A few days before Halloween of 1990, there would be a horrific murder of a handsome gay man in the streets of Tinseltown, a crime that was sadly largely forgotten until recently.
William Arnold Newton was originally from Wisconsin, but eventually ended up in Los Angeles in 1985 after wandering around the country for a time. He wanted to be an artist and write poetry, but took a job at a gay bathhouse to make ends meet. It was there that he made the acquaintance of David Rey, an adult film producer who would later become his boyfriend and business partner.
William began starring in adult films under the stage names Billy London and Billy Porter, and even produced some of his own films, using the pseudonym Bill E. London. As producer, he racked up six film credits, and seven as an actor; his last film was 1990’s The Grip of Passion.
On October 28th, a homeless man digging through a dumpster in an alley off Santa Monica Boulevard came across the severed head and feet of porn star Billy London. The remainder of his body was never found.
The case was reopened in 2015, and interest in the homicide increased thereafter due to the efforts of documentary filmmakers Eric Shaw Quinn and Christopher Rice, but there were no new developments in the case until February of 2023, when the LAPD announced that the murder had been solved.
William Newton, they stated, had been killed by Daralyn Madden, a former white supremacist going by the name Darrel, who later identified as a Jewish woman. Ironically, Madden had also once been a gay porn star. According to her confession, she approached William Newton in the street that night, intending to rob and beat him, but strangled him instead. Madden was already serving time for the murders of Steven Domer and Bradley Qualls, though authorities are not planning to charge her with William Newton’s murder at this juncture, as there is insufficient evidence for a conviction.
Crime Immemorial 