Billy Lee Chadd: Inside the mind of a Vegas Serial Killer
“My monster peeked out. He had been awakened…I tried to stop what was happening, but I couldn’t.”
Billy Lee Chadd was a little-known serial killer that made his way to Las Vegas during the 1970’s, perpetrating a vicious murder before skipping town. However, in what may be a first in true crime history, a different serial killer was initially charged with the slaying committed by Chadd.
There is one other unique aspect about the case of Billy Lee Chadd – he wrote a detailed manuscript about his crimes and what drove him to kill, offering insight into the mind of a sociopath.
Local Las Vegas press gave brief coverage to the 1975 murder of Delmar Bright, a porter at the Fremont Hotel. (Las Vegas-Clark County Library District)
A Drifter-Killer Passes Through Vegas
21-year-old Billy Chadd had already taken a life when he moved to Las Vegas in 1975.
Chadd was married, and he and his wife attempted to establish their young family in San Diego during the early-70’s. But Chadd had trouble holding down a job and in short order resorted to burglary to provide for his wife and young child. In 1974, Chadd broke into what he thought was the empty house of Patricia Franklin, a secretary at the Scripps Clinic. Chadd surprised Franklin while she was in the shower as she prepared for a date with her boyfriend. What was initially planned as a burglary quickly evolved into a more sinister affair. Chadd grabbed Franklin and restrained her with the cord of a window blind. He then sexually assaulted his unfortunate victim before stabbing her to death.
Chadd and his wife moved to Las Vegas not long after the Franklin murder.
Upon arriving in Vegas, Chadd took a job as a dishwasher at a restaurant located on Fremont Street and 11th Avenue, while his wife found work as a housekeeper in one of the city’s hotels. One day while walking down Fremont Street, Chadd encountered Delmar Bright, a 29-year-old porter at the Fremont Hotel. The two struck up a conversation about the sweltering heat on this particular August day and eventually went back to Bright’s nearby apartment upon him offering Chadd some cold beers.
A week later, on August 7, 1975, Chadd again found himself inside of Bright’s apartment located at 513 South First Street. As Chadd later recounted the events, Bright had suggested they head to his apartment for some drinks as they had done the week before. The two went back to Bright’s apartment, had a few beers, then Bright made the short trip to the Fremont Hotel to pick up his paycheck. When Bright returned to his home, he offered to pay Chadd $20 to take a few nude photographs. Chadd agreed to the proposition, telling police he needed the money.
The nude and bound body of Delmar Bright was found in his apartment on August 11, 1975. He was located on his bed with his arms tied behind his back and had suffered numerous stab wounds.
Billy Lee Chadd committed two murders in San Diego during the 1970’s. (San Diego Business Journal)
Killer Marine
Chadd did not remain in Vegas for long before moving to Arizona, and, from there, to Louisiana. Apparently seeking something approximating stability, Billy Chadd enlisted in the U.S. Marines sometime after relocating to Louisiana.
Fate returned Chadd back to San Diego – back to the city where he had first killed. It was not long after being stationed in California before he again acted on his murderous impulses – or as Chadd later described it, he was prompted to kill again when the “monster” that lurked inside of him “peeked out.”
On February 15, 1978, while Chadd was taking a bus back home after dropping his car off at a repair shop, he encountered 28-year-old Linda Hewitt and her infant son. Chadd and Hewitt struck up a conversation, during which Hewitt mentioned she was on the clock as a babysitter and was returning to her employer’s house before his children arrived home from school.
Chadd accompanied Hewitt to the front door of the house where she babysat in Mira Mesa. But when Hewitt refused his requests to come inside, Chadd forced his way in and pulled out a knife. Chadd sexually assaulted Hewitt before stabbing her repeatedly in front of her child. The gruesome crime scene was discovered later that afternoon when the two children for whom Hewitt babysat came home during their school lunch break.
The “monster” inside of Chadd did not rest for long after the murder of Linda Hewitt when it would rear its head again in a quiet neighborhood in Chula Vista. On the night of March 2, 1978, the young marine silently broke into a house armed with a machete and sexually assaulted a woman and her teenage daughter. He then tied up the other members of the household and drove the woman and her daughter far outside of town, repeatedly asking the woman, “Do you recognize me?”
Chadd stopped at a remote location and let the woman and her daughter out of the car before driving away. The woman was relieved she and her daughter had escaped with their lives. And the answer to Chadd’s question had been “Yes.” She recalled her attacker was the marine that had briefly interacted with her while she visited her cancer-stricken husband at Balboa Naval Hospital. Chadd had approached the woman with a clipboard and asked for her name and address to fill out a benefits form. The woman reported this information to the Chula Vista Police Department.
Revealing his monster
Police tracked down Chadd to his latest change of station in Lafayette, Louisiana. He was extradited back to California to stand trial for the murders of Patricia Franklin and Linda Hewitt, as well as for the sexual assault and kidnapping of a mother and daughter in Chula Vista.
The mask slipped off once Chadd was incarcerated. The murderous Marine started writing down the purported details of his crimes as well as his internal motivations in what would end up as an 84-page manuscript titled Dark Secrets.
Within Dark Secrets, Chadd recounts his life story and the inner-workings of his mind, including the internal force that drove him to kill. Chadd personified his impulse to harm as a “monster” inside of him that “had to be fed again and again.”
Chadd wrote about what went through his mind during the murders he committed: “My monster peeked out. He had been awakened…I tried to stop what was happening, but I couldn’t. It wasn’t me anymore. It was the creature who thrived on fear and death, a creature who had lain dormant for so long that he would not be denied.”
Over the course of several jailhouse interviews with police, Chadd would delve deeper into his motivations. He said his fascination with death was no different than people that go to car races to see a crash, and he explained that committing murders gave him a “power trip.”
Serial killer Wayne D. Horton - a longtime resident of Las Vegas - was initially charged in the murder of Delmar Bright before the arrest of Chadd. (Las Vegas-Clark County Library District)
charging the wrong serial killer
Chadd ultimately provided police with detailed confessions to the murders of Patricia Franklin and Linda Hewitt. Chadd also confessed to killing a man in Ellsworth, Kansas after an altercation with an older man, but local authorities were unable to match the details provided by Chadd to any unsolved homicides in their jurisdiction.
The final victim Chadd claimed was of a young man in Las Vegas by the name of Delmar Bright. Police had suspected Chadd in the Franklin and Hewitt murders, but his claim of responsibility for the killing of Bright was a new development.
Las Vegas police had previously arrested Vegas local Wayne D. Horton for a series of four slayings in the city between 1973 and 1975. Detectives questioned Horton about the murder of Delmar Bright as Horton was known to have met two of his victims downtown near Fremont Street.
Horton was the prime suspect in the murder of Bright, though he was not convicted of this crime as part of his plea bargain. And had Chadd not been arrested, Horton’s confession likely would have been sufficient to forever falsely seal in the official record that he had been the killer of Delmar Bright.
Billy Lee Chadd met Delmar Bright along Fremont Street on a hot August day in 1975. (UNLV Digital Collections, Dennis McBride Collection)
the last days of delmar bright
It was during hours of interviews with investigators that Chadd detailed the events leading up to the death of Delmar Bright. According to Chadd, after he agreed to pose for some nude photos, Bright propositioned the young newcomer to town. Chadd responded with just one word. “Bondage.”
According to Chadd, his new acquaintance consented to being tied up on the bed. Once Bright’s arms were secured behind his back, Chadd informed the young waiter of his intention to murder him. Chadd then strangled and stabbed Bright to death.
In a videotaped confession, Chadd told police, “I’d heard that stabbing somebody in the kidney would kill them, but I didn’t know, so I went ahead and cut his throat, too.”
Chadd was sentenced to death for the murders he committed in California. However, his conviction was overturned and Chadd was ultimately sentenced to life without parole. (Las Vegas-Clark County Library District)
seeking death
In January of 1979, Chadd attempted to kill himself by swallowing a large amount of tranquilizers he had hoarded. Sheriff’s deputies saved Chadd’s life, but the inmate persisted in pursuing his death wish.
In an effort to obtain a death sentence, Chadd plead guilty during his first court appearance in California. Chadd stated to the Court, “I have given serious consideration to the consequences of the trial, the outcome, what it might be. I feel the death penalty would be, for all intents better for me. If the State of California can't, and I don't receive the death penalty, then I have got another shot in Nevada. They're going to try for the death penalty, too. If that doesn't work out, then I will just have to do it myself.” However, the judge presiding over Chadd’s case refused to accept his guilty plea until he had undergone a psychiatric evaluation.
Two independent psychiatric examinations each determined that Chadd was competent to enter a plea as he was fully aware of his criminal conduct. Billy Lee Chadd entered a guilty plea to the murders of Linda Hewitt and Patricia Franklin, as well as the rape and kidnapping of a mother and daughter in Chula Vista.
At a subsequent hearing before a jury, excerpts from Dark Secrets were read before the jury. Chadd did not testify in his defense during the penalty phase of his trial. The jury deliberated for less than two hours before returning a sentence of death for Billy Lee Chadd. Superior Court Judge Earl B. Gilliam commented after passing the jury’s sentence, “Once you’ve heard the facts, the death penalty is overwhelmingly proper.”
However, the legal saga for Chadd was not over. The California Supreme Court overturned his conviction in 1981 on procedural grounds – Chadd had plead guilty and provided the Court with the details of his crimes, but Chadd’s attorney had never consented to the entry of a guilty plea by his client.
Local press expended more coverage on the arrest and trial of Chadd than on the murder of Delmar Bright. (Las Vegas-Clark County Library District)
justice for delmar bright
At the time the California Supreme Court overturned Chadd’s convictions, he was languishing in the Clark County Detention Center while awaiting trial for the Bright murder.
In February of 1982 – seven years after Delmar Bright had his life cut short in his own home – Chadd plead no contest to a charge of second-degree murder. District Court Judge Jim Brennan sentenced Bright’s killer to life in the Nevada State Prison, though Chadd would ultimately serve his sentence in his native California.
Billy Lee Chadd is presently serving a life sentence without parole at a facility in California.
Billy Lee Chadd was happy to detail his thoughts and motives regarding his crimes. Chadd wrote an 84-page manuscript about his life and crimes called Dark Secrets. (Las Vegas-Clark County Library District)
molding a monster
Billy Lee Chadd presents an interesting look into the thought processes and motivations of a serial killer. Chadd was a husband and father, and he was generally described as being a quiet man. But he was also a brutal killer and sexual sadist. And Chadd has provided a detailed account of how his mind processes the vile acts he committed.
Chadd committed his first violent crime as a teenager, apparently out of a combination of thrill-seeking and curiosity. He reportedly suffered years of severe childhood abuse in California juvenile and psychiatric institutions. The childhood abuse may have brought out the “monster” that Chadd claimed lived inside of him. Put another way, does Billy Lee Chadd’s monster still come out in a different timeline where he was sheltered from an upbringing of abuse?