The sometimes live-in boyfriend of a Calvert County mother who allegedly stuffed the bodies of two of her three adoptive daughters in a freezer is wanted on an open warrant by Prince George’s County police, The Examiner has learned.
Joe C. Dickerson, 42, has met with police repeatedly this past week to discuss his relationship with Renee Bowman, 43. Last week, Calvert County sheriff’s deputies discovered the frozen remains of Bowman’s daughters — ages 9 and 11 — after her 7-year-old daughter was found wandering the streets near her Lusby home in disheveled condition.
Bowman has told police that she toted the bodies for more than a year as she moved from Rockville, where she says the girls died, to Charles County and finally to Lusby.
Throughout that time, neighbors report Dickerson could often be found sitting on her porch steps, smoking and waving a friendly hello.
Court records show Dickerson’s relationship with Bowman dates back to at least 2003, when he listed a Landover house owned by Bowman as his residence on charging documents related to a series of traffic violations.
By that time, Bowman had already adopted her first daughter, was in the midst of bankruptcy proceedings and was looking to adopt the youngest two, who were sisters, which happened in 2004. All three adoptions were through the District of Columbia.
In 2005, Bowman lost the Landover home to foreclosure, despite having a federal government-backed loan and receiving $48,000 a year in federal cash for her daughters’ care, according to property records and District officials.
That same year, Dickerson’s failure to appear in court for the 2003 traffic violations caught up with him. A warrant was issued for his arrest and his bail bondsman, Nickolas Pantazes, had to fork over $2,000 for his client’s continued failure to appear, court records show.
A spokeswoman for the Prince George’s County Sheriff’s Office said late last week that the warrant remained open and sheriffs would be working with authorities in Calvert and Montgomery counties to determine its outcome.
Dickerson could not be located for comment.
Montgomery County police spokesman Lt. Paul Starks said Bowman would sometimes use Dickerson’s name for various transactions, which may explain why his name is listed in the phone book under Bowman’s Rockville address. Pantazes said he described Bowman as Dickerson’s “common law spouse” in his personal files.
Among other things, police want to know “what did [Dickerson] know and when did [he] know it,” Starks said.
