Charmin' Billy

It was a long time before she would trust another man enough to let him get close to her. Whenever someone inquired about her past, she'd tell them, "If you ever run into a man named William Lee Neal, turn and walk the other way." But she also wondered if she'd have the strength to turn Bill away if he showed up on her doorstep. For three years, she pined for what had seemed a perfect man.

Karen had a friend, Fred, who gradually let her know that he cared for her in more than a friendly way. He wasn't overly romantic, nor did he live life on the edge. He was soft and gentle, shy yet strong, a man who didn't need to beat his chest. With him she felt safe and loved. They were married and had a daughter in 1989.

But just because she was through with Bill Neal, that didn't mean he was through with her. Every now and then there'd be a telephone call. She had unlisted telephone numbers and changed them seven times over the next thirteen years, but still, one day the phone would ring and it would be him.

And he seemed to know as much about her life as ever. After she bought a new car, he called and told her he liked her choice. "He was letting me know that he was still keeping tabs on me," she says. "Still trying to control me."

Karen had stayed close to Bill's family, who told her what little they knew of his whereabouts and activities. Bill's mother had scolded him "for losing the best thing you ever had" and continued to treat Karen like a daughter.

Through them, Karen found out when Bill married again. Another Karen, whom he later took for her money, prompting calls to the first Karen from police investigators looking for Bill. Then he was married a fourth time, to a young stripper.

The calls stopped for a time. But after her parents died -- first her dad, then her mother -- Bill got back in touch. He knew she stood to inherit a considerable amount of money, and he wanted some of it. Fortunately, her parents had put the money in a trust, and while she received lump sums on a regular basis -- a fact that Bill seemed to know -- it was tough to put her hands on the kind of money he'd ask for. Which was a good thing, because otherwise, she might have found it difficult to withstand Bill and his stories.

He'd try different tactics. Once, the Mafia was after him: He owed the mob money, and if he didn't pay it back, a hitman was going to take him out. Karen was wracked with guilt. God, if I don't give him the money, he might die. But she didn't give him the money, and he managed to stay alive. Then he'd try again with a new story.

Only once did she hear from the Bill she had loved. When his mother died, in October 1995, he called, distraught. He said he loved Karen, had always loved her. She had to admit, she felt the old twinge. But there was no going back, she told him. "Maybe someday, when we're both sixty, we'll meet and talk about old times."

The last time she heard from Bill, he was asking for money again -- this time so that he could divorce his fourth wife, Jennifer. Once he had the divorce, he hinted, he'd be free, and maybe they could hook up again.

Karen didn't give him the money. Later, she learned from one of Bill's sisters that he was already divorced from Jennifer when he made that call. He was still trying to con her. That was the last straw. After that, she lied and told Fred that Bill Neal was dead.

On July 10, 1998, her birthday, Karen was sitting on the porch when her husband came to the door. One of Bill's sisters was on the telephone, he said, a strange look on his face.

Oh, my God, Bill's really dead, she thought.

"I don't know how to tell you this," Bill's sister said softly, "but he just killed three women."

At the Denver strip club where eighteen-year-old Jennifer worked as a topless dancer, the girls all kept an eye out for their favorite customer, a charming guy in a black cowboy hat. William "Cody" Neal.

Every time Cody walked in, they'd play his song, "Strokin'," by Clarence Carter, and he'd reward them by spending lavishly on the beautiful young women who surrounded his table.

Jennifer thought she didn't have a chance with Cody, as he called himself. She was petite -- her nickname was "Baby Half-Pint" -- and didn't think she compared to the "supermodels" who fastened onto the man they'd started calling "Wild Bill Cody." But on her nineteenth birthday, September 29, 1992, Cody came over to the stage where she was dancing and laid out a thousand dollars in one-dollar bills. And he asked her out.