In 1976, a small farming town in northern California found itself in the national spotlight in the midst of a harrowing story. A bus full of 26 children and their driver were kidnapped by three men and buried alive in a truck trailer.
Now, the last of the Chowchilla bus kidnappers still in prison, 70-year-old Frederick Woods, has been approved for parole 45 years after the abduction, CNN reported.
The three kidnappers, Richard and James Schoenfeld along with Woods, kidnapped 26 children and one adult from a school bus. They also planned on demanding $5 million before letting anyone go, a plan that was reportedly inspired by the 1971 Clint Eastwood film “Dirty Harry.”
They hatched a scheme to get the ransom money dropped to them in the Santa Cruz mountains, which would provide them with plenty of cover and time to get away. “It was pretty ingenious,” Ed Bates, who was the Madera County sheriff at the time, said of the kidnappers’ plan. “They were going to drive up the coast to someplace heavily wooded, then go back inland and have airplanes patrol for 200 miles up and down the area until they saw a certain series of lights indicating [the drop site]. Then the money was to be dropped on them, and they’d be gone. By the time they had the money, nobody would be able to get there. You just can’t stake out 200 miles.”
After the Schoenfelds and Woods abducted 26 children and their bus driver, they took them more than 100 miles away to Livermore, California, where they forced them into a truck trailer that they buried 12 feet underground near a rock quarry that Woods’ father owned. The underground trailer was equipped with a ventilation system, toilets, and the kidnappers provided their victims with water and food.
Bus driver Ed Ray had a plan of his own to get himself and the children out. He along with 14-year-old student Michael Marshall removed a man-hole cover that was blocking a hole in the trailer then began digging themselves out while their kidnappers were asleep. It took hours for them to reach the surface, and the victims spent a total of 16 hours underground.
Ray helped all 26 children out of the trailer, and they walked to the rock quarry where they were met by shocked workers. Police arrived and took the victims to a local jail where they were all examined by doctors and interviewed by police.
It took two weeks for police to capture Woods and the Schoenfeld brothers. All of them were sentenced to life with the possibility of parole. Richard Schoenfeld got out on parole in 2012, and James got out in 2015. Woods’ parole will become final after 120 days and a review by Governor Gavin Newsom, who can allow the parole to stand or refer it to a parole board for a full review.
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Source: Dailywire
