Man Writes Columnist, Saying He Killed His Wife; Police Find Body

The body of a woman believed to be a 40-year-old Anaheim schoolteacher was found Thursday after her husband wrote a letter to a newspaper columnist saying that he had killed his wife and had made a list of 54 other people targeted for death, police said.

The body of the woman, found on a cul-de-sac in north Anaheim, was not immediately identified, but police said they suspected it was Gail M. Schoenecker, a teacher at Price Elementary School.

Police said they believed that Schoenecker’s husband, David L. Schoenecker, 48, had killed the woman, fled the state and then written the letter from a motel in Missoula, Mont. He was being sought on suspicion of murder. His car was found abandoned in Mineral County, Mont.

The grisly series of events began Thursday when Bob Emmers, a columnist for the Orange County Register, received a letter postmarked from Missoula and written by Schoenecker, police said. In the letter, Schoenecker not only claimed to have killed his wife, but went on to threaten the others and to tell Emmers where her body could be found. Emmers gave the letter to Anaheim police and a check of the residence turned up the woman’s body lying on a bed in the master bedroom.

Lt. Marc Hedgpeth, an Anaheim police spokesman, would not release details of the letter other than to say that its tone was threatening and that it made reference to a list. A list of 54 names was found in the suspect’s house, and Hedgpeth said it was apparently the same list mentioned in the letter.

“There was a list of people, 54 people he was threatening,” Hedgpeth said. Asked if this was a hit list, Hedgpeth said that Schoenecker was “not specific, but his actions and his implications are that he’s intending to kill them.”

Hedgpeth would not release the names on the list but said that many of them were those of relatives and acquaintances.

“There was no threat to Emmers at all in the letter or the list,” Hedgpeth said.

All the people named on the list live in Schoenecker’s home state of Wisconsin, including at least one from Milwaukee, Hedgpeth said. Officers said they sent teletypes to police agencies “in a general area where we found people on the list.”

Emmers could not be reached for comment. Tim Kelly, the Register’s managing editor, would say only that “Emmers received a letter from somebody who claimed he killed his wife. We immediately notified Anaheim police. We’re cooperating fully with the Anaheim police.”

After finding the body, officers launched a multi-state search for Schoenecker, whom neighbors described as a quiet man who spent his spare time tending to his yard and doting over two small dogs.

Detective Al Baker of the Missoula police said that Schoenecker had been traced to a Travel Lodge Motel in Missoula last weekend. It was there, Baker said, that Schoenecker allegedly wrote the letter to Emmers on motel stationery.

“From what I can gather, the letter was sent from the Travel Lodge,” Baker said. “We went out there today and all the information we were able to gain was turned over to the Anaheim Police Department.”

A desk clerk at the motel confirmed that Schoenecker had registered under his own name and stayed there Saturday in a $28-a-night single room.

“He left Sunday,” the clerk said. “No one really remembers him. It’s busy here on the weekend and there are many faces that go in and out.”

Hedgpeth said it was difficult to positively identify the body found at the house because it was in a state of decomposition. He said it appeared that the woman had been dead for several days.

Trustees of the Anaheim City School District, however, said they had been told late Thursday that Schoenecker had been killed and that police were looking for her husband. Neighbors in the area of two-story tract homes also said they had been told that Gail Schoenecker had been killed and that her husband had threatened to kill others.

“It’s shocking,” said Betty Patterson, an Anaheim school trustee. “I think she had only been teaching there 3 years. I heard she was good. It’s an awful thing.”

Neighbors described the cul-de-sac area where the Schoeneckers lived as a quiet area where children played in the street and people were friendly. Police said that Schoenecker may have worked out of his home in some computer-related field and was often seen working in his yard during the day.