Hunting for a Diana

In 1958, when Harold Miller eloped for the first time, he was 22--and his bride was 13. Her name was Roberta, but Miller called her Diana, after the virgin Roman goddess of the hunt. Roberta-Diana died at age 20 from the effects of sniffing cleaning fluid to get high.

Miller, whose mother had turned over to him the bulk of his late father's estate, which included $270,000 in municipal bonds, next married a 13-or 14-year-old Canadian girl, but had the marriage annulled after he learned that she was not a virgin. Two weeks ago, Miller, a quiet graduate student and teaching assistant in speech and drama at the University of Illinois in Chicago, made one more effort to replace his lost Diana. For $30,000 in municipal bonds, he bought twelve-year-old Rita ("Jackie Lee") Flynn of Bolingbrook, Ill., from her mother and stepfather, Rita and Fred Flynn. The happy trader and his 5-ft., 100-lb. blonde bride-to-be then headed for South Carolina, where girls can marry at 14. They planned to await Jackie Lee's equally content stepfather, who intended to fly in and sign consent papers stating that she was 14.

Tipster. Instead, Miller was arrested last week on charges of conspiring with the Flynns to commit child abandonment. He was jailed in Asheville, N.C., and, after paying $8,000 in bond, returned to Illinois to face the charges. There the Flynns were also released on $10,000 bonds, and charged with child abandonment as well as conspiracy, for which they can be sentenced to one to three years in prison. Jackie Lee was in the custody of Illinois juvenile authorities. According to the Asheville medical examiner, she is still a virgin, and presumably will soon be back in the seventh grade.

A tipster in Chicago had alerted the Bolingbrook police that the child sale was in the making. Police followed the Flynns and were watching when the transaction took place at a Holiday Inn in nearby Willowbrook. But Miller managed to elude pursuing squad cars, and the arrests were not made until last week, when he was caught by North Carolina police.

According to Bolingbrook police, Fred Flynn, a steel-and-copper salesman, was in desperate financial straits and had been moonlighting as a cab driver when he met Miller, who mentioned his yearning for a child bride. Flynn offered his stepdaughter, Miller offered the $30,000 in bonds, and the sale was concluded.

The Flynns lost no time in enjoying their new riches. In the three days between the sale and their arrest they cashed in the bonds, paid off three loans and bought a new car as well as furniture, drapes and other items. When caught, they had $220 left.

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