Parents Defend Fugitive Son

Charlotte Staich, the mother of escaped murderer Ivan Von Staich, sat on the sofa of her modest Lake Elsinore home Monday afternoon and defended the son she gave birth to 29 years ago.

She said her son is not a “cold-blooded killer,” as he has been portrayed since his escape from Orange County Jail on Sunday afternoon with fellow inmate Robert Joseph Clark, a 23-year-old from Palm Springs awaiting trial on murder and robbery charges.

“They are making it worse than the Hillside Strangler,” Charlotte Staich said, referring to convicted serial killer Angelo Buono, who terrorized California during a four-month period in 1977-78 with his accomplice, Kenneth Bianchi.

“They are calling him the ‘Claw-Hammer Killer,’ ” said her husband, Duke.

The Staiches concede that their son killed Robert Topper and attacked Topper’s wife, Cynthia, in 1983, but they maintain that the full circumstances of the incident were not revealed in court.

According to trial testimony, Cynthia Topper--an ex-girlfriend of Ivan Staich--was sleeping with her husband when Staich cut the telephone lines to their Santa Ana home, kicked in the front door and burst into the couple’s bedroom, armed with a claw hammer. He was convicted last month of second-degree murder and attempted murder.

“He was afraid for his life and that’s why he broke out,” Duke Staich said. He claimed that Ivan was beaten several times by sheriff’s deputies during his trial and while awaiting court proceedings.

If Ivan Staich is captured, his father said, “he will definitely get murdered by the police--by the jail guards.”

Lt. Pauline Dammann, jail watch commander, said late Monday that “I’m not in a position to comment on any of that. That’s the first I’ve heard of it.”

Dammann referred the inquiry to Sheriff’s Department spokesman Lt. Richard Olson, who could not be reached Monday night.

Charlotte Staich said she hopes her son turns himself in.

“I do not want my son to get shot down like a dog,” she said.

Her husband wished his son “good luck.”

‘He’s Got Two Choices’

“It’s his choice, he got himself in this fix,” Duke Staich said. “He’s got two choices: He’s either going to get away or get murdered.”

The Staiches said they were unaware that their son was going to try to escape but added that he had telephoned them collect several times from jail to tell them he feared for his life.

The Staich home was searched Sunday by sheriff’s deputies, they said. And, according to Charlotte Staich, police have “a tap on our phone.”

“They (authorities) tore the house apart,” Duke Staich said. “They said they had a warrant. I didn’t question it. He’s not here and he hasn’t contacted me.”

The Staiches said they do not know their son’s whereabouts.

“I would tell my son to trust in the Lord” and turn himself in because he may win an appeal of his murder conviction, Charlotte Staich said.

Both parents described their son as “a good boy.”

“If anybody is pushed in a corner, you know, if it is life or death--you’re going to fight to the death,” Charlotte Staich said. “Whatever Ivan is today is what the authorities have made him.”