Not Guilty Plea Made in Alleged Plot Against Daughter

A Dana Point woman already facing charges of hiring mercenaries to firebomb two cars pleaded not guilty Monday to new charges of plotting to murder or kidnap her own daughter to keep her from testifying.

Charlotte Ruth Wyckoff, 51, was charged last week by a federal grand jury with trying to hire a man to prevent her daughter, Shirley Wright, 28, from testifying against her. Elizabeth Leta Hamilton, 39, Wyckoff’s housemate and partner in a chain of five elementary schools and preschools, also pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Meanwhile, another defendant in the first case, Paul Johnson, 42, pleaded guilty to two charges of firebombing and agreed to cooperate with government prosecutors. Johnson told U.S. District Judge Alicemarie H. Stotler that he helped prepare a gasoline, oil and soap mixture used to bomb two cars in San Bernardino on Aug. 13, 1985. The cars belonged to former teachers at Wyckoff’s and Hamilton’s schools. The teachers had complained about being fired from their jobs, prosecutors said.

Johnson and James Larosa Cuneo, 22, another defendant who has agreed to cooperate with prosecutors, are scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 15. Johnson faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and fines of up to $250,000. Cuneo faces similar penalties.

The second indictment filed against Wyckoff and Hamilton charges them with conspiracy, witness tampering and obstruction of justice. The two, who are being held without bail at Sybil Brand Institute, were accused of approaching another inmate and soliciting the services of the inmate’s boyfriend.

William L. Queen, a special agent of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, pretended to be the boyfriend during a telephone call with Wyckoff on June 23, according to the indictment.

Since their arrests, the women’s five schools in Orange and San Bernardino counties have closed.