This article is supplementary to 2012 – Death of a Pecan Dynasty.
1968 Bruce – San Saba HS (Ancestry.com) No more years are available in Ancestry’s yearbook collection.
One of my sources says that between 13 and 17, Bruce was sent to live at his mother’s home in Sparks, Nevada because he was so rude to Bonnie; however, he is enrolled in high school in San Saba during those years. Maybe he went to Nevada during the summers.
At age 17, Bruce married his first wife, Judy, in 1969; their son was born on April 1, 1970, and passed away in his sleep on April 15, 1970, at fourteen days old. (He blamed Bonnie because little Eric was in her care when it happened.)
Bruce – Freshman at Texas Tech (Ancestry)
Bruce and Judy moved to Lubbock to go to Texas Tech, and neither college nor his marriage lasted another year. Judy and Bruce divorced in 1971.Bruce moved out of Texas, possibly to Sparks, Nevada.
A young woman named Elisa became his wife in Sparks, Nevada, in July 1972. Bruce worked for Automated Merchandise Corporation in Reno, and during his employment, he reported to police that someone broke into his van’s safe and stole all the money he had collected that day.
He and Elisa divorced in November 1975 while living in Reno.
Michelle was his next wife in June 1976. During 1978 through 1982,possibly longer, Bruce was a Reno policeman.
Another daughter was born on Bruce’s 35th birthday in the spring of ’82. I believe her mother must have been Bruce’s next wife “Elizabeth.” Their divorce was in 1985.
1985 – Bruce as a Real Estate Agent
Bruce sold real estate in Austin in 1985 and 1986; he was in his early 30s.
It’s possible that Bruce was in Ventura, California in 1987. Someone named Bruce W. Harkey divorced a woman named “Rene’.”
Bruce was back to sales in 1988 in Reno, Nevada.
In 1989, he married Susan who was 13 years younger than he was; they divorced in 1991 in Texas. That same year, he married A’Lann in Austin, Texas.
A’Lann and Bruce sold a lot in Seguin, Texas in 1994. In the late fall of that year, he was the administrator of Valley View Healthcare (a nursing home) in Eastland, Texas which is about 55 miles east of Abilene.
By the summer of 1995, Bruce was the administrator at Memorial Health at Seminole, Texas which is near the Texas-New Mexico border.
The couple divorced in 1995 in Gaines, Texas.
Bruce married Kami in 1996. In the spring of 1997, he was working for another nursing home in Marble Falls. Bruce’s father passed away in July 1997 and left Bonnie a life estate in all of his property and assets. Bonnie kept her husband’s chosen manager to run the farm rather than Bruce and that stung Bruce.
Bruce and Kami had a daughter in 1998, which was announced in the Waco newspaper, where he was the administrator of a nursing home. Bruce also filed bankruptcy that year to discharge $176,000 in debt.
The next year, 1999, he was the administrator at the Brazos Valley Geriatric Center in College Station.
Bruce was working as an administrator of a nursing home in Austin in 2003. He began to threaten his soon-to-be ex-wife and put a hit out on her. His own lawyer found out about it and turned him in to the Texas Rangers. From 2004 until 2007, Bruce was in federal prison.
In 2007, he and Jennifer Karnes, an ex-wife, moved into the top floor of the Harkey home with Bonnie while he was on parole. They may have gotten married, but I could not find a record of it.
He and Jennifer moved out of Bonnie’s house in 2008 or 2009. Bonnie was beginning to have dementia and Connie became Bonnie’s guardian. Bruce and John tried to have her removed as Bonnie’s Guardian in court.
Harkey before his arrest in 2012.
In 2011, Connie passed away and Bruce and John tried again. The judge put lawyer, Darrel Spinks in charge of Bonnie and the pecan holdings. Bruce is constantly angry. He talks to Carl about killing Bonnie and gets Carl to sell him his interest in the pecan property for about 1/10 of what it was worth. Some of the property had been sold, about $95,000 worth. Jennifer’s two granddaughters had moved in with her and Bruce. He had only $20,000 left and needed to acquire money to pay Kami for back child support. (And I wonder about child support for the baby girl born 4/9/82.)
Harkey in a mugshot after 2013.
He was arrested for Bonnie’s murder in 2012.
Bruce was found guilty in 2014 and will be in prison for the rest of his life. Currently, he is living in the Allred unit in Iowa Park, Texas by the Oklahoma-Texas border.