Four Sentenced In Kidnapping Of Sect Member Religious Deprogrammers Sentenced To Serve 7 Days In Jail The Same Amount Of Time Woman Was Held Captive
Four people who pleaded guilty to kidnapping a Boise woman in an attempt to break her ties with a Montana religious sect were sentenced Thursday to each spend seven days in jail.
That is the amount of time the kidnapped woman was held.
District Judge Alan Schwartzman sentenced Joy Ellen DeSanctis, her husband Carmine, Charles Allen Kelly and Michael Howley for the Nov. 20, 1991, abduction of Laverne Collins Macchio from her Boise home.
“One person’s cult is another person’s salvation,” Schwartzman said, adding that some religions demand a lot more allegiance than others.
The three men put Macchio in a van and took her to various Idaho locations as they tried to persuade her she no longer should be involved with the Church Universal and Triumphant, based in Corwin Springs, Mont. Joy DeSanctis was waiting for them at a cabin.
All four pleaded guilty to second-degree kidnapping.
“Today is almost exactly five years since when the snatch-and-grab was made,” Schwartzman said. “It was a kidnapping with an asterisk. They used a bit of a blunt instrument.”
The defense earlier contended that Macchio’s mother, Laverne Coelho, feared her daughter was in imminent danger of being taken to a “dangerous bomb shelter” by a religious cult, never to be seen again.
Schwartzman also imposed on the foursome up to five years of unsupervised probation. He fined each person $2,500 and said each must perform 240 hours of community service. The DeSanctises still live in New Jersey. Howley has moved from there to Florida.
“They did it for money, they’re contract kidnappers,” Ada County Deputy Prosecutor Roger Bourne said. “Howley and Kelly are big. They were the muscle.”
Schwartzman asked Bourne why he declined to prosecute Macchio’s mother and sister for arranging the abduction.
“I believe Laverne’s mother was crazy. She was duped,” he answered.
Defense attorneys said Thursday that the four believed they were on a “mission of mercy” by coming to Boise, and did not think they were doing anything illegal. Joy DeSanctis said she and her husband, a Boy Scout leader, were barraged by telephone calls from Laverne Coelho before deciding to help out.
“I think a small measure of justice was done,” said Murray Steinman, a church representative.
But he noted Schwartzman closed with remarks about upholding the right to choose one’s religion, and then imposed light sentences.
xxxx WHERE IS SHE NOW Ada County Deputy Prosecutor Roger Bourne said Laverne Collins Macchio has remarried, lives in Minneapolis with her children and still is a church member.