviewed Bowles following his arrest. He asked Bowles why he chose gay men as his murder victims.
"He said they only perform an act on him and he never did (to) them," Youngman said last week. "I said, 'Well, that's homosexuality,' and he says, 'No.'
"Then what are you if you're not a homosexual?" Youngman asked Bowles.
"I'm a hustler," Bowles replied.
Bowles drifted around the country while a teen. He lived in Illinois, Louisiana, Missouri and Florida. His first arrest, a marijuana charge, came at 17.
In 1982, at age 20, Bowles was sentenced to eight years in prison in Hillsborough County for sexual battery with a weapon. The victim was tortured and her wounds were severe.
John Best, a retired Savannah police homicide detective, said he uncovered a lot of heinous details about Bowles' criminal life. The 1982 sexual battery in Tampa, he said, was the work of a sadistic killer.
#garyraybowles
Gary Ray Bowles victim speaks "This man totally had me blindsided." injustice 2 tome 4 | |
| 9 Likes | 9 Dislikes |
| 870 views views | followers |
| Education | Upload TimePublished on 17 Aug 2019 |
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét