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Everything She Ever Wanted:
Patricia Allanson (1991)

Ann Rule

Everything She Ever Wanted is a fascinating true crime story of a whirlwind of misguided love, denial, guilt, and passions out of control; a series of brilliantly manipulated crimes; the bizarre and horrifying tale of two families brought to ruin; and, at the center of it all, Patricia Allanson, the heartless, supremely selfish sociopath whose evil hid behind soft words and gentle manners, but who destroyed without mercy those who loved her.

Patricia Vann Taylor Allanson was born in 1937. She was adored by her aunts and especially by her grandmother. She was a beautiful child with big green eyes and blondish hair. She was quick and clever and grew up to be a beautiful teenager. Pat was spoiled by her mother, Margureitte and stepfather, Colonel Clifford Radcliffe. growing up to be an Army brat. She had a younger step-brother, Kent, whom she loved to bully and tease without mercy.

But there was a darker side to Pat. If she didn't get her way, she would throw a tantrum. If that didn't work, she manipulated her way. She learned how to charm both men and women -- especially if they had something she wanted.

Pat married at the very young age of fifteen. Her new husband was Gil Taylor, a hopeful young Army sergeant, and Pat embarked on a military life. Soon she had three children, Susan, Debbie and Ronnie, but she discovered that she didn't want all of the hard work that involved being a mother. And the lifestyle in the military was not her dreams of having a fine home and raising horses. So Pat did what she always did -- appeal to her parents for help.

Soon enough, Pat was living near or with her parents, having her mother help her out with the children, and Gil was often off on his deployments alone. The marriage started falling apart, and in 1971 they divorced.

In 1973, Pat met Tom Allanson, a tall, strong handsome man, son of a wealthy lawyer, who was just as passionately interested in horses as she was. He was six years younger than her. Although she had her eye on someone else, it looked like Tom could give her everything she ever wanted. Unfortunately, Tom was married and in the process of an ugly divorce from a woman known as Little Carolyn. However, the biggest problem for Pat was Tom's parents, Walter and Big Carolyn Allanson. They didn't approve of Pat. They were gravely disappointed in Tom and viewed divorce as not being an option. They sided with Little Carolyn, and the relationship between Tom and his family deteriorated.  There were accusations flying between both sides along with some pretty dreadful threats. 

Life started to look up for Tom and Pat. They purchased a heavily-mortgaged, 52-acre farm in Zebulon, Georgia, and started their dream of raising and showing horses together. In May 1974 they were married in a "Gone With The Wind" style ceremony. He was dressed as Rhett Butler and she as Scarlett O'Hara. It appeared that things were going to work out but........

The feud between Tom and his father over Pat escalated to the point that his father angrily tried to force Tom out of his life. To get even, Pat filed a complaint of sexual harassment against him, claiming that he had exposed himself to her. Tom grew alarmed over this, along with threats that he heard that his father was going to kill him, so he took out a restraining order. His father on the other hand believed that his own son was out to kill him. Someone had stolen a pistol and rifle from his home and he was convinced it was his son. The police searched Tom's home and came up empty-handed. The intense fear and anger continued to grow on both sides. With no communication taking place, it was the perfect set-up for a manipulative psychopath who wanted to get everything for herself.

On July 29, 1974, while taking a trip in their car, Walter and his wife, Carolyn, were shot at by someone. They survived the inexplicable attack and felt sure that Tom had been behind it. The situation between father and son grew more paranoid until August 3. On that day, Tom dropped Pat off at the doctor and then walked over to see his mother when he was sure his father would not be home. Pat had told him that someone had been calling their house all night long and said nothing. She felt sure it was Walter, so Tom felt it was time to try to straighten things out. Otherwise, he thought his father might try to shoot him off his horse in the parade that weekend. His mother was not home but Tom felt she would be returning shortly, so to avoid the possibility of running into Walter, he went to the basement to wait for his mother to return.

After receiving a call from an unknown woman informing him that Tom was at his home, Walter returned home. The electricity was off, so he went into the basement to look around. He found the switch box had been tampered with. He attempted to call the police, but the phone line had been cut. He went to a neighbor's home to use the phone to get the police out there. When they arrived, Walter said he'd take care of the situation himself, so they left. He returned to the basement and started shooting randomly. Carolyn was home by that time. He called up to her that he had Tom cornered and needed the gun he'd just purchased, so she grabbed it to bring it to him.

When the police officers arrived once again in response to an emergency call, they found Carolyn Allanson sitting upright on the basement steps, shot dead. Through the basement window, they could see Walter laying on the ground. He'd been shot numerous times. The police immediately suspected Tom. He'd been seen there, and a man matching his description had  been seen running from the crime scene.

Tom was soon arrested. When Pat told a number of lies to the attorney in an alleged attempt to provide Tom with an alibi, the situation became even more suspicious. Tom had his own story—also a lie—and it didn't match with Pat's story. He was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. At the time of the murders, he and Pat had been married less than two months, and now Pat had the farm to herself. It wasn't long before she tried to talk Tom into a suicide pact, which he later felt sure was an attempt to get him to die so she would inherit everything.

Pat began working on Tom's wealthy grandparents until they finally named her in their will as the primary beneficiary. Her house and barns burned down, and she forged Tom's signature to get the insurance payments. She feed arsenic laced food to Tom's grandparents. However, when they grew ill she was caught and ended up in prison for eight years.

When she got out, she started her scheming again. This time, she persuaded a wealthy couple from Atlanta, Mr. and Mrs. James Crist, to hire her as a nurse. It wasn't long before they, also, got sick and Mr. Crist died.

Once again, Pat was facing prison time. In a shrewd and controversial plea bargain, she would agreed to seven charges, including theft, attempted murder, and posing as a registered nurse, if she would never be charged with the murder of Mr. Crist or investigated for the murder of Tom's parents. She was sentenced to eight years.

Patricia Taylor Allanson, the Deadly Magnolia, was released from prison in 1999.

In February 2008, Patricia Taylor Allanson, age 70, was arrested and charged with doctor shopping for thousands of pain pills over the past year.  It is believed she may have received over 3,700 pills in less than a year. Her bond was set at $22,500 for three felony counts of unauthorized distribution.

This Southern Belle just can't seem to help herself. On second thought, she has done nothing but help herself to get everything she ever wanted no matter the cost.

Ann Rule's Full Length Bestsellers
with Case Background
 

• Too Late to Say Goodbye: A True Story of Murder and Betrayal(2007) - Tells the story of a Georgia dentist named Bart Corbin, and how two women, a beautiful dentistry student named Dolly Hearn, and Bart's wife, Jennifer Barber Corbin, found themselves fatally involved with Corbin over the course of two decades.

• Green River, Running Red: The Real Story of the Green River Killer-America's Deadliest Serial Murderer (2004) - This is the extraordinary true story of the most prolific serial killer the nation had ever seen -- a case involving more than forty-nine female victims, two decades of intense investigative work...and one unrelenting killer who not only attended Ann Rule's book signings but lived less than a mile away from her home.

• Heart Full of Lies: A True Story of Desire and Death (2003) - An idyllic Hawaiian wedding held the promise of a wonderful future for handsome, athletic Chris Northon, an airline pilot, a confirmed bachelor-turned-devoted family man; and Liysa, an acclaimed surf photographer, loving mother, and aspiring Hollywood screenwriter. But few, including Chris, had seen Liysa's other side -- her controlling behavior and dark moods, her insatiable hunger for money and property. And no one anticipated the fatal outcome of a family camping trip in an Oregon forest. Liysa soon revealed herself as a victim of domestic abuse that culminated at the campsite, where she shot Chris in self-defense. But crime scene evidence led detectives to wonder if Liysa was a killer, not a victim.

• Every Breath You Take: A True Story of Obsession, Revenge, and Murder (2001) - Although happily settled securely in a loving second marriage, and a new family of quadruplets, Sheila never truly escaped the vicious enslavement of her ex-husband, multi-millionaire Allen Blackthorne, a handsome charmer -- and a violent, controlling sociopath who subjected Sheila to unthinkable abuse in their marriage, and terrorized her for a decade after their divorce. When Sheila was slain in her home, in the presence of her four toddlers, authorities raced to link the crime to Blackthorne, the man who vowed to monitor Sheila's every move in his obsessive quest for power and revenge. Shelia had said, "If anything ever happens to me... find Ann Rule and ask her to write my story."

• And Never Let Her Go: Thomas Capano: The Deadly Seducer (1999) - On a June evening in 1996, 30-year-old Anne Marie Fahey, secretary to the governor of Delaware, vanished without a trace following a restaurant rendezvous with her secret lover of more than two years: Thomas Capano. One of Wilmington's most prominent and respected figures, a millionaire attorney and former state prosecutor, "Tommy" was a charming, soft spoken family man. But in the weeks and months that followed Fahey's disappearance, investigators would gradually uncover the shocking truth: Capano was a steely manipulator driven by power and greed -- and capable of brutal murder.

• Bitter Harvest: A Woman's Fury, A Mother's Sacrifice (1998) - Rule probes the case of Debora Green, a doctor and a loving mother. A small-town girl with a genius IQ, she achieved an enviable life: her own medical practice, a handsome physician husband, three perfect children, and an opulent home in an exclusive Kansas City suburb. But when a raging fire destroyed that home and took two lives, the trail of clues led investigators to a stunning conclusion.

• Dead By Sunset: Perfect Husband, Perfect Killer? (1995) - When attorney Cheryl Keeton's brutally bludgeoned body was found in her van in the fast lane of an Oregon freeway, her husband, Brad Cunningham, was the likely suspect. But there was no solid evidence linking him to the crime. He married again, for the fifth time, and his stunning new wife, a physician named Sara, adopted his three sons. They all settled down to family life on a luxurious estate. But gradually, their marriage became a nightmare....

• Everything She Ever Wanted: A True Story of Obsessive Love, Murder, and Betrayal (1992) - For their wedding portrait, petite Pat Taylor and handsome Tom Allanson posed as Rhett and Scarlett.  Less than two months later, their dream exploded in terror and murder: their beautiful home mysteriously burned to the ground and Tom was convicted of the brutal slaying of his mother and father. Pat's only brother had died in a puzzling suicide, her grandparents-in-law were poisoned with arsenic, and no one -- from her wealthy employers to her own children -- was safe when Pat Allanson didn't get her way. It took Georgia lawmen more than two decades to stop her for good -- if indeed they have.

• If You Really Loved Me: A True Story of Desire and Murder (1991) - David Brown was a computer wizard and millionaire by age thirty-two. When his beautiful young wife was shot to death as she slept, Brown's fourteen-year-old daughter, Cinnamon, confessed to killing her stepmother. The California courts sentenced her harshly: twenty-four years to life. But thanks in part to two determined lawmen, the twisted private world of David Brown unfolded revealing a trail of perverse love, twisted secrets, and evil mind games. Did David Brown convince his own daughter to prove her love by killing for him?

• Small Sacrifices: A True Story of Passion and Murder (1987) - A shocking and powerful account of the destructive forces that drove Diane Downs, a beautiful young mother, to shoot her three young children in cold blood.

• The Want-Ad Killer - Written as Andy Stack (1983) - After his first grisly crime, Harvey Louis Carignan beat a death sentence and continued to manipulate, rape, and bludgeon women to death--using want ads to lure his young female victims.

• The I-5 Killer - Written as Andy Stack (1984) - As a young man, Randall Woodfield had it all--a star athlete, good looks, and an award-winning student. Working in the swinging West Coast bar scene, he had more than his share of women. But he wanted more than just sex. An appetite for unspeakable violent acts led him to cruise the I-5 highway through California to Washington, leaving a trail of victims along the way. As the list of the dead grew, the police mobilized to stop a twisted killer who had 44 known deaths to his name.

• Possession - A Novel (1983) - Joanne Lindstrom's camping trip to Washington's Cascade mountains goes terribly awry, leaving her husband dead and Joanne's only hope for survival in the hands of a twisted stranger. (This is Ann Rule's only novel. Based on a real Northwest Case.)  

• Lust Killer - Written as Andy Stack (1983) - To his neighbors, Jerry Brudos was a gentle man whose mild manner contrasted with his awesome physical strength. To his employers, Jerry was a fine worker. To his wife, he was a good husband. And to the Oregon police, Jerry Brudos was the most hideously twisted killer they had ever unmasked.

• The Stranger Beside Me - Ted Bundy: The Classic Story of Seduction & Murder (1980) - Ann Rule was a writer working on the biggest story of her life, tracking down a brutal mass-murderer. Little did she know that Ted Bundy, her close friend, was the savage slayer she was hunting.

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