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The History of Lynda and Max, in Her Own Words
I met Max Camp in 1975 when I was just out of High School and had gotten married. My then husband Tony worked at Lellock Motor Sales in Punxsutawney and Max was a regular visitor there. He also was a friend of Tony’s. I had known who Max was because he had gotten a divorce from his first wife Sharon, and lived alone on West Mahoning Street, and used to sit out on his porch with his German shepherd Heidi. I used to drive by when I was in High School and beep at him. I thought he was cute. My best friend Cheryl Rubin was always with me. When I actually met him at Lellock Motor he was very charming and sweet to me. He said he knew “of me.”
Shortly after, he started to drive up and down Perry Street where I was living. I used to sun myself a lot and eventually he stopped one afternoon and asked me if I needed help with my tanning lotion. I said yes. He stayed about half an hour and after that started to call me daily. Shortly after, he married Cheryl Harriger from Brookville PA. Though he was a newlywed, as I almost was, he still called.
* We had our first sexual encounter May of 1977.
I was out jogging across the Margiotti Bridge and he was in the police marked cruiser. He stopped and asked me if I needed a ride. It was about 8:00 in the evening. We went to a cemetery near Rossiter, Pennsylvania, and that’s where it began. I began talking to him all the time.
* I even went to see him when he was in the Indiana hospital, about that time, in traction. I waited for Cheryl to leave, and I’d go in and perform oral sex on him.
The affair went on. When he went home, I’d visit him there in Rochester Mills while Cheryl was teaching at the Purchase Line elementary school. Sometime around 1979 I confided in my mother about being in love with this man. Her exact words to me were: “Lynn honey, be careful, he’s not a stable man and morally it’s wrong.” My mom knew Max because: A, it was a small town. And B, she was active in local politics and she had met him years before. She was very scared for me for many reasons. But I refused to stop seeing him.
* In June, 1978, I got pregnant. It was Max’s baby. He insisted I have an abortion.
I had one child at the time, Melissa who was three. Max told me it would be in my best interest to abort the child. So, I told Tony that I had been exposed to chicken pox, measles and he took me to a woman’s clinic in Pittsburgh to have it done. I couldn’t reach Max so I called to Pennsylvania State Police and talked to Liz Uzzo who was very aware of the affair and told her my problem. I needed money for the procedure and she called Max at home. He called me immediately. The next day he gave me three hundred dollars to have it done. He said never tell anyone! But Tony knew what I was doing and so did my parents, and Tony’s parents.
In November of 1979 I got pregnant again to Tony. Max was concerned it was his. At the same time his wife was pregnant with Heather. In April 1980 Max was with me at my home on Dinsmore Avenue when he got a call saying Cheryl was rushed to the Punxsutawney Hospital for eclampsia. They did a C-section. Heather was born February 15th. However, Max didn’t leave when he got the call. He stayed with me another hour. That night we spent the night together at his house. I told Tony I was staying with a friend who needed my help with personal problems.
After that we saw each other all summer and on September 7th I had Leslie. The day I brought her home, Max showed up demanding to see her. He said he knew she was his. She was not. She had the “Fernichio” look from the nose to the eyes to the hair. He was angry and left. Two days later he called and said he wanted to leave Cheryl and marry me! I laughed at him. It was about then I got involved in the Church and teaching aerobics so I had an excuse to be out every night. We used to go out in his cruiser at night when he did the three to eleven and the eleven to seven o’clock shift and I always wore black or gray pants. If he got a domestic call or a MVA he would put his black jacket on me and his gray Pennsylvania State Trooper hat on me, and take me with him. I figure I went out on over a hundred calls in all those years.
* He would take me up to the Barracks on midnights and we go through many files of people I knew. I had access to Social Security numbers, driver’s license numbers, and criminal files. Anything I needed.
The other troopers were used to seeing me there. It was a no big deal thing. I even answered calls for him when he was on the desk on midnights.
I told my mom this, and she told me to get out of this, that any man who had such a disregard for his position and authority was pond scum, and she told me I was in for trouble and heartache. My mother also went to see him after that and told him to stay away from me or she’d tell Cheryl. Well, we didn’t stop till August ’93. He told me Cheryl was going to have another baby. He hated her for that. He didn’t want another baby. He said he was getting too old and his career was starting to thrive. I totally lost it and told him to never call me again.
* For three months we didn’t talk until one day he came to my house and told me Tony was in a lot of trouble.
* He told me about an investigation that was in progress against Tony from the white-collar crime unit out of Pittsburgh.
* He said Tony was looking at a lot of time in prison for embezzlement, fraud, and theft.
* He told me he could fix it so he either goes to jail or is on probation.
* He said it was my choice.
* He said if Tony was in prison I could be with Max and we’d be free and clear.
* I didn’t know what to do, but I told Max a few days later to please don’t let Tony go to jail and I promised Max my life in return. I said I’d do anything he wanted but don’t put my girl’s dad in jail.
* A few months later Tony went to court and gotten ten years’ probation.
I thanked Max but he asked me if Tony had any of the money left. I said yes but mom had it. He said if I gave him $2,500 it was payment enough. So, I got the money and said thanks and walked away. Shortly after my mom got sick, very sick, and died of cancer. Max knew before I did. I found out and ran down to daddy’s house and Max was coming down the street in a tan cruiser. He said he was so sorry and wished he could be with me. All I wanted to do was go see Gram and dad. Before I got to see her in the funeral home, Max called, and told me how wonderful she looked, and that Wayne Pifer did a good job. I asked how he knew. He said he went to see her, to say goodbye. I resented that. She was my mother! I wanted to see her first!
After that time, I backed off. Cheryl had just given birth to Chantel in April, and I was devastated over mom. I remembered mom always saying she wished one of her girls would have been a nurse. So, I went to nursing school. After that, I picked back up with Max…. Tony had gotten a job at Paris Rental in DuBois, and we moved to Treasure Lake. Max, by the way, was working in DuBois. He was transferred out of Punxsutawney to Dubois. We started to see each other all the time. The going on calls with him became a daily and nightly occurrence. Cheryl found out and came to see me with her children and warned me, and him. But we didn’t listen. It got so out of control. The Treasure Lake security guards got tired of seeing him in and out of the gate.
* One of my best friends ended up being a security person, J.R. Ross and I confided everything to him about Max and told him many times I was frightened he would follow-through with the threat of killing me if I ever left him or found anyone else. J.R. knew of my fear and my helplessness at him always butting into what I do. No matter where I went and what I did, Max was there. He seemed to know things like who I talked to. It was getting weird.
This went on till about 1990, after dad died. Then, in late 1990, I had it with him. I broke it off with him, and it was hell. I even called Cheryl in August 1990 and told her to put him on a leash! He was so pissed at me! I was frightened! Somewhere around late ‘91 – ‘92 we got together again.
* I had gotten into trouble for taking Demerol from the hospital and he called me and said if I saw him again, he’d make sure I only got probation. Well, I only got two years’ probation,
and I started to see him again. He was in Punxsutawney again now, as a Corporal, and his power was visible to me. It seemed he made things happen. He would tell me people would be arrested or involved in something and a few days later, it happened.
