Husband says FBI had reason to believe his missing wife was alive

DALLAS (AP) The FBI had reason to believe that a missing Oklahoma prison warden's wife was alive and being held captive but never told her worried family, her husband says. <br/><br/>Randy Parker said

Monday, April 25th 2005, 6:14 am

By: News On 6

DALLAS (AP) The FBI had reason to believe that a missing Oklahoma prison warden's wife was alive and being held captive but never told her worried family, her husband says.

Randy Parker said the FBI has ``blown off'' his questions about why he and his daughters weren't told about a 2001 phone call in which his wife's abductor made her talk with an author of a book about their disappearance.

Bobbi Parker was freed earlier this month after living on an East Texas chicken farm for nearly 11 years with escaped killer Randolph Dial. The pair vanished in 1994 from the Oklahoma State Reformatory in Granite, where her husband was an assistant warden.

After his capture, Dial told reporters he was so comfortable ``hiding in plain sight'' with Bobbi Parker that he called author Charles Sasser to praise his book on the case. He said he even put her on the phone to prove she was still with him.

Sasser confirmed the call took place and said he reported it to the FBI. He said authorities told him they couldn't trace the call because his phone service was antiquated.

An FBI spokesman in Oklahoma declined comment, referring questions to the district attorney's office in Greer County. Dial faces escape charges there and is under investigation for possible kidnapping.

Randy Parker said he has repeatedly asked the FBI why agents neither traced the call nor alerted his family.

``They kind of blew it off. They said, 'Well, there was a report that he might have gotten a phone call from somebody that said he was Dial,''' he said, adding, ``it didn't seem to have the emphasis placed on it that it should've had.''

Bobbi Parker has told investigators she stayed with Dial because she feared his constant threats that he could use mob connections to hurt her family. Oklahoma authorities say they're trying to determine whether she was a hostage or should be charged with helping Dial.

Randy Parker said his wife met with a counselor for the first time last week. He said she remains fearful and will not talk at length about her life with Dial, though she said she is troubled that the FBI didn't trace the call.

He said she also is upset with Sasser, who has said he believes she was a willing accomplice because she told him in 2001 that she was ``fine and happy'' and was dismissive when he urged her to call her two daughters.

Randy Parker said his wife has insisted she only spoke with Sasser because Dial made her, and she says she asked him to check on her daughters and tell them she'd asked about them.

``He said he would. He never did. Now he's running around on every TV show he can possibly get on, saying things that just aren't true,'' Randy Parker said.

Sasser says Bobbi Parker had ``many, many opportunities'' to call her family and tell them she was alive.