Mother Admits Abducting Child

A Wisconsin woman accused of running away with her infant son and hiding the boy from his biological father for 17 years pleaded guilty Monday to a single charge of child abduction.

Linda Sue Decker, who now goes by the name Michelle Jones, had previously declared her innocence to the felony charge, which carries a maximum three-year prison sentence.

But the day before her preliminary hearing, the 37-year-old woman changed her plea during a late-afternoon conference in Ventura County Municipal Court. She is scheduled to be sentenced Nov. 20.

Jones’ guilty plea comes three days after another dramatic turn in the case.

On Saturday, her 17-year-old son Michael, who had never spoken to his biological father, called Robert Decker at his Camarillo home. It was the first conversation ever between father and son.

“As Bob said, it made his year, maybe his decade,” said Theresa McConville, Robert Decker’s longtime attorney.

She and Decker, an English and drama teacher at Oxnard High School, were in court Monday when Jones changed her plea.

“Obviously my client is very, very happy to not have to go through a preliminary hearing and a trial, given the circumstances,” she said.

“I never thought there was any other possible plea that could be made,” she said. “And I certainly felt that the D.A. would have been victorious if it had gone to trial.”

The boy, who only recently learned the true identity of his father, was taken as a 9-month-old from the family’s Camarillo home in 1981 and hidden by his mother for almost two decades.

Over the years, Decker and local prosecutors searched the country for the boy, but the few leads they tracked went nowhere.

Then, on July 10, police in Georgia arrested Jones after receiving an anonymous tip that she was visiting relatives in a resort area south of Savannah.

She was later extradited to Ventura County, where she is free on $250,000 bail.

In a written statement after her arrest, Jones acknowledged that she abducted her son during a custody dispute and hid the boy from his father.

Later, in statements to the media, her attorney, Jay M. Johnson, said she fled because she was “young” and “scared to death,” but offered no other details of the reason behind her decision to run.

Johnson could not be reached for comment Monday. But he previously indicated that his client wanted to tell her side of the story during the preliminary hearing.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Denise Payne also could not be reached for comment after the 4 p.m. hearing. But McConville said reunification remains more likely than ever.

“I think the phone call was the first step,” she said. “I don’t think that the mother will put up any roadblocks at this point.”