Dr. Patrick Henry, Deadly Intentions Again Based on His Life

2008-08-10T13:50:00.002-07:00

The True Story

To friends, acquaintances and professional colleagues, they were the perfect couple. Dr. Patrick Henry, a successful dermatologist, was a distinguished man. Tall, handsome, charming and pleasant were adjectives used by many to describe the prominent physician. His attractive wife, Tina, was a loving wife and doting mother to Stevie, their only child. By 1972, Dr. Henry was an integral member of the United States Public Health Service in Mobile, Ala. In time, he would become the organization's director. There they were -- the Henrys -- established career and comfortable home. Only Tina knew she had married a real life Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde. From the very beginning, her Patrick was weird. He grew worse. Soon after they married, Tina realized that the dashing med student was less than perfect. Patrick ignored her for days at a time. He looked through her, walked around her as if she didn't exist. Tina thought a baby might change her husband's disposition. Stevie's birth had no effect on his father. In fact, Patrick often ignored the child, as he did his wife. STRANGE INCIDENT When he did talk with Tina, the doctor would go into great detail about what he would do to people who crossed him in any way. He would tell her that he would cut out their stomachs, gouge out their eyes and stick pins up their fingernails. She often begged him to stop or would run out of the room. One day, Tina rushed to her crying baby to find that one of the child's arms had turned blue. She suspected Patrick had caused the strange incident. Little Stevie came around after Tina gently rubbed the arm for some time. On another occasion, Tina was swimming when, unknown to her, an alligator came dangerously close. Patrick warned her to quickly swim ashore, but seemed more interested in taking photos of the close call than in assisting his wife. Photography was Patrick's hobby. When Tina was pregnant he took pleasure in snapping her picture when she had morning sickness. He also had a thick glass, which would horribly distort Tina's face when he took her photo. Tina worried about the safety of her child. She thought of revealing what she knew of her husband, but who would believe her. Dr. Henry was a pillar of the community. Her accusations would be attributed to the ravings of a hysterical wife. The weird incidents continued. When Stevie developed diarrhea, Patrick gave his wife a capsule to administer to the child. Instead, Tina phoned a pharmacist, who admonished her not to even think of giving Stevie that particular capsule. It was a narcotic which could prove fatal. Tina put down the phone, her hands shaking. She now knew without a doubt that her husband had attempted to murder his own son. In 1977, when Patrick was attending a convention in New York, Tina took advantage of the opportunity and left her husband. With Stevie, she returned to her parents' home in Tucson, Arizona. When Patrick learned that Tina had left him, he begged her to return. He promised he would turn over a new leaf, but Tina wouldn't be deceived. Despite the distance between them, Tina was forever fearful that her husband would seek revenge, as he had so often told her he would. In time, the Henrys were divorced. Patrick remarried. Months passed. On Dec. 6, 1977, a man wearing a wig and bulky oversized clothing was stopped at the Tucson airport. He was carrying a briefcase and insisted it be checked as luggage aboard the aircraft he was attempting to board heading for Dallas. When an airport security employee became suspicious, the briefcase was X- Rayed. Although the X-Ray didn't reveal anything definite, it did indicate that the case contained several metal objects. The suspicious looking man, a Mr. Donald Vester, was asked to open the briefcase, but he claimed he had lost the key. Officials told him he could proceed, but the briefcase would not accompany the flight. They promised that if the articles inside were harmless, they would forward the briefcase to Dallas on the next flight. Bomb specialists opened the briefcase. Inside they found a glass cutter, cord, pins, a Boy Scout hunting knife and an Ivor Johnson .32 calibre pistol with nine rounds of ammunition. Dallas was contacted and told to detain Mr. Vester for questioning. He turned over his wallet to his interrogators. They found a VISA credit card and a U.S. public services ID card, all in the name of Dr. Patrick Henry. The impostor admitted he was not Donald Vester, but was in reality Dr. Patrick Henry. Security officials were stymied. What was this doctor doing, wearing a ridiculous wig, baggy clothing and travelling under an assumed name? The doctor, who claimed he was in Dallas for a dermatology convention, would not give the authorities any further information. Police checked with convention officials and learned that Syntex Laboratories of Palo Alto were sponsoring the convention and that Dr. Henry was indeed an invited guest. PADDED SUIT But the good doctor had more surprises in store for the police. He complained that it was stifling hot and asked permission to remove his coat. Police stared as Dr. Henry stripped. Under his oversized clothing he was wearing what amounted to a padded suit, which added 50 to 75 pounds to his appearance. From his airline ticket, detectives learned that Dr. Henry had flown from Dallas to Tucson. Among the pencilled notes was a Tucson address. Upon checking out the address, Tucson police located Tina Henry, who was the proprietor of a nursery school located next door to her parents' home. Tina informed the police that she was divorced from Patrick, who had remarried and was presently living in Baltimore. Nervously she told the detectives that the day before she had seen the strangely dressed man staring at her from across the street. He was totally disguised, but she was sure it was Patrick. Further questioning revealed that someone had broken into the nursery school and that the family dog had barked at about 3:30 a.m. on the morning of Dec. 6. He had barked so loudly that Tina's father had arisen from bed and had investigated with a flashlight. In doing so he had probably saved his daughter's life. Later that morning the dog had been dopey and had vomited. Eventually the vomit was analyzed and found to contain a tranquilizer. Studying Dr. Henry's written notes, detectives were able to decipher certain words and initials. Among them they found the address of Tina's parents' home, reference to the family dog and the initials MT, which was interpreted to mean Murder Tina. Dr. Henry's scheme was plain enough. He flew from the convention in Dallas to Tucson with the intention of killing his wife and returning to the convention. A dog barking had stopped him from murdering his wife and an alert airport security guard had uncovered a can of worms. TRICKY POINT OF LAW Dr. Patrick Henry was arrested and charged with attempted murder. Lead prosecutor Randy Stevens had a tricky point of law to overcome. Cunning Patrick admitted that he had left Dallas with the express intention of murdering his wife, but had changed his mind. Thus, no crime had been committed. You can prepare to commit a crime but stop short of committing it. This defense argument is most commonly called abandonment. On the other side of the coin, if the accused is forced to stop due to some external influence, he is guilty of the attempt. You can't give murder a whirl and be stopped by chance. That's still attempted murder. The jury agreed with prosecutor Stevens. Dr. Henry was found guilty of attempted murder and sentenced to a term of from five to 15 years imprisonment in the Arizona State Prison. The gray walls of Arizona State Prison closed in on the once prominent doctor, but the world hadn't heard the last of Dr. Patrick Henry. In 1982, prosecutor Randolph Stevens wrote a book on the case, entitled Deadly Intentions. The book was later made into a television movie. EXPLOSIVES MANUAL In Feb. 1986, after serving six and a half years, Dr. Henry was released from prison and reunited with Nancy, his second wife. Within two years, Nancy, who had never believed anything derogatory about her husband, contacted police. She had found a munitions box in her home containing manuals on explosives and fake identities, as well as a pistol. Evidence indicated Patrick was planning to construct a bomb to blow up prosecutor Randy Stevens in the U.S. Attorneys office in Tucson. A quantity of marijuana was also seized in his home. Patrick Henry was prosecuted on the weapons and marijuana charges. He was found guilty and sentenced to 15 years imprisonment. In addition to those items already mentioned, police recovered three vials of blood serum containing the AIDS virus and a container filled with ricin, one of the deadliest poisons known to man. GRAPHIC: photo courtesy The Arizona Daily Star REVENGE MOTIVE ... Dr. Patrick Henry after his arrest in 1977.

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Court Case Summary

STATE of Arizona, Appellee, v. Patrick Gerald HENRY, Appellant No. 2 CA-CR 1934 Court of Appeals of Arizona, Division Two 128 Ariz. 204; 624 P.2d 882; 1980 Ariz. App. LEXIS 691 December 31, 1980 SUBSEQUENT HISTORY: [***1] Rehearing Denied February 4, 1981. Review Denied March 3, 1981. PRIOR HISTORY: APPEAL FROM THE SUPERIOR COURT OF PIMA COUNTY Cause No. A-34768 Honorable Ben C. Birdsall, Judge DISPOSITION: Affirmed. COUNSEL: Stephen D. Neely, Pima County Atty. by D. Jesse Smith and W. Randolph Stevens, Jr., Deputy County Atty., Tucson, for appellee. Ronald W. Sommer, Tucson, for appellant. JUDGES: Howard, Judge. Hathaway, C. J., and Richmond, J., concur. OPINIONBY: HOWARD OPINION: [*205] [**883] OPINION Appellant, convicted by a jury of attempted murder, second degree, was sentenced to not less than five nor more than fifteen years in the Arizona State Prison. Appellant contends his conviction should be reversed because (1) it was obtained by the use of illegally seized evidence; (2) his arrest in Arizona was the result of a subterfuge to defeat his resistance to extradition; (3) evidence that the intended victim had been hypnotized before trial to refresh her memory was improperly admitted and (4) the trial court erred in instructing the jury on the crime of attempted murder. We affirm. Appellant was married to Christina Bellios in May of 1971, immediately after his graduation from medical school. His [***2] bizarre and threatening conduct towards his wife during their marriage eventually led to her return to her parents in Tucson and a divorce. She was awarded custody of their only child. The following account of the crime is based upon Dr. Henry's testimony at trial. After the divorce, Dr. Henry began to formulate a plan to kidnap his child, which scheme was subsequently modified to include the murder of his ex-wife. Using the name of Terry Cordell, a mental patient at the Maryland hospital where the doctor was doing his residency, he created a false identity by securing a birth certificate, social security card, and driver's license in Cordell's name. He also accumulated material to be used for his "Terry Cordell disguise". The opportunity to murder his wife finally arrived when he was invited to a dermatology convention in Dallas, Texas as it provided him with a perfect alibi. In Maryland, he reserved a private room in Dallas so that he could come and go undetected. He also reserved a flight on Continental Airlines from Dallas to Tucson in the name of Terry Cordell with a return flight to Dallas on American Airlines in the name of a friend, Donald Vester. He planned to change [***3] from the Terry Cordell disguise to the Donald Vester outfit prior to his departure from Tucson. Before he left Maryland, Dr. Henry placed the intended murder weapon, a .32 caliber revolver, in a black attache case which had a broken handle, along with other items which might be used to perpetrate the crime. After he checked into his motel room in Dallas, he wrote down his plan, step by step, together with a last minute check list and placed both in his wallet. When he left the motel room, he was dressed in his clumsy Cordell disguise. Dr. Henry checked the attache case as baggage and because he could not find it when he arrived in Tucson, he filed a lost baggage claim with Continental Airlines. While he could not immediately carry out his plan to murder his wife, the plan was still in effect. In the early morning hours, he walked ten miles to her house, watched it and jotted down the activities in the area. Shortly after 7:15 a. m., Christina and their son left the house while he was in plain view about 100 feet away. He walked away to get out of sight. [*206] [**884] Christina operated a nursery school in the house next door to her own. Dr. Henry became curious [***4] when he did not see any activity at the school so he called Christina, pretending to be Tim LaShanta, a person who was interested in seeing the school. After the conversation, he was struck with remorse and realized he could never kill Christina. He then walked downtown to the Marriott Hotel and took an airport limousine to the terminal. He went to the Continental Airlines ticket counter and upon inquiry, was handed his lost attache case. While we have set forth the foregoing facts as recited by the doctor, there was evidence which showed he had his attache case with him when he went to Christina's house, that he sedated a dog in the yard with a tranquilizer, broke into the school next door, and called Christina in an attempt to lure her inside the school where he could murder her. Continuing with the scene at the airport as testified to by Dr. Henry, he went to the American Airlines counter to upgrade his ticket to a day coach in order to leave earlier than scheduled. The ticket agent, Mr. Gene Zarr, noticed that Dr. Henry seemed exceedingly nervous and that he was trying to disguise himself since he was wearing a long-haired, ill-fitting black wig. Mr. Zarr also noted that [***5] when Dr. Henry reached into his pocket for money, the muscle of his arm wrinkled indicating that rather than being a very large, heavy-set man as he appeared, he was actually wearing a great deal of padding underneath his clothing. Dr. Henry indicated that he wished to check the briefcase he was carrying. Mr. Zarr took the case, noted that the handle was broken and taped the claim check to it. Before it was placed on the conveyor belt, Dr. Henry demanded its return, indicating that he would return it shortly. He then disappeared with the case, walking towards the men's room. His suspicions aroused, Mr. Zarr went to his supervisor, Mr. Eugene Weber, and reported the incident. Mr. Weber became concerned and instructed Mr. Zarr that if the man should return with the briefcase, he was to tell him that it was too late to check it and that he would have to take the case to the departure gate, which would require an examination by the x-ray machine. After 10 minutes, Dr. Henry returned wearing the trenchcoat he had previously been carrying. Mr. Zarr told him that he would have to check his bag at the departure gate. At no time did Mr. Zarr or any other person attempt to force Dr. [***6] Henry to carry the briefcase aboard or to take the bag from him. Rather than leave the airport, Dr. Henry took the attache case to the security gate n1 where it was passed through the screening device. The agent watched the screen, but unable to clearly identify the bag's contents, asked Dr. Henry to open the case. n2 Dr. Henry stated that he did not have the key and was thus unable to comply. A Tucson Airport Authority police officer stationed at the gate, unaware that American Airlines officials desired the bag to go through a security checkpoint prior to being loaded, told Dr. Henry that if he would not open his briefcase, he could not take it further and would have to return the bag to the ticket counter. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -Footnotes- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - n1 At both the ticket counter and the security gate, signs are prominently displayed warning of federal inspection requirements. These signs note that all persons and articles passing the checkpoint are subject to inspection and that while inspection might be refused, the person may not pass the checkpoint after so refusing. The security inspection procedure itself is public and may be easily observed. [***7] n2 This is normal procedure when the contents of baggage cannot be satisfactorily determined. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -End Footnotes- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Persisting in his attempt to get the briefcase, unopened, aboard the aircraft, Dr. Henry returned to the counter and told Mr. Zarr that the security guard wanted the briefcase opened but that he was unable to do so because he did not have the key. Dr. Henry gave the briefcase to Mr. Zarr who asked that Dr. Henry meet him at the security checkpoint. Mr. Zarr, accompanied [*207] [**885] by Mr. Weber, proceeded with the briefcase to the gate where Dr. Henry was to be waiting. Dr. Henry however, did not wait at the gate as requested, but went directly to the boarding gate from which he hoped to depart. Mr. Zarr and Mr. Weber approached Dr. Henry at the boarding gate and, after identifying himself, Mr. Weber explained that unless the briefcase was opened for inspection, it would not be permitted to be placed on the aircraft. Dr. Henry argued with Mr. Weber, repeatedly insisting that he had to have the bag with him in Dallas. Mr. Weber stated that the bag could not accompany him until its contents [***8] were determined. Dr. Henry reiterated that he had lost the key. Mr. Weber assured him that the case could be opened by using one of over 100 passkeys in possession of the airlines. Mr. Weber proposed that he would take the bag, open it with a passkey and forward it to Dallas on the next American Airlines flight after determining that the bag contained no hazardous materials. Mr. Weber also asked Dr. Henry for permission to force the lock in the event he was unable to open the case. Dr. Henry re-emphasized to Mr. Weber that he had to have the case in Dallas and agreed to Mr. Weber's proposal. Mr. Weber wrote on Dr. Henry's baggage stub "V/S (voluntary separation) 384, 1821," a notation signifying that Dr. Henry had been voluntarily separated from the bag which was to arrive on American Airlines flight 384 at 1821 hours. Dr. Henry then enplaned and departed Tucson International Airport. Mr. Weber contacted George Boiko, Manager of Airport Services for American Airlines, and a member of the Airport Security Committee. Together the two men returned to the security checkpoint. Mr. Boiko was concerned because, as he testified, "We have become acutely aware of our responsibility [***9] to passengers to check and make sure nothing of a destructive nature would be on the aircraft . . .", because of the danger of hijackings. The briefcase was again screened by the x-ray device. This time the operator was able to see a handgun inside. Mr. Weber and Mr. Boiko looked at the screen as well. Mr. Weber was able to discern something resembling a pair of pliers. Mr. Boiko saw these in addition to something resembling a spool of string or wire. That the attache case contained a weapon was in itself a violation of federal law. See 18 U.S.C. Secs. 922(e) and 924(a). Of more immediate concern however, was the possibility that the string or wire was a fuse connected to an explosive device. Mr. Boiko, Mr. Weber and the Tucson Airport Authority police officers took the case to American's baggage service area where it was partially opened. By raising the lid approximately one inch and peering inside, both Mr. Boiko and Mr. Weber saw that the case did indeed contain a spool of string or wire. Alarmed that it might contain an explosive device, they took the bag outside and deposited it in a bomb basket, a device to protect against explosion. The Pima County Sheriff's office [***10] explosive ordnance detail was summoned along with the Tucson Police Department's bomb detection dog squad. When the dogs arrived they were allowed to investigate the briefcase and responded positively to the presence of explosives. The sheriff's officers, alerted to the presence of explosives by the dogs, inspected the briefcase. A .32 caliber revolver, extra ammunition, miscellaneous burglar tools, a number of explosives, fireworks and a birth certificate for a Terry Lee Cordell was found inside the case. Based on this information, appellant was arrested upon deplaning in Dallas. When he was searched, several scraps of paper were found on him, including the plan of the murder which had been written down, a map of the City of Tucson, and a librium capsule, the identical drug which had been administered to the dog. Dr. Henry was tried and convicted in the federal court in Tucson for delivering the firearm to a common carrier in violation of 18 U.S.C. Secs. 922(e) and 924(a). His conviction was confirmed on appeal in United States v. Henry, 615 F.2d 1223 (9th Cir. 1980). [*208] [**886] Appellant contends the trial court erred in failing to suppress the evidence found [***11] in his attache case and on his person when he was arrested because the evidence was the product of an illegal search at the Tucson Airport. We do not agree. The contentions which he advances here are the same ones relied upon in United States v. Henry, supra, with the addition of a claim that the procedure at the airport abridged his constitutional right to travel. We find, as did the federal court, that he voluntarily consented to the search of the briefcase. His right to travel argument is irrelevant in the face of his consent. Appellant contends that at the time he was indicted in the federal court, he was in the process of challenging extradition proceedings brought against him by the State of Arizona in Maryland and that the federal indictment was sought only to secure his removal to the District of Arizona and his arrest by Arizona state authorities. He argues that he was denied his right to contest the extradition proceedings and contends the trial court erred in refusing to dismiss the indictment on these grounds. We do not agree. As did the court in United States v. Henry, supra, at 1234, we find no support in the record for this argument. He was indicted [***12] in good faith by the federal government, a trial was held, and he was convicted. Appellant contends the trial court erred in instructing the jury, relative to the crime of attempt, that abandonment of the crime was not a defense once there had been the formation of the intent coupled with an overt act. n3 We do not agree. See Wiley v. State, 237 Md. 560, 207 A.2d 478 (App.1965). Furthermore, we find this alleged error to have been invited since the instruction given was the one offered by appellant. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -Footnotes- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - n3 Appellant was tried under the criminal code prior to its extensive revision on October 1, 1978. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -End Footnotes- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Appellant attacks the trial court's failure to grant his motion for mistrial when the state introduced evidence that part of Christina's testimony was the result of her recollection while under hypnosis. n4 Appellant did not question the competency of such testimony at trial, n5 but instead contended it was irrelevant because he had not yet attacked the credibility of that particular evidence. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -Footnotes- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - n4 While under hypnosis, she remembered that when she saw appellant across the street the morning he came to kill her, he was wearing a disguise and carrying a briefcase with a broken handle. [***13] n5 See State v. La Mountain, 125 Ariz. 547, 611 P.2d 551 (1980). - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -End Footnotes- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Assuming that error was committed, it was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt because appellant confessed to the crime of attempted murder from the witness stand. He described the events that occurred from the initial plan to his departure from Tucson and subsequent arrest in Dallas. He admitted his intent to kill her when he left Dallas for Tucson in his disguise, thereby establishing the intent to kill plus an overt act. When he arrived in Tucson, the intent sill existed and when he deplaned another overt act occurred. The crime of attempt was complete. See A.R.S. Sec. 13-108; n6 State v. Mandel, 78 Ariz. 226, 278 P.2d 413 (1954).

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People Magazine Article about Christina Henry ex wife of Dr. Patrick Henry
Christina Bellios Henry doesn't live in Tucson anymore. She left sometime during the last long hot summer with her mother and her 12-year-old son. She got in her car and, in the words of a friend, simply "disappeared off the face of the earth." Neighbors on East Broadway Boulevard, where Christina lived and ran a nursery school, say she left no forwarding address. The lawyer from whom Christina and her parents had long sought counsel says he expects never to hear from her again. He says she told him she had to go; it was the only way she could ever feel safe.

Christina is convinced that her former husband, dermatologist Patrick Henry, plans to hunt her down and kill her, no matter how long it takes. Henry calls her claim "ridiculous," and many who know him agree. Yet others, including a former Pima County, Ariz. prosecutor, believe that Christina may well be right—that Henry is a creature of multiple personalities and that one of them is sadistic and homicidal. Their disagreement involves one of America's strangest criminal cases—a case Christina Henry fears may yet have a final chapter.

It began shortly before 3 p.m., Dec. 6, 1977, at the Dallas-Fort Worth airport, where police and FBI agents stood scrutinizing passengers coming off American Airlines flight 156 from Tucson. They were looking for a man named A. Donald Vester, who had aroused the suspicion of a Tucson ticket clerk by his bizarre appearance and behavior. According to the clerk, Vester had the massive torso of a weightlifter and a tiny head. He was wearing a foolish-looking black wig, and when he moved his arms his biceps seemed to wrinkle.

Vester had acted so jumpy when he tried to baggage-check his briefcase that the clerk told him he would have to carry it on board. Then the clerk dashed to the security gate and watched as the case was X-rayed, revealing what looked like a pistol. Asked to open the briefcase, Vester said he'd lost the key. He voluntarily surrendered the case, however, and was permitted to board his flight to Dallas. Minutes later, bomb experts pried the briefcase open. Inside they found burglary tools and an odd assortment of gear: In addition to the .32-caliber pistol and nine bullets, there was a glass cutter, glue, pliers and a plumber's helper, as well as 23 firecrackers, string, three books of matches and a double-edged hunting knife.

In Dallas, authorities could not at first find anyone fitting Vester's description. Finally, an FBI agent spotted a wisp of black hair trailing from a passenger's raincoat pocket. The passenger identified himself as "Donald Vester." When the agent had him empty his pockets, he produced a bottle of pills, safety pins, a street map of Tucson, a car-rental application covered with hand-written notes and, in a wallet, full sets of identification in two names, neither of which was A. Donald Vester. There was a Maryland driver's license, social security and library cards, and a post office receipt, all in the name of Terry Lee Cordell. There were also credit cards and a U.S. Public Health Services ID identifying the bearer as Dr. Patrick Henry.

With a few phone calls, agents confirmed that the man was indeed Dr. Patrick G. Henry, a senior resident in dermatology at the University of Maryland hospital in Baltimore. Henry was registered at a hotel in Dallas, where he had been attending a medical conference. Apparently he had left the conference, flown to Tucson and returned to Dallas under a false name. When the agents asked him about the false IDs and the wig, Henry told them, "I like to travel incognito." Then, sweating profusely, he asked if he might shed some of his clothing. As the puzzled agents looked on, Henry stepped out of his baggy pants and sweater. Underneath he was wearing thermal underwear larded with cotton padding to add bulk to his arms, chest, hips, buttocks and legs. He looked like a football tackling dummy.

The authorities had no way of holding Henry—he had, after all, committed no crime they knew of. They kept his briefcase, however, as well as his clothing, notes and IDs, which were turned over to Charles Wallace, a Tucson-based agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Asked by the U.S. Attorney's office to investigate, Wallace thought he was wasting his time until he examined the notes on the Hertz application. Among the decipherable jotting was what looked to him like a burglary plan: "In 1409; select window; tape, plunger; thru-open; find T; M T; out front; or rm window." What, Wallace asked himself, did "T" stand for? And "M"? He thought of the gun and the double-edged knife. Murder?

Henry's notes included two Tucson telephone numbers. One belonged to the Broadway Boulevard Kindergarten and Preschool at 1403 East Broadway Boulevard. The other was listed for a Mr. William Bellios at 1409 East Broadway. Wallace drove to 1409, half expecting to find a body there. Instead, he found Christina Bellios Henry. In a guest house out back lived her parents, William and Athena Bellios. When they called their daughter Tina, Wallace suspected he had found "T."

The mere mention of Patrick Henry's name upset Christina. She told Wallace she thought she had seen her ex-husband on the sidewalk across the street the day before, though he seemed heavier and had very long hair. Later that morning, she said, she was sure he had phoned her, disguising his voice and pretending to be a parent interested in putting his child in her school. He had asked to see the school, which was closed that day. "He said he wanted to meet me there," Christina told Wallace, "and see what I had to offer." Terrified, she had slammed down the phone and run screaming to her mother's house.

Leaving Christina's house, Wallace went to see William Randolph Stevens, chief prosecutor for Pima County. A no-nonsense ex-Marine with a passion for detail, Randy Stevens was fascinated by Wallace's report. After interviewing Christina himself, he too began to fear for her safety.

Christina told Stevens that she and Patrick first met in 1967 when Henry, a medical student at the University of Arizona, rented a room next door to her parents' house. Henry was polite, even charming, but terribly shy. Tina had been sheltered by her staunchly traditional Greek parents and knew little about men. But Henry persisted and the couple was wed on May 31, 1971. It wasn't long, Christina said, before her husband began to reveal a darker side. He began to call her by a private, ugly nickname: "Toad." He would sometimes sit impassively for hours, ignoring her.

When he did talk, the conversation could be unnerving. A favorite topic, Tina told Stevens, was what he'd do to anyone stupid enough to cross him. "I'd get even no matter how long it took me," Tina said her ex-husband told her. "First I'd stick pins in their eyes.... If you put a knife in their lower abdomen—stick it straight in—you can pull it up in a single movement and cut someone wide open.... That's one of the most painful ways to die." Stevens thought about the safety pins found in Henry's pocket and the double-edged knife in his briefcase. "I'd take explosives—not big ones; they'd have to be small, or I wouldn't be able to stay close enough to watch.... If it was a woman I'd put it in her vagina and ass.... I'd stand close and watch while they went off." Stevens thought of the firecrackers. It gave him a chill.

Then there was the matter of the camera. On a vacation trip to Florida, said Tina, she was swimming alone in a remote lake when Pat shouted to her to get to shore fast and not to look back. Tina swam furiously; as she did, Pat aimed his camera and clicked away. She hit the beach just seconds ahead of an alligator. When she broke down sobbing, Henry laughed hysterically. Appalled, Stevens investigated. Former acquaintances of the Henrys told him they had indeed seen Pat's slides of an alligator swimming after his wife.

For Tina, leaving Pat was out of the question. She believed her church did not permit divorce, which would, in any case, shame her parents. In her desperation she thought a baby might change her husband. Their only child, Patrick Steven Henry, was born Sept. 7, 1973. At first Pat played with Stevie, but soon he began to ignore him too. One night Tina said she had heard Stevie screaming and ran to his crib to find his blanket wound around him like a smothering cocoon, the edges neatly folded and tucked. Tina said she urged her husband to get psychiatric help, but he refused.

Finally in the spring of 1974, she took her child and went home to her parents. There was a divorce, and within a year Henry remarried, adopted his new wife's two daughters and settled into the life of a suburban Baltimore physician. He waited three years and eight months from the day Christina left him before returning to Tucson in disguise, planning the revenge he had so often described to her.

That, at least, was the scenario pieced together by Randy Stevens. Christina's safety, he felt, depended upon his being able to put her ex-husband behind bars. The trouble was that Henry hadn't actually done anything to Christina. To make a charge of attempted murder stick, Stevens would have to convince a jury that the doctor had not merely plotted to kill his ex-wife but had committed "acts in furtherance" of the crime. First Stevens had to persuade Christina to testify. "I'm so afraid," Christina told him. "He can fool anyone. He's a doctor. He knows how to act and be the perfect person. They'll look at him and they'll see the person he's pretending to be. He'll fool them, you'll see."

The trial began Sept. 6, 1979. Henry admitted he had plotted to kill Christina, but only, he said, to gain custody of his son. "I loved him more than my own life," he said. He testified that once he had seen Christina and Stevie he "was overcome with emotion...and I determined I couldn't go through with it."

Challenging this account of Henry's epiphany, Randy Stevens told the jury that only when Christina had recognized her ex-husband's voice did Henry realize the game was up and flee to the airport. When Christina took the stand, jurors listened raptly as she described Henry's sadistic fantasies and the humiliating snapshots he took. Attempting to show that his client's photographs were just typical family fare, Henry's lawyer, Harold Glaser, produced some slides Henry had given him. One showed Christina on her birthday. As Glaser was about to enter it into evidence, Christina interrupted to say, "I think that's the picture that says 'Happy Toad Day' on the cake." To Glaser's chagrin, she was right.

The star witness for the defense was Nancy Henry, Pat's new wife. Petite and quiet-spoken, she sobbed as she tried to impress upon the jury the injustice that was being done her husband. But when she testified she had never seen the man's dark side, of which Christina had spoken, prosecutor Stevens glanced pointedly at a mannequin that stood dressed in Henry's padded disguise. "Did you know what preparations were made before he came out here?" he asked. The second Mrs. Henry said that she didn't. Did she know what had happened in Tucson? "No," she admitted. "I did not."

It took the jury roughly six hours to reach its verdict: guilty of attempted murder in the second degree.

After serving six-and-a-half years in the Arizona State Prison at Florence, Patrick Henry was released on parole last February. Next week he will be released from supervision entirely. In the interim, says Harold Glaser, his client has been working as a physician's assistant somewhere in Alabama. He has applied for the return of his medical license in Maryland, and a hearing on the application will be held the day after his parole is up. Glaser says it is unthinkable that Pat would try to harm Christina now. "He has too much to lose," says the lawyer. "He's got a wife. He's got two children he loves. He wants to continue in the practice of medicine." In fact, says Glaser, if anyone needs psychiatric help now, it is Christina. She is hysterical, he says, "an oddball coming in from left field."

Randy Stevens disagrees. Henry, he maintains, is a "textbook sociopath...with no qualms, no ethics, no conscience," a disturbed man with a genius for mimicking sanity, a man capable of plotting revenge, then waiting years to achieve it.

From Tucson it is 78 miles across the desert to Florence, a small, sandblown community dominated by the high walls and turrets of the Arizona State Prison. One day last summer, eight months before Patrick Henry was scheduled to be released, the temperature outside hovered at 110°F. Inside, in the cool oasis of his office, Warden Lloyd E. Bramlett had Henry's files spread across his desk. "He was in minimum security," said Bramlett. "Pretty much a model inmate." No violence. No discipline problems. But wait. Three years before, he had been caught using a "mail drop," an arrangement that enabled him to send correspondence outside the walls without revealing that he was writing from prison. Using the names of two different people, one a prison employee to whose personnel file he had apparently gained access, he was sending for their birth certificates and social security cards.

Subsequently, prison officials searched Henry's cell and found a collection of books on confidence tricks, fraud, method acting, disappearing without a trace—and one on locating missing people. Hidden in the cover of a handmade historical album on England, they discovered a plan of the prison and a map of Florence. The model inmate was shifted for a time to maximum security.

Had Henry been planning an escape? Bramlett wouldn't hazard a guess. "Win, lose or draw, he's done his time," said the warden. "But he was thinking about something he shouldn't have been thinking about." Did this sound like the behavior of a wronged man? "Let me put it this way," he said with a smile. "That's a very tough cellblock he's in. Those prisoners are the best psychologists and sociologists in the world. They can sniff out someone who doesn't belong there in five minutes, and they accepted Patrick Henry real quick."

Tidbits and Updates

In 1987 Dr. Patrick G. Henry was arrested again on drug charges. He was living in Mobile, Alabama working as a physician's assistant at the time. He served 6 1/2 years in an Arizona prison for attempted murder. His second wife's name is Nancy. Patrick Henry lives in Oregon or that's the last that I heard.

Deadly Intentions" and "Deadly Intentions...Again"

Dr. Patrick Henry, Deadly Intentions Again Based on His Life