Jeffrey Don Lundgren, Prophet of Death
To Catch a Prophet
On January 5, Jeff contacted his mother-in-law, Donna Keehler, and asked her to drive to California and pick up her grandchildren. Donna contacted the federal law enforcement officials in Kansas City following Jeff's call and relayed the information to ATF agents. Jeff had instructed Donna to drive west toward San Diego and had provided her with a telephone number so that she could contact him upon her arrival and take custody of the children.
(Lake County News Herald/Duncan Scott)
The phone number Jeff had provided was quickly traced back to a Santa Fe Motel, just six miles north of the Mexican border. Ohio FBI agent Rick Van Haelst immediately boarded a plane and flew to San Diego to supervise the arrest. As agents surrounded the motel, they spotted Jeff using a pay phone in the lobby. Five agents quickly converged on the phone booth and pulled Jeff out. Agent Van Haelst placed his service revolver to Jeff's ear and said, "Jeffrey Don Lundgren, you are under arrest for murder."
While Jeff was being taken into custody, agents raided his motel room and found Alice, Damon and the younger children watching television. Damon and Alice were taken with no resistance. The first words to come out of Damon's mouth after officers stormed the room, "I didn't do the actual shooting."
During a search of the suspects' room, agents confiscated two .44 magnum revolvers, a .45 caliber handgun, an AR-15 assault rifle, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, camouflage bdu's, maps, a storage locker receipt, and various Mormon bibles. Upon completion of the search, investigators followed up on the storage locker receipt and discovered two trunks of gun powder, hundreds of rounds of ammunition, a paramilitary semi-automatic rifle, two long guns, and a 9-mm semi-automatic handgun identical to ones the agents themselves were known to carry. Agents on the scene considered themselves lucky that the arrests went down as smoothly as they had. One can only imagine the devastation Jeffrey Lundgren could have inflicted had he been able to get to his arsenal before they had arrived.
(Union-Tribune Publishing Co.)
On January 8, 1990 Jeff, Alice and Damon appeared in a San Diego felony arraignment court. All three refused to waive extradition from California to Ohio and were held without bond pending a review of the hearing.
Danny Kraft and Kathy Johnson were still at large and agents had no idea where they might be. On January 9, a maid at a Chula Vista motel found two handguns, a large .50 caliber sub-machine gun, hundreds of rounds of ammunition and documents identifying the occupants of the room as none other than Kathy Johnson and Danny Kraft.
On January 10, a San Diego patrol unit spotted Danny and Kathy traveling west on route 78 in Danny's Nissan pickup. They arrested the pair without incident. The following day, appearing before the same judge as the Lundgren's, they too refused to waive extradition and were also held without bond pending a review hearing.