Criminal Who Killed Two at Courthouse Was a Great Guy, Says His Ex-Wife

Posted on | July 12, 2016 | 36 Comments

Cop-killer Larry Gordon in happier times.

Two bailiffs, Joseph Zangaro, 61, and Ronald Kienzle, 63, were killed and Berrien County Sheriff’s Deputy James Atterberry Jr. were wounded at a Michigan courthouse Monday when a prisoner tried to escape:

Larry Darnell Gordon, 44, of Coloma was apparently attempting to escape and tried to take hostages inside the Berrien County Courthouse when he shot and killed two bailiffs and wounded a deputy. . . .
“A preliminary investigation reveals that Larry Darnell Gordon disarmed one of the officers who were escorting him to a court hearing inside the Berrien County Courthouse,” Berrien County Sheriff Paul Bailey told reporters at a 9 p.m. Monday press conference. “After shooting the officers, Gordon briefly attempted to take hostages while other bailiffs and police officers in the courthouse engaged Gordon and he was shot and killed.”

Gordon, 44, had a criminal record dating back to 1992, when he was charged with robbery but copped a plea to a misdemeanor. In 1998, Gordon “pleaded guilty to felony fleeing a police officer and misdemeanor operating while intoxicated,” according to WZZM-TV, and in 2013, Gordon pleaded guilty to “second-offense misdemeanor driving while intoxicated or impaired and to felony theft from a building.” In April this year, Gordon was charged with very serious crimes — armed first-degree criminal sexual conduct, first-degree criminal sexual conduct during a felony, felony kidnapping, felony assault with a dangerous weapon and misdemeanor aggravated domestic violence — that could have put him in prison a long time. Despite this, his ex-wife said Gordon was a swell guy:

Gordon’s ex-wife, Jessica Gordon, 39, said Larry Gordon did it because he feared he would never be released and wanted to see his 6-year-old daughter.
“Larry was not a violent person,” she said Monday at the home they shared. “The only thing I can think of is that he was completely terrified, and people do things out of character when they’re scared. With all my heart I believe he was trying to get home to see Cheyenne (his daughter).” . . .
“He probably found out how much time he could potentially be looking at and wanted to get out to see us,” she said. “He thought he would die in prison.” . . .
She said she still loves him and that Tuesday would have been their 10-year wedding anniversary. She said they had been a couple for 19 years, and Cheyenne turns 7 on Saturday.

What struck me about this was how it echoes the narrative that the media always feed us whenever a black criminal gets shot by cops, or when a Muslim goes on a one-man jihad attack — oh, he was an honor student, and he loved his family, blah blah blah. So here we have a white guy who commits an atrocity and, yeah, his ex-wife wants to assure us that Larry Gordon was “not a violent person,” despite the numerous felonies he was accused of committing. Are there any activists on TV claiming that Larry Gordon was a victim of social injustice? No, because he was a heterosexual white male, and social justice rhetoric tells us that heterosexual white males are oppressors who benefit from “privilege.”

Larry Gordon was a thug, just like Michael Brown was a thug, and yet the media don’t seem to understand this. The media are always eager to buy into a prefabricated victimhood narrative — the innocent black man wrongly targeted by racist police — and facts be damned.

Don’t jump to conclusions and don’t believe everything people tell you — this is basic Journalism 101 stuff, and yet time after time, we see the media get bamboozled by professional “activist” types who peddle tales about innocent victims of racism, sexism and homophobia. No one can deny that such prejudices actually exist and cause real harm, but the media need to be sure they have the facts before they start turning the news into social justice sermons. Larry Gordon wasn’t a black guy or a gay guy or a transvestite like Bradley “Chelsea” Manning, so this incident at the Berrien County Courthouse is just a one-day crime story. Instead of having a “national conversation” about some kind of oppression, the media will quickly forget Larry Gordon.

Just a dead white criminal. Nothing to see here. Move long.

Category: Crime, Media Bias

Comments

36 Responses to “Criminal Who Killed Two at Courthouse Was a Great Guy, Says His Ex-Wife”

OrangeEnt
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:00 am

The Press: Wha? Who? Huh? Some white guy? Yeah, no story here. Let’s go report on our hero king talking today in Dallas. No need to write the story, it’s already done for us…….
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:03 am

I suspect a big part of this phenomenon is that, after such a horrible event, you don’t want to look like an idiot or worse, an enabler by saying “Oh yeah, he was a real violent bastard, I’m astonished he hasn’t done something like this before.”

Nope. He was a nice guy, treated you well, never gave any reason to suspect there might be a problem. Nobody is interviewed about his neighbor and says “You know, we all wondered why all those flight attendants and nurses went in and never came out. And in retrospect maybe we should have wondered about all those Hefty bags he’d drag out to his pickup after midnight. And that shrine to Jody Foster he built in his garage was a bit creepy, especially after he decorated it with all those dead rats.”

No, nobody saw anything.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:04 am

Since he grabbed a deputy’s gun it’s hard to blame this on the NRA.

Not that it stopped that mouth breathing moron Shannon Watts from doing exactly that. Because the NRA is all about stealing guns from law enforcement and killing people.
Kirby McCain
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:29 am

Liberal bullshit, they claim a shackled defendant influences the jury. Well, tough shit.In 2008, Brian Nichols was unshackled and allowed to change into a suit and tie before appearing in court. He overpowered a diminutive female deputy and took her weapon. He murdered a superior court judge, court reporter, deputy and a federal agent. He escaped from the courthouse in a suit and tie! Nobody should ever have to die because of this idiocy.
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:30 am

I think you’ll very seldom find someone charged with street crimes (as opposed to something like bank fraud) who actually was an honor student (unless the honor roll is a participation ribbon where they went to school). The New York State Statistical Yearbook reports the numbers on the educational attainment of state prisoners. The share with baccalaureate degrees is in the low-single digits.

And it does not surprise me one bit. A large share of the female population admire bad boys and people have many sides to them. He may have been congenial to her and the dynamics of their domestic disputes may have been such that it was water-under-the-bridge when they were over. Most women would call him handsome. I would wager only a minority of women find a man’s moral turpitude repellent as long as it is not directed at anyone palpable to them (and, in some cases, as long as it is not directed at the woman in his life, i.e. her).

http://www.metrolyrics.com/hes-a-rebel-lyrics-the-crystals.html
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:33 am

That would only apply to someone like a neighbor. The smart money says she was with him because she was actually fond of him.
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:36 am

He was convicted in 2008. The whole mess was in 2005. I do not understand why a quadruple murder is not an automatic death sentence in states which have capital punishment (bar Anthony Kennedy’s arbitrary sentiment that you shouldn’t have fixed rules as opposed to nebulous standards which allow for a lot of argy-bargy by lawyers).
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:40 am

A proper civil service examination for the bailiff’s job would include an athletic component which would have screened this broad out. How much you want to bet it wasn’t there because the corporation counsel told the civil service commission that some other county had to sign a consent decree to gut their requirements because federal judge?
Dana
July 12th, 2016 @ 10:55 am

And, since he wasn’t armed himself, but snatched a weapon off a bailiff, there’s no gun control story here, either.
Quartermaster
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:18 am

It would appear you need to familiarize yourself with the concept of hyperbole.
CrustyB
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:26 am

I saw a video on YouTube of a black man who shot a police officer to death during a traffic stop. The cop never withdrew her gun. A #BlackLivesMatter dream come true.
There’s a video on theYNC of a crazy white woman approaching a police officer with a knife in her hand. Cop shot her. No nationwide obsession about it.

When I turn on CNN, MSNBC, ABC, or CBS, are these videos slammed in my face 24-hours a days? Are there non-stop hour-long news panel discussions about these events? Of course not. White lives don’t matter. When white people get shot chimping out on a cop people say, hey, get violent with a cop, you get shot. Black person gets shot, the whole nation spazzes out with shouts or “racism.”
Jeanette Victoria ?????????
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:36 am

Oh come on you know it is the gun’s fault it enticed Larry Darnell Gordon to take it and kill the bailiffs.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:49 am

Maybe, love being blind and all.

On the other hand, there are plenty of abusive relationships where the abused member can’t leave because she (or he) is afraid of being alone.

People can rationalize and justify nearly anything.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:52 am

Black lives don’t matter either.

Not if they’re ended in a Democrat run city by gangbangers, anyway.
Dana
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:56 am

Jumping to a conclusion, I would bet a whole case of Mountain Dew that recreational pharmaceuticals were involved.
DeadMessenger
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:57 am

The problem in your example is “diminutive female deputy.” This is why women should not be cops. Or firemen. Or men’s underwear models.

The situation in the story at hand is not a diminutive anybody though. The problem in this story is complacency. Which means that maybe deputies need to be rotated out of courthouse duty, perhaps as often as monthly.

I can dig an older cop wanting to score that gig, thinking it’s a relatively safe way to finish your time until retirement. Who could blame him? But we see what carelessness does, and actually, it could’ve been a lot worse.
robcrawford2
July 12th, 2016 @ 11:57 am

“He was a nice guy, real outgoing.”

“Are you surprised at what he did?”

“Oh, no. He talked about killing Gumby all the time.”
Kirby McCain
July 12th, 2016 @ 12:03 pm

Anyone accused of violent criminal behavior should be restrained anywhere outside of a cell.
guinspen
July 12th, 2016 @ 12:26 pm

“Don’t jump to conclusions and don’t believe everything people tell you — this is basic Journalism 101 stuff, and yet time after time, we see the media get bamboozled by [whomevers]”

Was basic Jou-101 stuff.

And sure, just like all those bartenders, time after time, bamboozled poor Teddy Kenne*hic*.
Pelosi Schmelosi
July 12th, 2016 @ 1:42 pm

So here we have a white guy who commits an atrocity and, yeah, his
ex-wife wants to assure us that Larry Gordon was “not a violent person,”
despite the numerous felonies he was accused of committing.
——————————————————————

With just a few changes to that sentence, you could have described Hillary Clinton, and the #Narrative that protects her, perfectly.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 2:36 pm

I live in a rural county in Western WA, with one incorporated city. Town. Whatever.

The majority of court cases here are either domestic violence or drug related, meth being very common. Every now and then a single wide goes up in a magnificent fireball because chemistry is unforgiving and the learning curve is steep.

Anyway, that one town I mentioned? The largest employer is the timber company. Every time I drive through the theme from Twin Peaks runs through my mind.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 2:37 pm

But they should totally be SEALS and Army Rangers and Marine Rifleme- um, Riflepersons.
Dana
July 12th, 2016 @ 2:51 pm

Most women would call him handsome? Well, maybe, but, looking at the picture, he’s kind of out of her league, so p’raps she just has to defend him.
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 3:02 pm

I think you mean the majority of criminal cases. I’d wager you the majority of cases are civil disputes, or the sum of civil disputes, custody proceedings, probate, and bankruptcy. It is so in New York, which has a lower divorce rate than all but a few states.
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 3:04 pm

Always a pleasure doing business with you.
Joe Joe
July 12th, 2016 @ 3:50 pm

Women will excuse any man if they’re sleeping with him or want to.
DeadMessenger
July 12th, 2016 @ 3:55 pm

They should totally not. That’s an atrocity. Just the fact that any woman would even want to do those things calls her sanity into question. Some things are better left for persons with testicles, who are hormonally equipped, and just crazy enough to actually do them successfully.
GUEST
July 12th, 2016 @ 3:59 pm

The obvious question seems to be: if he was such a great guy, why is he your ex husband?
DeadMessenger
July 12th, 2016 @ 4:01 pm

Don’t know if I want to go down that road, on account of step two being to restrain anyone who might potentially commit violent criminal behavior, at which point, you and me and a bunch of others will be chained together, singing “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot”.
Art Deco
July 12th, 2016 @ 4:59 pm

She tried to trade-up and it didn’t work out.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 5:18 pm

Yes, actually. Crime in rural America tends to follow the same patterns across the country.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 5:21 pm

And let’s not even look into how men and women together will respond in the high stress of combat.

I mean, the Marines did a study on precisely that and found that mixed sex units performed much below all male ones. But SECNAV Mabus threw it out because, what the hell, Marines, right? What do they know?

I also find it intriguing that the two modern nations with experience of women in combat, Israel and Russia (or the USSR) do not have women in combat units today. And nobody has bothered to ask why not.
Kirby McCain
July 12th, 2016 @ 5:22 pm

If someone is in custody for or has a prior conviction for a violent crime they should be restrained anytime they are outside of a cell unless it’s playtime at the pokey playground.
Steve Skubinna
July 12th, 2016 @ 5:23 pm

No, Citizen, you have nothing to worry about! If you are indeed innocent the system will clear you!

And in any event, the fact that you’ve been accused of something must mean you’ve done something, correct?
RS
July 12th, 2016 @ 6:35 pm

Historically, the job of bailiff is given to sheriff’s deputies who are approaching retirement, at least in state courts. Federal courts have more robust federal marshals keeping order. Many, many years ago, I represented a defendant in a federal trial. He was unshackled, but had two big marshals sitting right behind him at counsel table at all times. He was brought in and unshackled before the jury entered and could only stand when the judge entered or left. At recesses, after jury was out of the courtroom, he was allowed to move from counsel table.
Joe Joe
July 12th, 2016 @ 8:34 pm

OT: RSM, FYI