Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - She Got Famous By Stalking a Guy // The Joyce McKinney Story

Episode Date: October 1, 2026

Joyce McKinney is a former Miss Wyoming who became an international media sensation in 1977 after allegedly abducting Kirk Anderson, an American Mormon missionary, in England.

Imagine a woman essaying a man, but she can't be charged for it because the law says that a woman isn't capable of essaying a man. Let me explain. Now, this starts with this woman, Joyce. And Joyce is 25 years old during this time, living in Provo, Utah, and she's a student at BYU studying drama. And one day in 1975, her whole life changes, because she's in one of her drama classes, and she meets this guy. Kirk. And Kirk is also studying drama and theater, and he's 19, so he's a bit younger than her. Regardless, Joyce thinks Kirk is kind of foin, and Kirk thinks Joyce kind of foin, and soon they start dating and eventually they start smashing. Here's the thing about them smashing, though.

They're both super religious. They're actually Mormon, especially Kirk. And according to their religion, they aren't supposed to be hooking up before marriage. There are Mormon rules that they're supposed to follow. And so pretty quickly, Kirk starts feeling really guilty about this. Like he's committed an unforgivable sin. So he goes to this bishop at his church, and he confesses what they've been doing. And his bishop basically tells him that he needs to end his relationship with Joyce and straight up move away. And that's kind of what he does. He immediately goes and breaks up with her.

But see, Joyce, she isn't about to let Kirk go. She feels like she's super in love. And so she starts stalking him, and she slashes his tires on his car. And at one point, he's driving and she tries to run him off the road. And pretty quickly, Kirk can't take her stalking and aggressive behavior anymore, and he moves from Provo all the way over to Los Angeles, California. And there, he stays somewhere. He doesn't tell anyone exactly where he's staying,

because he doesn't want Joyce contacting him. him. Well, Joyce isn't gonna give up. In 1976, she moves to Los Angeles too, just to try and find him. Once she gets there, she has trouble finding work, so she becomes an escort, and she starts saving up money. While Kirk, he eventually discovers that she recently moved to Los Angeles to find him, and wanting to get away from her, he moves again, this time from California all the way up to Oregon. And he straight up changes his name so that she won't be able to find him. And I don't know what city he ended up in in Oregon, because he was that secretive about his location. No one knows. That's how badly he wanted to get away from Joyce. Well, once she learns that he moved to Oregon, she of course

moves there too. And she is somehow able to locate him. So poor Kirk, he's out of options. And he goes to his church because, you know, he's still very Mormon, and he asks them for help. So the church decides that the best way to handle this is to relocate him out of the country all the way to East Grinstead in England. And there, he's supposed to do a two-year missionary tour, you know, that like a lot of young Mormons do. So he starts doing this missionary work in England. Meanwhile, back in the States, Joyce is still not going to let this go. She is convinced. She is convinced, that she and Kirk are destined to be married. Now, she had heard that he had been sent to England,

but England is kind of a big place, and she's not sure exactly where he's at. So she calls up a private investigation firm in London, and she uses the money that she made escorting to hire a private investigator to go track him down. Once she gets his location, she recruits a friend to accompany her to find him. Her friend is this guy, Keith May.

And Keith May is apparently totally in love with Joyce, and he's also totally in the friend zone, and so he'll do whatever that she wants him to do. Whatever she asks him to do, he'll do it. So they fly over to London, and they rent a car, and they drive over to a Mormon church in a town called Yule, where Kirk is supposed to be at. And there they wait, and they wait until they see him outside on the steps having a conversation with someone. So they approach him. And suddenly, boom, Keith May pulls out a fake revolver that looks real. And they tell Kirk to get in the car. And Kirk is scared, so he does. Then they sedate him

with chloroform and they drive about 185 miles to a secluded farmhouse that they had rented. And in the farmhouse, she handcuffs him to the bed and she essays him repeatedly for three days. After three days, Joyce and Keith May finally bring Kirk back to London, and they let him go. Well, Kirk, he goes right to the police, and he tells them everything that happened. So police go and they find Joyce and Keith May, and bam, they arrest them both. Now, while under arrest, police questioned Joyce, and she doesn't admit that she did anything wrong. She tells them a completely different version of what happened. She says that she didn't kidnap Kirk or essay him.

She claims that they're in love and that any sexual contact in the cabin was consensual and part of their honeymoon. Because I guess she says they were on honeymoon? Now, I guess police aren't buying it. Because they charge Joyce and Keith May with false imprisonment and possession of a fake firearm. Now, they're unable to charge her with rape because in England during this time, a woman could not legally be charged with that. The law said that rape was something that could only be committed by a man. So she's not charged with that. Anyway, pretty quickly, the local media catches word of this story, specifically the tabloids,

and they start reporting on it and sensationalizing it. Then, after three months in jail, both Joyce and Keith May get out on bail while they wait for their trial to start. And by this point, so much has been printed about Joyce that she's become sort of a minor celebrity. And she loves all this new attention she's been getting. And like all the tabloids now want to interview her, so she starts touring the offices of major newspapers, trying to sell her story for tens of thousands of pounds.

And she also treats this as like a Hollywood business opportunity. She takes out an ad in Variety Magazine, trying to get the attention of movie studios, screenwriters, and agents so that they might produce a feature film about her life. Now, despite all this fame chasing, she and Keith May are actually worried that they're going to get convicted. So about a month before her trial is supposed to begin, the two of them flee England. And they go to Ireland, and from there they fly to Toronto, Canada, then they take a bus back to the U.S. to Cleveland, Ohio. And they hide out there for a while.

Meanwhile, back in England, the tabloids are still reporting about Joyce, mostly the Daily Mirror and the Daily Express. And these two tabloids are taking opposing sides on this issue. See, the Daily Mirror sees Joyce as a crazy former escort who stalked Kirk all the way to England. While the Daily Express sees her as a woman in love trying to rescue her man from this brainwashing cult, the Mormon church. And they both print opposing stories about this, and they both sell a shiload of papers this way. However, then, in 1979, boom, the FAA. FBI finally finds an arrest Joyce and Keith May in North Carolina. And they end up going to trial, but they receive suspended sentences as they were only charged

with falsifying their passports. And for whatever reason, England doesn't extradite Joyce or Keith May. So ultimately, there are no consequences for her kidnapping and essaying Kirk. Meanwhile, poor Kirk, he finishes his mission in England. and he moves back to Utah, and he tries to start a normal life. Like, he meets a nice woman, and he gets married, and he has a kid. But see, Joyce, she still isn't going to give up. She continues to want Kirk in her life in a romantic way.

So in 1984, she goes to Salt Lake City, Utah, where he now lives, and she starts stalking him and his wife, like following them around town. And eventually Kirk notices and he alerts the police. And so, bam, they arrest Joyce outside his workplace. Here's her mugshot. And then she gets out on bail and she flees the state and eventually the charges against her are dismissed. And from here, lucky for him, she does eventually stop stalking Kirk.

I guess at some point she finally got the hint. He's just not that into you.