A Santa Fe real-estate agent who was kidnapped while showing a vacant home two years ago and then forced to withdraw $8,000 from her bank account says she hopes her kidnapper can straighten her life out.

"This was an intelligent girl that came up with an elaborate scheme to get money from an innocent person," Realtor Marilyn Foss said Monday. "She was savvy. She knew how to get around on the Internet. ... I just hope she can get her life together and makes something of it when she gets out of prison."

Sarah Susanna Ochoa, 26, agreed late last week to a plea bargain calling for an eight-year prison sentence, a fine of up to $250,000 and restitution. U.S. District Judge William Johnson can reduce the fine but not the jail term when he sentences Ochoa on March 11.

Ochoa pleaded guilty to one count of kidnapping and one count of interfering with federal commerce.

When Foss got a call on Dec. 3, 2007, she said, Ochoa spoke in a fake Middle Eastern accent. Foss said she has helped other foreigners find properties in Santa Fe and didn't suspect anything out of the ordinary when Ochoa asked to meet her at the downtown public library instead of at her office.

Realtors "are a trusting group of people that like to serve and help other people," Foss said. "We don't judge everyone we meet."

According to the Real Estate Safety Council, more than 200 real-estate agents were killed between 1982 and 2000 while showing empty houses. In 2004, Realtor Garland Taylor was shot to death by a man pretending to be a prospective buyer of a $1 million home in an Albuquerque suburb.

After visiting one house in Tesuque, Ochoa and Foss went to another, off Tano Road, where Ochoa pulled out a toy gun that looked like a semi-automatic pistol, threatened to shoot Foss and ordered her to strap what she said was a bomb onto her body, walk into a bank and demand $500,000.

"She's saying, 'You put this bomb on or Hasheim will have me kill you,' " Foss said. "And this is with a gun at my head. ... I kept telling her I had the $8,000 in my bank account and we could go and get that money. ...

"She tried to tape my hands behind my back ... (but) she couldn't ... because the tape stuck together. She had a very detailed plan of what she wanted to accomplish ... which didn't happen because I struggled with her. And it ended up with her sitting on my chest for about a half-hour and finally she said, 'OK, you don't have to wear the bomb. Let's just go get the money.' "

Foss then drove Ochoa to the Los Alamos National Bank office at 301 Griffin St., where Foss withdrew $8,000 in $20 and $100 bills. Foss said she tried to get the bank clerk's attention by writing "bomb" and "help" on his desk blotter, and pulling down her sweater to reveal a device taped to her chest that Ochoa had said was a microphone. But Foss said the clerk didn't notice, even as Ochoa stood behind her with an improvised "burqa" over her face and told the clerk not to count the money.

Once they left the bank, Foss handed Ochoa the bag of money, told Ochoa she was not going with her and then walked back into the bank to report the robbery. Ochoa left on foot. "I could be dead now," Foss said. "If I had gotten back in my car with her, I don't know what would have happened to me."

In the plea agreement, Ochoa admitted that:

• On Nov. 29, 2007, she created a fake e-mail account at the Rio Rancho Library and began contacting real-estate agents in Albuquerque and Santa Fe.
• She identified herself as "Nata Ramien," a Lebanese citizen who with her husband, "Hasheim," wanted to buy a home for their daughter who had graduated from Yale Medical School and was taking a job in Santa Fe.
• On Dec. 3, 2007, she arranged to meet Foss at the Santa Fe Public Library on Washington Avenue, less than a block away from Foss' office at Sotheby's International Realty.
• To disguise her identity, Ochoa wore a lavender "burqa" over her face that she fashioned from a piece of cloth she bought at Walmart.

Authorities finally took Ochoa into custody on April 11, 2008, after the tattoo of a pair of lips on her left hand that Foss had noted was recognized by someone at the Tamaya Resort at Santa Ana Pueblo, where Ochoa was working as a waitress.

She was jailed initially, but released to an Albuquerque halfway house three months later. Following a plea hearing Thursday, Johnson ordered U.S. marshals to take Ochoa into custody again.

Ochoa's defense attorney, Caroline "Cammie" Nichols, said her client had been financially desperate because she couldn't pay the mortgage on a Rio Rancho house that had lost so much value that it was no longer worth what Ochoa had borrowed on it.

"She was one of the people who basically fell victim to the mortgages based on greed, essentially, and didn't see a way out," Nichols said.

After her arrest, Ochoa filed for bankruptcy on Sept. 23, 2008, claiming $234,859 in debts, mostly for the house. That meant she had monthly obligations of $2,175.25 and an average monthly income of only $2,172.64.

Shortly after the kidnapping incident, Ochoa took a job as a $10.48-an-hour parking attendant for the city of Santa Fe on Dec. 17, 2007. A California native who has family in Albuquerque and attended The University of New Mexico, Ochoa previously had worked for the Santa Fe office of the Rothstein, Donatelli, Hughes, Dalstrom, Schoenburg & Fry law firm, where her lawyer, Nichols, works. Ochoa also designed Web sites for another Realtor at the same Sotheby's office where Foss works.

After the robbery, Ochoa reportedly deposited $2,400 in cash into her bank account and bought money orders to pay off some debts. But a U.S. Justice Department spokesman said Monday that none of the stolen money has been recovered. Los Alamos National Bank agreed to cover the loss from Foss' account.

Foss said she appreciates the efforts of the FBI, the U.S. Attorney's Office and the news media in the case, as well as her many friends and strangers who called to leave messages of support.

"I'm just really glad it's over and I can move on," she said. "It's been hanging over my head."

Contact Tom Sharpe at 986-3080 or tsharpe@sfnewmexican.com.