'Down the Wrong Road'

That's how the father of one of the 'Barbie Bandits' describes their fall from grace. How nice middle-class girls became strippers and alleged bank robbers.

At a strip club in Doraville, Ga., is where two dancers, Ashley Miller (known as "Adrienne") and Heather Johnston (who went by "Charlie"), met recently and became fast friends. The pairing proved ill-fated. Both were reportedly on a destructive tear. Johnston, 19, was heavily using drugs, according to a fellow stripper at the club. And Miller, 18, had struck up with a reputed drug dealer. The two reached a nadir last week when they robbed a bank in Acworth, Ga.

Miller and Johnston became a media sensation. Caught on a security camera wearing designer shades and giggling as they made off with the loot, they became known as the "Barbie Bandits." They were so sloppy that cops cracked the case in two days, arresting Miller, Johnston, the bank teller—who police say was in cahoots with the two—and Miller's male companion, who allegedly hatched the plot. Now the four face a mix of theft and drug-related charges. But the most intriguing question remains: How did two girls who grew up in comfortable middle-class homes with a wealth of opportunity wind up as exotic dancers and accused crooks?

There was a time when they seemed full of promise. Johnston, 19, was a straight-A student and a nimble tennis player, says her uncle, Jay Johnston. She received a HOPE Scholarship, awarded to Georgia students with at least a 3.0 GPA, according to her father, Edward Johnston. Miller, 18, wasn't strong academically but had a big heart and volunteered at a nursing home, says her mother, Joy Miller. But after graduating from high school last year, each fell in with a shady crowd, according to neighbors and relatives. Miller started going out with Michael Chastang, 27, known as "Skinny," who Joy Miller describes as troubled. Her daughter, she says, wanted "to take him under her wings and make him all better." Johnston, for her part, began dating a guy that her father disapproved of, according to her uncle. That may have contributed to a schism with her parents. She moved out last fall, and in December, police arrested her for trying to break in to her parents' home while they were away. "It just goes to show you how quick a kid can be swayed from on-track to dead-end," says Johnston's uncle.

As the girls await their fate, their parents are praying for their redemption. Johnston "went down the wrong road" and "lost her way from the Lord," says her father. But "God puts people in our paths to bring us back to him." Joy Miller, who visited her daughter at the Cobb County jail on Sunday, says Ashley was coping as best she could and even talked about returning to school to study nursing. "She is a great kid," says Joy. "She's made a bad choice," but "everything happens for a reason." Maybe the reality of prison time will finally set her and Johnston straight.

photo & story courtesy msnbc.msn.com, 03/06/07