The CEO of Exxon, Reso was kidnapped from the driveway of his home in Morris Township, New Jersey. For the next few weeks, the FBI and investigators received several confusing phone calls and letters leading them to various points throughout Morris and Somerset Counties. Sidney Reso was kidnapped in the early morning hours of April 29, 1992. The following are links to newspaper articles about the kidnapping and murder of Exxon Oil executive Sidney Reso: People Magazine – July 6, 1992: Hoping Against Hope The New York Times – July 1, 1992: Twisted Tale of a Kidnapping And of Dreams Gone Wrong New York Daily News – May 22, 2010: Ransom gone bad Exxon oil executive Sidney Reso killed in kidnap try by Arthur and Irene … The reason for the crime was likely an inability to sustain their expensive lifestyle, the. Sydney Reso was the victim. The couple dumped his body in Bass River State Park. In June 2009, she was transferred to a halfway house in the Midwest. Arthur Seale (born 1947), of Hillside, New Jersey, and his wife Irene were responsible for the kidnapping and murder of Sidney Reso, the Vice President of International Operations for Exxon on April 29, 1992, in Morris Township, New Jersey.The case garnered national notoriety. (Newark, New Jersey: Gary Matsumoto) Kidnapping of Exxon International president Sidney Reso featured; scenes shown of area near the New Jersey shore where his body was found; photos shown of suspects Arthur and Irene Seale. Exterior of the Sidney Reso home is photographed April 29, 1992 in Morris Township, New Jersey. Reso kidnapping and murder. He attended A.P. There were plenty of theories, but all that was known on the morning of April 29, 1992, was that at 7:30 a.m., Reso had left his $683,000 ranch-style brick home in Morris Township, N.J. [5], After Irene pleaded guilty, she cooperated with police in exchange for a reduced prison sentence. His body was found on June 27, 1992, after the arrest of ex-policeman Arthur Seale and his wife Irene. On a practical level, kidnapping is a high-risk business that can immediately bring to bear federal law enforcement resources, specifically the FBI. Whereas Sidney Reso was a man who believed in hard work and perseverance to provide for his family, Art Seale was lazy and unambitious. Four days earlier, he was abducted from the driveway of his Morris Township, New Jersey, home. Ed Petersen – Exxon Oil Executive Kidnapping, Sidney Reso from FBI Retired Case File Review on Podchaser, aired Thursday, 8th March 2018. The largest kidnapping investigation happened on April 29, 1992, when Reso’s car was found in the driveway, with the engine on idle. Sidney Reso may seem like a typical American tragedy. In response to one of the letters, Reso's wife Patricia made two public appearances on TV, pleading for her husband's safe return. Sidney Reso, shown at right, would never come home, thanks to his kidnappers, Arthur and Irene Seale. Despite his death, … Retired agent Ed Petersen served with the FBI for more than 27 years. Morris Elementary, and Hillside High School. [2] Seale graduated from Admiral Farragut Academy in 1965. A standing-room audience packed the Morristown & … During that call, an agent noticed a man picking up a public phone wearing latex rubber gloves. On April 29, Irene jogged past Reso's driveway, and deliberately kicked his paper away, so Reso would be forced to walk a longer distance to pick it up. Suspicious, she took down his license plate number as he drove off. Get premium, high resolution news photos at Getty Images She then entere… Nearly three decades later, the 1992 kidnap and murder of Exxon executive Sidney Reso still reverberates in Greater Morristown. When Reso saw a wooden box in the back of Arthur's van, he tried to break free. Childhood. In 1992, Irene Seale and her husband grabbed Sidney Reso, the 57-year-old president of Exxon Co, in the driveway of his Morris Township, New Jersey home. In 1992, Irene Seale and her husband grabbed Sidney Reso, the 57-year-old president of Exxon Co, in the driveway of his Morris Township, New Jersey home. [7], "Portrait of 2 Accused of Kidnapping: Ardent, Hapless Pursuit of Affluence", "Ransom gone bad Exxon oil executive Sidney Reso killed in kidnap try by Arthur and Irene Seale", "Find an inmate – Arthur D Seale (Register Number: 15882-050, Located at: Fairton FCI, Release Date: March 24, 2075)", "Officials Say Body in Forest Is Sidney Reso", "Find an inmate – Irene J Seale (Register Number: 15881-050, Released On: November 20, 2009)", Reso's Last Days: How an $18.5 million kidnapping was botched from the start, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Arthur_Seale&oldid=984079936, People convicted of murder by the United States federal government, Articles with unsourced statements from December 2018, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 18 October 2020, at 01:33. The next day, police received a phone call from a woman claiming to be Reso's kidnapper, directing them to a letter in a highway street sign. In this episode of FBI Retired Case File Review, he … For example, when Ed Petersen, an FBI agent whose expertise was in kidnapping, went to Sidney Reso’s house for the first time, O’Rourke writes, “‘We didn’t know,’ said Petersen, ‘if we had a kidnapping [or] if it was an actual abduction.’ There was no ‘signs of struggle.’ During the investigation, the FBI followed up on several clues, including one eyewitness seeing a white van near Reso's home on the morning of his abduction, a blonde woman seen jogging frequently in the area, and hair belonging to a Golden Retriever found in one of the letters. She will be supervised by the U.S. Retired agent Ed Petersen served with the FBI for more than 27 years. Seale’s husband, Arthur, was a former police officer and an Exxon employee in charge of supervising guards supplied to the company by a contractor, the Times reports. O n May 3, 1992, Exxon executive Sidney Reso dies in a storage vault in New Jersey. While they negotiated for his release for 52 days, what investigators didn’t know was that Reso had been shot in the arm during the kidnapping, and had died three days later. With Wayne Allsop, Stephen W. Blackwell, Elizabeth Ann Koshak, Dan Sanders. The case garnered national notoriety. Although the FBI had the money ready and waited outside the restaurant for over an hour, the kidnappers never showed up. [6] Irene was sentenced to 20 years in prison; she was released in November 2009. For 17 years, an attractive mom of two from what’s been described as an “average family,” has been in the Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, teaching Pilates and serving time for a tragic kidnapping that led to the death of an Exxon executive. Episode 83: Kidnapping of Exxon Executive Sidney Reso In 1992, Exxon executive Sidney Reso was kidnapped from the driveway of his New Jersey home. He put up a struggle and his captors, Arthur and Irene Seale, shot him in the arm. [4], Seale pleaded guilty to the kidnapping and murder of Sidney Reso. The Seales were captured less than two months after the kidnapping, as the couple began to betray each other, according to the Times. In it, the kidnappers claimed to be members of the Greenpeace Environmentalist group who were furious at Exxon after the Exxon Valdez oil spill three years earlier, as well as the 1985 deliberate Sinking of the Rainbow Warrior that killed Greenpeace photographer Fernando Pereira. Prior to the abduction of Reso, Irene frequently jogged in his neighborhood, in order to monitor his daily routine. JERSEY - Exterior of the Sidney Reso home is photographed April 29, 1992 in Morris Township, New Jersey. Seale's father was a Hillside police officer. Arthur Seale (born 1947), of Hillside, New Jersey,[1] and his wife Irene were responsible for the kidnapping and murder of Sidney Reso, the Vice President of International Operations for Exxon on April 29, 1992, in Morris Township, New Jersey. Seale arrived in that car soon after, while the agents were still present, and was arrested.