AULANDER -- In the months after Allen Ray Jenkins was murdered, 15-year-old Crystal Morris emerged as the star witness, the one who really knew what had happened inside Jenkins' house, and when.

But her story kept changing.

A Hertford High School dropout, Crystal was a regular visitor to Jenkins' house, where she hung out, drank and called him "Uncle Allen Ray."

Jenkins had known the Morris family for decades. When Crystal's father was courting her mother, Jenkins drove him from Aulander to Scotland Neck. Crystal's uncle, Kenny Morris, was the neighbor who had found Jenkins' body on April 14, 1995, the one who said something was "bad wrong."

Police realized early on that Jenkins had been killed by someone he knew. He kept his house locked tight, even when he was home, and was picky about whom he let in. There were no signs of a break-in.

The Marlboro Lights, the open wine coolers, the tampon applicator and wrapper in the bathroom came from someone else; Jenkins didn't use them.

And given Jenkins' sexual habits and his criminal record, investigators turned to young girls who knew him. Taking the lead were SBI agent Dwight Ransome and Aulander Police Chief Gordon Godwin.

Crystal Morris came from a rough family. Her father died when she was 4, and various uncles (though not Kenny) have been in and out of jail and prison.

Crystal's best friend was Shanna Hall, a student at Ahoskie Christian School. The two were like sisters, just six days apart in age. Crystal had lived with the Hall family, almost as a foster child, because of the trouble at home.

The girls spent a lot of time with their boyfriends -- Crystal with a young man named Gary Scott, and Shanna with Alan Gell, a small-time drug dealer.

Gell's mobile home in Lewiston, eight miles south of Aulander, was party central, where the four hung out, drinking and doing drugs. Gell, 20, had a reputation among police and a record: breaking and entering and bringing a weapon to school.

String of versions

In the weeks and months after Jenkins' murder, Crystal Morris gave a string of versions of how it had happened.

APRIL 15 -- VERSION ONE: Crystal gave her first account when she talked with police at 12:48 a.m. on April 15. Jenkins' body had been found 10 hours earlier.

Police Chief Godwin and SBI Agent P.E. Brinkley talked to her at Shanna Hall's house outside Ahoskie.

She told the officers she thought she had last seen Jenkins on April 3, a Monday. Crystal said she and Shanna were walking down Lombardy Street and Jenkins came to his door and said hello. The two girls stood inside the front door for 10 or 15 minutes and chatted before leaving, she said.

MAY 5 -- VERSION TWO: Three weeks later, on May 5, Crystal went with her mother to the Aulander Police Department to meet with the chief and SBI agent Ransome -- and there she provided a revised account.

Once again, Crystal told the officers that she and Shanna stopped by Jenkins' house for a few minutes on the afternoon of April 3.

Then, for the first time, police heard Alan Gell's name in connection with the murder.

Crystal told the officers that Gell was Shanna's boyfriend. Then she described a confessional phone call. Gell, she said, had called her collect from the Bertie-Martin Regional Jail several days before Jenkins' body was found. He was going to move to Florida when he got out of jail because he had done some bad things and might go to prison for a long time.

Gell then told her something that she could not tell anyone else. According to Crystal, the conversation went like this:

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