“It’s a bit embarrassing,” 35-year-old Richard Bowler told the police operator when he called for help in the early morning hours of August 20, 2013. “It’s my friend. … We had a bit of a kinky sex game and he’s stopped breathing.”
“He’s on my bed,” Bowler continued, his voice growing more and more frantic. “He’s wrapped up in a PVC sheet with tape and that. He’s got clingfilm wrapped around his body and I have got a text message on my phone stating that’s what he likes.”
When paramedics arrived on the scene, they found Bowler struggling to perform CPR on Williams in bed.
“I thought he was just sleeping,” Bowler reportedly told them. “I am sorry. I should have called before. He takes ketamine and that mongs him out.”
The mattress was covered in black plastic sheeting. Williams was tightly bound with saran wrap.
“The clingfilm extended from his ankles to his shoulders and it was obvious he had been dead for some time,” prosecutors told the court this week.
Bowler suffers from cerebral palsy. He and his live-in caretaker, 23-year-old David Connor, are now facing manslaughter charges after accidentally killing 47-year-old Alun Williams during a bondage sex session gone wrong last summer.
Williams lived with his girlfriend in Shepherdswell, Kent, England, but would occasionally engage in bondage and “mummification” with men he met online. On August 19, he went over to Bowler and Connor’s flat to have a threesome.
Upon his arrival, Bowler and Connor wrapped Williams in saran wrap then laid him down on the bed. Then Connor proceeded to spank him while Bowler penetrated him with a strap-on. At around 1 a.m., the two men left for a while. When they returned, Williams was dead.
Police found drugs including poppers, ketamine, cocaine, and methamphetamine at the scene of the crime. They also found gas masks, hand ties, masking tape, duct tape, and other sex toys.
A post-mortem examination on Williams’ body confirmed that he had suffered from dehydration which eventually led to a heart attack. At the time of his death, he was under the influence of ketamine and methamphetamine.
Both Bowler and Connor are now facing charges of manslaughter. The charge specifies that wrapping Williams in saran wrap and plastic “subjected him to bodily harm in the form of dehydration, overheating and stress to his cardiovascular system” and was the “substantial cause of his death.” The men also face an alternative charge of manslaughter by gross negligence.
Bowler told police that he and Williams had met on a gay website five years ago and would often get together for bondage sex sessions.
Text messages between he and Williams sent between June and August of last year confirmed his statement. On the afternoon of August 19, Williams texted Bowler about meeting later that night, in which “wrapping” was mentioned. His final message to Bowler was sent at 11:23 p.m. telling him that he was outside of his flat.
Both Bowler and Connor deny the charges against them.
The trial continues.
Related stories:
U.K. Man Pleads Not Guilty To Extreme Meth-Fueled S&M Gay Sex Session Gone Wrong
A Closeted Actor Keeps His Boyfriend Prisoner, A Bisexual Soap Star Accused Of Rape, And More
British Actress “Devastated” After Discovering Boyfriend’s Not-So-Secret Gay S&M Past
Graham Gremore is a columnist and contributor for Queerty and Life of the Law. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
Stache99
I have to admit I just really don’t understand that kind of play.
I would just look at this at assisted suicide. What did they expect to have happen. Wrap someone up in saran wrap and just leave them while they tweeked out of their minds.
Stache99
That would be my worst fear of dying. What would they say at my funeral. He died doing what he loved. Whatever the hell that was.
dvlaries
I’ve always felt that if I had to advance to those measures of ritualization and accoutrements just to get satisfaction it would mean that I’d ignored repeated messages from Nature that I needed to be broadening my interests beyond sex.
demented
“A bit embarrassing”? That’s ALL?
And this just seems like it was ASKING to happen. Taking horse tranquilizers before someone wraps them in saran wrap?
Roan
“Connor proceeded to spank him while Bowler penetrated him with a strap-on”
Proof that fat girls and dorks do get more action.
Tracy Pope
Well s**t. Now they’ll be banning my favorite food preservative cover. Can’t make spanking porn, can’t wrap someone up like a left-over ham. What’s this world coming to??
jwtraveler
It sounds like there was a lot of stupidity going around.
NoCagada
@jwtraveler: YUP…but now there’s a bit less
derkstaff
Wow. I cant even. I hate how they made this the fault of a Seran Wrap and a “bondage session gone wrong”. And just grazed over he was on f#cking ketamine and meth!
They used the words Saran Wrap/Clingfilm 8 times, Bondage 5,
Drugs 1 time, and Methamphetamine 2 times. They only mention the word “negligence” once only while describing pending charge.
This wasn’t that fault of bondage or plastic. This was the fault of unresponsible adults being unresponsible. Their negligence is what caused a death here not god damn plasic. Poorly written article is poorly writen…
Hugh
@derkstaff: Good to see some sense here.
I’m surprised by the number of very judgemental comments on this. I love bondage, but I’m not a sex fiend. Many people in fact enjoy bondage without sex, me included. I also don’t do drugs – as the vast majority of ‘us’ don’t. FTR, I’m neither a dork nor a fat girl.
ATEOTD there were significant lapses in judgement, perhaps through inexperience – although if you can get through the PornWall, there are some excellent learning resources on the internet. As derkstaff points out, this was really an issue of drugs and negligence. If someone is unable to do anything for themself, particularly in a situation in which they could become – say – dehydrated, they need to be monitored and looked after. Giving them drugs makes it more likely that they will require assistance and less likely that they’ll even be able to express that they require assistance. I bet Stephen Hawking doesn’t do Horse. These two men are not guilty of having some fun with a strap-on and clingfilm. They are guilty of negligence, and that’s all.