When Richard Mallory didn’t show up to open his shop on Monday, 3 December 1989, his staff and clients didn’t think much of it. As far as friends went, there was no one close enough to him to notice he was gone. Frankly, no one even cared. It wasn’t until the cops turned up at his business saying they had found his abandoned Cadillac outside Daytona that anyone knew anything was amiss. No one ‘gave a rat’s ass’, as one officer dryly observed.
‘The best beach in Florida! A perfect destination for honeymooners and couples! Vacation values that won’t bust your budget!’ So scream the tourist brochures. But Daytona is no different to many cities: along the star-spangled sidewalks, lined with laundromats, strip joints and seedy hotels, Joe Public can get his ‘round the world’ (everything) for 80 bucks, or a straight ‘ho’s strip’ (where the hooker strips for oral only) for 20. Richard was a sufficiently regular customer at the topless bars in the Tampa, Clearwater and Daytona areas that the strippers, go-go dancers and hookers mostly knew him by sight, if not by name. When he latched on to them, he was like a rigged fruit machine – guaranteed to pay out nearly every time.
The weather had closed in on Thursday, 30 November 1989. Rolling in from the Gulf of Mexico, the storm front had been snapping its leaden skies at Florida’s east coast for several hours. To the west, the palms from Cape Coral all the way north to Cedar Key were whistling; the rain, at first a heavy spatter, now became a thundering torrent. Flash floods were probable and gale warnings had sent sensible folk scurrying home.
Out on Interstate 4, Richard Mallory was cursing his bad luck – as if he didn’t have enough problems without his light-beige, two-door Cadillac Coupé de Ville with tinted windows being wedged in traffic. It would have been a long haul at the best of times. He had had a good run out of Pinellas County across Old Tampa Bay on I-275 along the glistening Howard Frankland Bridge, but now he was stuck like a belligerent cork in a bottleneck. Making Orlando would take him ages now, and on top of that it would be another 60 minutes before he hit Daytona Beach where his fun could start.
Above him, a Med Air chopper was fighting its way through the rain to a railroad trestle where a hobo had jumped the metals and been hit by a train. He has lost both legs: it’s terminal. Looking down from the chopper, the observer takes in the interstate, pumping from the heart of Tampa like a knotted artery twisting and turning 30 miles east to Brandon and on to Orlando in the grey distance. Just outside the city limits, the traffic has congealed into a solid mass as hundreds of vehicles, their tail lights glowing red, slither to a standstill along the highway.
Down there, on the eastbound lane, the observer sees the red and blue flashing strobes of light bars. Highway Patrol officers have lit flares and are busy with the wreck of an overturned truck. That’s what’s causing the snarl-up. The chopper banks sharply and clatters away into the night.
Among this traffic congestion, Mallory lights a reefer, takes another slug of Smirnoff vodka and taps his fingers impatiently on the wheel, cursing again and again…
The traffic edged forward at a snail’s pace, and his patience was now threadbare. He had closed up shop early, rushed home to change into jeans and a pullover, thrown a few things into a bag, then headed east for Daytona and a long weekend of drinking and pleasure. Mallory had chosen not to drive either of his white or maroon company vans: if he wanted a quick lay, the Cadillac, with its plush brown interior and tinted windows, was far better suited to the pursuit of pleasure.
Mallory’s mind was full of urgency now. Earlier in the week he had confided in a customer, somewhat boastfully, that he hated being around Clearwater with the people gossiping behind his back. The truth is that his criminal record meant it was a place where he had to keep his nose clean. He was always pushing his luck, but on his home patch he had to treat the hookers and bargirls right. They were all whores but, although Mallory had kept out of serious trouble for years, if he slipped up he would be back behind bars before he could blink. Out of town, away from Tampa, he could do more or less as he wished. He could use and abuse women. He could, if the mood took him, treat them like shit.
Suddenly the long tail of red brake lights in front of him switched off. His time for brooding was over. He took another draw on his reefer and, with his windscreen wipers slapping back and forth, he pushed the car into gear and was on the move.
Now the rain was coming down in sheets. There was a slight wind, and the rush of heavy traffic was whipping the water up into a spray. He had driven a short distance when suddenly a figure thumbing for a lift appeared in his headlights. Mallory slowed down and took a sly look. It was a woman, aged around 30, of medium build and carelessly dressed in cut-off jeans, T-shirt and baseball cap. His pulse raced and he sucked in his breath. He felt the need of company – if it was a woman, so much the better. After stopping the car, he hooked his right arm over the back of the passenger seat, looked through the rear window and reversed to where she stood.
Fate keeps a close hand. There is a point along the road to a murder where things are set in motion: one life ends, the other is irrevocably changed. In this instance, a few minutes either way and the paths of victim and killer would not have crossed. Had Mary Christiansen missed the skidding truck, even by a millisecond, she would now be at home, fit and well. The road accident that caused the traffic jam that night would not have happened, and Mallory would have been long gone on his way to Florida’s east coast. The domino effect, however, had started: the first one had tipped over near Tampa; the last one would fall along a dark, remote track in Volusia County near Daytona Beach.
If only he had not noticed Lee. Any one of a hundred or so drivers could have stopped for this lonely woman; indeed, many had already given her a ride that day and lived to tell the tale. After her arrest, for those men it would be a memory they would never forget. In their nightmares they would recall the hitchhiker chatting in their cars. Maybe they had sensed all was not good with her. Her manic little laugh; her hints at sex. But they had lived; Richard Mallory, on the other hand, had a rendezvous with death.
Bisexual Lee, who had never killed a man in her life, had been drinking way down in Fort Myers. For a few nights she hustled for money, then she had an argument with Tyria over the phone. She had been on the road since 6am and her mood, right now, was not good. However, she had the better part of $250 in her purse to put down as a deposit on a new rented apartment in Burleigh Avenue. Now, after six rides north, she was about to climb into a car with a sexual predator.
Lee was happy with the chance of a ride and drawled that if he was on his way to Daytona that was just fine. As they moved off, Mallory asked her if she minded him smoking the reefer. She laughed and told him he could do what he liked, but she didn’t touch drugs herself. She did, however, accept his offer of a drink. He always kept booze in his car, so they began to get friendly and drunk.
‘I thought he was kind of funny. Don’t often take a ride and have a joint pushed your way,’ Lee said to me. ‘To start with, the fucker was kind of cute.’
With shifty sidelong glances at his passenger, Mallory, who was not averse to paying for sex, almost immediately weighed her up as a hooker who had hit hard times. She had a mottled complexion, straggly blonde hair, thin, somewhat cruel lips, a cute nose, great legs and the wet T-shirt accentuated her firm breasts. She had a manly way about her and was a tad on the heavily built side, but the more he knocked back the booze, the better she looked.
Although a little abrasive, Lee was a chatty, forthright lass, so he was not surprised when she asked him if he would like to ‘have some fun and help her make some money’. Mallory replied saying he might be interested. Lee would later confirm that this was her usual modus operandi. She always brought up the issue of sex, and several witnesses who had given her rides would testify to this.
Mallory told her he knew girls in topless bars and bragged he would pay $2,000 per photo session. He talked about politics, religion and that his electronics store was going through troubled ti
mes. Just past Orlando he stopped for petrol. He bought a six-pack of beer and went to the bathroom. Upon returning to the car he talked about his ex-wife and having problems with a lady. Lee could identify with his troubles and, at that moment, murder was the furthest thing from her mind. All she needed to do was get back to Tyria, pay the deposit on the new apartment, shift their personal belongings and move in.
We have no reason to doubt Lee when she claims that they turned into a stopping point just off US Highway 1 and continued to drink and talk until nearly 5am. The place was too wide open for sex, so they drove on towards Daytona and Mallory asked the woman who gave her name as Lee if she wanted to make her money now.
‘My rates were easy to understand, even for a drunk,’ she explained to me. ‘Head for $30; $35 straight; $40 for 50/50 [half oral/half vaginal penetration]; $100 an hour.’ According to Lee, she agreed to $30. Evidence at autopsy that Mallory may have only opened his zip, yet had his pants belted at the waist, testifies to Lee’s claim that he just wanted a $30 blowjob.
They swung off Interstate 95 and drove up a track which she knew as the Quail Run, which ended in deserted woodland. Leaving the headlights ablaze and switching on the interior light, Mallory and Lee swung open their car doors. Shortly after her arrest she stated that Mallory gave her the money she wanted and she began to strip off her few clothes. Usually she would ask the men to strip too, and certainly to remove their pants. Mallory didn’t.
At first, she said she provided him with the service he required then he attacked her. At trial, she changed the story by saying that he had refused to pay her anything, tied her up, beat her and forced a blunt object into her anus. She was sure he was going to kill her, so she broke free and shot him. ‘It was just another trick,’ she told me during our interview. ‘It was cool and royal before it went sour.’
When she was naked, she asked him if he wasn’t going to do the same. But it seems that Mallory had no intention of undressing. Merely unzipping his trousers, he rolled drunkenly on top of the woman, smothering her face in kisses. Even through his alcoholic haze, Mallory would have seen that a sudden change had come over her. One minute she had been just another good-time girl hoping to make a fast buck. Now she looked like an avenging fury, her face a distorted mask of hatred. ‘You son of a bitch,’ she hissed. ‘You were going to rape me.’
She said they began to hurl abuse at each other, Lee repeatedly accusing Mallory of attempted rape. Ignoring her, he rolled on top again, this time more forcefully. But Lee succeeded in wriggling away from him and out of the car, taking her shoulder bag with her. We will never know the exact truth of the sordid scenario, but something happened in that car which sparked a monstrous fury in Lee – she had never been so enraged before in her life. She had been with scores of johns; countless men had paid her for sex, yet, up until that moment in time, Lee had not shot anyone. Why was Richard Mallory so different?
When Mallory looked up, it was to see her standing naked with a small-calibre pistol aimed straight at him.
‘What’s going on?’
‘Get out of the car,’ Lee ordered.
He hesitated before starting to sidle over to the passenger seat. When he was in the doorway, she backed away. He made to lunge at her but she squeezed the trigger of the .22-calibre, nine-shot pistol. The gun jumped in her hand, the sharp crack of the report shattering the stillness of the early-morning air. Mallory moaned as the round struck him in the upper part of his left arm, passed clean through it and lodged in his rib cage. Bewildered, he managed to stand up outside the car. Lee backed still further away from him, holding the weapon in a police grip for deadly accuracy. She pulled off two more rounds in quick succession. He was now mortally wounded.
The copper-covered, hollow-nose bullets tore into the right and left of Mallory’s chest. As he jerked under the impact of the third shot, the frenzied Lee let off a series of rounds, one of which struck Mallory in the side of the neck above the collarbone. He fell to the ground. Both of his lungs had collapsed; blood was pouring into his body. He wheezed in a futile fight for air.
Meanwhile, his killer coolly got dressed and chose what she liked among his belongings, then squatted down on her haunches and watched. After just over ten minutes, Mallory’s wheezing stopped.
The next day, Mallory’s Cadillac was found suspiciously abandoned near John Anderson Drive in Ormond Beach, a short distance from where Lee and Tyria were staying. Deputy John Bonnevier and County Deputy Sheriff John Bondi were out on routine patrol when they stopped to examine the vehicle parked up in a sunny clearing. Two doors were open, the interior light was on. Peering inside, they noticed what appeared to be bloodstains behind the steering wheel, but there were no signs of either the driver or, for that matter, any passengers. John Bondi would later testify at trial: ‘On 1 December 1989, in the course of routine patrol, at or about 3.20pm, I discovered an abandoned vehicle in a wooded area on John Anderson Drive … I conducted an enquiry around the vehicle looking for a driver … failed to find anyone in the area.’
Officer Bondi added that the vehicle’s ignition keys were not in the switch, but numerous items were found a short distance from the car. Partially buried in the sandy soil was a blue nylon wallet containing Richard Mallory’s Florida driving licence, miscellaneous papers and two long-expired credit cards. There were also two plastic tumbler glasses, a half-empty bottle of Smirnoff vodka, an empty bottle of Budweiser and a red car caddy, along with several other items, all of which suggested that Mallory had not been alone. An examination of the driver’s seat revealed that it had been pulled as far forward as it would go, into a driving position which would have been extremely uncomfortable for a man of Mallory’s size. There was a trail of items leading down the track to the main road.
Further examination of the vehicle revealed a pair of prescription spectacles under the front seat and, in the boot, the impression left by a toolbox which had apparently been removed. The car was dusted unsuccessfully for fingerprints by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, and then towed into the Volusia Country Sheriff’s Office compound for safekeeping before it was removed to the Orlando Regional Crime Laboratory where it was analysed by Daniel Radcliffe.
The next find came on Wednesday, 13 December. Jimmy Bonchi and James Davis, who were out scavenging for scrap metal along a dirt road off Interstate 95, made a gruesome discovery. They had found Richard Mallory’s corpse at a spot roughly five miles across the river from where his car had been discovered.
Volusia County deputies who responded to the 911 call saw a body that was skeletonised from the collarbone to the top of the head. Wild animals and insects had enjoyed a feast. The bulk of the putrefying corpse lay under a piece of cardboard with only the fingers showing. It was fully dressed in jeans and a pullover, the belt slightly askew. Detective James Malady, who arrived shortly after the body was called in, noted that the pockets of the jeans had been turned inside out. A set of dentures lay on the ground next to the corpse.
Charles James Lau, an investigator with the Volusia County Sheriff’s Department, oversaw an immediate autopsy of the unidentified body and recovered four bullets from its torso. The hands of the victim were removed and transported to the crime laboratory for latent-print examination because, as Lau explained, ‘When we have an unidentified body, you can’t roll the fingerprints because of the decomposition.’
At Lee’s trial, James Downing, the Daytona Beach medical examiner, described the removal of the body to a local funeral home on the night of 13 December. ‘Ordinarily, bodies were sent to Halifax Hospital, but the decomposition of this body was too severe,’ he said.
On the following day, the clothing was removed and sealed in a bag. ‘I don’t believe he had any underwear on,’ Downing told the jury. ‘I did not notice the zipper,’ he added when questioned as to whether or not Richard Mallory’s zip was closed or fastened. Dr Arthur Botting certified his death.
Several months of investigation into Mallory’s sordid lif
estyle and somewhat shady acquaintances produced no real leads. Police learned that he had last been seen at his shop on 30 November by Jeffrey Davis, the son of Jackie Davis, Mallory’s last girlfriend. Officers were also able to locate a customer to whom Mallory confided his plan to visit Daytona Beach for a couple of days. Notes and phone numbers in the dead man’s apartment led investigators to two dancers at local strip clubs, Chastity Marcus and Kimberly Guy, and Doug Lambert, Chastity’s boyfriend.
Initial suspicion revolved around Chastity who was described as ‘as hot as a firecracker’ by the manager of the strip joint where she worked. She told the cops all about Mallory and his sick perversions. She introduced them to other girls who had been abused by this sexual pervert. Even Mallory’s former girlfriend Jackie Davis told officers that he had been incarcerated for sex offences for ten years. But the cops slammed them all down and the case went cold.
By the middle of May 1990, the murder of Richard Mallory had been all but forgotten by the Volusia County Sheriff’s Department. There was, seemingly, no reason to believe it was anything other than an isolated homicide.
Mallory’s sister in Texas and his brother in New Jersey wanted nothing to do with Richard’s business. A Mr Townley took over the repair equipment that had been dumped, moved the shop several doors from the original site, and Mallory Electronics became Johnny’s TV & VCR of Palm Harbor. Jackie Davis took charge of Mallory’s cremation and scattered his ashes in nearby woodland.
But did anyone other than Lee know about the killing of Richard Mallory? In various quarters, it has always been accepted that Lee’s lesbian lover had no knowledge at all of Mallory’s murder. Indeed, after Lee’s arrest for murder, Tyria initially told investigators that she had no inkling that Lee had been involved with any murder until they crashed murder victim Peter Siems’s car on Wednesday, 4 July 1990 – almost a full seven months after Mallory was killed. She then watered down her story when pressed, saying that Lee had told her about the murder of Mallory but she didn’t believe her.
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