Hunting the Abductors

Shortly before dawn one day last week a 25-car caravan descended upon the 100-acre estate of Frederick N. Woods III near Portola Valley, Calif., 34 miles from San Francisco. Out of the vehicles burst 62 sheriffs deputies and federal agents armed with riot guns and tear-gas canisters. Their quarry, wanted on 27 counts of kidnaping and 16 counts of robbery: Woods' son, Frederick Woods IV, 25; James Schoenfeld, 24; and his brother Richard, 22, both sons of a podiatrist in Atherton, Calif.

The three, said police, are "armed and dangerous" and should be arrested "on probable cause." At week's end the youngest of the three, Richard Schoenfeld, turned himself in to authorities in Oakland. But the other two men were still missing. Also missing was a clear motive for the bizarre crime that prompted the police sweep--the kidnaping two weeks ago of 26 schoolchildren and their bus driver from the sunbaked town of Chowchilla.

The 27 captives were driven 100 miles from Chowchilla to a quarry in Livermore, Calif. There three kidnapers wearing stocking masks forced their victims down a small tunnel into a buried 25-ft.-long moving van. Sixteen hours later the prisoners dug themselves out. The elder Woods--who was cooperating fully with investigators--owns the California Rock & Gravel Co., site of the quarry where the mass abduction ended. On his estate, 29 miles distant, police found a virtual junkyard--100 vehicles, including several wrecked police cars, a fire engine, assorted trucks and vans, and a tractor that could have been used to tow around the underground trailer; apparently the younger Woods liked to collect and restore the wrecks. His father's only public comment: "I was told by the sheriffs office not to say whether I have one son or ten sons."

The police descent upon the Woods estate followed two possibly significant breaks in the case, which has spurred one of the greatest manhunts in California's history. The first came when a National Audubon Society group, on an outing in the Santa Cruz mountains some 40 miles from the Livermore quarry, stumbled upon notebooks, clothing and shoes belonging to the Chowchilla students, and an ID card owned by the children's bus driver.

Chilling Detail. Two days later, police finished unearthing the tractor-trailer prison in which the 27 captives had been entombed. The vehicle bore year-old license plates, and its tires were still inflated. Investigators quickly traced it to the Palo Alto Transfer & Storage Co., where they learned that it had been sold last November for $2,700 to a man named "Fred."

Police officials speculated that the kidnapers not only spent more than $10,000 to underwrite the ghoulish venture but also planned it in chilling detail. The kidnapers took care to stock the big truck with water, blankets and a small chemical toilet, and to install two air vents before it was buried. They apparently spent a good deal of time in Chowchilla studying the movements of the schoolchildren; when they finally ambushed the school bus, they did so at a place and a time when they knew nobody would be around.

What motives were behind the crime? Because the kidnapers took a trinket or item of clothing from each captive, some officials felt that they were preparing to make a ransom demand. In fact, the Oakland Tribune quoted police sources as saying they had discovered an outline of the kidnaping and a ransom note demanding $5 million in the cottage occupied by Frederick Woods IV.

As police tracked down a number of reports at week's end, easygoing Chowchilla was a town transformed. Once, the 4,550 residents left doors unlocked and greeted strangers with home-cooked meals. Now armed guards and unmarked cars accompanied the Chowchilla school district's 14 buses whenever they went out on their routes. An air of frustration and anger hung over the town--people spoke of "revenge" and "lynching"--and few doors remained unlocked.

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