Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, March 26, 1992 TAG: 9203260281
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAVID REED ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: LYNCHBURG LENGTH: Medium
William Karl Alley was found Monday, but he vanished again hours later.
Now his wife wants him arrested for abandoning their family.
"I'm shocked and sad," Pam Alley said from her home in University Park, Texas, a Dallas suburb. She filed an affidavit with police so that her husband will be held if he is found again.
In Lynchburg, Pam Alley's brother began retracing Alley's steps and trying to figure out where he's gone.
"I'm just a brother-in-law trying to help," Gil Sheehan said. Sheehan was scrutinizing Alley's telephone bill as he waited for Lynchburg police Investigator Dennis Lariviere to arrive at the house where Alley had rented a room since July.
"He flew the coop," Lariviere said. The owner of the house, Ronald Byerly, found the room empty of Alley's belongings and no one knows where he went, Lariviere said.
Alley, then the owner and president of Hartland Plastics, a sports figurine company in Dallas, vanished Feb. 28, 1991, after telling a doorman at the New York Hilton, "I'm going for a walk."
He was found when Lariviere went to Alley's new home to check out a "Mr. Allen" reported to police by several residents. The callers said Alley, who was using the alias William Hart Allen but gave the investigator his real name, acted strangely when questioned about his past.
Out of curiosity, Lariviere ran his name through the crime information computer and found William Alley listed as a missing person in New York.
"We couldn't hold him here; there are no warrants charging him with anything," Lariviere said.
But Wednesday, Pam Alley filed a criminal complaint against her husband for failure to provide support to children younger than 18, a felony.
Pam Alley, who was pregnant when her husband disappeared, has since given birth to their fifth child and sold his company.
Police said Alley told them he was working as a partner with someone in a land development business.
He told new acquaintances that his wife and child had been killed in Dallas in an auto accident in 1989, Lariviere said.
During his time in Lynchburg, Alley became active in Thomas Road Baptist Church.
The Rev. Charles Hughes said it was not unusual for Alley to be in church all day Sunday, minister to a 10-member grief support group on Mondays, head up a Parents Without Partners group Wednesdays and go to Bible study on Thursdays.
by CNB