Russ sat on the log and leaned in toward the fire. After a few minutes, the shivering subsided. He was dizzy and nauseated from the shotgun pellet striking his skull. His ears rang from all the guns going off around him, including the “Shorty” AR he had fired so many times.
Chris reached for a stick from a pile beside him and tossed it into the small fire. Russ saw his brother’s lips move, but there was no sound. Russ asked, How bad you hit? Plenty bad, Chris said. They were silent for a while, staring into the fire. We’re not getting out of this one, you know. Russ nodded. I know.
The fire went out from the rain and they could not get it going again. Chris stood up, coughed. Let’s go. Russ picked up the pouch with the handguns and ammunition. Where are we going? he asked. Chris stood, trying to catch his breath. Anywhere, I’m cold.
Russ followed his brother, moving slowly down to the mouth of Coldwater Canyon where it opened up onto Lytle Creek Canyon. Chris grimaced with every misstep. They stopped frequently for him to lean against a tree or boulder to catch his breath. I’m gonna need to have this looked at real soon. Yeah, and I’m gonna need some food and another shot before I start freaking out. Chris squinted up into the low sunlight. Let’s go.
They continued out to the wide Lytle Creek wash and headed down the canyon, keeping on the opposite side from the road. Russ was in the lead when he turned back to check on his brother. Chris had stopped and was looking across the wash to the road a few hundred feet away. Get on the ground, he told Russ.
JUST AFTER 8:00 A.M., SAN BERNARDINO ASSISTANT SHERIFF FLOYD TIDWELL rounded up captains Philip Schuyler and Charles Follett for a trip up to the SWAT command near Coldwater Canyon. The three hopped into a four-wheel-drive Jeep and began the five-mile trip up the dirt portion of Lytle Creek Road. Along the way, they picked up deputy Michael Smith of the SWAT force whose own vehicle had been unable to make the water crossing at the North Fork. About three and a half miles north of the command center, Deputy Smith spotted something on the far side of the wash. I got movement across the wash there, he shouted above the sound of the engine. Tidwell slammed on the brakes and all four men bailed out, guns drawn, and took cover behind the vehicle.
Across the boulder-strewn wash, two figures were walking along a knoll at the base of the mountainside. While not completely in the open, the two were nevertheless making no attempt to conceal themselves. One had his hands across his chest, the other had his tucked underneath a poncho. “Sheriff’s officers, get your hands in the air, up where we can see them!” Tidwell called out to the suspects. One of the suspects stopped and looked in their direction. The one in front kept walking.
“Get down, get down now or we’ll shoot you,” one of the officers yelled.
One of the men raised his arms and lowered himself to ground, facedown. The other one then did the same.
The four lawmen advanced, taking turns covering each other. Two carried handguns pointed out in front of them; Tidwell carried a shotgun. Michael Smith carried a high-powered semiautomatic rifle with a scope he trained on the two suspects lying in the dirt. “You move or give us any problem and we’ll shoot you,” one of them said when they reached the two Harven brothers. “Let’s shoot ’em right now,” another one said.
Thirty minutes later, Floyd Tidwell rode into the command center at Glen Ranch like an Old West sheriff with the two most wanted men in the territory tied up in the back of his wagon. In this instance it was a Ford station wagon brought up to transport the outlaws down the canyon. Chris and Russell Harven found themselves circled by several dozen sheriff’s deputies straining to get a look at the men who had gunned down one of their own.
In the photos that ran in the pages of the Los Angeles Times the next day, Chris Harven is in a hooded sweatshirt, still seated in the wagon with his legs in front of him, eyes averted down. He looks like a tough character, but one who knows he has been defeated. Russell is being led by his captors, hands cuffed behind his back, in boots, jeans, and ripped flannel shirt, the last shredded remains of a rain poncho hanging strangely from around his neck. Unlike his older brother, Russell is staring straight into the camera, scowling. With his scraggly beard and wet hair matted on his forehead, the Russell Harven staring back at readers looks like some sort of wild mountain man, a vicious outlaw entirely capable of gunning down a lawman in cold blood.
But the Russell Harven who was led into the command center was anything but a defiant outlaw. He was merely a frightened young man from the suburbs of Orange County who had gotten in way over his head. Once inside the ranch house, Russ spotted a fire blazing in the big stone fireplace. “Please let me stand by the fire. I won’t move, I promise,” he asked in a soft voice. Tidwell told him he could, and Russ stood there, teeth chattering, while more reporters moved in and deputies continued to enter the command center to gawk at the two cop killers. Russ watched as Chris was led out of the ranch house by two detectives to a waiting patrol car for transport to the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Homicide department for questioning. Chris didn’t even look over as he was leaving.
“HOW MUCH DO YOU WEIGH?”
“With or without the lead?” Chris Harven said.
San Bernardino Homicide detective Larry Malmberg lit a cigarette and slid a Miranda waiver in front of him. Harven initialed each of the questions, signed the bottom, and slid it back. The chain-smoking Malmberg was a gruff veteran detective with a thick nose and bags under his eyes from frequent lack of sleep. Beside him in the interview room sat detective Roger Kuhns, who had driven down from the mountain with Harven. “You agree to talk to us about the charges?” Malmberg said.
“Whatever you want, start reeling ’em out,” Chris said.
“Do you know what those charges are?”
“No,” Chris shook his head.
“Bank robbery, numerous assaults on police officers, and a murder of a police officer. You understand those?”
Harven shifted in his seat. “I know what you mean. I just, you know, it’s the first time I heard about a police officer being injured or killed. What was he killed with?”
“A firearm. He was shot.”
“Where did it happen?”
“Lytle Creek area up above Stockton Campgrounds. You want to talk about it?”
“Yeah, whatever I can tell you.”
“You can probably tell us a whole lot, man. Why don’t you start from the beginning.”
“You mean how the whole thing started?”
“There ain’t no place like the beginning, right?”
“Well, I guess,” Chris said. He thought about it. “Might say the whole thing started a couple years ago when my friend George split up with his wife. He went sort of a little nuts after that. He was living with me and my wife and that didn’t work out, so my wife split. I had a job for seven years and they got rid of me so that’s why I’m on unemployment. Manny, his wife’s going to have a baby. He doesn’t have any cash. Billy, he’s got arthritis. He won’t even be able to walk, or wouldn’t have been able to walk, after he was twenty-five. He didn’t have anything to lose. George lost his wife, his job, his family. My brother was against it but he went in just ’cause we’re all friends. I didn’t have to go in on it, but I had a lot of peer group pressure, I guess, so I went along with it. So we went down and hit the Security Pacific.”
“So, all five of you got together and decided that you’d hit a bank. Is that it?” Malmberg asked.
“Well, not really.” Chris shrugged. “I didn’t decide to hit a bank. Russ didn’t decide to hit a bank. Manny didn’t decide to hit a bank. George decided to hit the bank. Believe it or not, before all this started out, I was a reputable citizen. The whole plan was stupid. Why we ever went through with it I’ll never know.”
“So George planned the whole operation?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, it went pretty smoothly for no rehearsal. I mean, you guys went in there like a bunch of professionals from what I understand.”
Chris s
hook his head. “I thought it was a botched job from the word go.”
“What didn’t you like about it?” Malmberg asked.
“Well, first of all, I don’t like, you know, I don’t believe in bank robbery. I don’t believe in hurting people, I don’t believe in killing people. If it wasn’t for George, day after day. ‘Are you going to be a yellow-belly or a coward?’ I wouldn’t never have gone in there. I know my brother wouldn’t either. He was saying right up to the last minute, let’s stop.”
“But you did, so . . .”
“So we done it.” Chris stared down at the table. “George’s motto is, ‘I’m not going to be taken prisoner.’” He shook his head, already informed of Smith’s capture. “Right. Here he is down here now.”
The interrogation went on for over an hour, with Harven confessing in detail to his own participation and that of the others. “What were you thinking about while all of this was going on?” Malmberg wanted to know when they were almost finished.
“Wishing I hadn’t done the job. I can’t deny anything about it, you know, the whole thing was stupid. I get what I deserve for being stupid. I mean you can sit there and go, your life’s unhappy, you haven’t got a job, nobody wants to give you a job, you haven’t got a wife and family, all the bills are piling up and piling up . . . But that’s no excuse and now I can’t say why I did it.”
“I’ll tell you something, Chris,” Malmberg said. “When you guys crossed over into our county, the information that we had is that you had a hostage. That’s the only reason that you’re alive right now.”
“Well, probably you should have killed us because what we did was wrong.” Chris paused. “So, what am I looking at?”
“You’re looking at the death penalty,” Malmberg said flatly.
“Oh,” Chris said. “I guess I’m looking at the death penalty. When do I get to see an attorney?”
“When you ask for one.”
“Anytime I want?”
“Anytime you want.”
“You mean I can ask for an attorney right now?”
“Sure.”
Chris nodded. “Maybe we better continue this on with an attorney since I’m going to get the death penalty, okay?”
“Sure enough,” Malmberg said, snuffing out his cigarette and standing up from the table. “We’ll terminate the interview at 11:10 hours.”
“TODAY’S DATE IS 5/11/80, THE TIME IS 11:42 HOURS,” SAN BERNARDINO DETECTIVE Hugh Gonthier said into the microphone on the table. “This will be an interview conducted at the sheriff’s Homicide division. The persons present are sergeant Ron Durling, detective Hugh Gonthier of sheriff’s Homicide. Interviewing a Russell Aaron Harven, date of birth 1/6/54.”
Gonthier had already pegged Russell Harven for a “pleaser,” ashamed of what he had done. He and Durling both agreed that all they would really need to do to get the guy to talk was to be nice to him, show him a little respect and kindness. “Russ, do you know what you’ve been arrested for?” Gonthier began.
Russ didn’t know shit beyond that he was alone and in deep trouble. “Uh, yeah, I think so,” he said, his soft, boyish voice a sharp contrast to his rough appearance.
“What did they say you were arrested for?”
“They didn’t.”
“You’ve been arrested for bank robbery and murder.”
“Murder?”
“Murder.”
There was a long pause. “I was thinking it over if I should talk or not,” Russ said. “I’ll . . . I’ll talk, I guess.”
“Before you got to the bank, how long did you plan to do that thing?” Gonthier asked.
“Uh, it wasn’t too long. Chris said that everything was planned out pretty good and that George said everything was set and there wasn’t gonna be any mistakes, but I figured, shit . . . you know, this is pretty risky business,” he said, laughing nervously. “I didn’t really want to go through with it. But I figured my brother’s doing it, you know, so . . .”
Gonthier went through the sequence of events. Russ gave out information, but equivocated in his answers, pretending to forget simple, often meaningless, details. He seemed torn between coming clean and the urge to bullshit his way out of trouble.
“Okay, the cops show up; had you started to move the van?” Gonthier asked.
“I don’t think so. Fired off a couple rounds and then, then we started to move.”
“Who did you fire the rounds at initially?”
“Well, at the cops.” Russ looked down, shaking his head. “Look, I know I shouldn’t be spilling all this out, but shit . . .”
“Anytime you want to cease, we stop. You have the right,” Gonthier said.
“Doesn’t that make it basically harder on me or something like that?” Russ asked.
“Not necessarily. It’s helpful to us, Russ, to find out what happened,” Gonthier said, almost apologetically.
“Yeah, to help you get a good case to lock us all up.” Russ stared at the floor, shaking his head. “Boy, are my parents gonna be surprised. They’ll probably disown me. Course it doesn’t matter, I guess; I’ll be dead in a few months anyway.” He looked up. “We didn’t shoot any cops, did we?” he asked.
“One cop is dead,” Gonthier informed him.
Russ leaned forward and let out a deep breath. “I feel I might be clamming up here in a minute.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know if I want to do too much more talking. I’m getting fucking scared.”
“You don’t have to.”
“Yeah, I know that,” Russ said. “It’s just that you guys, you know, being so nice to me and I feel like an asshole clamming up on you.”
“Did you get hit at all from the exchange of gunfire?” Gonthier pressed on.
“One got me in the back of the head here,” Russ said.
“Was anybody else hit?”
“Yeah, Billy got hit and Chris got it in the back and George got it in the leg. I think George’s was pretty bad cause he was bleeding a lot in the back of that truck. He was expressing doubts as to his survivability. Billy, we left him in the van. I don’t know what kind of condition he’s in.” Russ looked up. “How is he?”
“Billy’s dead,” Gonthier informed him.
Russ stared at the floor again.
“Who got the van again, Russ?”
“Billy and Manny and me.” Russ thought about it. “Is that a charge against me?”
Gonthier nodded. “Kidnapping and grand theft.”
“Well, I guess the dead cop and dead Billy, you’re gonna put me in the chamber as it is, it doesn’t matter anymore.” He shook his head. “I’m slowly hanging myself here.”
“Have you ever been involved in any type of offense like this before?” asked Gonthier.
“Uh-uh. Never robbed nobody, never had any weapons offenses, nothing. I’m not a violent person.”
“Did your mom and dad have any idea this was going on?”
“No, they thought I was just going camping with Chris this weekend.” He paused. “Wow, this is going to be a fucking shock to them.”
“I’ve been asking you all the questions,” Gonthier asked. “Are there any questions you’d like to ask us?”
“Well . . .” Russ said, thinking about it. “Not really. I know what’s gonna happen.” He gave a small laugh to emphasize the futility of it all. “This case is open-and-shut.”
“Right now, as I’ve explained to you, we’ve got one officer dead, we’ve got officers wounded, Billy’s dead, there’s a stolen vehicle involved, there’s a kidnapping involved, there’s a bank robbery involved . . .”
“No doubt about it, we’re dead,” said Russ.
“Russ, let me ask you something. What were you thinking?” Gonthier said.
Russ shrugged. “I was thinking this is crazy but I didn’t want to go to jail.”
“Well, why were you shooting?” Gonthier asked, his tone almost one of a frustrated father wondering how the young man bef
ore him could have made such a terrible mistake.
“’Cause I didn’t want to go to jail.” Russ let out a breath. “Lot of good that did.”
Gonthier gathered up his papers. “Do you have anything, Russell? Anything you want to say?”
Russ thought about it. “I got something to say. I’m just sorry I did this whole fucking thing, man. It doesn’t carry no weight, but that’s how I feel.”
AFTER TURNING THE BEND ON BALDY NOTCH ROAD AHEAD OF THE OTHERS THE night before, Manny Delgado started to run. He just kept running and running up the road until he could run no more and then he went over the side. It grew dark, but he never stopped moving. Sliding, tumbling, crashing through manzanita and buckthorn that tore at his skin and clothing. If he got far enough away from the washout site, he could hide by day and move by night until he eventually made it out of there. After that, maybe melt away into Mexico with relatives or friends.
Manny also knew if he stopped moving, he would start thinking about Billy. No matter what happened, he would always have to live with that. But he sure as hell was not going to let them put him in a prison cell where he would have nothing else to do but think about it. He’d make it out of those mountains or take a bullet trying.
High up on the hillsides of Coldwater Canyon, he could see the lights of the men making their way up Lytle Creek. He pushed on, trying to make a last steep uphill climb to a rounded ridgeline that loomed a mile to the south. With each step up the sharp incline, the loose gravel and shale kicked out from under his feet, and he slid back, making scant progress. The effort was exhausting, like running up a sand dune. Finally, he traversed in switchbacks until he crested a domed ridgeline thick with chaparral as high as a man’s head and penetrable only by crawling flat against the earth beneath the branches.
As daylight broke over Lytle Creek, Manny lay on his belly near the center of the thick stand of brush with a .38 in his hand, sucking rainwater out of his clothing and listening to the throaty baying of bloodhounds in the distance. By noon, the sun was cresting over the canyon, dissolving away the thick morning cloud cover. And then the helicopters came.
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