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Woman remembers murder suspect saying ‘I’ll be back to kill you’

NEW CASTLE, Ind. (WISH) — A New Castle woman is sharing her story to warn others after being attacked by a man she met online.

The man is now charged with murder and robbery for another case in Somerset, Kentucky.

The woman told 24-Hour News 8 in a phone interview Dwight Bell attacked her last year and pleaded guilty to strangulation.

She said had it not been for a butcher knife on the kitchen counter, she would not be here today. She grabbed the knife to defend herself when he came after her.

She said she lived in fear every single day when he was released from jail after serving six months in Henry County.

“I would have never dreamed that I would have met someone like him on a dating site,” she said.

Diana, who asked us not to share her last name said she met 41-year-old Dwight Bell through a dating website called Plenty of Fish.

“He helped me at first he was good and then he just turned into a monster,” she said.

According to court documents, the two had been dating for about 2-1/2 months when Bell attacked her last Thanksgiving.

“I’ve never really been as scared of anyone,” she said. “But him, oh, yeah, he was the one that got me. He scared me to death.”

Diana said Bell strangled her, slammed her against the wall, dragged her around the apartment and bashed her head against the floor.

“The only thing that got him off of me was the butcher knife, and I hate to say it but I had to pull it,” she said. “It was that or my life.”

Diana said Bell told her one thing she would never forget.

“I’ll be back to kill you,” she said. “You could see the evil right in his eyes.’

Last month, Bell was considered a person of interest in the murder of a 70-year-old woman in Kentucky. Police believe he drove the victim’s car to downtown Indianapolis and left the car in the parking lot of Shapiro’s Delicatessen on South Meridian Street.

He was later seen on camera at a gas station across from Lucas Oil Stadium. Police said a tip led them to Bell in Tennessee where he confessed to the crime.

“I’m hoping they give him life,” she said. “I hope they give him life.”

24-Hour News 8 learned Bell also pleaded guilty to second-degree manslaughter in Kentucky for shooting and killing his dad in the back of the head with a shotgun. Bell was sentenced to 15 years in prison in 1999 and got paroled in 2005. He violated his probation and went back to prison in 2008, but was released in 2012.

Police said Bell is now charged with murder and robbery in Kentucky and with being a fugitive from another state for the warrant in New Castle. That warrant was issued after he didn’t show up to a court hearing.

He was being held in Somerset, Kentucky, with no bond.

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