Steven Stayner
Encyclopedia
Steven Gregory Stayner was an American kidnap
victim. Stayner was abducted from the Northern California
city and county of Merced, California
at the age of seven and held until he was 14, when he escaped and rescued another victim, Timothy White, in 1980. Stayner died in 1989 in a motorcycle accident while driving home from work.
on April 18, 1965. Steven had three sisters. His older brother, Cary Stayner
, is a convicted serial killer
.
. Murphy, described by those who knew him as a trusting, naïve and simple-minded man, had been enlisted by convicted child rapist
Parnell (who had passed himself off as an aspiring minister to Murphy) into helping him abduct a young boy so that Parnell could "raise him in a religious-type deal," as Murphy later stated.
Acting on instructions from Parnell, Murphy passed out gospel tracts to boys walking home from school that day and, after spotting Stayner, claimed to be a church representative seeking donations. Stayner later claimed that Murphy asked him if his mother would be willing to donate any items to the church; when the boy replied that she would, Murphy then asked Steven where he lived and if he would be willing to take Murphy to his home. After Steven agreed, a white Buick
driven by Parnell pulled up and Steven willingly climbed into the car with Murphy. Parnell then drove a confused Steven to his cabin in nearby Catheys Valley
instead. (Incidentally, Parnell's cabin was, unbeknownst to Steven, located only several hundred feet from his maternal grandfather's residence.) Parnell molested Steven for the first time early the following morning.
After telling Parnell he wanted to go home many times during his first week with the man, Parnell told Steven that he had been granted legal custody of the boy because his parents could not afford so many children and did not want him anymore.
Parnell began calling the boy Dennis Gregory Parnell, retaining Stayner's real middle name and his real birthdate when enrolling him in various schools over the next several years. Parnell passed himself off as Steven's father and the two moved frequently around California. He allowed Steven to begin drinking at a young age and to come and go virtually as he pleased. One of the few positive aspects of Steven's life with Parnell was the dog he had received as a gift from Parnell, a Manchester Terrier
whom Steven named Queenie. This dog had been given to Parnell by his mother, who was not aware of Steven's existence during the period he was living with Parnell.
For a period of over a year, a woman named Barbara Mathias, along with one or more of her children, lived with Parnell and Steven. She later claimed to have been completely unaware that "Dennis" had, in fact, been kidnapped. During the seven years that he lived with Parnell, Stayner claimed that he was sexually assaulted more than 700 times; however, Parnell claimed the number was much higher. Stayner also said that, at the behest of Parnell, he had sex with Mathias several times around the age of nine.
, Parnell began to look for a younger child to kidnap. On February 14, 1980, Parnell and a teenage friend of Steven's named Sean Poolman kidnapped five-year-old Timmy White in Ukiah, California
. Motivated in part by the young boy's distress, Steven decided to escape with him, intending to return the boy to his parents and then escape himself. On March 1, 1980, while Parnell was away at his night security job, Steven left with Timmy and hitchhiked
into Ukiah. Unable to locate Timmy's home address, he decided to have Timmy walk into the police department to ask for help, before escaping himself. Before he could successfully escape, the police spotted the two boys and took them into custody. Steven immediately identified Timmy White and then revealed his own true identity and story.
By daybreak on March 2, 1980, Parnell had been arrested on suspicion of abducting both boys. After the police checked into Parnell's background they found a previous sodomy conviction from 1951. Both children were reunited with their families that day. In 1981, Parnell was tried and convicted of kidnapping Timmy and Steven in two separate trials. He was sentenced to seven years but was paroled after serving five years. Parnell was not charged with the numerous sexual assault
s on Steven Stayner and other boys, as most occurred outside the jurisdiction of the Merced county prosecutor or were by then outside the statute of limitations
. The Mendocino County prosecutors, acting almost entirely alone, decided not to prosecute the sexual assaults that occurred in their jurisdiction. This is likely due to the prosecutors' belief that they were "protecting" Steven because rape and molestation victims were seen as "damaged goods." They may also have felt they were respecting the Stayner parents' reluctance to discuss Parnell's crimes, because of the stigma of male sexual abuse. Poolman, who had helped abduct Timmy White, and Ervin Murphy were convicted of lesser charges. Both claimed they knew nothing of the sexual assaults on Steven. Barbara Mathias was never arrested. Steven remembered the kindness "Uncle" Murphy had shown him in his first week of captivity while they were both under the influence of Parnell's manipulation, and believed Murphy to be as much Parnell's victim as Steven and Timmy were.
Steven Stayner's kidnapping and its aftermath prompted California lawmakers to change state laws "to allow consecutive prison terms in similar abduction cases."
On September 16, 1989, Steven's motorcycle collided with a car that pulled into traffic from a side road. Steven received head injuries that proved fatal; he died at the Merced Community Medical Center shortly thereafter. He was driving without a license (suspended for a third time because of excessive traffic violations) or a helmet, which had been stolen days earlier. Over 500 people attended his funeral, including then-14-year-old Timmy White, who helped carry Steven's coffin into the church. Steven had joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints just before his death.
) and had a non-speaking part, playing one of the two policemen who escort 14-year-old Steven (played by Corin Nemec
) through the crowds to his waiting family, on his return to his Merced home. Although pleased with the dramatization, Steven did complain that it depicted him as a somewhat "obnoxious, rude" person, especially toward his parents, something he refuted while publicizing the miniseries in the Spring of 1989. The two-part miniseries was first broadcast in the USA by NBC
May 21–22, 1989. Screening rights were sold to a number of international television companies including the BBC
, who screened the miniseries in mid-July of the following year; later still, it was released as a feature-length movie.
The production was based on a manuscript by Mike Echols
, who had researched the story and interviewed Stayner and Parnell, among others. After the premiere of I Know My First Name is Steven, which won four Emmy Award nominations, including one for Corin Nemec, Mike Echols published his book I Know My First Name is Steven in 1991. In the epilogue to his book, Echols describes how he infiltrated NAMBLA.
In 1999, against the wishes of the Stayner family, Mike Echols wrote an additional chapter, about Cary Stayner
, at the request of his publisher who then re-published the book.
The title for the film and book are taken from the first paragraph of Steven's written police
statement, given during the early hours of March 2, 1980 in Ukiah. It reads (note the incorrect spelling of his family name);
confessed to, and was charged with, the 1999 Yosemite multiple murders
, amid fears that the name "Stayner Park" would be associated with Cary rather than Steven. On August 28, 2010, a statue of Steven Stayner and Timmy White was dedicated in Applegate Park in Merced, California Merced Sun-Star 8/30/10. Residents of Ukiah, the hometown of Timmy White, carved a statue showing a teenage Stayner with young Timmy White in hand while escaping their captivity. Fundraisers for the statue have stated that it is meant to honor Steven Stayner and give families of missing and kidnapped children hope that they are still alive.
In 2004, Kenneth Parnell, then 72 years of age, was convicted of trying the previous year to persuade his nurse to procure for him a young boy for five hundred dollars. The nurse, aware of Parnell's past, reported this to local police. Timmy White, then a grown man, was subpoenaed to testify in Parnell's criminal trial. Although Stayner was dead, a written statement he made before his death was used as evidence in Parnell's 2004 trial. Kenneth Parnell died of natural causes on January 21, 2008, at the California State Prison Hospital in Vacaville, California, while serving a 25-years-to-life sentence.
Timmy White later became a Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department Deputy. He died April 1, 2010, at age 35 of a pulmonary embolism
. White was survived by his wife, Dena, and two young children, as well as his mother, father, and sister.
selected = Child sexual Secular}}
Kidnapping
In criminal law, kidnapping is the taking away or transportation of a person against that person's will, usually to hold the person in false imprisonment, a confinement without legal authority...
victim. Stayner was abducted from the Northern California
Northern California
Northern California is the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. The San Francisco Bay Area , and Sacramento as well as its metropolitan area are the main population centers...
city and county of Merced, California
Merced, California
Merced is a city in, and the county seat of, Merced County, California in the San Joaquin Valley of Northern California. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 78,958. Incorporated in 1889, Merced is a charter city that operates under a council-manager government...
at the age of seven and held until he was 14, when he escaped and rescued another victim, Timothy White, in 1980. Stayner died in 1989 in a motorcycle accident while driving home from work.
Birth and family
Steven was born the third of five children to Delbert and Kay Stayner in Merced, CaliforniaMerced, California
Merced is a city in, and the county seat of, Merced County, California in the San Joaquin Valley of Northern California. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 78,958. Incorporated in 1889, Merced is a charter city that operates under a council-manager government...
on April 18, 1965. Steven had three sisters. His older brother, Cary Stayner
Cary Stayner
Cary A. Stayner is an American serial killer currently on death row for the 1999 murders of four women in Mariposa County near Yosemite, California.-Early life:Stayner was born and raised in Merced, California...
, is a convicted serial killer
Serial killer
A serial killer, as typically defined, is an individual who has murdered three or more people over a period of more than a month, with down time between the murders, and whose motivation for killing is usually based on psychological gratification...
.
Kidnapping
On the afternoon of December 4, 1972, Steven Gregory Stayner was approached on his way home from school by a man named Ervin Edward Murphy, an acquaintance of Kenneth ParnellKenneth Parnell
Kenneth Eugene Parnell was an American convicted sex offender, known infamously for his kidnapping of seven-year-old Steven Stayner in Merced, California.-Early life:...
. Murphy, described by those who knew him as a trusting, naïve and simple-minded man, had been enlisted by convicted child rapist
Rape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
Parnell (who had passed himself off as an aspiring minister to Murphy) into helping him abduct a young boy so that Parnell could "raise him in a religious-type deal," as Murphy later stated.
Acting on instructions from Parnell, Murphy passed out gospel tracts to boys walking home from school that day and, after spotting Stayner, claimed to be a church representative seeking donations. Stayner later claimed that Murphy asked him if his mother would be willing to donate any items to the church; when the boy replied that she would, Murphy then asked Steven where he lived and if he would be willing to take Murphy to his home. After Steven agreed, a white Buick
Buick
Buick is a premium brand of General Motors . Buick models are sold in the United States, Canada, Mexico, China, Taiwan, and Israel, with China being its largest market. Buick holds the distinction as the oldest active American make...
driven by Parnell pulled up and Steven willingly climbed into the car with Murphy. Parnell then drove a confused Steven to his cabin in nearby Catheys Valley
Catheys Valley, California
Catheys Valley is a census-designated place in Mariposa County, California. It lies in Catheys Valley 22 miles northeast of Merced, and southwest of Mariposa, at an elevation of 1325 feet . As of the 2010 census, Catheys Valley had a population of 825...
instead. (Incidentally, Parnell's cabin was, unbeknownst to Steven, located only several hundred feet from his maternal grandfather's residence.) Parnell molested Steven for the first time early the following morning.
After telling Parnell he wanted to go home many times during his first week with the man, Parnell told Steven that he had been granted legal custody of the boy because his parents could not afford so many children and did not want him anymore.
Parnell began calling the boy Dennis Gregory Parnell, retaining Stayner's real middle name and his real birthdate when enrolling him in various schools over the next several years. Parnell passed himself off as Steven's father and the two moved frequently around California. He allowed Steven to begin drinking at a young age and to come and go virtually as he pleased. One of the few positive aspects of Steven's life with Parnell was the dog he had received as a gift from Parnell, a Manchester Terrier
Manchester Terrier
The Manchester Terrier is a breed of dog of the smooth-haired terrier type.-Appearance:Manchester Terriers are considered by most to be the oldest of all identifiable terrier breeds, finding mention in works dating from as early as the 16th century. In 1570 Dr...
whom Steven named Queenie. This dog had been given to Parnell by his mother, who was not aware of Steven's existence during the period he was living with Parnell.
For a period of over a year, a woman named Barbara Mathias, along with one or more of her children, lived with Parnell and Steven. She later claimed to have been completely unaware that "Dennis" had, in fact, been kidnapped. During the seven years that he lived with Parnell, Stayner claimed that he was sexually assaulted more than 700 times; however, Parnell claimed the number was much higher. Stayner also said that, at the behest of Parnell, he had sex with Mathias several times around the age of nine.
Escape
As Steven entered pubertyPuberty
Puberty is the process of physical changes by which a child's body matures into an adult body capable of reproduction, as initiated by hormonal signals from the brain to the gonads; the ovaries in a girl, the testes in a boy...
, Parnell began to look for a younger child to kidnap. On February 14, 1980, Parnell and a teenage friend of Steven's named Sean Poolman kidnapped five-year-old Timmy White in Ukiah, California
Ukiah, California
The average high temperature is 73.5 °F . Average low temperature is 46.1 °F . Temperatures reach 90 °F on an average of 65.6 days annually and 100 °F on an average of 14.4 days annually. Due to frequent low humidity, summer temperatures normally drop into the fifties at night. Freezing...
. Motivated in part by the young boy's distress, Steven decided to escape with him, intending to return the boy to his parents and then escape himself. On March 1, 1980, while Parnell was away at his night security job, Steven left with Timmy and hitchhiked
Hitchhiking
Hitchhiking is a means of transportation that is gained by asking people, usually strangers, for a ride in their automobile or other road vehicle to travel a distance that may either be short or long...
into Ukiah. Unable to locate Timmy's home address, he decided to have Timmy walk into the police department to ask for help, before escaping himself. Before he could successfully escape, the police spotted the two boys and took them into custody. Steven immediately identified Timmy White and then revealed his own true identity and story.
By daybreak on March 2, 1980, Parnell had been arrested on suspicion of abducting both boys. After the police checked into Parnell's background they found a previous sodomy conviction from 1951. Both children were reunited with their families that day. In 1981, Parnell was tried and convicted of kidnapping Timmy and Steven in two separate trials. He was sentenced to seven years but was paroled after serving five years. Parnell was not charged with the numerous sexual assault
Sexual assault
Sexual assault is an assault of a sexual nature on another person, or any sexual act committed without consent. Although sexual assaults most frequently are by a man on a woman, it may involve any combination of two or more men, women and children....
s on Steven Stayner and other boys, as most occurred outside the jurisdiction of the Merced county prosecutor or were by then outside the statute of limitations
Statute of limitations
A statute of limitations is an enactment in a common law legal system that sets the maximum time after an event that legal proceedings based on that event may be initiated...
. The Mendocino County prosecutors, acting almost entirely alone, decided not to prosecute the sexual assaults that occurred in their jurisdiction. This is likely due to the prosecutors' belief that they were "protecting" Steven because rape and molestation victims were seen as "damaged goods." They may also have felt they were respecting the Stayner parents' reluctance to discuss Parnell's crimes, because of the stigma of male sexual abuse. Poolman, who had helped abduct Timmy White, and Ervin Murphy were convicted of lesser charges. Both claimed they knew nothing of the sexual assaults on Steven. Barbara Mathias was never arrested. Steven remembered the kindness "Uncle" Murphy had shown him in his first week of captivity while they were both under the influence of Parnell's manipulation, and believed Murphy to be as much Parnell's victim as Steven and Timmy were.
Steven Stayner's kidnapping and its aftermath prompted California lawmakers to change state laws "to allow consecutive prison terms in similar abduction cases."
Later life & death
Steven married Jody Edmondson on June 13, 1985, and they went on to have two children, a son and daughter.On September 16, 1989, Steven's motorcycle collided with a car that pulled into traffic from a side road. Steven received head injuries that proved fatal; he died at the Merced Community Medical Center shortly thereafter. He was driving without a license (suspended for a third time because of excessive traffic violations) or a helmet, which had been stolen days earlier. Over 500 people attended his funeral, including then-14-year-old Timmy White, who helped carry Steven's coffin into the church. Steven had joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints just before his death.
Media adaptations
In early 1989, a television miniseries based on his experience, I Know My First Name is Steven (also known as The Missing Years), was produced. Steven, taking a leave of absence from his job, acted as an advisor for the production company (Lorimar-TelepicturesLorimar-Telepictures
Lorimar-Telepictures was a production and television syndication firm established in 1986 with the merger of Lorimar and Telepictures until both TV divisions became separate in 1988...
) and had a non-speaking part, playing one of the two policemen who escort 14-year-old Steven (played by Corin Nemec
Corin Nemec
Corin "Corky" Nemec is an American actor. Nemec is known for playing the title character on Parker Lewis Can't Lose, Jonas Quinn on Stargate SG-1, and Harold Lauder in the ABC miniseries The Stand.-Personal life:Nemec's mother was a graphic artist as well as a painter, writer and poet...
) through the crowds to his waiting family, on his return to his Merced home. Although pleased with the dramatization, Steven did complain that it depicted him as a somewhat "obnoxious, rude" person, especially toward his parents, something he refuted while publicizing the miniseries in the Spring of 1989. The two-part miniseries was first broadcast in the USA by NBC
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
May 21–22, 1989. Screening rights were sold to a number of international television companies including the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, who screened the miniseries in mid-July of the following year; later still, it was released as a feature-length movie.
The production was based on a manuscript by Mike Echols
Mike Echols
Walter Harlan "Mike" Echols was an American author who wrote several books, mainly dealing with child sexual abuse...
, who had researched the story and interviewed Stayner and Parnell, among others. After the premiere of I Know My First Name is Steven, which won four Emmy Award nominations, including one for Corin Nemec, Mike Echols published his book I Know My First Name is Steven in 1991. In the epilogue to his book, Echols describes how he infiltrated NAMBLA.
In 1999, against the wishes of the Stayner family, Mike Echols wrote an additional chapter, about Cary Stayner
Cary Stayner
Cary A. Stayner is an American serial killer currently on death row for the 1999 murders of four women in Mariposa County near Yosemite, California.-Early life:Stayner was born and raised in Merced, California...
, at the request of his publisher who then re-published the book.
The title for the film and book are taken from the first paragraph of Steven's written police
Police
The police is a personification of the state designated to put in practice the enforced law, protect property and reduce civil disorder in civilian matters. Their powers include the legitimized use of force...
statement, given during the early hours of March 2, 1980 in Ukiah. It reads (note the incorrect spelling of his family name);
"My name is Steven Stainer. I am fourteen years of age. I don't know my true birthdate,
but I use April 18, 1965. I know my first name is Steven, I'm pretty sure my last is Stainer,
and if I have a middle name, I don't know it."
Aftermath
Ten years after Steven's death, the city of Merced asked its residents to propose names for city parks honoring Merced's notable citizens. Steven's parents proposed that one be named "Stayner Park". This idea was eventually rejected and the honor given to another Merced resident because Steven's brother Cary StaynerCary Stayner
Cary A. Stayner is an American serial killer currently on death row for the 1999 murders of four women in Mariposa County near Yosemite, California.-Early life:Stayner was born and raised in Merced, California...
confessed to, and was charged with, the 1999 Yosemite multiple murders
Cary Stayner
Cary A. Stayner is an American serial killer currently on death row for the 1999 murders of four women in Mariposa County near Yosemite, California.-Early life:Stayner was born and raised in Merced, California...
, amid fears that the name "Stayner Park" would be associated with Cary rather than Steven. On August 28, 2010, a statue of Steven Stayner and Timmy White was dedicated in Applegate Park in Merced, California Merced Sun-Star 8/30/10. Residents of Ukiah, the hometown of Timmy White, carved a statue showing a teenage Stayner with young Timmy White in hand while escaping their captivity. Fundraisers for the statue have stated that it is meant to honor Steven Stayner and give families of missing and kidnapped children hope that they are still alive.
In 2004, Kenneth Parnell, then 72 years of age, was convicted of trying the previous year to persuade his nurse to procure for him a young boy for five hundred dollars. The nurse, aware of Parnell's past, reported this to local police. Timmy White, then a grown man, was subpoenaed to testify in Parnell's criminal trial. Although Stayner was dead, a written statement he made before his death was used as evidence in Parnell's 2004 trial. Kenneth Parnell died of natural causes on January 21, 2008, at the California State Prison Hospital in Vacaville, California, while serving a 25-years-to-life sentence.
Timmy White later became a Los Angeles County Sheriffs Department Deputy. He died April 1, 2010, at age 35 of a pulmonary embolism
Pulmonary embolism
Pulmonary embolism is a blockage of the main artery of the lung or one of its branches by a substance that has travelled from elsewhere in the body through the bloodstream . Usually this is due to embolism of a thrombus from the deep veins in the legs, a process termed venous thromboembolism...
. White was survived by his wife, Dena, and two young children, as well as his mother, father, and sister.
See also
- Kenneth ParnellKenneth ParnellKenneth Eugene Parnell was an American convicted sex offender, known infamously for his kidnapping of seven-year-old Steven Stayner in Merced, California.-Early life:...
, the man who kidnapped Steven Stayner - Cary StaynerCary StaynerCary A. Stayner is an American serial killer currently on death row for the 1999 murders of four women in Mariposa County near Yosemite, California.-Early life:Stayner was born and raised in Merced, California...
, Steven's older brother and a convicted serial killer - Cases of children kept in captivity
Further reading
- I Know My First Name Is Steven, by Mike EcholsMike EcholsWalter Harlan "Mike" Echols was an American author who wrote several books, mainly dealing with child sexual abuse...
. Pinnacle Books, New York. 1999. ISBN 0786011041
External links
selected = Child sexual Secular}}