Perry had no weapon — and no warning, she says: "He points the gun at this cleaning lady, who starts screaming. The manager comes out, and Randy's demanding money. She brings him to the cash register and opens it. He tells me to put all the money in my pockets. I'm grabbing at the money, and money is flying all over the place. Then he grabs my wrist again and we run."
Some men pursued them. Miller pointed his gun at them and they backed off. The couple returned, out of breath, to the apartment they shared with another woman who worked at DIA. Miller counted the haul, around $900 in currency and a few checks, which they destroyed. He told Perry they'd have to get out of town fast; by now the police probably had her fingerprints from the cash register. He was also upset that she hadn't seen fit to cover her face. Perry wasn't worried about that. "I was more concerned that he would leave me," she says.
Brian Stauffer
During her sophomore year of high school, Perry kept secret her relationship with convict Randy Miller — who had dark secrets of his own.
Watch a video interview with Perry.
Details
Related Content
More About
On Friday morning, Ateba Bailey, a friend of Miller's from his days in juvie, dropped by the apartment. Bailey was also failing parole and determined not to go back to prison. He and Miller agreed that it was time to "breeze." But first they needed more cash and wheels. Miller had already procured the other necessary items: He produced two more Bryco Jennings 9-millimeters identical to his own — one for Bailey, one for Perry. Now they had a matching set.
Miller asked his roommate to drive them to the Wyoming border. (The roommate later told police that she was "the victim of a kidnapping" and, like Perry, had received no advance briefing of the crimes about to be committed. She was never charged in the case.) Miller seemed to be improvising as they went; before they reached the state line, he announced a plan to fake a breakdown outside of Cheyenne and then steal a car when someone stopped to help them. But after a few minutes of standing by the side of the road, trying to flag down motorists, he gave up the idea. Instead, he eyed an isolated house not far from the highway and announced his intention to go make a phone call.
Perry and the others followed him to the front door. A four-year-old girl answered the bell. She summoned her mother, and Miller went into a spiel about his car breaking down. Then he was through the door, politely asking if his friends could come in, too. Once the others were inside, he pulled his gun on the woman, demanding, "Who else is in the house? Where is your money?"
The father appeared from another room. Perry stood guard over the family as Bailey and Miller went through the house, searching for treasure. They tied up the family in the basement and took off with their car and several guns they found. But after a few minutes of aimless driving around, Miller began to cry. "We shouldn't have done that," he said.
They left the stolen car at a truck stop and caught a ride with the roommate back to Colorado. Bailey, Miller and Perry stayed with another friend in Westminster that night. But once their host saw all the guns, she told them they'd have to find other lodgings.
On Friday the trio checked into the Royal Host motel at Colfax and Colorado Boulevard. After breakfast they wandered into the Mayfair neighborhood, where Miller selected a house, seemingly at random, and knocked on the door. A woman answered. This time Perry knew exactly what to expect, because it was a replay of the Cheyenne robbery: Could I please use your phone? Is there anyone else in the house? Where is your money?
No children this time, thankfully. Just the woman and her father, money and a car. But Miller seemed more agitated than during the previous robberies, frantic to leave. As he headed for the door, Perry called out, "Randy." He turned around and belted her with the back of his hand. They piled into the stolen car and he drove wildly, swerving and nearly crashing.
"Why did you say that?" he screamed. "Now they know my name!"
Perry felt shut down, as if the blow had snapped something inside her. She got out at the Royal Host. Miller said he and Bailey would dump the car and come back with another one.
She could have left at that point. But she stayed put. She called Teresa but refused to tell her where she was. She says she was too passive, too deeply enmeshed in her doomed romance to believe in the possibility of an exit.
"I remember talking in circles, telling Teresa I had seen bad things happen," she says. "My responsibility all along was in not getting out of that relationship. I'm absolutely responsible for my own dysfunction and not getting help. I understand why people who are abused feel they can't do that. But when you watch something happen and you don't get help, there's a lot of culpability in that."
