Escapees Caught in Garden Grove : Ariz. Family Abducted; Daughter Leads Police to Suspects

Three heavily armed escapees from a New Mexico prison were captured Thursday in Garden Grove after one of them kidnaped five members of an Arizona family and forced them to drive at gunpoint to California, authorities said.

The men were apprehended after one victim, an 11-year-old girl who had been abandoned on a Garden Grove street, flagged down a police officer and told him what had happened. Based on what her abductor told her, police suspected that he was at a trailer park in the 12000 block of Harbor Boulevard and that two fellow prison escapees were at the nearby Fire Station Motel. Shortly before 5 a.m., FBI agents and Garden Grove police closed in on the Vacation Village Trailer Park and arrested James Neal Kinslow, 27, who was sleeping in the kidnap victims’ truck. Authorities said Kinslow had been serving time for killing a New Mexico woman and her two young daughters.

A short time later, FBI agents, armed with shotguns and wearing black camouflage outfits, kicked in a door at the Fire Station Motel and captured two other prison escapees, William Wayne Gilbert, 38, a convicted murderer, and David Benjamin Gallegos, 34, a convicted robber.

The three were among seven convicts who broke out of prison near Santa Fe, N.M., on July 4, killing a guard as they fled and triggering an intense manhunt throughout surrounding states. The other four inmates were captured within eight days. New Mexico authorities said the escape was launched by Gilbert when he pulled a smuggled handgun on an officer.

The kidnaped family, William and Mary Blades, and their three children, Bobby, 14, Elizabeth, 12, and Malina, 11, were reunited Thursday night. Their ordeal had begun about 1:30 a.m. Wednesday in the northern Arizona city of Flagstaff.

Richard T. Bretzing, special agent in charge of the Los Angeles FBI office, said Kinslow broke into the couple’s split-level home in a middle-class neighborhood in the middle of the night, bound and gagged the family and ransacked the home. He reportedly seized three rifles, a shotgun and three hunting knives.

Flagstaff police said late Thursday that they have evidence that Kinslow may have left the Blades’ home at some point and tried to enter a second house on the street, but was frightened off when a barking dog awakened the occupants.

About 6 a.m., the intruder ordered all the Blades into their 1981 Dodge Ram Charger, Bretzing said. They drove west on Interstate 40, crossing into California and reaching the high desert town of Barstow about 2:30 p.m. Wednesday, he said.

En route, the agent said, Kinslow continually threatened to kill the family if police got too close.

In Barstow, they checked into a motel. About 5:30 p.m., Kinslow reportedly cut up some towels and bound the couple and their two older children. Authorities said he then left with Malina, promising not to harm her if the family did not contact police.

The Blades were tied to the steering column of their vehicle and left in the Barstow area. They freed themselves later that night and called police.

Meanwhile, Bretzing said, Kinslow had arrived in Garden Grove. About 11:45 p.m., he stopped behind a fast-food restaurant and released the girl, warning her to stay put until he returned.

But she then flagged Garden Grove Police Officer Robert Phan at the corner of McFadden Avenue and Ward Street. The girl told him Kinslow kept talking about a motel and a trailer park where he was to “meet friends,” according to Garden Grove Police Capt. John Robertson.

After contacting the FBI, police tentatively identified Kinslow. Following up on what Malina had told them, officers went to the trailer park and saw the Blades’ vehicle at 2:15 a.m. Thursday.

“Without her information we wouldn’t have been able to do it,” Robertson said, praising the girl’s composure. “If she had been all broken down like a lot of other kids, we would not have been able to get any information.”

Officers set up surveillance, and Kinslow was arrested at 5 a.m. When confronted, Kinslow pointed a .357 magnum at the agents, Bretzing said.

“But just before a very tender situation erupted, he decided to throw the weapon to the ground and surrender,” Bretzing said.

Munitions Found in Room

About 6:30 a.m., an FBI SWAT team forcibly entered Room 243 at the motel and arrested Gallegos and Gilbert. Two sawed-off shotguns and a revolver, along with a large quantity of ammunition, were recovered in the room.

Also arrested, in another room at the motel, were Chris Martinez, 25, and Chris Faviell, 21. Of Martinez, Bretzing said FBI agents have “some reason to believe he has known the escapees for some time and may have been involved in the escape.” Faviell was arrested on an unrelated charge involving bad checks.

A resident at the 104-room motel who witnessed the arrests said police broke down the motel room doors to reach the suspects. “I wish I had had my camera,” said the man, who lives in a room across a small courtyard from where Gallegos and Gilbert were staying.

FBI officials said they had contacted Garden Grove police 10 days ago about the possibility the escapees may have fled there. But Matt Bivens, assistant manager at the Fire House Motel, said FBI agents showed up at the motel “just days” after the Fourth of July prison break.

Authorities said they checked the motel because Martinez, who was living there, knew the escapees and might be in touch with them. Agents reportedly confiscated the motel’s phone records to determine whether there had been any such contact.

It is not known when Gilbert and Gallegos showed up at the motel, police say. But Robertson said there is evidence that “they planned to meet in Garden Grove all the way from Santa Fe.”

‘Real Dangerous’

“These are real dangerous people, and I’ve very glad that they are no longer in our city,” he said. “This group was very, very well armed with massive amounts of ammunition. It could have been a very bad situation.”

Authorities said all three escapees were carrying numerous weapons.

A maid, who was cleaning the room after police broke in to arrest Gilbert and Gallegos, said “it looks like a disaster.” Only a few sliced cucumbers were found in the room’s tiny refrigerator.

Police said it was a tearful scene late Thursday when Malina and her family were reunited in Garden Grove. Although all were safe, FBI agents refused to disclose whether any family members were harmed.

All three escapees appeared in leg manacles and handcuffs in federal court in Santa Ana Thursday afternoon, where they waived their rights to a bail hearing. They were being held without bail at Garden Grove Jail, awaiting transfer to a federal prison at Terminal Island. Authorities said they probably would be returned to New Mexico to face charges there.

At the start of the bail hearing, Maurice Mandel, Kinslow’s court-appointed attorney, was overheard telling Kinslow that he should waive the bail hearing because he had no chance of obtaining bail. And if he didn’t, Mandel said, “you will have to face the embarrassment of having the government put on its case and listening to all the details about what happened.”

Bail Set at $25,000

U.S. Magistrate Ronald W. Rose set bail of $25,000 for Martinez, who is accused of aiding and abetting the three felons.

In New Mexico, where officials had been sharply criticized for the Independence Day prison break, there was relief at news of the escapees’ capture.

“We are all extremely glad this is over,” said Public Safety Department Secretary Robert Kimble. “Those men were very armed and very dangerous.”

The seven inmates escaped after Gilbert, armed with a .22-caliber pistol, overpowered one guard and killed another, authorities said. The inmates then made their way to the prison roof, where they used a building support next to the wall to swing their legs over a barbed-wire fence to freedom.

Gilbert was convicted in November, 1980, of killing his wife, who was a former model, and an elderly Albuquerque couple. He become the first person sentenced to death under New Mexico’s 1979 capital punishment statute, but the death sentence was reduced to life in prison last November in a controversial move by then-Gov. Toney Anaya.

Kinslow was sentenced in 1982 to three life terms for killing a Chaparral, N.M., woman and her two daughters.

Gallegos was sentenced in 1982 to 108 years in prison for nine armed robberies between 1980 and 1982 in Albuquerque.

Times staff writers Jerry Hicks and Nancy Wride contributed to this story.