A Widower Found Love, and It Drove His Family Mad

"'Be careful what you wish for' looms a little bit," says Suzy Chase-Motzkin in recounting what unfolded after she encouraged her lonely widowed father to give eHarmony a try in 2010. Phil Chase, an 85-year-old retired psychologist in North Carolina, followed his daughter's suggestion and soon matched with "Sarah Kahn," an 80-year-old in Pennsylvania who he was immediately taken with. She showered him with compliments and called him her "Dazzlin' Amazin' Dude"; within weeks of their first in-person brunch, she'd moved into his home. An "alarmed" Suzy did some digging—and discovered "Sarah" was actually Sara Jane Moore, the woman who tried to shoot President Gerald Ford outside San Francisco's St. Francis Hotel in 1975 and served more than 30 years in federal prison.

To Phil, a psychologist, Moore had been "emotionally fragile" and had paid her debt; they were married within five months. Nearly 15 years later, Suzy remains "filled with anguish" over their relationship and its reverberations, Steven Kurutz writes in a lengthy piece for the New York Times that cites "troubled" details about Moore as captured in a "deeply researched" 2008 biography by Geri Spieler. As Phil aged and his health declined, Moore's sway appeared to grow. He asked relatives not to discuss her criminal history, largely stopped socializing, let her listen in on his phone calls; and, at her insistence, barred his son from visiting after she learned of his decades-old felony drug conviction. The two men didn't speak for three years.

Only when Moore was briefly sidelined by back surgery in 2018 did Phil confide to his daughter that marrying again had been a mistake. Four months later, he died at 93. His will had been revised repeatedly; Moore walked away with roughly a third of his assets and control of family heirlooms and even his ashes. Phil's children ultimately sued, securing a settlement that returned some belongings and his remains. Moore was arrested in 2019 at JFK for violating parole by traveling abroad without notice and briefly landed back in custody. She died in September at 95—but not before, according to one Nashville family who tracked her down online, trying once again to find love on a dating site, this time as "Sally Chase." (Read the full article here.)