Dance With The Devil

Ten years after meeting John Perry, Barbara sat in court awaiting his trial for attempted murder on her life.  If he didn't get thrown behind bars, her life could once again be in danger. And now his defense attorney told the jury a sad tale of a man dying of cancer, who wanted to knock his wife unconscious with ether just long enough to kill himself.

The jury didn't buy it -- John Perry was found guilty.  But Barbara's victory was so short-lived that it only caused more anxiety.

Dennis Murphy: He was convicted of first-degree attempted murder?

Barbara: First-degree attempted murder. Sentenced to five years in jail, and made parole in less than one year.

Dennis Murphy: So, all of a sudden, he's out?

Barbara: Yeah.

Toni: She had a couple of panic attacks. She had nightmares, nightmares that he would come back and get her, whether there was a restraining order or not.

And Barbara knew better than anyone what this man was capable of because she'd lived it -- all those years he'd bamboozled so many -- for so long.  He'd rubbed shoulders with the country's top brass, traveled the world as a bon vivant... Why, he'd even been saluted by a president.  And no one seemed to wise up to his fabrications.

How did he do it?  With a lot of cunning and a lot of planning, decades spent spinning a life for himself. By the time he'd bought the war medals and uniforms, forged all those documents and credentials, memorized combat histories that he told as his own. He'd built himself an armor plated red, white and blue persona.  Most of all, he could sell his elaborate charade.

All lies, of course, but not the kind of things you'd want to call someone out on.  Few who met John Perry didn't feel privileged to pipe the admiral aboard into their lives.  And, funnily enough, at the heart of all those autobiographical whoppers, there was a kernel of truth.

Barbara: I found out he was the black sheep of the family. 

Still digging for answers, Barbara was able to track down Admiral John Richard Perry's widow, who revealed that John WAS in fact Admiral Perry's true son from a previous marriage.  The woman also told Barbara that unlike the father, John Jr. the son never made it past the enlisted ranks.  There'd been an accident ... John dove into a hotel swimming pool and hit his head.  Once discharged from the military, John started acting erratically and getting into trouble with the law.  He'd even spent time in a mental institution, without improvement.  His heartbroken father died prematurely, and the other Perrys never spoke much of John.

But what had happened now to John Perry, the black sheep son?  For years after the ether attack, Barbara felt she needed to keep tabs on him for her safety.  Here's what she says she was able to piece together to the best of her knowledge:

Once out of prison it appeared that John was soon at it again, impersonating variously an admiral, a navy captain, a doctor of psychology, a director of a hospital, and a former undersecretary of commerce.  And he quickly inserted himself into another woman's life, but things there soon turned sour.  Over a fight about money, he barricaded himself into a bedroom, telling the woman he was going to shoot himself.

Barbara: She had been warned through a friend that I had talked to, "Be careful. Because he is gonna try to murder you."

Perhaps heeding Barbara's warning, the woman didn't open the bedroom door. 

Barbara: I believe if she had gone and touched that door, that she would be dead today, that he would've shot through the door and said it was an accident cleaning the gun.  Because they had already changed their wills, and he was going to inherit all her money. 

The next morning, John was found dead on the kitchen floor.  The autopsy revealed he'd died of an overdose of drugs.  Barbara recognized the list of medications as some of the same ones she'd found in his briefcase in Florida -- which she now thinks he took to fake the symptoms of his heart attack. 

Barbara:  And this time either he was too old or took the wrong concoction.  But he died.

Dennis Murphy: What do you hear when the phone rings, and, "Barbara, John Perry's dead"?

Barbara:  I cried.  I cried again, because there was that part of him that seemed like a wonderful person beyond the evil part of him.

Dennis Murphy: And you were saying even with everything that's happened, you can look at his picture today, and still feel a little twinge, a little bit of affection.

Barbara: Well, because I was in love with the man. And for me, there's two people there.  There's this person that I loved, and then there's this evil person that lurked underneath.

Dennis Murphy: But how could he have his fingers in your brain, in your emotional being even after all that time and everything he'd done?

Barbara: We had had a lot of good times together.  And you don't throw out all the good times because you've had some bad times. 

Dennis Murphy: Maybe you do if it's attempted murder.

Barbara: He still was a human being.  You know?

Perry the conman is starting to recede from Barbara's life. She's now happily remarried, and speaks to groups about victims' rights and the painful lessons she learned from a man she now believes was a psychopath.  She's also set down a memoir of her ordeal. The book, out now, is aptly titled A Dance With The Devil. 

Dennis Murphy: Are you still back in that motel bathroom some nights in your sleep?

Barbara: There are dreams of him trying to take advantage of me again, or chasing me.  You know, unfortunately those will be with me until the day I die.  But, they're not that often.  And you know, I wake up and I've got a wonderful husband beside me.  And my little kitty cat snuggled and realized that you know, that's a ghost from the past.

Barbara successfully lobbied to change the divorce law in the state of California, which she believed punished the victims of domestic violence more than the perpetrators. 

The FBI gave Barbara back all of John's medals except for one, the Medal of Honor - which Barbara eventually found buried in the soil of an old planter.  But she could never find any connection between John and Robert Perry, who claimed to have discovered the North Pole.

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