Fugitive father suspected in B.C. triple child slaying arrested: RCMP
And he was found by an enraged local citizen with a lot of backwoods experience. Even if mentally ill...this guy is as good as dead. If not guilty...why hide up in the woods for 10 days?
Prayers for everyone - and the suspect's family too. It's a nightmare for everyone...and that poor mom.
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Some backup on the story, in case you don't read all the way through...
Quote:
A mother found her three children [all under the age of 10] murdered in their family's mobile home in Merritt Sunday afternoon.
RCMP Const. Tracy Dunmore confirmed three young children were found murdered in their home but would not comment on a possible suspect. She said no arrest was made and that police were not searching for the killer.
"Neighbours saw the woman who lives in this mobile home walking to the store," CJNL radio reporter Andrew Hopkins told The Province.
"She came back from the store and within five minutes [neighbours] say four cop cars came screaming around the corner to the front of the home. They then saw the woman distraught, leaving the home and the police escorted her to an ambulance." Papove said the mother fell to her knees when she left the house.
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http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/children_killed
Follow-up story
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/sto...-arrested.html
Fugitive father suspected in B.C. triple child slaying arrested: RCMP
1 hour, 30 minutes ago
By The Canadian Press
MERRITT, B.C. - A local resident, armed with his dog and a sense of outrage, has tracked down the fugitive British Columbia father suspected in the slayings of his three children.
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Allan Schoenborn was located by the resident and arrested by RCMP on Wednesday, 10 days after the bodies of his children were found in the family's mobile home in Merritt, B.C. Police said Schoenborn was found in the bush on the outskirts of the town, not that far from where the bodies of his three children were found by their mother more than a week ago.
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Local tracker Kim Robinson said he has been looking for Schoenborn for days.
"He wasn't on the highway. He was up on a side hill," Robinson reported.
"I'll tell you this much - I've been looking every day for him, hiking every bush around here looking for him."
Schoenborn has been the subject of a police manhunt since the bodies of Kaitlynne, 10, Max, eight, and Cordon, five, were found on April 6.
"At this time we're confirming that Mr. Schoenborn is in custody and he is alive," Const. Tracy Dunsmore of Merritt RCMP told a local radio station.
Dunsmore would not release any further details of Schoenborn's arrest.
Merritt RCMP said Schoenborn was found by a local resident and arrested around 10:30 a.m. just outside Merritt, a ranching community about 270 kilometres northeast of Vancouver.
Robinson said he's glad, as a local resident, that Schoenborn is in custody.
"But it's a sick, shitty friggin' story. Everything involved. The guy looks like a beaten friggin'..." he said, trailing off.
Kurt Mohr, Robinson's neighbour, said the avid outdoorsman has been looking for Schoenborn "pretty much since he took off."
Mohr said 50-year-old Robinson knows the bush "like the back of his hand" and was passionate about finding the main suspect in the triple slaying.
"If Kim's looking for you, he's going to find you. He's like a guy stuck in time. He should be back in the wild west days," Mohr said.
He said he's been frustrated by police efforts to locate Schoenborn, whose disappearance over a week ago has put the ranching community on edge.
"Police are useless," Mohr said.
"I think it's good that Kim found him. It shows a lot about himself, never mind the police."
Corrina Smith said her boyfriend got a call from Robinson's son and headed out to where the fugitive father was caught in the bush at Hamilton Hill, an area about 10 kilometres outside Merritt.
"They have him down on the highway now, last I heard," Smith said.
"The bloodhounds got him, just about chewed his arm off. Kim caught him and tied him to a tree."
Smith said her boyfriend told her there are police all over the area now.
"He came home and told me I could unlock the doors," said the mother of twins.
She said she was terrified knowing Schoenborn was on the loose.
"I checked the closets and under the bed and everything before I go to bed at night."
Schoenborn hadn't been seen since the bodies of his children were discovered more than a week ago.
Kathleen Walker, who organized a rally in memory of the children at the B.C. legislature, said she's relieved, and she lauded Robinson for bringing the fugitive to justice.
"This has been a case where it's sort of ordinary civilians who have risen above and beyond," she said.
Walker said she was told police declined Robinson's offer of help in their search, so he went out on his own every day to search.
"It just seems like the government and the police, the institutions, have dropped the ball here and that it's just ordinary folks who have picked it up and run with it, but most particularly in the case of Kim Robinson," said Walker, a Vancouver lawyer who has made contacts in Merritt since the tragedy unfolded.
Robert Richard, a neighbour of Schoenborn's wife, Darcie Clarke, spoke to Schoenborn the Saturday evening before the murders. He said he's felt threatened since the murders were discovered.
"I thought he had left town, I really did. I'm surprised he was still around," Richard said.
He said the house had been quiet since police and forensic investigators left but police returned to the mobile home Wednesday.
The case raised questions because RCMP did not inform the public for more than 20 hours that the children's father was the prime suspect and on the run.
Schoenborn was arrested at his children's school a few days before the killings and charged with uttering threats. A justice of the peace released him on bail, unaware of a peace bond that restricted Schoenborn's contact with his wife, Darcie Clarke.
Schoenborn was arrested two other times the week before the children's deaths.
A coroner's inquest has already been announced into the deaths.
Merritt Mayor David Laird said Schoenborn's arrest is a big relief.
"It's just great they've caught the person they were looking for and the community will be greatly relieved and (we'll) just wait until we have further details," he says.
"That's all we can do at this time."
Schoenborn's cousin, Val Truthwaite, said she was relieved to learn her cousin had been found alive.
"When I found out I started bawling," she said in an interview from Winnipeg.
"I'm happy, I'm sad, I'm overwhelmed, I'm hurting for the family."
Truthwaite said she's hoping to get some answers now about what happened to the children and why.
She said she's been in contact with Schoenborn's brother, Derek, who told her: "I just want to wake up from this nightmare."
Truthwaite said she wants to travel to B.C. to see her cousin now that he's been apprehended.
Walker said she is happy that Schoenborn has been apprehended. The court process can now begin, but she's worried that people will forget what led to the tragedy.
"It's extremely important... that we not forget that these children, in my view, were let down by the system," she said.
