Woman heard her mother’s rape over the phone in 2014 Fort Worth attack, warrant says
William Bell III approached a 55-year-old woman at a convenience store near John Peter Smith Hospital in August 2014, telling her he was there because his girlfriend just had a baby.
Minutes later, Bell lured the woman to a nearby vacant house where he raped her as she begged him to stop, according to a warrant.
Unbeknownst to Bell, the woman’s daughter overheard the sexual assault on her mother’s cell phone while it was happening, according to the warrant obtained by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram on Wednesday.
New charges of sexual assault and aggravated sexual assault were filed in October against Bell, 51, of Fort Worth, who is in prison serving a 10-year sentence for a 2015 rape.
The new charges involved alleged separate attacks against women in August 2014 and October 2014 in Fort Worth.
Fort Worth police Detective Kerry Adcock obtained the warrants on the new sexual assault charges months after Bell was convicted in February 2018 for the 2015 rape of a woman at knifepoint near JPS Hospital.
The new charges focus on attacks that were reported on Aug. 14, 2014, and Oct. 22, 2014.
Bell denied to Adcock sexually assaulting the woman in August 2014, saying it was consensual. Bell was interviewed on Oct. 11, 2019, while in prison at the Coffield Unit in Tennessee Colony.
The warrant in the August 2014, attack gave this account:
At about 1 p.m. on Aug. 14, 2014, the woman had been at JPS for a medical appointment and walked to a nearby convenience store, where she purchased a drink while waiting for a Medicaid vehicle to come and pick her up.
She met Bell outside of the store and the two talked. They talked for several minutes, making her feel like he was a friend. Bell said he wanted to show her something and asked her to walk with him to the 1700 block of S. Main St. in Fort Worth.
It was a lot with a vacant house, and when they arrived, Bell put his fist up to her face and said, ”Pull them down.” She knew he meant for her to pull her pants down. She felt threatened because he was 6 feet tall and weighed about 190 pounds, while she was 5-feet-3 and 100 pounds.
She was forced to lie down in a grassy area where he pulled his pants down and raped her, according to the warrant.
After the attack, Bell fled the scene, stealing her cellphone. The woman walked back to JPS, where she contacted a hospital officer.
After a rape exam, the woman was taken home and police spoke to her daughter, who said she had called her mother just before the attack and overheard the sexual assault while it was happening.
The woman’s daughter heard her mother saying, “No, stop. Stop.”
Fort Worth detectives received information in June 2018 that DNA evidence taken at the scene in August 2014 matched Bell.
Information on the Oct. 22, 2014, sexual assault was not available Wednesday.
A warrant obtained by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram in November and written by Fort Worth Detective K.L Hernandez in 2017 gave this account of the 2015 attack:
A 32-year-old woman went to JPS in Fort Worth because she was having chest pains on May 15, 2015. The woman and her husband had been dropped off at the hospital.
A friend came to the hospital so the couple would have a way to get back home. As the woman was being treated, her husband left and drove their friend home. The woman started walking home before her husband returned because she said the doctor was rude.
As she walked down Main Street, the woman was on the phone with her husband, who was on his way back when she lost the signal.
At that point, a man later identified as Bell walked up to her and said he could help. Bell told the woman his girlfriend had just had a baby at JPS and he was on his way back to her, but he would take the time to help.
Bell and the woman were walking through an empty parking lot when he grabbed her hand.
Bell then tried to get the victim on the ground, but she fought him, losing her glasses and cellphone. She tried to call 911 after she picked her phone back up, but she failed.
Bell pulled out a knife and told her, “B----, shut up. Quit crying,” according to the warrant.
Bell slid his pants down to his knees and then removed the woman’s pants and underwear as he raped her.
During the sexual assault, Bell told the woman that she was his property, but he would let her leave once he was done.
In December 2016, Fort Worth police received notice from the Texas Department of Public Safety that identified a match between Bell’s DNA profile and the DNA taken from the woman.
At that time, Bell was already serving time in prison for drug possession, according to Tarrant County criminal court records.
This report contains information from Fort Worth Star-Telegram archives.
This story was originally published February 12, 2020 at 1:13 PM.
