Police doubt sex assault claim [The Wilson Daily Times, N.C.]

Jan. 12--The bruises on her legs are fading, and the marks on her wrists are imperceptibly faint. But Bonnie Smith says she'll always carry the scars of her sexual assault.

The Wilson insurance agent turned to police for help, but detectives doubt her story. Five days after Smith said a man sneaked into her house and attacked her, police accused the 49-year-old of filing a false report.

"This is a warning to the residents of the city of Wilson that if you're a victim, you've got to think twice before you call the police," Smith said. "I feel like I'm in a foreign country. I could have never imagined being treated this way."

Smith is accused of lying to police about being tied up and sexually assaulted. She said detectives instead believe the man she suspects of attacking her. The man, Smith said, claims to be her boyfriend.

Police rushed to Smith's Huntsmoor Drive home when she reported a break-in and sexual assault the night of Jan. 2. The following week, officers charged Smith with making a false report to a police station, a Class 2 misdemeanor.

Officers said evidence, witness statements and Smith's conflicting stories showed her claims to be untrue.

"It kind of all pointed toward this being a false report," police spokesman Sgt. John Slaughter said. "We don't have the motive yet, but we're still working on the investigation."

The former owner of the Nationwide Insurance Bonnie H. Smith Agency in Wilson, Smith said she retired late last year and recently started a new job. She said she has no reason to lie to the police.

"I have 1,400 clients at my agency, and out of those 1,400 people, I feel many would come forward and testify as to what kind of person I am," Smith said. "I don't hunt for drama. This is nothing I would ever put upon myself."

CALLING FOR HELP

Smith had let her dog outside the night of Jan. 2 and left her front door closed but unlocked, she said. When she walked into her bedroom, Smith said a man rushed out of her bathroom, threw a blanket over her head and grabbed her.

"I felt like I was so isolated. I didn't have any concept of reality," she said. "Everything was black, everything was dark, and I didn't know what in the world was going on."

Smith said the man bound her legs and arms and placed duct tape over her face. She said he sexually assaulted her and threw her into a tub of scalding bathwater.

"I was trying to be as compliant as possible up until he threw me in that water," she said. "Then, I started fighting with everything I had."

Smith said she couldn't see the man clearly enough to offer police a detailed description. She identified her attacker as a black man wearing a red stocking cap.

"I was only able to see him during the struggle in the bathroom," she said.

"After the bathroom incident, he was screaming at me that I had ruined everything, I had ruined everything," Smith added. "I didn't know what that meant."

The man told her to lock herself in the bathroom and wait a half-hour before calling police so he could make his getaway, Smith said.

She said she waited a few moments and opened the bathroom window, then dove outside. Smith ran to a neighbor's house and frantically rang the doorbell. When no one answered the door, she said she ran to the next house and alerted a neighbor who let her call 911.

Later, Smith said, she noticed cash from her pocketbook and several other items missing from the home.

SHROUD OF SKEPTICISM

Smith said police were rude to her and treated her with suspicion from the outset. She said her story hasn't changed, and she doesn't understand why investigators won't believe her.

"The detective was never nice to me," she said. "Her accusations that she would sling at me, she would not give me anything to back them up."

Smith said police asked her to identify her alleged assailant in a photo array and a live lineup. She said she had trouble picking out the right man, and a detective asked why she didn't point the finger at her boyfriend.

Smith said police would later tell her that a man matching the description she gave claimed to have been in a romantic relationship with her for three months.

"He admitted that he came to my house and he had on a red toboggan and we had been a major item," she said. "They said they had proof that he was my boyfriend."

That proof, Smith said, was personal information about Smith's life that he was able to tell detectives. Smith counters that he could easily have found the information online or looked through her belongings while he was inside her house.

"Here I've got to defend myself from someone I don't even know because he had information he could have easily got from my house," Smith said.

Smith said not only had she never met or dated the man she accused of attacking her, but she hasn't had a boyfriend in years.

"Honestly and truly, I haven't dated anybody in four years," she said. "My choice."

If Smith had been dating the man for three months, she said, someone would have likely seen him at her home. But two of Smith's neighbors told The Wilson Times that they've never seen any men visiting her.

"I ain't never seen no cars in her yard or nothing," said Jessie Tomlin, who lives across the street from Smith on Huntsmoor Drive. "I've never seen a man over there."

A female neighbor who declined to give her name told an identical story -- no boyfriends or dates ever seen at Smith's home.

Smith said police also doubted her explanation of her escape through the bathroom window. She said detectives didn't believe she could reach the high window, but Smith said she climbed nearby shelves.

"That was not rocket science," she said. "I even begged her (the detective) to let me show her how I did it."

Police would not explain what they believe happened the night Smith said she was assaulted. Slaughter said the case remains under investigation.

INSURANCE CAREER

Smith's clients received a Jan. 2 letter informing them that she would no longer be a Nationwide agent. Clients were referred to another Wilson insurance agency affiliated with Nationwide.

"We value you as a customer, and we know that you value the relationship you've had with Bonnie," Lee Morton, a regional vice president, wrote in the letter mailed to Smith's clients. "That's why we're dedicated to making this transition as smooth as possible and are working to provide you with a new agent."

An insurance agent who had worked for Smith said she left the business in November and another agent is planning to rent her former Forest Hills Plaza storefront.

Smith said she is now working at another insurance agency. She still is licensed as a property, accident and health, sickness, life and casualty insurance agent in North Carolina, according to the N.C. Department of Insurance.

In May 2012, one of Smith's former insurance agents pleaded guilty to embezzlement after investigators accused her of pocketing more than $11,000 in premiums she collected while working at Smith's business.

Susan Kaye Glover of Country Club Drive accepted a deferred prosecution agreement and said she'd pay $15,788 in restitution. If Glover satisfies the agreement, the charge could be dismissed this March.

Department of Insurance investigators said Glover took the money between December 2009 and October 2010. Glover's North Carolina insurance license has been revoked.

Smith said the embezzlement hobbled her business and derailed her personal finances. She missed two home mortgage payments while reimbursing the companies whose premiums had been stolen.

"And my bank put foreclosure proceedings on the following month," she told The Wilson Times for a May 2012 story. "I was carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders."

Smith has been an insurance agent for more than three decades and had owned her own agency for more than six years.

CURRENT CASE

The crime Smith is charged with is a Class 2 misdemeanor. A defendant with no criminal history could receive probation, fines and community service if convicted, but under North Carolina structured sentencing guidelines, would not be sent to prison or jail.

Smith said she's hired Rocky Mount attorney Lawrence T. Gulley Jr. to represent her. She hopes that the charge of making a false police report will be dismissed.

"This doesn't need to happen to no woman, no person," she said. "Even if anybody is in a relationship, they don't deserve what I've gone through. Why would I self-inflict this kind of damage?"

Not only does Smith want her name cleared, she also believes the man she says entered her home and brutally attacked her should be prosecuted.

"I've gone from crying my eyes out to I'm pissed," she said. "Everyone has ignored me from the beginning. It seems like I have been the most awful person. Why would I need this drama in my life?"

Police said they investigated Smith's claims thoroughly and found them to be false. Officers conducted a K-9 search and a door-to-door neighborhood canvass. The response took roughly eight man-hours, Slaughter said.

"Anytime someone calls 911 and reports something, we put 110 percent into it," he said. "We treat it like it's real unless we prove otherwise."

Police arrested Smith on Monday, and a Wilson County magistrate judge set her bond at $500, according to the Wilson Police Department.

Smith is scheduled to appear in court on Feb. 18.

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