Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, January 24, 1994 TAG: 9401240045
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MIKE HUDSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
There it is, in a two-page spread in the National Enquirer: the happy couple's all-smiles wedding picture, the arms-crossed photo captioned "Bitter Husband," a publicity shot of Dan Aykroyd in his "Ghostbusters" gear.
The headline: "Husband claims in shocking divorce case . . . DAN AYKROYD STOLE MY WIFE . . . and ruined my marriage!"
It's typical fare for the National Enquirer, where the pages teem with catch-phrases like "skirt-chasing hubby," "TV star's brush with death," and "diet makes you look [fill in the number] years younger."
But there was something different about this story.
The husband is Rick Hawkins, a former football and baseball all-star in Roanoke; the wife is the Roanoke Valley's Lisa Aliff, a former Miss Virginia and a Hollywood actress.
For the record, both Aykroyd and Aliff deny ever having an affair.
But Hawkins' allegation - contained in papers filed in Bedford County Circuit Court - has transformed a painful but quiet divorce and custody battle in Virginia into a burgeoning Hollywood-style scandal-sheet story.
Hawkins has signed a contract to go on "The Montel Williams Show," and says he expects more television appearances to follow. "You're probably looking at the `Current Affairs' and `Hard Copies' and stuff like that."
Why did Hawkins go public?
If you ask him, he tells a tale of a storybook marriage gone bad. And he talks about how he battled his way to success as a stockbroker only to be reduced to unemployment and financial ruin - a development he blames on his soon-to-be-ex-wife.
"I've exhausted all my income toward attorneys fees," he says. "And I don't have a job, after I've worked so hard to beat the odds."
There are other reasons.
In this day and age, Hawkins says, "you don't visit somebody who is having an affair with your wife and take care of them in the middle of the night. You do it the legal way. And this just happened to be the Hollywood way too, I guess."
For the record once again, Hawkins says he's doesn't want to hurt his wife. "I don't want to slice my wife up in public. I'm not going to bang her up. This is just the truth. I'm not gonna tell you any personal situations. Because that's between a man and a woman. I'm not gonna get into that."
They have a 3-year-old son, and Hawkins says he doesn't want Langley to learn someday that "daddy's been bashing mommy in the paper."
Still, he does let some of his anger - at Aliff as well as Aykroyd - show through.
"It's costing her her marriage," Hawkins says. "I hope she thinks it's worth her losing her son. You can quote me on that."
One other question: Did the National Enquirer pay him for the story?
Hawkins is discussing his case over a drink at Corned Beef & Co. in downtown Roanoke. He looks his interviewer in the eye.
"No comment," he says.
He smiles, then takes a sip of Coors Draft from a tall glass.
A pause.
"And if they did, it was not anywhere close to the $20,000 I've paid in legal fees."
Aliff told the National Enquirer that she had never had an affair with Aykroyd. She also denied Hawkins' claims that she had taken trips with Aykroyd and accepted jewelry and other gifts from him.
"It's rather obvious that Mr. Hawkins just wants to try to make some money out of the situation," Aliff's Roanoke attorney, John Lichtenstein, says. "And that speaks for itself. . . . It think that reduces any credibility he might have."
Hawkins says he's not doing it for the money. He says "The Montel Williams Show" has not offered him money, and doubts he would take any from other TV shows.
Aliff declined to be interviewed last week by the Roanoke Times & World-News. In a brief telephone call, she dismissed the Enquirer story but said, laughing, that she'd "had a baby by a space alien and dated Elvis." Lichtenstein says Aliff believes it's not appropriate to be talking about personal matters in newspapers or on television.
"He wants to get things down in the muck. . . . She's not going to get into that kind of thing."
Her denial to the National Enquirer stands for itself, Lichtenstein said.
As for himself, Lichtenstein said, "I'm a little surprised that the newspaper is taking a story and saying it's a story just because the National Enquirer ran something. The National Enquirer is the National Enquirer for a reason. It's a gossip sheet - or worse."
Aykroyd - who is married to another Miss Virginia turned actress, Alexandria native Donna Dixon - said in a statement that the allegation was a "flat lie" and "a baseless fantasy."
Since they worked together on the 1987 movie "Dragnet," he said, he has not seen Aliff except for running into her in public a couple times.
Hawkins, 34, was a star athlete at Roanoke's William Fleming High School and later an honor graduate from Ferrum College. "He was a good student who seemed to be very serious about his career," one of his professors, Joan Litton, says. "He just seemed like a super-nice guy."
Aliff, who graduated from Roanoke County's Cave Spring High School, was crowned Miss Virginia in 1983.
During her reign, she was described as ambitious, talented and hard-working. Roanoke County treasurer Fred Anderson called her "a stunning lady and a pleasant person to be around. She's the kind of person you'd want your daughter to grow up to be like."
Hawkins and Aliff dated from the time they were teen-agers. They married in 1985, just as her acting career began to move ahead.
Hawkins eventually quit his job as a salesman and went Hollywood to join her. He began fishing on the pro bass circuit.
When Lisa was Miss Virginia, Hawkins says, "I was always the guy in the background . . . . I never intruded. I never said anything. I was the perfect boyfriend. . . . I didn't want any press. I just wanted to be quiet. I just wanted to go fishing and do what I wanted to do. And then it all blew up."
Hollywood changed things, Hawkins says.
He claims that he uncovered an affair between Aykroyd and Aliff that began after the two had worked together on "Dragnet."
Hawkins and Aliff separated for a while, Hawkins says, but eventually they reconciled.
They had a son together in 1990. But they began having problems again and Hawkins - who had become a stock broker and manager with Shearson Lehman Bros. in Hollywood - moved back to Virginia early last year to take a job with PaineWebber's Roanoke office.
He was coming home, he says, "just to be quiet and chill out."
But soon after he left California, Hawkins claims, friends told him Aliff and Aykroyd had resumed an affair.
Hawkins filed for divorce and custody of their son.
Hawkins claims that Aliff called his boss at PaineWebber and accused him of illegal trading and other misdeeds. That, he says, cost him his job. He says he was told that he was "not complying with PaineWebber standards" and was participating in illegal securities deals.
Haven Shuck Jr., the manager of Roanoke's PaineWebber office, says it is "basically right" that Hawkins was let go because of alleged illegal activities.
Shuck says he knows Lisa Aliff well - she used to baby-sit his children. "I'm very familiar with what's going on" in the divorce.
But Shuck says "she didn't tell me anything" about Hawkins' conduct at work. "I've been in the securities business 26 years, and I don't have to have somebody tell me when somebody's doing something wrong."
Hawkins says he did nothing wrong. "I've got a completely clean record."
Hawkins says he was one of the most successful syndicate managers in the country when he was in Shearson's Beverly Hills office, and he received a $75,000 signing bonus to come work for PaineWebber in Roanoke.
But when he got here, he contends, he was never given a real chance to do his job.
"It's like taking Emmitt Smith from the Dallas Cowboys back to college and putting him on the bench," Hawkins says. "You don't cut a racehorse's legs off."
On Aug. 3 - "before I even got my feet wet" - he was fired.
A month later, the couple went to court over custody of their son. The hearing included allegations that Aliff had assaulted Hawkins this summer on the street in Vinton.
The judge gave Hawkins custody.
Still, he was angry. He says rumors swirled around Roanoke about how he lost his job. After all his work to beat the odds on the pro fishing circuit and in the stock business, Hawkins says, he was ruined.
"I'm not from a rich family. I didn't have anything given to me at all. Nothing was given to me. Nothing."
He was sitting in his lake house over the Christmas holidays when the National Enquirer called.
"I thought about it probably four or five days. And I called back said, `Why not?' Here I am sitting in Roanoke qualified to do a better job than just about anybody, and I'm out of work. Here I am a victim of Hollywood again."
The Enquirer writer came to Virginia, interviewed Hawkins and checked court records.
In the Enquirer's typical exclamation-point-heavy style, the story says Hawkins "stormed" and "fumed" during the interview.
Still, Hawkins was pleased. "There was nothing that was printed in the Enquirer that wasn't true."
Since then, Hawkins has fielded calls from television producers. He expects to tape "The Montel Williams Show" next week. It should appear sometime next month.
There are more battles ahead: Aliff has appealed the custody ruling. And Hawkins says PaineWebber wants its $75,000 bonus back.
Eventually, Hawkins says, he'll probably have to move away from the Roanoke Valley again.
But he says he does not regret going public.
"I have nothing to lose but my self-respect," he says. "I don't have any problem with my self-respect. I've proven I can do what I need to do, three or four times."
Staff writer Karen Barnes contributed information to this story.
by CNB