Killer ‘flew under the wire’

Who was Fred Bittman?

That’s the question police and the community are asking after Bittman is said to have shot and killed two women before turning the gun on himself.

Police say Bittman, a 52-year-old Rock Falls man, shot his ex-girlfriend, Sheila Mae Bejster, 48, on the street soon after she dropped her daughter off at Dillon Elementary School on Friday morning, May 20. Then he ran to Bejster’s apartment at Coloma Homes, shot her friend, Verna J. Rosas, 34, then killed himself.

In the days since the shootings, police are slowly piecing together Bittman’s life and the time he spent in the Sauk Valley to help them understand a motive in the case.

By some accounts, he was a longtime homeless man who seemed down on his luck. Rock Falls Police Chief Mike Kuelper said Bittman simply “flew under the wire.”

Bejster’s relatives paint a much darker picture of Bittman, the man they say abused Bejster during their 2 years in a on-again, off-again relationship.

Still, her family says they are shocked that this happened.

Time in the Sauk Valley

Little is known about Bittman’s roots, according to Kuelper.

Bittman had an expired driver’s license from St. Louis, and a Social Security number that is from the Hawaii area, Kuelper said.

While family and witness interviews indicate Bittman came to the area 3 years ago, there is evidence he was here long before that, he said.

Police say Bittman bought the gun he used from an area dealer in the late fall of 1990.

It appears he kept that gun in an old pickup truck that he may have been living in before the shootings.

Bittman had several traffic tickets in Whiteside and Ogle counties. His criminal history in Winnebago County goes back to 1986, when he was convicted on a misdemeanor battery charge that resulted in a fine. He also was fined for a disorderly conduct conviction in 2000, and was sentenced to conditional discharge for a 2003 conviction for damage to property.

Not much is known about his work history, Kuelper said. Bittman had a trucking license, though it expired late last year. To make some money, Bittman may have been doing odd jobs around town, he said.

Finding shelter

Bittman sought refuge at the PADS shelter in Sterling for the past 3 years, Kuelper said.

Brandy Walter-Wren has been the director of the shelter for the past 2 years.

Bittman did not particularly stand out, she said.

“All of our residents are there for a reason, whether they lost their job or can’t get on their feet,” she said.

Walter-Wren said Bittman had expressed frustration about finding work. She said Bittman had talked about renewing his trucking license and had thought he may have found work driving a truck. She was surprised to see him back at the shelter at the end of October of last year.

Disputes between shelter residents are common, and Bittman was no exception.

In late February, he got a black eye in a scuffle with another resident. Walter-Wren did not know what the dispute was about.

Both men were banned from the shelter for 3 days, she said.

The shelter was the place that Bittman met Bejster, who had just moved from Greenville, S.C., with her sons Shane Hecker, 25, Steven Bejster, 18, and daughter Samantha, 9.

She had separated from her husband, Leroy, after 20 years of marriage. The two never legally divorced.

Walter-Wren said she was aware of the relationship between the two, though she had never met Bejster.

While Bittman has relatives in the Rockford area, he never spoke of them, she said, and usually only talked about Bejster or her mother, Louise Meggs.

A love gone wrong

Court records and family accounts show that Bittman lived off and on with Bejster at her Coloma Homes apartment at 505 W. 18th St., dating back to at least 2009.

Terry Casford, 64, of Spring Valley, is Bejster’s mother-in-law. She says she was introduced to Bittman, who Bejster said was a truck driver, 2 years ago.

“She acted like she was proud that she had a boyfriend,” Casford said. “She didn’t value herself enough.”

Casford said she was less than impressed with Bittman, who she described as “shiftless” and “was living off my grandson’s Social Security check.”

“When I met him, he was raunchy looking, he wasn’t clean,” she said.

Bejster’s sister, April Hecker, 47, of Amboy, said the relationship was good at first, but the two soon began to argue.

He broke her left hip and hurt her knee, Hecker said. Still, she always took him back.

Casford said Bittman was very controlling of her daughter-in-law, and often “he let me stay in the background,” she said.

Though Bejster called her regularly, Casford said, she didn’t talk about the abuse.

Bejster did confide in Casford’s other daughter-in-law. But Casford said she didn’t tell her about it because “she knew I’d be down there in a hurry.”

Hecker said Bittman would go “berserk” when Bejster went to visit with friends or her mother, and he often wouldn’t allow her to talk to anyone.

Hecker said Bittman did not like Rosas, who had been a friend of Bejster’s for a couple years, because he thought she was “putting things in Sheila’s mind.”

Bittman did not like Bejster’s two boys, either, Hecker said.

And Bejster’s kids weren’t fans of Bittman, she said.

Shane Hecker was arrested Sept. 7, 2009, and charged with misdemeanor aggravated assault for pointing a kitchen knife at Bittman and threatened to kill him, according to court documents.

He received probation and was ordered to stay away from Bittman.

Casford said Shane had had enough of Bittman’s abuse of his mother and was trying to protect her when he threatened Bittman.

She expressed frustration that the abuse allegations were never investigated after Shane’s arrest.

Casford told Shane recently that “if anything goes wrong, you let me know.” However, he never called her, Casford said.

“Shane thought he could take care of it himself,” she said.

Throughout everything, no one ever called the police on Bittman.

‘I can’t take it anymore’

On June 21, 2010, Bejster filed an order of protection against Bittman, who was living with her in the Coloma Homes.

She also listed Steven and Samantha in the petition.

In her written statement, Bejster wrote that on June 20, she and Bittman had just finished dinner when he “started nick [sic] picking me about, he having to eat T.V. dinner.”

She wrote he called her a “b----” and then berated her for “telling my son things and not him.”

The argument lasted until 5 a.m., she wrote.

The fight continued until the following morning after Bejster came back from the store. He kept asking her where she had been, saying “he had an [sic] right to know,” she wrote.

She told him “I can’t take it anymore” and told him to leave, which he refused to do, she wrote.

“I need to get some sleep, so I can take care of my children,” she wrote in the petition.

She wrote that Bittman had gotten rough with her in the past and had left a mark on her neck and a “crack” on her leg, which forced her to wear a brace.

A judge granted her request, and Bittman was ordered to stay 500 feet away from Bejster and her kids.

The petition was dropped July 7 when she didn’t to show up in court.

Apparently the two made up, and he continued to stay at the apartment.

Getting out

In November, Bejster had Bittman banned from the apartment complex, according to Kuelper. That ban lasted 6 months.

According to Hecker, Bittman “beat up” one of Bejster’s sons, and she finally had enough.

Undeterred, Bittman sent Bejster a string of nasty text messages, Hecker said. Bejster never called the police, and instead ignored him at Hecker’s urging.

Bittman sought shelter at PADS again until the shelter closed May 1.

The two didn’t see each other again until Bittman caught up with her May 20 after she dropped of Samantha at Dillon Elementary School to catch her bus to Merrill Elementary School.

As she walked back across the street, he shot her twice – once in the head and once in the lower abdomen.

He then ran to her apartment, where Rosas was waiting for Bejster. He shot and killed Rosas and then killed himself in a downstairs bedroom.

Bejster died Monday at OSF Saint Anthony Medical Center in Rockford.

Bejster’s son, Shane, was in an upstairs bedroom at the time of the shooting, according to police.

The shootings shocked the Rock Falls community, police, and the families of the victim.

Casford said she never saw this violence coming. However, her daughter-in-law made a chilling statement that still sticks in her mind.

“I think Sheila might have known what was going to happen because she talked to the kids and told Shane to make sure that the kids stayed together,” she said.