Loss of Four Family Members Stuns Developer

Five people, including four members of one family, were killed when two small planes collided over San Joaquin Valley farmland, a sheriff’s spokesman said Monday.

Developer Matt Franich, who made news when he took possession of California’s unwanted governor’s mansion in Carmichael in 1984, lost two sons and two granddaughters in the crash.

“I hope I can live through it to support my remaining family,” a stunned Franich said Monday. “They were such beautiful people, hard-working, honest, with a great future.”

Two of Franich’s three sons, Russell, 39, of Agoura and Dennis, 38, of San Diego, Russell’s daughter Tara, 14, and Dennis’ daughter Katie, 11, were killed Sunday in the crash about 25 miles south of Sacramento.

Russell and Dennis Franich were returning to their homes after a visit to their parents and a one-day ski trip to Lake Tahoe.

San Joaquin County sheriff’s spokesman Mike Esau said the Franiches’ Cessna 210 collided with a Cessna 180 flown by Bennie Ray Wallace, 37, of Shingle Springs, a Sierra Nevada foothills community about 30 miles east of Sacramento.

Wallace was returning from a sky-diving trip to Southern California or Nevada, Esau said.

The two planes plummeted to the ground, crashing about a mile apart in fields just west of Interstate 5 near the town of Thornton.

Matt Franich, 64, was in the headlines in 1983 when he bid $1.53 million for California’s unused governor’s mansion, a 31-room, Spanish-style home that was built on a bluff overlooking the American River about 14 miles east of the state Capitol.