Swarnes sentenced after pleading guilty

On Tuesday afternoon, Lonnie E. Swarnes, 64, pleaded guilty in Vernon County circuit court to five felony counts and was sentenced.

The five counts included a single A-felony count of first degree assault, two counts of B-felony first degree kidnapping, one count of B-felony burglary and a single count of armed criminal action.

After questioning Swarnes on the stand, Vernon County Presiding Circuit Judge David R. Munton accepted the plea agreement and sentenced Swarnes to 12-years on each count. The sentences are to be served concurrent with one another as well as run concurrently with the other cases in New Jersey for which he has already been serving time. In addition, Munton said Swarnes would receive credit for time already served while in jail here awaiting disposition of his case.

Appearing alongside Swarnes was his specially appointed public defender, Kyle Lee Kanable and local District Defender Renee GotviAghehya while the special prosecutors for the case from the Office of the Missouri Attorney General were Benjamin F. Butler and Randa M. Morris.

Following the guilty plea, Munton placed Swarnes under oath, put him on the stand and asked a series of questions to ensure he understood all to which he was pleading guilty, the terms of the plea agreement, the option of still proceeding with the trial which had been set for the week after Thanksgiving as well as questions to determine his satisfaction with defense counsel.

According to the charges and probable cause affidavit, Swarnes “acted in concert” with his nephew — Andrew Wadel of Rich Hill — and Douglas Stangeland of Nevada, to perpetrate the home invasion of Charles and Linda Scammell of Richards, Missouri on Nov. 9, 2009.

As noted in the probable cause sheet, the purpose of the home invasion was to question Scammell about his knowledge of anyone by the name of Muller. “Scammell told them he had had some business dealings with a Jeffrey Muller about 10 years earlier, and the last he knew, Muller lived in New Jersey.”

Wearing ski masks, the three perpetrators invaded the home but prior to questioning, Stangeland shot Charles Scammell in the right hand with a shotgun, resulting in the loss of three fingers. After questioning, the Scammells were secured to chairs using zip ties.

The case went unsolved until early Jan. 2010, when the kidnapping of the wrong Muller went sour.

Wadel, Swarnes and Stangeland had gone to New Jersey to get Muller but kidnapped the wrong Jeffrey Muller and as they were driving him back to Missouri; their vehicle broke down in Lake Ozark. Muller escaped and sought help.

The kidnappers told the convenience store attendant not to believe Muller for they claimed he was a psychiatric patient whom they were taking back to the “state mental hospital” in Nevada. Nevada’s State Hospital No. 3 closed in 1991 and the attendant called the police.

All three men ended up in the Miller County jail and progress was quickly made in the investigation of the crime in Richards. During an FBI interview, Swarnes claimed that he, Stangeland and Wadel perpetrated the Scammell home invasion and had kidnapped Muller on orders from William “Billy” Barger of Nevada, to return Muller to Missouri.

The probable cause affidavit states Swarnes first told FBI Special Agent Benson and later – on Jan. 14, 2010 – then Vernon County Investigators Shayne Simmons and Steve Schlup along with a detective from New Jersey about how he, Wadel and Stangeland were “prospects/prospective officers” for a Hell’s Angels motorcycle club being started in the area.

Barger told the others, he was not only going to be the president of that club but further claimed the founder of Hell’s Angels, a man named Sonny Barger, was his father; Billy did not own a motorcycle.

While the group known as Hell’s Angels was formed by a Ralph Sonny Barger, there is no relation between Sonny and “Billy” Barger.

Between the lure of promises made and several not so subtle threats, Barger ordered the three to get the needed information as to the whereabouts of Muller from Scammell and then find, kidnap and return Muller for their reward.

During a Jan. 14, 2010 interview at the Miller County Jail, Stangeland “admitted that he, Swarnes and Wadel had done both the kidnapping in New Jersey and the home invasion in Vernon County. Stangeland admitted he was the shooter in the Scammel home invasion” and “that they had committed these crimes by order of William Barger.”

Also that day at the Miller County Jail, Simmons and Schlup interviewed Wadel who confirmed the statements made by Stangeland and Swarnes.

“Wadel went on to state he had poisoned the Scammell’s dogs the night prior to the home invasion” and that “he was armed with a handgun at the Scammell home” and confirmed “they had committed these crimes by the order of William ‘Billy’ Barger.”

Barger’s involvement goes back to a man named Roy Slates. Both in his construction business and personally, hard times fell on Slates. Missouri’s Division of Employment Security fined him more than $11,000 in April 2004. In addition, two credit card companies filed claims against him totaling more than $20,000, plus interest and court costs.

One night, Slates – a former Nevada building contractor – was drinking and soon bemoaning the loss of $485,000 in a failed effort to construct a championship golf course in Utah, years earlier. In that project, Slates claimed a Jeffrey Muller had failed to deliver. Stangeland listened intently to the story and later repeated it in detail to Barger. Besides the promises about the motorcycle club, Swarnes and the others were promised a significant percentage of any funds they recouped.

On Aug. 30, 2016, in Nevada, William “Billy” Barger accepted a plea agreement sentence of 12 years for his involvement in the same incident.

Slates pleaded guilty in New Jersey court to conspiracy to commit theft by extortion while on Nov. 15, 2011, Slates was given a suspended sentence of five years of court-supervised probation in Vernon County. Slates pleaded guilty to the felonies of concealing a felony and hindering prosecution. While on parole from New Jersey state prison, Slates died at Barton County Memorial Hospital in Lamar on May 20, 2017.

In 2011, in a New Jersey court, Wadel admitted using a taser and kidnapping Muller and was sentenced to 18 years in state prison to be followed by 5-years of supervised parole.

In June 2012, Wadel was sentenced to 15 years on a single B-felony charge of first degree burglary; seven years each on two C-felony charges of felonious restraint; seven years on a single C-felony count of second degree assault; and 18 years on a single cunt of armed criminal action. All sentences are to be served concurrently with each other and with the 18 year sentence Wadel is serving in New Jersey.

Stangeland was convicted in New Jersey on May 7, 2015, of conspiracy to commit murder, first degree kidnapping, robbery, attempted extortion and possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose, among other charges for the kidnapping of Muller. The next day, Stangeland collapsed in the Sussex County, New Jersey jail fell into a coma and remains on life-support.

In New Jersey, Swarnes has already been convicted on federal charges related to the Jan. 2010 interstate kidnapping of Jeffrey Muller and was sentenced to a total of 25 years.