'Bad Horror Story': Group Attempted To Abduct Mennonite Kids, Slaughter Their Parents

A Scottish court ruled on Monday, Jan. 31, that nothing will be stopping the extradition of three Americans who fled to and hid out in Scotland after a botched attempted child kidnapping in 2018.

Fort-one-year-old Valerie Hayes, 58-year-old Gary Reburn, and 36-year-old Jennifer Lynn Amnott allegedly attempted to kidnap children from the Mennonite Community in Maryland and fled to the United Kingdom when their plans went awry, according to a U.S. Attorney’s Office report.

They have been attempting to block the extradition process for years, as they face a possible life sentence in the United States for their attempted kidnapping and conspiracy to commit the murder of the parents of the children, the Daily Beast reported.

“If proved, this was a premeditated conspiracy to kidnap five children and to murder their four parents,” the Lord Justice General Lord Carloway, Scotland’s senior judge, said. “The crimes, which the appellants have allegedly committed, are extraordinary.”

Hayes, who reportedly pretended to have worked for intelligence services in the past, befriended Amnott and her husband Frank after she had read Amnott’s blog post regarding her three miscarriages.

After a while, Hayes and her boyfriend Reburn roped the Amnotts into a scheme where she claimed that her three babies were stolen from her and that Jennifer Amnott could keep one if she helped out.

Her intentions and reasoning behind kidnapping these children are unclear, but they attempted to do so anyway, with a plan to murder the parents of the children that they kidnapped so that there would be no witnesses to the abduction.

However, when they attempted to steal from the first home, police officers arrived while they were tying the father in the basement. Frank was arrested while Hayes, Reburn, and Jennifer Amnott escaped to the United Kingdom.

“Although the facts of this case read like the script of a bad horror movie, the defendants’ murderous plot was real and it posed a grave risk to their intended victims,” U.S. Attorney Thomas Cullen said.

Frank Amnott pleaded guilty in 2019 to kidnapping and conspiracy charges.