Suspect Leaves Trail of Pain, Anger, Shock : Crime: Family of Lake Forest man accused of leading a double life is ‘trying to get back on our feet.’ Bail is set at $50,000.

SANTA ANA — Family, friends and co-workers in two states were shocked and angry Saturday after learning that a Lake Forest man had been arrested for allegedly living under a false identity since leaving his wife and seven children near St. Louis almost 14 years ago.

“We’re just trying to get back on our feet and get over the shock,” said Maxine Elliott of Hillsboro, Ill., whose husband, Gary Elliott, had vanished without a trace, causing a huge manhunt in 1979.

“The kids are OK, but they’re hurting,” she said.

Orange County sheriff’s investigators said that after two hours of questioning Friday, Elliott, 49, stated he abandoned his family and has been living under the name of Clifford Wraymond Leighton in California since 1981.

The electronics technician was being held on $50,000 bail Saturday and is charged with using a false identity to apply for public documents such as a driver’s license. Authorities say Elliott assumed the name of a 2 1/2-year-old Simi Valley child who died in 1953.

Investigators began delving into Elliott’s life when his fiancee, Jennifer Bradford, reported him missing Jan. 22. When Elliott was found last Sunday unconscious on a roadside near Hemet, he said amnesia had blocked out the three weeks he had been gone.

In both Illinois and Orange County, there was bitter reaction to Elliott’s discovery.

In Coffeen, Ill., the town of 700 where Elliott lived with his family before disappearing, Shirley Snow, who runs a coffee shop, said, “Hearing about Gary was a shock to everyone, and a lot of us are kind of mad right now.”

Pastor Michael McClanahan of the New Life Assembly of God Church in Coffeen, where Maxine Elliott worshiped until last year, said that despite their anger, the children are happy that Elliott is alive.

“There’s a big sense of relief that he’s not dead, but by the same token they hold a lot of anger because he just abandoned them,” McClanahan said. The Elliott children now range in age from 19 to 30. “But I think he’ll see a lot of forgiveness in them too.

Meanwhile, at KVB Inc., the Irvine electronics company where Elliott works, co-workers who distributed flyers last month to help find the missing man were angry and tight-lipped about his purported double life.

“We’re pretty livid,” said an accounting secretary who declined to give her name.

An ex-girlfriend, Judy Fox of Anaheim, said Saturday that Elliott ended their five-year relationship as abruptly as he’s believed to have left St. Louis.

“I had a party; when it ended he kissed me good night, and I never saw him again,” Fox said. “I think his disappearance (last month) was his way out because he couldn’t face that she (Bradford) wanted to get married.

“I’m not angry, but I am hurt because he lied to me, and I spent five years in a relationship that was based on a lie,” Fox said. “He told me that he was an orphan, he was alone and had no one else to love. Now to find out that all that time he had family.”

While looking into the recent disappearance, sheriff’s investigators said they began to get suspicious when various descriptions of Elliott’s background didn’t check out.

Following a reference listed in an employment application filed by Elliott at KVB, investigators said they called a power company just outside Coffeen.

Three days after Elliott was found unconscious outside Hemet, a supervisor at the Central Illinois Power Co. looked at a photo of the man known in California as Clifford Leighton and positively identified the man as Gary Elliott, authorities said. Elliott had worked at the power company between 1972 and 1979.

When Elliott was asked to sheriff’s headquarters to be questioned Friday, he was accompanied by Bradford, who authorities believe didn’t know of her fiance’s past. Earlier Friday, Wayne Elliott was flown in from Illinois and positively identified his brother Gary, according to authorities.