And So Is Love

The risks in a soft voice

Ron Reed, 34, first heard of Kyle Stratton ten years ago when he went from the University of Miami to work as a technician at a glass plant in Toledo. Ron recalls that Kyle's friend Carolyn Matuszak showed him a picture of the beautiful blond and told him that she was an heiress who had been injured in a car crash. Kyle was now being kept a virtual prisoner (under an assumed name) in a local hospital, hooked up to a kidney dialysis machine and watched over by a fiercely suspicious attorney.

One evening Ron received a call from Kyle. "There was this very soft, sexy voice on the other end of the line and she introduced herself." More calls followed, then letters. Ron was in love.

But how to liberate Kyle? According to Ron, Carolyn suggested that he provide alternative medical care, and in 1972 Ron began giving money to Carolyn to make the arrangements. For the next seven years he worked 60-hour weeks and scrimped to pay for the freedom of his beloved. The total cost of devotion: $45,000.

Earlier this year, after Carolyn scolded Ron for being late with a payment, Ron admitted to a friend that he had never seen Kyle, and the friend urged Ron to go to the police. They discovered that there was no Kyle. Carolyn, charged with grand theft and deception, and her husband Robert, charged with duplicity, completely deny the charges. Ron is heartbroken. Says he: "I felt such love for her."

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