A mother who was forced to rob the bank she managed after kidnappers strapped dynamite on her and her daughter’s bodies with fake dynamite is speaking out about how she helped investigators solve the case.
Michelle Renee, daughter Breea, then aged 7, and a roommate were held hostage for 14 hours after three masked gunman burst into their San Diego County home in November 2000.
The men told Ms Renee they had been staking out a Bank of America branch in Vista that she managed for months before targeting her home in the terrifying heist.
They warned her they would detonate the explosives if she refused to comply, and forced her to take $360,000 from the bank’s vault.
“It was very much that mind control thing that they were doing, that, ‘we know everything about you,’” Ms Renee told CBS’s 48 Hours in an episode screening on Saturday night.
After handing over the money, Ms Renee said she rushed home to find Breea hiding in a closet where she had been since the previous evening.
The police bomb squad examined the explosive device and realised it was a fake.
Ms Renee told 48 Hours that she recognised the one of the kidnappers’ eyes after the man had posed as a customer while casing the bank.
He had left a business card behind at the bank containing his real name, which became a crucial lead in cracking the case.
The suspect, Christopher Butler, had a history of bank robberies and was placed under surveillance. He was arrested 10 days later with his fiancee Lisa Ramirez, who police believed had planned the robbery with him.
The couple would later claim at trial that Ms Renee had been in on the heist, and defence lawyers mercilessly attacked her credibility on the witness stand, she told 48 Hours.
“They were trying to paint me as somebody that was irresponsible,” Ms Renee told the popular true crime show.
“A selfish, terrible mother... that... would do anything for money,” she added.
Butler was found guilty and was sentenced to several life sentences, but Ms Ramirez, who had denied any wrongdoing, was acquitted.
Ms Renee said she felt like a cloud of suspicion hung over her for decades, until in 2020, when Butler finally admitted she had nothing to do with the kidnapping at a parole hearing.
He was denied parole and remains behind bars.
In 2006, her book Held Hostage: The True Story of a Mother and Daughter's Kidnapping was published.
