The ex-wife of a serial killer has revealed the chilling second she found her former husband had brutally murdered a minimum of three younger ladies.
Bonnie Lou Gower married Richard Evonitz when she was simply 17-years-old. The pair divorced when she was 25 and she or he later remarried and had two youngsters.
However 5 years later the FBI confirmed up at her entrance door with a shock revelation, she defined in a viral TikTok video, which has since logged over 30 million views.
Investigators say Evonitz was accountable for the murders of three ladies in Virginia between 1996 and 1997: Sofia Silva, 16; Kristin Lisk, 15, and her sister Kati Lisk, 12.
His reign of terror lastly ended on June 24, 2002 when his subsequent would-be sufferer, 15-year-old Kara Robinson Chamberlain, escaped and alerted cops. Three days later he shot himself after a high-speed automobile chase.
Pictured: Bonnie Lou Gower, who’s now in her fifties and remarried with youngsters, was once the spouse of serial killer Richard Evonitz within the late Eighties and early Nineties
Pictured: Richard Evonitz, who police have linked to the killings of three younger ladies all through Virginia. He was by no means prosecuted for these crimes as a result of he dedicated suicide amid a police chase
Bonnie Lou Gower has now shared particulars of her marriage to the serial killer in a collection of TikTok movies.
She started with a ‘put a finger down’ model clip earlier this week.
‘Put a finger down for those who had been married at 17, divorced by 25, remarried, had two youngsters, after which 5 years later the FBI confirmed up at your door to seek out out that your first husband was a serial killer who murdered three ladies,’ Gower stated.
She claimed she later discovered he had allegedly killed a number of individuals earlier than and through their eight-year-long marriage – however solely three victims have ever been confirmed.
In her subsequent video she defined how she had met her ex-husband via his youthful sister, whom she lived three doorways down from and was pals with via center and highschool.
In line with Gower, Evonitz had the ‘older brother’ mystique and was within the Navy, so was not round that a lot.
After attending to know him when he was house on go away, she stated she developed a crush on him, and when she was about 16, Evonitz started to reciprocate her emotions.
‘He began flirting with me and determined to ask me out,’ she stated.
She defined that her household had reservations over their roughly eight-year age hole – she was 17 and he was 25 once they had been first relationship – however did not cease them.
‘They felt snug as a result of they already knew the household, they usually might see how a lot we appreciated one another. So, they supported it,’ she stated.
Kristin and Kati Lisk had been kidnapped from their backyard on Could 1, 1997 and later discovered lifeless in Spotsylvania County, Virginia
Sofia Silva, 16, was murdered in 1996 in Spotsylvania County, Virginia
In her first official video telling the story of her relationship with Evonitz, Gower began at the start and defined how they met and began relationship regardless of the eight-year age hole between them
He rapidly proposed they usually had been married in August 1988, eight years earlier than the homicide of Sofia Silva.
They moved to Maine and regardless that ‘all the things was superb at first,’ in response to Gower’s retelling in her half 2 video, ‘he in a short time took cost and let me know what my duties had been presupposed to be to him as a spouse.’
Evonitz was nonetheless within the Navy on the time and dealing as a sonar technician aboard the USS Koelsch in Portland from Could 8, 1988, to Could 31, 1989, in response to centralmaine.com.
In the meantime, Gower was unemployed and solely had her highschool diploma with no plans of going to school. So she took on the position of a conventional stay-at-home spouse.
However quickly he began making feedback about her gaining weight, she claimed.
‘He began telling me I used to be fats and that I wanted to affix Weight Watchers,’ she stated, including, ‘If I cheated on my weight loss plan, he would inform me you are going to wind up being fats like your mom.’
‘Up till this level, I felt fairly good about issues total, however as time was happening I used to be regretting my selection of getting married.’
However was decided to remain the course and show fallacious naysayers who had stated she was too younger to get married, she added.
The image of Evonitz that the FBI circulated following his suicide to keep away from seize and prosecution after his kidnapping of 15-year-old Kara Robinson Chamberlain
Pictured: Kara Robinson Chamberlain across the age she was when she was captured by Evonitz. She is in her thirties now
In a second video, Gower stated that Evonitz had a behavior of commenting on her weight
In the summertime of 1989, the couple moved to San Diego the place Evonitz had been relocated by the Navy.
However after preliminary ‘enjoyable and romantic’ vibes his perspective shifted as soon as once more, she stated, in her half 3 video.
She stated he wished her to get a job but additionally be house when he received again at 4pm – and he did not approve of the few jobs she was certified to do with only a highschool diploma.
He additionally did not assist her in getting a university schooling, she added. Finally although, he relented and allowed her to go to cosmetology faculty.
‘Going to cosmetology faculty actually opened up my world and allowed me to get out of the home and make new pals. He did not actually like that that a lot,’ she stated.
She added that he all the time informed her to not speak about their marital issues with anybody else.
‘Not having loads of pals or anyone who I might discuss to about my relationship, I actually did not know the way completely different it was from the common marriage,’ she stated.
‘I actually did not have anyone to bounce issues off of and discover out what was regular, which I feel was most likely precisely what he wished.’
The flyer first revealed by the Spotsylvania Sheriff’s Workplace after Sofia Silva went lacking on September 9, 1996. Her physique was present in a severe state of decomposition a month later
Kristin and Kati Lisk, whom Evonitz kidnapped and killed a 12 months after Silva, in response to police, are pictured with their bookbags
On prime of all his compelled secrecy, Gower was distant from her household, isolating her additional.
Lengthy distance cellphone calls costed ‘some huge cash again then and he actually restricted the sum of money I used to be allowed to spend,’ she stated.
In her fourth video launched Thursday afternoon, she skipped forward within the narrative to November 1992.
That is when she and Evonitz moved again throughout the nation from San Diego to Virginia, regardless of Gower’s total household transferring to the southern California metropolis to lastly be near her.
Gower stated her husband was battling transition out of the army and into a daily job.
Then someday she claimed he got here house and repeatedly requested her if she would be a part of him if he immediately needed to fly in another country.
Initially, Gower was confused, asking issues like, ‘why would you ask me that?’ and ‘why do it’s essential go?’
However after he demanded a solution, Gower lastly stated that she would go together with him to get him to relax.
On the time, she stated she thought this habits was simply because of him being confused at his new job.
‘There have been issues like that, that finally performed into future issues,’ she stated. ‘Trying again at that that appears sort of loopy.’
Her story is constant to unfold on TikTok, and Gower has stated she is going to drop common movies offering perception into her marriage.
She stated she has additionally written a e-book about her experiences and is within the means of looking for an agent or writer.
Many commenters have urged her to get in touch with Evonitz’s 2002 kidnapping sufferer Kara Robinson Chamberlain.
Gower has not but publicly addressed the story of Chamberlain, who herself has a big social media presence on TikTok.
Amid movies of her understanding and spending time along with her youngster, Chamberlain regularly recounts the harrowing expertise of virtually being Evonitz’s fourth homicide sufferer.
Gower has not but publicly addressed the story of Chamberlain, pictured as an grownup, who herself has a big social media presence.
After a information convention saying that Richard Evonitz had been recognized by police because the killer of Kristin and Kati Lisk an unidentified FBI agent kneels by the grave of the Lisk sisters, Tuesday, August 13, 2002, at Goshen Baptist Church in Spotsylvania, Virginia
Chamberlain has beforehand recounted how Evonitz confronted her within the entrance yard of her good friend’s South Carolina house at gunpoint.
He then handcuffed her and put a gag over her mouth whereas on the way in which to his condo, the place raped and tortured her for about 18 hours.
All through the terrifying ordeal, Chamberlain stated she made certain to concentrate to her environment.
‘My capability to flee was a part of my trauma response,’ Chamberlain stated in a June 4 TikTok video.
‘I used to be capable of keep calm and picked up and appease my captor in order that I might make him really feel secure sufficient to sleep. So after I escaped, it was when he was asleep the following morning.
‘I needed to really use my enamel to sort of loosen the clip that related {the handcuffs} to the mattress after which slide out of the mattress, get my issues collectively. So I feel the important thing for me was to remain calm, and that is not all the time an choice for everybody.’
After she led the police to his condo, they discovered proof linking Evonitz to the unsolved murders of Sofia Silva and sisters Kati and Kristin Lisk, Folks Journal reported.
FBI Lab Director Dr. Dwight E. Adams, proper, explains a number of the forensic proof recovered from Evonitz’s South Carolina condo throughout a information convention Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2002. Objects recovered from his house had been tied to Sofia Silva, Kristin Lisk and Kati Lisk
Professor Deirdre Enright, who based the Innocence Challenge on the College of Virginia College of Legislation, has beforehand speculated that Evonitz murdered greater than the three identified victims – and may be accountable for the loss of life of Julianne Williams, 24, and Laura ‘Lollie’ Winans, 26, again in 1996.
Their our bodies had been present in Shenandoah Nationwide Park in Virginia in 1996, and Darrell David Rice, the unique suspect, was excluded because the perpetrator via DNA testing.
DNA testing on Evonitz was described as ‘inconclusive.’ However his grandmother was dying in a hospital in Harrison, which was simply 25 minutes away from the park, in response to a College of Virginia Legislation College article.
There may be additionally some hypothesis that Evonitz could have killed 12-year-old Sarah Cherry, who disappeared in broad daylight from a Bowdoin house in July 1988 and was discovered lifeless two days later.
The magnitude of the crimes of Evonitz are unknown. However he informed his sister moments earlier than his loss of life that he had dedicated ‘extra crimes than he can keep in mind’
Presently, Evonitz was newly married to Gower and stationed in Portland on a Navy ship – only a 40 minute drive from Bowdoin, the place Cherry was kidnapped and killed.
Nevertheless, Dennis Dechaine, a 31-year-old farmer, was convicted Cherry’s homicide and is serving a life sentence. And prosecutors stay steadfast of their opinion that they’ve the proper man.
But as police closed in on Evonitz in 2002, he allegedly referred to as his sister and admitted he’d dedicated ‘extra crimes than he can keep in mind.’
