Police hunt father of 3 slain B.C. children
Anyone with information about this man is asked to contact RCMP.
Allan Dwayne Schoenborn is shown in an RCMP handout photo. Police say a manhunt is under way for Schoenborn, the father of three children found slain in their Merritt, B.C., home. (April 7, 2008)
The father of three children found slain in their British Columbia home had been arrested at the local school last week and charged with making threats, RCMP now say.
And only a year ago, he’d been charged in Vancouver with sexual assault and making threats.
Allan Dwayne Schoenborn is now the subject of a massive manhunt, the day after his children were found slain in their Merritt, B.C., home.
Const. Julie Rattee said Schoenborn had a court order barring him from contacting the principal and the other children at the school. He did not have an order against seeing his own children.
Because it was a targeted crime, Rattee said there’s no indication the public is at risk but police did issue a warning today, 20 hours after the children’s bodies were found.
“He is obviously considered to be dangerous, although this was a targeted offence,” Rattee said.
“There’s been no indication that anybody else is specifically at risk, meaning the general public.”
Court documents show Schoenborn was charged last May with threatening and sexually assaulting a woman in Vancouver.
But the charges were stayed in July when Schoenborn apparently agreed to stay away from the woman and posted a $500 bond to keep the peace.
However Schoenborn was charged the following month with breaching his conditions, which included not being near the woman’s Vancouver home if he had consumed alcohol in the previous 12 hours.
He pleaded guilty to one count and was fined $200 but the second count was stayed.
In a statement issued toeday, police said they were “requesting that the public not approach Schoenborn if located as he may be dangerous and has suffered from a mental illness.”
Rattee says RCMP did not alert the public yesterday because they didn’t have a confirmed suspect in the killings.
Schoenborn’s uncle, Karl Schoenborn of Lorette, Man., said he heard a radio report about the slain children as he was driving home with his wife.
“We heard Allan Schoenborn,” he said. “We both just looked at each other and we couldn’t believe it.
“What a sickening thing to happen,” said a shaken Schoenborn. “I mean innocent little children.”
Schoenborn said he hasn’t seen his nephew since he moved from Manitoba as a young child.
“There was something (mentally) wrong with him,” he said, adding he’d heard tidbits about Schoenborn’s behaviour over the years from family members.
Rattee said Schoenborn is known to police.
The bodies of the girl and two boys, all under the age of 10, were found by their mother inside the family’s mobile home yesterday afternoon.
Meantime, the day before his neighbour’s three children were found slain in their home, Clint Heigh chatted over the fence with the man who had recently joined the family.
Heigh, a prison chaplain, said the woman and her three children had lived alone in the mobile home for the four or five months since they’d arrived.
“Then a man showed up a week or so ago and we noticed him in the yard cleaning,” Heigh said.
“On Saturday, he came up to the fence and talked to me and asked me what I did. I told him and he had some questions about that.”
Heigh said the man told him he was a roofer from Vancouver and “found that it was difficult to maintain a family and live in Vancouver.”
“Then, for some reason, I’m not a mystic of any kind, but I told him, I said” `If you ever need help, please feel welcome to give me a shout,”’ Heigh said.
Tragically, that offer of help was not heeded.
“He thanked me and he turned around and walked away . . . and then within 24 hours of offering him . . . whatever happened,” Heigh said, his voice breaking with emotion.
School district staff spent yesterday calling the families of all 185 students of Diamond Vale elementary, where the young victims went to school, to inform them that the school would be closed today.
A flower memorial continued to grow outside the police tape that still surrounds the home.
Kendra Bennett, 9, dropped off flowers today for her friend, Kaitlynne, the oldest girl. Kendra said one of Kaitlynne’s brother’s names was Max.
Through tears, Kendra said her friend was beautiful, with long, blonde hair, but she struggled to make the transition to a new school.
“Kids always teased her because of what she wore and no one really liked her because she was new. She only had a few friends,” she said.
RCMP say Schoenborn, who has a distinct scar on his right eyebrow that continues down the right side of his face and scars on both his ears, may be travelling with a large dog and has previously expressed a wish to camp out in the bush.
He has brown hair and hazel eyes, weighs about 130 pounds and is about five feet, four inches in height.
From http://www.thestar.com/News/Canada/article/410957
