Dave Kroupa watched his cell phone blow up with dozens of text messages from his stalker. Kroupa, 36, was almost used to it by now. He would go on to receive tens of thousands of texts and emails like this over a three-year period. The messages are rife with jealousy and rage at first, then over time, the tone changed from spiteful to threatening. Kroupa said he can't remember how many times he changed his phone number, and yet, the messages kept coming.
They all appeared to be from Cari Farver, a woman he dated for only two weeks in Omaha, Nebraska, but no one had physically seen her for a long time. It was years after the harassment began that detectives uncovered a vindictive lover, who had gone to extreme and deadly lengths to destroy her perceived rival.
Author Leslie Rule was so fascinated by this story that she wrote a book about it called "A Tangled Web. Kroupa moved to Omaha in after taking a job managing an auto repair shop. At the time, he was separated from his longtime girlfriend Amy Flora, with whom he had two children.
It was his first time on his own in a while. Kroupa said he signed up for a couple of dating sites. The first person he met through one of them was a woman named Shanna Elizabeth Golyar, who went by "Liz. I was attracted to her right away, so then we set up a date," he said. Golyar told him that she was a single mother with two kids who were around the same age as his kids. By the fourth date, Kroupa said their relationship escalated and they started having sex.
But Kroupa said he was also up front with Golyar, telling her that he wanted to continue seeing other women. About six months after meeting Golyar, Kroupa said an "extremely attractive woman" walked into the auto shop. It was Cari Farver, a single mom who had brought in her Ford Explorer for maintenance. By all accounts, Farver was vivacious and warm, according to friends and family.
