Boy, 15, Held in Strangling Death of Redlands Girl

A 15-year-old boy was arrested here early Tuesday morning on suspicion of strangling an 8-year-old girl before throwing her body into a dumpster and then “going off to watch ‘Monday Night Football’ at a friend’s house,” police said.

After he was arrested at 4 a.m., the boy, whose name was being withheld because of his age, told authorities that he murdered Bonnie Lynn Norcross, then stuffed her body into a “plastic trash bag that had been taped shut and placed inside a cardboard box about the size of a color television,” Redlands Police Sgt. Walt Kadyk said.

“He seemed to be completely without remorse about the whole thing,” Kadyk said. “He just went off and watched ‘Monday Night Football’ with his friends.”

The youth’s friends were interviewed Tuesday, and told police the suspect said nothing about the murder Monday night. The suspect was being held Tuesday in San Bernardino County Juvenile Hall.

Bonnie was reported missing by her mother about 6 p.m. Monday, about an hour after she was seen running into the courtyard of the apartment complex where she lived, Kadyk said. Her body was found at 9:10 p.m. in a dumpster in the same complex.

“Investigators believe the cause of death was strangulation and there was some evidence of sexual molestation,” Kadyk said. “However, we are waiting for a coroner’s report to determine the exact cause of death.”

Investigators were able to trace the girl’s movements Monday afternoon to a playmate’s apartment in the same complex. “It appears the playmate was not home. Her older brother was,” Kadyk said.

Armed with a search warrant, investigators searched the apartment and recovered “considerable physical evidence to connect the suspect to the crime,” including an unidentified weapon, Kadyk said. The older brother was arrested at 4 a.m. when he arrived back at the apartment.

Kadyk said the boy had a history of “generally antisocial behavior in school” as well as “contact with the Police Department in the past.”

A spokesman for the San Bernardino County district attorney’s office said that formal murder charges could be filed in San Bernardino County Superior Court’s Juvenile Division today. A resident of the apartment complex, who asked that her name not be used, said: “We didn’t have any severe problems with him; just typical teen-age stuff like being mouthy. Nothing that would indicate anything like this.”