July 12-Berrien County Sheriff Paul Bailey confirmed at a Monday press conference that two court bailiffs – both retired police officers – were killed and the suspect, an unidentified man, was shot and killed by police inside the county courthouse in downtown St. Joseph. He shot and killed two bailiffs, and wounded the deputy and a civilian woman.
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People scrambled for cover inside the Berrien County Courthouse in St. Joseph in the southwestern corner of MI, about 100 miles northeast of Chicago. During the “extensive scuffle”, Bailey said Gordon disarmed the deputy and shot him in the arm before firing at two bailiffs, 61-year-old Joseph Zangaro and 63-year-old Ronald Kienzle, a short distance away.
At the time of the shooting, a report via woodtv told how a sheriff was escorting Larry Gordon, who’s been indicted on a series of charges including, sexual assault, kidnapping and domestic violence when he overpowered the deputy and took his gun before firing off shots.
Bailey said he didn’t know whether the inmate was handcuffed.
Two bailiffs were shot dead during a scuffle with a prisoner turned gunman inside a MI courthouse on Monday, that left two people wounded before police officers killed the shooter, a county sheriff said.
“Our hearts are torn apart”, Bailey continued. They were our friends, they were my colleagues. Zangaro and Kienzle were 30-year law-enforcement veterans.
The country’s top law enforcement official offered to help MI authorities following a deadly shooting at a southwest MI courthouse. This is a particularly tough time for law enforcement.
“Together we can pull through it and hopefully come out strong”.
“We need prayers and the families need your prayers especially”. He retired from the Michigan State Police as commander of the Bridgman Post in Berrien County.
The inmate is identified as Larry Darnell Gordon, 45, from Coloma.
He had been taken from a holding cell and was being moved to a third-floor courtroom for an arraignment hearing when he began struggling with Atterbury, Bailey said. Just like in an airport, people must remove belts and coins from their clothing and put them in a basket to go through an imaging system.
A jail inmate trying to escape from the western MI courthouse wrested a gu. She said they were respectful and comforting. They had been married 19 years. “I mean, it could’ve been way worse than what it is”, said his uncle Robert Atterberry.
Berrien County Circuit Judge Charles LaSata was on the bench when all of it happened.
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State Police have taken over the investigation and their forensics experts are going through the courthouse, which will be closed Tuesday.
