One of the three men responsible for the 1976 kidnapping of dozens of children and burying them alive has been approved for parole.

Frederick Woods, 70, was found no longer to be a threat to the public and deemed suitable for parole after spending 44 years in prison. The decision came during Woods’s 18th parole hearing after he pleaded guilty to kidnapping 26 children and their bus driver in Chowchilla, California, and holding them for $5 million ransom in the largest kidnapping in U.S. history. All the victims survived.