'Mr. Wonderful' or a monster?

Man charged in brutal beating at Denver hotel holds sway over alleged victims as prosecutors paint picture of a habitual offender with a sadistic, violent past

Sue Lindsay, Rocky Mountain News

Published March 24, 2007 at midnight

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Jimmie Wellmon terrorized a string of women across the country, conditioning them through sadistic acts of degradation and violence to obey him, call him "Daddy" and become his sex slaves, court documents allege.

Wellmon, 39, faces trial April 2 on charges that he severely beat one of those women in a Denver hotel room last year.

Because he fired his attorney and is representing himself, Wellmon is in a position to exercise the ultimate control over his alleged victim at his trial - subjecting her to his own questioning.

Wellmon is charged with attempted first-degree murder and assault in the Feb. 11, 2006, attack on the 26-year-old woman, who was beaten, bitten, kicked, strangled and burned with cigarettes in a room at downtown's Adam's Mark Hotel.

At the time of his arrest, he was wanted on warrants alleging sexual assault in Texas and a probation violation in a drug case in Georgia, court records show.

Prosecutors say he has "a long and violent criminal history" and are charging him as a habitual offender, citing convictions in North Carolina in 1987 for larceny and burglary.

Wellmon says he is innocent and that someone else beat the young woman.

He points to forensic tests that concluded blond hairs found at the scene are not his or the victim's.

Fingerprints found on a broken wine glass don't match his, either.

Wellmon concedes that his sexual relationships may be unconventional, but he says he didn't beat any of his partners.

The relationships were consensual, undertaken with women who shared his passion for bondage, domination and sadomasochism, he says.

"Lifestyle choices between consenting adults are protected under the U.S. Constitution," he said. "The key word here is 'consenting.' "

But a domestic violence expert says that assault can't be consensual.

"The whole issue of whether women like it is irrelevant," forensic psychologist Hannah Evans said.

"He is charged with a physical assault, which is illegal in this state. It's not something that can be consented to."

The Rocky Mountain News is withholding the women's names because of the nature of the allegations.

The woman in the Denver case told police that Wellmon broke a wine glass and cut her with it, threatening to slash her throat and make her eat glass.

She alleges that he burned her eyelid and other parts of her body with a cigarette. He also put her in a tub of scalding water and tried to drown her, she said. Clumps of her hair were found in the hotel room.

She suffered a broken eye socket, and her body was bruised.

Previously, she told police, he stabbed her foot with scissors.

Wellmon was enraged, she said, because she used money she earned as a stripper to pay their room service bill.

'I love my Daddy'

Wellmon contends that she blamed him for the beating because she left her shift as a Diamond Cabaret dancer to have sex with a patron who beat her up and she feared she would lose her job.

When police asked her to identify her attacker, she told them, "I don't know his real name. I only call him Daddy."

The court file includes passages from notebooks in which Wellmon allegedly detailed his training methods for the woman, who was instructed to remain nude when they were alone, to kneel before him, walk behind him and never speak without permission.

"When spoke to directly by anyone, you will look to your Father for permission to speak. Any deviation to above rules will be issued at Daddy's discretion."

Wellmon said the victim supplied the notebooks to police and that he didn't write them.

Police also found a notebook in which the woman completed an assignment to write, "I love my Daddy" 200 times.

She also wrote him letters signed as "your slave."

Prosecutors said Wellmon required the woman to study passages of Anne Rice's erotic retelling of Sleeping Beauty.

"The defendant used this book as a training tool to indoctrinate (the victim) into the worlds of bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism," prosecutors said in court pleadings.

During the investigation, police uncovered what they say is a sadistic trail that led to five other victims from the East Coast to Texas.

The women described Wellmon as a true "Prince Charming" who won them over with his good looks, loving personality and promises of money and gifts.

Once they were entangled in a relationship, he subjected them to violent sexual assaults and beat them, burned them with candle wax and cigarettes, and forced them to perform degrading acts, according to court records.

"I just saw slime and dishonesty the first time I laid eyes on him," said the mother of one of the women.

Wellmon, however, says the tales the women told police are fiction.

Meeting at Maryland bar

The woman in the Denver case, who met Wellmon while she was working at a bar in Maryland, told investigators that he became her "Mr. Wonderful" and her "knight in shining armor," according to court records.

He persuaded her to go on a road trip to Denver - in a car owned by another of the alleged victims.

Once the two were on the road, a sadistic side began to emerge, she told police.

She said he began beating her and forced her to work as a stripper.

The beatings escalated during their time in Denver, culminating with the hotel attack, she said.

Police traced the car Wellmon was using to a woman in Delaware who said he took it without her permission.

She told investigators that he tried to turn her into a prostitute, describing beatings including one in which he allegedly burned his initial into her buttocks.

She said she escaped by running naked from a motel room.

This woman was to be a key witness in the case against Wellmon, but after a series of phone calls from him, she told the district attorney's office that she was no longer willing to testify.

The court file contains an affidavit of common-law marriage to Wellmon that she apparently signed in September.

In an April 24 e-mail to the investigator, the Delaware woman said, "He did not have anything to do with this decision directly. I am just exhausted from dealing with everything to do with him over the last six months. I much prefer to focus on my life and moving forward."

In June, she wrote a letter stating that she did not "feel personally intimidated or threatened during my phone conversations or correspondence with Jimmy Wellmon since his incarceration" and did not want additional charges filed against him.

Nonetheless, Wellmon was charged with intimidating a witness for the phone calls he made while in jail, and was cited for contempt when he continued to contact her despite repeated court orders to stop.

Prosecutors say that Wellmon wanted the Delaware woman to pay off the Denver victim.

Recanted testimony

In a recent letter to the court, she said, "I feel that Mr. Wellmon is in an incredibly impossible position, for which I feel partly responsible, and I can't be a part of his burial."

Karen Steinhauser, a former prosecutor who once lead Denver's domestic violence unit, said it is common for abused women to recant their testimony or refuse to cooperate with prosecutors.

"They will do what they believe is necessary to survive," she said.

The stories told by the women are common to many violent relationships, Steinhauser said.

"At first they see this very charming, charismatic individual, but once they get hooked into a relationship, they can't get out," she said.

Wellmon's insistence on representing himself is also a classic sign, Steinhauser said.

"He doesn't want anyone else to have control of what goes on in the courtroom," she said. "One of the hardest things for the victims is that he will be able to cross-examine them. These people who have been controlled by him are now having to face him and answer questions."

Evans said such defendants may act fine in the courtroom until someone crosses them.

Evans recalled that serial killer Ted Bundy, who represented himself, began howling like a wolf when a judge thwarted his plans.

It will be interesting to see if the same dynamic holds true for Wellmon, she said.

What accuser wrote in journal

The woman who has accused Jimmie Wellmon of attempted murder wrote a journal after the alleged attack, recalling the days she spent with him. It was filed as part of the court record. Some excerpts:

• Dec. 3, 2005: The day she met Wellmon. "He seemed like Mr. Wonderful."

• Dec. 4: "He was so charming and I felt myself falling for that handsome and intelligent man."

• Jan. 4, 2006: As they left Baltimore on a road trip to Denver: "We were on the highway in Pennsylvania. That was the first night that I started to consider a hotel room 'home.' "

• Jan. 7: "We got into Colorado that afternoon, and the first place that we stopped was Shotgun Willies strip club. That was the first night that I was ever in a strip club, let alone danced in one."

• Jan. 8: "He got down on one knee and proposed to me. It was so sweet. I was so in love with him and he seemed to be such a great man. I guess that one of my biggest faults is how badly I want to love and be loved and when the chance of a great loving relationship presented itself, I jumped right into it."

She said she put on a Claddagh ring as a symbol of their engagement. "The next time that I took that ring off was on Feb. 11 while I was in the emergency room."

• Jan. 14: "This was the first time that he beat me. What an excellent six week anniversary gift."

• Jan. 15: "The beating was so bad that I had to call out of work the next day because 'I got into a car accident the night before.' He was so sweet to me that day. . . . Besides the bruises and the physical pain that I was in, things were perfect and he was back to his 'normal' sweet and caring self. That night we went out to dinner at Maggiones in the 16th Street Mall and the evening was basically perfect."

• March 18: "Five weeks ago today, I was hospitalized and he was arrested. I am very doubtful that the scars will fully heal on their own, which will be a constant reminder to me of the hell that I lived through. . . . I have realized that I am stronger than I ever thought I could be. I am a survivor and I will not stop fighting."

What Texans allege

In addition to the two women involved in the Colorado charges, three other women, all from Texas, have alleged abuse at the hands of Jimmie Wellmon. He denies the allegations. Here's what the three have told investigators, according to court records:

• J.W.

One woman, who had a child with Wellmon, said she endured episodes of abuse for four years before leaving him in 2002 after she was beaten with a mop handle and stabbed in the foot.

She said Wellmon threw her on the floor when she was in a full upper-body brace after breaking her back.

Most of the abuse was never reported to police.

The woman is quoted in court records as explaining, "I was so scared, and he threatened everyone in my family to basically go and mass-murder my family."

• A.M.

She said was beaten so badly in 2003 that her face was unrecognizable, but she did not report the assault to police or seek medical attention. She said the beating went on for six hours, and that Wellmon slept near the door on top of the phone so she couldn't leave or call for help.

She has a scar on her throat that she says came from a July 2003 incident in which he cut her throat while demanding that she sign over her Oklahoma home to him.

She told an investigator that "she is still in fear of Jimmie."

• C.S.

She said that on Sept. 13, 2003, Wellmon kicked and punched her and dragged her to the bedroom, calling her names and telling her, "You need to obey me!" before subjecting her to violent sex.

She said he frequently threatened to kill her and her children.

lindsays@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-5181

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