‘Runaway bride’ feared being imperfect wife

? Runaway bride Jennifer Wilbanks wanted to vanish because she feared she could not be the perfect wife. She picked Austin, Texas, as her original destination after seeing actor Matthew McConaughey talk about his hometown on TV. And she funded her odyssey by cashing a cell phone rebate check and emptying an old bank account.

Those were some of the details that emerged Tuesday from investigation reports by the FBI and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation that detailed Wilbanks’ flight. The reports portrayed the 32-year-old nurse as a naive woman whose mother did her banking for her.

Wilbanks’ disappearance four days before her scheduled 600-guest wedding gained national attention.

Wilbanks told investigators that she didn’t know about the extent of the search.

Agents said in the report that Wilbanks “was scared to marry (fiance) John Mason because she is afraid of an imperfect world. Wilbanks stated that she could not be the wife that her fiance John Mason needed. Wilbanks wanted to disappear without a trace.”

The report from Georgia investigators said she broke off an earlier engagement to another man, and – even though she had been in a relationship with Mason since August 2004 – she kept “I love you” text messages on her cell phone from another man she dated in 2003.