Chowchilla school bus abduction (26 children & driver): kidnappers still in prison 25 years later
Patty
Kidnappers say they've paid for 1976 crime
TRIO STILL IN PRISON FOR ABDUCTING 26 CHILDREN AND SCHOOL BUS DRIVER
BY TRUONG PHUOC KHÁNH AND AARON DAVIS
Mercury News
Time and hope are running out for Merry and John Schoenfeld.
Twenty-five years ago Sunday, their sons James and Richard and co-conspirator Frederick
Woods forced 26 children and the driver from a school bus in Chowchilla and herded them
into a tractor-trailer buried in a quarry. It was the largest mass kidnapping in U.S.
history.
The captives escaped and the captors were caught. The three Peninsula men have been behind
bars since 1976, paying for a crime even those closest to them still struggle to
comprehend.
Today, the parents of the Schoenfelds are calling for mercy.
But the kidnapping that shocked the nation that hot July day brings back haunting memories
for many Californians. Some of the victims are still traumatized by their ordeal in the
darkened truck, and strenuously oppose any move to release the kidnappers.
``The worst thing was they buried us under the ground. Why didn't they leave that trailer
on the ground or lock us in a building or something?'' said bus driver Ed Ray, now 80 and
still living in Chowchilla. ``They buried us alive. I've thought a lot about it. I've
tried to forget it.''
Since 1984, when the three became eligible for parole, the nine-member parole board has
rejected their pleas to be released at least 10 times each, citing the enormity of their
crime.
But the Schoenfelds say their sons -- model prisoners by all accounts -- have paid their
dues. When they last held them as free men, James and Richard Schoenfeld were in their
20s. A quarter-century later, a ring of prison barbed wire still separates the sons, now
49 and 47, from their parents, who are in their late 70s. John Schoenfeld is frail and
gravely ill.
``Our sons are very remorseful. They're truly sorry,'' Merry Schoenfeld said. ``Justice
has been served. I think the boys have paid their debt to society.''
On July 15, 1976, the Schoenfeld brothers and Woods -- children of well-to-do Atherton and
Woodside families -- set up a roadblock on a rural road outside Chowchilla and
commandeered the bus. They used two vans to drive the children and Ray about 100 miles
north to Livermore, where Woods' father owned a quarry.
After forcing the victims into the buried truck, they funneled in an air hose to keep
their hostages alive. They also provided bread, water and peanut butter. They say they had
no intention of killing the victims; they just wanted $5 million in ransom.
After nearly 17 hours, the children and Ray clawed their way out of the truck. Nobody was
killed or physically harmed. The kidnappers pleaded guilty and were sentenced to life in
prison. Subsequent court rulings made them eligible for parole.
`It makes me sick'
All three are housed at the California Men's Colony at San Luis Obispo. Richard Schoenfeld
and Woods are due for another parole hearing later this year. James Schoenfeld had his
most recent hearing this spring. Parole was denied. He will be eligible again in 2003.
As they have aged, the Schoenfelds so resemble their father that their mother joked: ``If
I hadn't been there, I wouldn't know they were mine.''
They are as much a family as they can be. She sends them care packages; they send her
cards. They talk on the phone almost every week. This Mother's Day, Richard Schoenfeld --
as millions of sons and daughters did -- sent her a card.
He wrote: ``When I think of the turn our lives took 25 years ago, it makes me sick. I wish
I could be a father and know the love a parent has for his son or daughter. Through your
action and devotion to us, I have a sense of the love.''
He signed it: ``Love you lots, Rick.''
Fred Woods' parents could not be reached for comment. But his attorney, Herbert Yanowitz
of San Francisco, said he too should be paroled.
``He has led an exemplary life inside the prison. He has learned trades. He has tutored
people as part of a literacy program,'' Yanowitz said.
``He has lost 25 years of his life to atone for his mistake. He has become a decent and
compassionate person and he should be returned to his family and given a chance to prove
he has been rehabilitated.''
Built new lives
Even the judge who sentenced them in 1977 to life in prison without the possibility of
parole later changed his mind.
``It seems to me that the period of more than 10 years of imprisonment already served . .
. constitutes very severe punishment, severe enough to justify favorable consideration for
parole,'' Judge Leo Deegan wrote in 1986. Deegan died in 1993.
That sentiment has been echoed by several officials who had investigated the kidnapping.
Edward Bates, retired sheriff and coroner of Madera County, wrote in 1988 he was
``disturbed about the ultimate `fairness' of the sentencing for no parole.'' Dale Fore,
who was chief investigator and in charge of the Chowchilla area in Madera County at the
time of the kidnapping, wrote in 1998: ``I personally feel these men have paid their debt
and should be paroled.''
The three have tried to build new lives in prison, including taking college courses and
getting married and divorced. Woods has become certified in automotive repairs and pest
control. Jim Schoenfeld teaches architecture modeling on computers.
``I hope we're alive when they get out so that we can help them adapt to a normal life,''
Merry Schoenfeld said.
She last saw her sons June 30. When the weather is nice, the family likes to sit outside
at picnic tables. They reminisce about better times and family trips, traveling to Africa,
camping in Canada, horseback riding in the Sierra.
Asked if she has ever asked her sons, ``What on Earth were you thinking?'' Merry
Schoenfeld closed her eyes and nodded.
``They apologize,'' she said, ``over and over again.''
But apologies have not satisfied the state parole board. Kidnapping is the most serious
crime, short of homicide, in the U.S. legal system, said Paul Robinson, a criminal law
professor at Northwestern University in Chicago and a former federal prosecutor.
``And the Chowchilla case has all the characteristics of the worst kind of kidnapping,''
he said. ``They were young, vulnerable children and you can imagine any number of
scenarios that it could have gone sour and you could have had 26 dead kids.''
If the crime were committed today, the kidnappers probably would face the same, if not a
more stringent, jail sentence, said Robinson, a founding commissioner of the U.S.
Sentencing Commission, established by the Senate.
But Frank Zimring, director of the Earl Warren Legal Institute at the University of
California-Berkeley, said the fact that no one died in the Chowchilla kidnapping should
play a central role in parole discussions for the three men. The criminal justice system's
``greatest terrors,'' such as life in prison, should be reserved for those who have taken
another life, he said.
``Their parole is affected by politics,'' Zimring said, citing the way Gov. Gray Davis has
all but eliminated parole for many serious crimes. ``With the current climate, they have a
better chance of hitting the . . . lotto.''
Patty
MASS KIDNAPPING LEFT MARK ON CHOWCHILLA
BY MEGAN LONG
Contra Costa Times
CHOWCHILLA -- The 9,000 people of this San Joaquin Valley town seem to want to forget the
top news story of 1976.
But those 30 hours between the abduction of 26 children and their driver from their school
bus on a country road and their escape from a tractor-trailer buried in a Livermore quarry
marked the town.
It also scarred many of the youngsters -- then ages 5 to 14 -- and left them with
lingering fears, of the dark or of strangers.
After nearly 17 hours in the truck, driver Ed Ray and two of the oldest boys pried the
steel plate off the entrance to the trailer, then broke a board and clawed away at the
layers of dirt that had sealed them in what could have become their tomb.
The trailer's only fresh air came from a battery-powered fan connected to a four-inch
dryer hose leading above ground.
``We could have died. We were sealed off and if those batteries had run out we would have
been dead,'' said Ray, 80, a great-grandfather now retired and still living in Chowchilla.
Except for a few bumps, scrapes and bruises, the victims were physically fine. No
psychiatrist or psychologist was brought in. A San Francisco doctor who studied the group
five months after the kidnapping and again five years later said that was unfortunate.
The crime ``had a tremendous effect,'' said Lenore Terr, a clinical professor of
psychiatry at the University of California-San Francisco. ``It was traumatic for
everybody.''
Terr's studies found that the majority of the kidnapped children showed personality
changes. Many were pessimistic about their futures; some suppressed details of the
incident out of shame and many expressed anger over it.
Most of the young passengers lead their adult lives far from Chowchilla. Lisa McCubbins, 9
at the time of the kidnapping and now a 34-year-old mother in northern Missouri, still
sleeps with a night light on. She is claustrophobic, doesn't go outside alone after dark
and never wears pantyhose -- the kidnappers put stockings over their heads as disguises.
McCubbins also remains uneasy around school buses.
Others who were kidnapped, including Angela Robison, say they've gotten on with their
lives.
``We're just tired of it. It happened a long time ago and we don't care,'' said Robison,
34, now a manager of a truck stop near Madera. ``I try to work a lot and not think about
it.''
Years ago, Robison wrote to her kidnappers in prison; she received an apology from Richard
Schoenfeld, one of three men who pleaded guilty to the kidnapping and were sentenced to
life in prison.
``You'd be sorry, too, if you were in prison for 25 years,'' she said wryly.
DedNdogYrs
possibility of parole later changed his mind.>
I didn't know they were ever sentenced to life without parole. When and how
did that change to life with parole? I would be in favor of letting them out
someday because they didn't kill anyone and they have already gone from young
to middle aged in prison and missed the opportunity to have a family.
Dogs & children first.
Jill
through the ether:
Missed the opportunity to have a family? These are 3 men. Ever hear
of Tony Randall?
