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Bridget Townsend, the youngest of three children, appears in an image before her death.
Patricia Townsend stands in daughter Bridget's room, which she said she hasn't changed since her daughter disappeared in January 2001. Her body was found 21 months later at a Medina County ranch. The man who is accused of killing her is scheduled to go on trial Feb. 1.
Patricia Townsend said the hardest part about her daughter's disappearance 'was not knowing where she was.' She added that 'every time someone knocked on my door, I'd think it was her.'
;
Mother awaits justice as trial nears for accused
Web Posted: 12/26/2005 12:00 AM CST
Zeke MacCormack
Express-News Staff Writer
BANDERA --Patricia Townsend's anguish ove
r her daughter's disappearance nearly five years ago is measured in hugs missed, grandchildren denied and justice delayed.
Hopeful uncertainty about why Bridget Townsend vanished on Jan. 15, 2001, turned to chronic heartache after her remains were found 21 months later.
"The hard part was not knowing where she was," Patricia Townsend, 58, recalled of the vibrant 18-year-old she calls "my baby."
"Every time the phone would ring, I'd think, 'It's her,'" she said at her home. "Every time someone knocked on my door, I'd think it was her."
Investigators had no leads about Bridget Townsend's fate until Ramiro F. Gonzales, whom she'd known since middle school, told po
lice
in
October 2002 that he'd slain her.
Gonzales, then 19, led police to Townsend's skeleton just days after he had been sentenced to life in prison for the kidnapping and sexual assault of another Bandera woman, who had escaped and helped police find him.
In an interview Oct. 9, 200
2, with the San Antonio Express-News, Gonzales claimed he'd intended only to burglarize the trailer of Townsend's boyfriend but, while high on cocaine, he kidnapped and shot her after finding her there.
"I did do it. I regret it," he said from jail. "I wasn't in a right state of mind."
Earlier this month, visiting District Judge Antonio Cantu denied defense motions to suppress incriminating statements previously made by Gonzales for his trial on three counts of capital murder, slated to begin Feb. 1 in Hondo.
The case is being tried in Medina County because Townsend's remains were found on a ranch there.
It's being prosecuted w
ith help
from l
awyers at the attorney general's office, who plan to seek the death penalty for the defendant whose scrapes with the law date to middle school.
If Gonzales is convicted, his attorneys hope jurors will spare his life on hearing of his troubled upbringing.
Abandoned at birth and raised primarily by a grandmother, Gonzales was sexually
abused by a male relative as a child and corrupted with alcohol and drugs by age 12, Emmett Harris, a court-appointed defense attorney, said last week.
"When I look at this case, I see a little boy about 2 years old on his hands and knees drinking out of a drainage ditch like an animal, and there's nobody there to tell him otherwise," Harris said. "I'd like to save his life, and the state of Texas wants to kill him. If they succeed, that will not resurrect Bridget Townsend."
Early entries on Gonzales' rap sheet include a 1996 criminal mischief complaint and, in 1997, being a minor in possess
ion of alcoh
ol and publ
ic intoxication, court records show.
Beside the 2001 kidnapping and sexual assault that he admitted to a year later, Gonzales' adult transgressions include convictions for theft, burglary and forgery, records show.
Gonzales told mental health officials he was "obsessed" with dead bodies, the records show.
As a youth, the records state, Gonzales "on numerous occasion
s shot animals and then watched their bodies decay over time."
They also state that he repeatedly went to the ranch where Townsend's body was dumped to look at it after her death.
That sort of graphic testimony is upsetting to Patricia Townsend, who repeatedly left a recent pretrial hearing after being consumed with tears.
"It's a nightmare. I've been crying all day because of what was said at the hearing," she later said while secluded in her darkened home, comforted by a dog and cat. "How would you feel if your daughte
r was picked up
piece by piece?
"
Until recently, Patricia Townsend refused to accept that the bones belonged to the youngest of the three kids she raised alone.
She came to terms with that grim reality after a visit a few weeks ago to the spot where Bridget was found, joined by a woman whom Gonzales kidnapped at knifepoint and then raped on the same remote rural ranch after Bridget's death.
Both Patricia Townsend and Gonzales' pas
t victim are eager for the trial to start, calling a conviction and death sentence key to their emotional recoveries.
"For three years I've just taken every day as it comes," said Townsend, a waitress. "I haven't been working. I'm just waiting here for them to turn off my electricity. My family's been helping and some organizations, but it's just hard to get a grip on reality."
She takes some solace in her sister Clara Kunkler's assurances th
at Bridget is at pe
ace.
"
She was one of the sweetest, kindest and most gentle children you'd ever know," said Kunkler, 75.
"Any time she saw an elderly person she'd say hello. She never could pass a newborn baby or a child without saying hello. She was always giving people gifts."
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/sto...bo.8053818.html
Bridget Townsend, the youngest of three children, appears in an image before her death.
Patricia Townsend stands in daughter Bridget's room, which she said she hasn't changed since her daughter disappeared in January 2001. Her body was found 21 months later at a Medina County ranch. The man who is accused of killing her is scheduled to go on trial Feb. 1.
Patricia Townsend said the hardest part about her daughter's disappearance 'was not knowing where she was.' She added that 'every time someone knocked on my door, I'd think it was her.'
;
Mother awaits justice as trial nears for accused
Web Posted: 12/26/2005 12:00 AM CST
Zeke MacCormack
Express-News Staff Writer
BANDERA --Patricia Townsend's anguish ove
r her daughter's disappearance nearly five years ago is measured in hugs missed, grandchildren denied and justice delayed.
Hopeful uncertainty about why Bridget Townsend vanished on Jan. 15, 2001, turned to chronic heartache after her remains were found 21 months later.
"The hard part was not knowing where she was," Patricia Townsend, 58, recalled of the vibrant 18-year-old she calls "my baby."
"Every time the phone would ring, I'd think, 'It's her,'" she said at her home. "Every time someone knocked on my door, I'd think it was her."
Investigators had no leads about Bridget Townsend's fate until Ramiro F. Gonzales, whom she'd known since middle school, told po
lice
in
October 2002 that he'd slain her.
Gonzales, then 19, led police to Townsend's skeleton just days after he had been sentenced to life in prison for the kidnapping and sexual assault of another Bandera woman, who had escaped and helped police find him.
In an interview Oct. 9, 200
2, with the San Antonio Express-News, Gonzales claimed he'd intended only to burglarize the trailer of Townsend's boyfriend but, while high on cocaine, he kidnapped and shot her after finding her there.
"I did do it. I regret it," he said from jail. "I wasn't in a right state of mind."
Earlier this month, visiting District Judge Antonio Cantu denied defense motions to suppress incriminating statements previously made by Gonzales for his trial on three counts of capital murder, slated to begin Feb. 1 in Hondo.
The case is being tried in Medina County because Townsend's remains were found on a ranch there.
It's being prosecuted w
ith help
from l
awyers at the attorney general's office, who plan to seek the death penalty for the defendant whose scrapes with the law date to middle school.
If Gonzales is convicted, his attorneys hope jurors will spare his life on hearing of his troubled upbringing.
Abandoned at birth and raised primarily by a grandmother, Gonzales was sexually
abused by a male relative as a child and corrupted with alcohol and drugs by age 12, Emmett Harris, a court-appointed defense attorney, said last week.
"When I look at this case, I see a little boy about 2 years old on his hands and knees drinking out of a drainage ditch like an animal, and there's nobody there to tell him otherwise," Harris said. "I'd like to save his life, and the state of Texas wants to kill him. If they succeed, that will not resurrect Bridget Townsend."
Early entries on Gonzales' rap sheet include a 1996 criminal mischief complaint and, in 1997, being a minor in possess
ion of alcoh
ol and publ
ic intoxication, court records show.
Beside the 2001 kidnapping and sexual assault that he admitted to a year later, Gonzales' adult transgressions include convictions for theft, burglary and forgery, records show.
Gonzales told mental health officials he was "obsessed" with dead bodies, the records show.
As a youth, the records state, Gonzales "on numerous occasion
s shot animals and then watched their bodies decay over time."
They also state that he repeatedly went to the ranch where Townsend's body was dumped to look at it after her death.
That sort of graphic testimony is upsetting to Patricia Townsend, who repeatedly left a recent pretrial hearing after being consumed with tears.
"It's a nightmare. I've been crying all day because of what was said at the hearing," she later said while secluded in her darkened home, comforted by a dog and cat. "How would you feel if your daughte
r was picked up
piece by piece?
"
Until recently, Patricia Townsend refused to accept that the bones belonged to the youngest of the three kids she raised alone.
She came to terms with that grim reality after a visit a few weeks ago to the spot where Bridget was found, joined by a woman whom Gonzales kidnapped at knifepoint and then raped on the same remote rural ranch after Bridget's death.
Both Patricia Townsend and Gonzales' pas
t victim are eager for the trial to start, calling a conviction and death sentence key to their emotional recoveries.
"For three years I've just taken every day as it comes," said Townsend, a waitress. "I haven't been working. I'm just waiting here for them to turn off my electricity. My family's been helping and some organizations, but it's just hard to get a grip on reality."
She takes some solace in her sister Clara Kunkler's assurances th
at Bridget is at pe
ace.
"
She was one of the sweetest, kindest and most gentle children you'd ever know," said Kunkler, 75.
"Any time she saw an elderly person she'd say hello. She never could pass a newborn baby or a child without saying hello. She was always giving people gifts."
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/sto...bo.8053818.html
