Slain Woman Pursued Stars

As police Sunday said they still had no suspects in the slaying of actor Robert Blake’s wife, the victim’s family and friends described a woman periodically tangled in legal problems and obsessed with meeting entertainment stars.

Over the past decade, the 44-year-old Bonny Lee Bakley endured a drug arrest in Tennessee, was jailed in Arkansas and sold nude photos of herself and others by mail, according to family members and court records.

Through it all she enjoyed the spotlight.

To her family and friends, she spun tales of intimate relationships with celebrities such as Jerry Lee Lewis and Frankie Valli. Late last year she finally landed the Hollywood husband she had always hoped for.

“She liked to live on the edge, that’s for sure,” said her mother, Marjorie Carlyon of Tennessee, in a phone interview Sunday. “I always worried about her.”

Bakley was found fatally shot on Friday night, her body slumped over in the front passenger seat of Blake’s car outside the Studio City restaurant where the couple had dined. The actor, star of the ‘70s television series “Baretta,” told detectives he found his wife in the car after he went back to the restaurant to get his gun, a pistol which he said he had been carrying because his wife feared for her safety.

Police said Sunday that Blake is not a suspect. However, they obtained a search warrant for the actor’s home and had spent much of Saturday afternoon combing through his property. Officers took numerous items from Blake’s home.

After being interviewed by police Saturday, Blake spent much of Sunday at his home, a throng of reporters and television cameras surrounding the property. He had spent the night in a hospital because of a high blood pressure problem, his lawyer said.

Blake lawyer Harland W. Braun said police had taken Blake’s gun, for which he has a concealed weapon permit. Authorities would not say if they are making progress in the case or when an arrest might be made. An autopsy has been performed, but authorities would not comment on the results.

Lawyers for Blake insisted Sunday that Bakley led a risky lifestyle that could have created many enemies.

In response, Bakley’s family raised questions about Blake’s demeanor before the murder and said her past had nothing to do with the crime.

As some of Bakley’s family traveled to Los Angeles on Sunday to make funeral arrangements, others recalled her as the most ambitious of Marjorie Bakley’s four children.

Born June 7, 1956, in Morristown, N.J., Bonny Lee Bakley was the oldest child in a working-class family. Her late father, Edward J. Bakley, was a tree surgeon.

Her three siblings have lived relatively routine lives. Margerry Lisa Bakley is a secretary in Dover, N.J. Brother Joey, of San Diego, is in construction. Peter Carlyon, her half-brother, does landscaping in Tennessee.

But Bonny Bakley, beautiful from an early age, was determined to avoid such a life, her family said. Because of problems at home, she moved in with her grandmother for a time, before graduating from high school and pursuing a modeling and acting career in New York. Her mother said Bakley told her that she was studying with famous acting coach Lee Strasberg. She had two great desires, Bakley told friends and family: to be a famous actress and to marry a movie star.

“She was able to do half of that,” her sister, Margerry, said ruefully Sunday. “Life can be hard.”

Finding a star spouse did not come quickly. She met her first husband in New Jersey, and they were married in the early 1980s, her family said. They have two children, Holly and Glen, both in their early 20s, according to family members.

Family and friends say that while Bakley’s husband stayed home and took care of the children, she spent time traveling and starting several small mail order businesses.

She wanted to be a female Donald Trump. “She adored him, not for his looks but for his intelligence,” her sister said of Trump. “She went out pursuing careers.” Her husband “took care of the kids.”

The ‘80s brought her some measures of success. Using the name Leebonny Bakley, she told family members that she had earned a Screen Actors Guild card and appeared briefly in the film “9 1/2 Weeks.” A SAG spokesman was unable to confirm that information Sunday.

She moved to Tennessee to be close to singer Jerry Lee Lewis, whom she pursued with fervor, her sister said.

She was arrested for drug possession in 1989 and told police in Tennessee she was holding the drugs for a celebrity and got off with a small fine, said a lawyer who handled the case.

In 1991, Jerry Lee Lewis’ sister, Linda Gail Lewis, and Bakley were co-plaintiffs in a federal libel suit against a London tabloid that had alleged they trafficked in pornography, according to court records and published reports at the time. Lawyers involved with the case said Sunday they could not recall how it concluded.

Attending concerts and cozying up to male celebrities, Bakley made dozens of well-connected friends.

She named her third child, who is now 7, Jeri Lee Lewis.

Her siblings sometimes made fun of her dalliances, but they also marveled at her generosity. When Margerry Bakley’s phone was shut off because of $500 in unpaid bills, Bakley took care of it. “She would help the family out no matter what,” said her sister. “If she didn’t have the cash at the time, she would employ us.”

Family members said Bakley made her living by investing in real estate, running a dating service and selling nude photographs to lonely hearts by mail.

In 1997, Bakley was prosecuted in federal court in Little Rock, Ark., for possessing several fake identifications. As part of a plea bargain, she eventually received three years probation and $1,050 in fines.

Bakley met Blake a few years ago, she told friends, after traveling to Los Angeles with an entertainer friend. She spotted Blake at a party, and left Christian Brando for him, her sister said.

Blake starred in the “Our Gang” movies of the 1930s, and played one of the killers in the movie “In Cold Blood.” But after starring as a hard-as-nails detective in the 1970s TV series “Baretta,” he has had an inconsistent career, and has battled depression and alcoholism.

When Bakley became pregnant in late 1999, she believed the child was Brando’s, according to Blake’s lawyers. But after the baby was born June 2, a DNA test confirmed that the child was Blake’s. The two married, even as Blake hired investigators to look into Bakley’s background.

Both Bakley’s relatives and Blake’s lawyers concede that it was a difficult relationship. Margerry Bakley said the two often argued and there was tension over who would care for the child.

When Bonny Bakley visited her sister in New Jersey earlier this year, Margerry Bakley listened as the couple argued over the phone.

“He would be real nasty, and sometimes he would be sweet,” said Bakley’s mother. “She liked him when he was sweet. I told her that he’s an actor, and how is she going to know when he’s acting.”

Bakley and her sister Margerry had spoken every night for the last several weeks. “Then she didn’t call on Friday,” Margerry said.

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Times staff writers David Pierson and Massie Ritsch contributed to this story.