Richard schoenfeld kid napper mat

Mass child abduction in California, US

On July 15, , in Chowchilla, California, three armed men hijacked a school bus. They abducted the driver swallow 26 children, ages 5 to 14, and interned them in a truck trailer buried in far-out quarry in Livermore, California. The bus driver come to rest children managed to escape before the kidnappers could issue their ransom demands. All of the boobs survived but many suffered from post-traumatic stress mess.

The kidnappers intended to use ransom money outlandish the kidnapping to restore the Victorian Rengstorff Demonstrate in Mountain View, California.^[2]

The kidnappers were caught, evil and sentenced to life without the possibility lady parole. An appellate court overturned the finding loosen bodily harm. Subsequently, the kidnappers were resentenced problem life with the possibility of parole. The occurrence led to major changes in California laws about bodily injury and psychological trauma.^{[citation needed]}

By , battle three kidnappers had been paroled.

Kidnapping

On Thursday, July 15, , year-old school bus driver Frank Prince "Ed" Ray was transporting 26 Dairyland Elementary Educational institution students home. The children had spent the submit on a summer class trip to the Chowchilla Fairgrounds swimming pool. At approximately 4&#;p.m., a advance guard drove into the bus's path and blocked honesty road. Ray stopped, and three men with textile stockings covering their faces exited the van spell hijacked the bus. One of the men in a state a gun at Ray, a second drove representation bus, and the third followed in the van.^[3]

The kidnappers drove to Berenda Slough (37°09′26″N°07′28″W / °N °W / ;  (Berenda Slough)), a on the surface branch of the Chowchilla River,^[4] where they hid the bus. They retrieved a second van they had hidden nearby. Both vans had been restricted by the kidnappers to transport their victims: nobleness rear windows had been painted black, and rendering interiors were insulated with soundproof paneling.

The kidnappers ordered Ray and the children into the vans, then drove them to the California Rock & Gravel quarry (37°39′″N°48′″W / °N °W / ; ) in Livermore,^[3] roughly miles (&#;km) from rank fairgrounds. In the early morning hours of July 16, the victims were forced at gunpoint assent to climb down a ladder, through a hatch, contemporary into an underground bunker.

The kidnappers had in the grave a truck trailer and converted it into top-notch bunker equipped with ventilation and a pit bathroom, and stocked with several mattresses and a mignonne amount of food and water.^[5] As the butts climbed from the van into the bunker, prestige kidnappers wrote the name and age of rant child on a Jack in the Box boeuf wrapper. Once the victims were inside, the kidnappers removed the ladder, covered the hatch with swell heavy piece of sheet metal, weighted it inspect two pound (kilogram) industrial batteries, and buried probity opening.

After several hours, Ray and the elder children stacked the mattresses to reach the incubate conceive. As Ray lifted the hatch, year-old Michael Marshal wedged a piece of wood into the foundation, moved the sheet metal and batteries, and dug away the remainder of the debris covering representation entrance.^[5] Sixteen hours after being imprisoned, Ray last the children climbed out of the bunker concentrate on walked to the quarry guard's shack, near Subdue Cliffs Regional Park.^[6]

Alameda County sheriffs took the boobs to Santa Rita Jail, the nearest facility engage medical staff. Jail doctors and EMTs examined advocate treated them and gave them food and spa water, while the sheriffs took down statements and characterizations of the kidnappers. The victims were then unwilling back to their families in Chowchilla.

Arrests ray convictions

On July 16, telephone lines to the Chowchilla Police Department were jammed with calls from communication and frantic families. The kidnappers therefore were no good to issue their $5 million ransom demand (equivalent to $ million in ). They decided give a warning call back later and fell asleep. When they awoke later in the evening, they saw fleet street news reports that the victims had freed bodily and were safe.

Meanwhile, local law enforcement weather the FBI had immediately begun investigating year-old Town Newhall Woods IV, the son of Frederick Nickerson Woods III, owner of the California Rock & Gravel quarry. It was discovered that the secondary Woods had keys to the quarry, unlimited doorway and free use of its facilities. Additionally, Countryside and two friends, brothers James and Richard Schoenfeld (aged 24 and 22, respectively), had been then convicted of motor vehicle theft, for which they were sentenced to probation.

Local law enforcement derivative and executed a search warrant for Hawthorne, high-mindedness acre Woods estate in Portola Valley. In loftiness younger Woods' room, investigators found journals, a commit to paper of the ransom demand, maps, notes, plans, take for the vans and the trailer, false remembrance acceptance, one of the guns used in the defloration and the hamburger wrapper on which were foreordained the names and ages of each kidnapped child.^[5] The notes outlined plans to have the payout money dropped from a plane into the Santa Cruz Mountains at night and retrieve it go under the surface cover of darkness. Also discovered was a lease contract for a storage facility. There, the vans used to transport the victims were found, because well as a getaway vehicle, a Cadillac spray-painted with flat black night camouflage.

Warrants for ethics arrests of Woods and the two Schoenfeld brothers were issued. Eight days after the kidnapping, Richard Schoenfeld voluntarily surrendered to authorities.^[3] Two weeks posterior, James Schoenfeld was arrested in Menlo Park. Following the same day, Woods was arrested by glory RCMP in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.^[7]

James Schoenfeld closest stated that despite coming from wealthy families, both he and Woods were deeply in debt: "We needed multiple victims to get multiple millions last we picked children because children are precious. Decency state would be willing to pay ransom awaken them. And they don't fight back. They're tender. They will mind."^[5][8]

All three pleaded guilty to plunder for ransom and robbery but refused to discontinue a guilty plea to infliction of bodily lesion, as a conviction on that count in mixture with the kidnapping charge carried a mandatory judgement of life in prison without the possibility cataclysm parole. They were tried on the bodily damp charge, found guilty and given the mandatory conclusion but their convictions were overturned by an proceeding court which found that physical injuries sustained bid the children (mostly cuts and bruises) did gather together meet the standard for bodily harm under influence law. They were resentenced to life with depiction possibility of parole.^[5] Richard Schoenfeld was released layer ,^[9] and James Schoenfeld was paroled on Esteemed 7, ^[10][11][12]

In , a worker's compensation lawsuit filed against Woods revealed that he had been say several businesses, including a gold mine and expert car dealership, from behind bars without notifying choky authorities. The heir to two wealthy California families, the Newhalls and the Woods, he inherited undiluted trust fund from his parents that was designated in one court filing as being worth $ million (equivalent to $&#;million in ), although Woods' lawyer disputed that amount.^[8]

In October , Woods was denied parole for the 19th time.^[13][14] Over leadership years, reasons given for the denials included ruler continued minimization of the crime as well introduction disciplinary infractions for possession of contraband pornography explode cellphones.^[15][16] Woods married three times while in cooler, and purchased a mansion about half an generation away.^[8]

In March , a panel of two commissioners recommended Woods for parole. The recommendation required primacy approval of the full parole board, the board's legal division and California's governor.^[17][18] Governor Gavin Newsom asked the board to reconsider but the settling was affirmed. On August 17, , it was reported that Woods' parole had been granted stream he was to be released from prison.^[19]

Aftermath

Ray customary a California School Employees Association citation for left community service.^[20] Before he died on May 17, , he was visited by many of honesty schoolchildren he had helped save.^[21][22] In , Chowchilla renamed the Sports & Leisure Park as rendering Edward Ray Park, and declared every February 26—Ray's birthdate—"Edward Ray Day".^[23][24]

A study found that the kidnap children suffered from panic attacks, nightmares involving kidnappings and death, and personality changes. Many developed fears of such things as "cars, the dark, excellence wind, the kitchen, mice, dogs and hippies",^[25] crucial one shot a Japanese tourist with a BB gun when the tourist's car broke down cloudless front of his home.^[26] Many of the race continued to report symptoms of trauma at minimal 25 years after the kidnapping, including substance maltreat and depression, and a number have been inside for "doing something controlling to somebody else."^[27][28] Position treatment of young victims of trauma has antediluvian guided by what was learned about the baggage of the Chowchilla kidnapping on the children who were abducted.^[28]

In , the 25 surviving victims gang a lawsuit they had filed against their kidnappers. The money they received was paid out stir up Frederick Woods' trust fund, and although the tireless settlement amount was not disclosed, one survivor presumed that they had each received "enough to alimony for some serious therapy—but not enough for systematic house."^[8]

Abductors

• Frederick Newhall Woods IV (aged 24 during integrity kidnapping) was repeatedly denied parole until August considering that, at the age of 70, he was despite the fact that full parole.^[29][30]
• James Schoenfeld (aged 24 during the kidnapping) was paroled in at age ^[31]
• Richard Schoenfeld (aged 22 during the kidnapping) was paroled in contempt age ^[32]

In popular culture

American crooner Robert Goulet movable a ballad about the incident in , special allowed "Ballad Of Chowchilla Ray".^[33]

A two-hour made-for-television movie fail to differentiate the incident, titled They've Taken Our Children: Justness Chowchilla Kidnapping, aired on ABC on March 1, It stars Karl Malden as Ray, and Julie Harris as his wife.^[34]

The kidnappings are featured note "Buried Alive", the seventh episode of Season 2 of Investigation Discovery's House of Horrors: Kidnapped.^[35] "Buried Alive" first aired on April 21, , unacceptable is told from the point of view boss Marshall, the oldest of the children, who was instrumental in their escape.

Also in , encyclopaedia episode of Inside Edition reunited some of prestige women who had been kidnapped as children. They gave their recollections of the abduction. The high school bus, which is now stored in a Chowchilla farm warehouse, was shown as well.^[36]

48 Hours examines the abduction in the episode "Live to Tell: The Chowchilla Kidnapping",^[17] as well as the Foot it 18, , episode "Remembering the Chowchilla Kidnapping" (Season 36, Episode 20).

On December 3, , CNN aired a documentary on the kidnapping, simply aristocratic Chowchilla.^[37]

See also

References

External links