Do you have to be reckless or seasoned to dare to kidnap, in broad daylight, the only daughter of the famous designer Calvin Klein? Let’s say unconscious. The “brain” of the kidnapping, which takes place on February 3, 1978 in New York, is Dominique Ransay, a 19-year-old kid who is developing an action plan called “55 days plan”: for nearly two months, he studies the 11-year-old Marci Klein’s daily commute tracks the bus she takes to get to the Dalton School, an upscale middle school in Manhattan, as well as her father’s habits and activities, stashing hours outside his apartment building on the Upper East Side.
The eccentric idea arises in the post-adolescent, originally from Martinique and occasional diver at the restaurant La Potagerie, on the Ve Avenue, discovering a photo published in a Spanish magazine. He sees his half-sister, Paule Ransay, next to Calvin Klein, accompanying little Marci and her classmates to the premiere of the musical Beatlemaniaon Broadway. “But you mix with rich and famous people! », Dominique reportedly told Paule. At 24, the latter, a waitress in the same establishment as her brother, is also one of Marci’s extra babysitters. The idea is simple: kidnap the little girl and demand a $100,000 ransom from her father. The indispensable Paule is enlisted in the scheme.
A Harlem Apartment
If, at the time, Calvin Klein had not yet built the empire that made his name, he is on the right track. “At the end of the 1970s, he was, along with Ralph Lauren and Donna Karan, one of the most prominent fashion designers in New York. He is also a well-known personality. We see it at Studio 54, New York’s must-see nightclub, and in the gossip pages of magazines. For many, he embodies success and the American dream.explains Nancy Deihl, American fashion historian and professor at New York University.
“He first thought it was a joke in bad taste. And then he learned that Marci was indeed missing from school” – Steven Gaines, Calvin Klein biographer
On the morning of February 3, each his role. Paule picks up Marci at her school bus stop near the home of her mother, Jayne Center Klein, who has been separated from her husband for four years. She persuades the little girl to follow her by making her believe that her sick father wants her at the hospital. We can imagine the emotion of the child, especially as she quickly notices that the taxi does not take the direction of any hospital, but goes to Paule’s apartment, in the Harlem district, in the north of Manhattan. Marci is gagged and confined in a room by the third member of the team, Cecil Wiggins, a friend of Dominique. She can also see Paule playing the victim, pretending to be a gang hostage too.
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