One of the players in a group arrested and charged in a May plot to kidnap a Vernal child gave testimony about the plot during a preliminary hearing in 8th District Court last
week. 32-year-old Beth Marilyn Schardine, 36-year-old Ty Lucero Whetten, and
24-year-old Kaitlyn Anne Bachman were arrested in Vernal on May 15th after forcefully
entering the child’s biological and custodial father’s home in Uintah County with the
alleged intention of taking the child, who was home at the time. Police arrived, the plot
was foiled, and Schardine, Whetten, and Bachman were taken into custody and charged
with felony kidnapping and burglary. In the months that followed, more individuals were
arrested. In August, 52-year-old Amanda Kaye Bachman, the maternal biological
grandmother of the child, was arrested and charged for her role in the kidnapping plot and
in September, the biological but non-custodial mother of the child, 31-year-old Lindsey
Colleen Morrell, was taken into custody on charges resembling the other group members.
In September, Schardine entered pleas of Guilty to Kidnapping and Burglary charges that
were reduced from 1st Degree to 2nd Degree Felonies and last week she took the stand
about the kidnapping plot. Schardine stated that her mother, Amanda Kay Bachman, was
the mastermind behind the kidnapping plot, convincing the three who committed the act
in May that the child needed to be rescued and the custody orders of the child were not
done legally. Amanda Bachman, who traveled with the group to Vernal, was giving them
instructions leading up to the trio’s kidnapping attempt and consequent arrest. Plans to
kidnap the child allegedly began in January of this year after Utah County Sheriff’s
deputies visited Amanda Bachman’s Goshen residence with a “Writ of Assistance to
Remove a Child” to return the child that was in the home to the girl’s custodial father in
Uintah County. Arraignments for Amanda Bachman, Kaitlyn Bachman, and Whetten are
all scheduled in December. Schardine’s sentencing is scheduled for December 17th.
