Last weekend I blogged the story of Dennis J. Saban, a 43-year-old man who had turned himself in on drug charges in an attempt to make a fresh start in his life, who was then housed with a violent murder that beat him to death in his cell.

Today the Oregonian has a front-page story uncovering the confusion Multnomah County jail officials had about the violent nature of the 22-year-old convicted murderer Tommy Gordon of Vancouver, Washington.

Two internal documents tell conflicting stories about whether Multnomah County jail staff knew how violent convicted murderer Tommy Gordon was when he arrived in Portland in late May.

An internal e-mail says jail officials tried for two weeks — without success — to get Gordon’s prison records from Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla, where he spent the past 31/2 years.

But another internal “safety alert” — a flier apparently distributed within the jail — says Washington prison officials warned almost immediately that Gordon was a threat to inmates and staff.

But as you read the story, it becomes clear that everyone who ever came into contact with Tommy Gordon in the criminal justice system could plainly see the man was an unpredictable, violent psychopath. Here’s the basic timeline of the story. You tell me whether it ever made sense to place Gordon in a cell with a non-violent middle-aged drug offender. (I’ve placed the timeline as accurately as I can from the article; approximate dates are in parentheses, unproven claims are listed in italics.)

1. 2001 – 18-year-old Tommy Gordon shoots an acquaintence in the back of the head while driving in Vancouver.
2. 2002 – Clark County judge sentences Gordon to 33 years in prison. Sentencing is influenced by the judge noting Gordon’s record of violent outbursts while awaiting trial.
3. 2002-2005 – While in prison in Walla Walla, Gordon repeatedly assaults staff and other inmates. He spends all but two months in solitary confinement.
4. Early 2005 – Portland police want to bring Gordon to Oregon to face charges of murdering a Portland man, Vernon Moranville (that would be Gordon’s second confirmed murder) in his home in 2001. Portland police had no reason to believe Moranville’s death was foul play until Gordon himself contacted them while serving his murder sentence in Walla Walla.
5. May 25, 2005 – Gordon is transferred from prison in Walla Walla to Umatilla (OR) county jail. Walla Walla officers explain to Umatilla officers that Gordon is unpredictably violent (“All I was told was that he was a problem, and I had a separate cell waiting for him,” said Umatilla County sheriff’s Cpl. Tony Norris.)
6. May 25, 2005 – Multnomah County officers arrive to pick up Gordon from Umatilla County. Cpl. Norris warns the Multnomah sheriffs about Gordon’s violent tendencies, and they respond by keeping Gordon in a separate area of the bus for the trip.
7. May 30, 2005 – Gordon spends five days among the general inmate population at Multnomah County jail without any violent incidents. The Oregonian publishes a story about Gordon, noting the the Clark County judge’s pronouncements on Gordon’s violent tendencies. Multnomah sheriffs respond by placing Gordon in solitary confinement.
8. (May 31, 2005?) After the article appears, Multnomah Sgt. Scott Johnson claims he gave orders to jail staff to “gather the inmate’s history from any jurisdictions [Clark County, Walla Walla prison, and anywhere else] in Washington State.” Walla Walla prison officials say, however, that Multnomah County never formally asked for any information about Gordon until after his cellmate, Dennis Saban, was fatally assaulted.
9. June 1, 2005 – A safety alert flier, dated June 1, is distributed out at Multnomah with Gordon’s mug shot. The flier says [Walla Walla] Washington prison officials were contacted, and “we discovered that Gordon does indeed have a recent history of both staff and inmate assaults. Extreme caution should be used when in contact with this inmate.”
10. (June 13, 2005?) – Sgt. Johnson claims he receives information on Gordon from Clark County jail, but no infomation from Walla Walla prison. Johnson assumes the reports of Gordon’s violence come only from his 2002 Clark County stay and not from his more recent time at Walla Walla prison.
11. June 13, 2005 – Dennis Saban turns himself in on drug charges. According to his uncle:

“He turned himself in to the jail to get this behind him and get his life straightened around,” said Marvin Buck, Saban’s uncle.

Saban had struggled with drug problems but had been through treatment programs, Buck said.

“He decided he’d had enough of this lifestyle,” Buck said.

12. June 16, 2005 – Saban is beaten to unconsciousness in the cell he shares with Gordon. According to Willamette Week:
    

    “An inmate in the same Multnomah County Jail unit where Dennis Saban was mortally beaten by a cellmate says the deputy responsible for the unit was nowhere to be seen during the June 16 attack. John Sigismondi, jailed on a menacing charge, tells WW that he began hearing screams and the dull noise of flesh hitting the stainless-steel toilet before breakfast, which is served after 7:30 am. He says the screaming continued for about 15 minutes, and the blows for another 10 minutes after that. Several minutes later, Sigismondi says, a deputy came in to find Saban, who had been in the same cell as Thomas Allen Gordon, a convicted murderer with a history of jailhouse aggression. (Saban died about two weeks after the beating.) A Sheriff’s Office spokesman says the beating happened after 8:30 am, and that the deputy left for only about 15 minutes.”

13. June 17, 2005 – Johnson sends an e-mail to jail staff, claiming that after the May 30 Oregonian article the request was made of Washington officials for details on Gordon’s history of violence. He makes the claim that only info from Clark County was received and nothing from Walla Walla prison was received. Johnson ends his e-mail by saying that if he had known about Gordon’s violence in prison, “this inmate would have remained in (solitary confinement) for his entire stay.“
14. June 29, 2005 – Saban dies at OHSU hospital.

Does anyone else here smell a cover-up? It’s bad enough that Saban was trying to turn over a new leaf and escape the lifestyle of his drug addictions and that meant having to go to jail. This is another reason why the prohibitionist mentality must be challenged; Saban deserved a new lease on life and he deserved the help of medical treatment, not the punishment of jail. He certainly did not deserve to die for his legal mistakes or the mistakes of Multnomah County jail officials that either didn’t have the sense to keep him separated from a convicted murderer and known psycho or at least weren’t aware that he was a known psycho.

Note for Multnomah County officials: from now on, when someone’s in your jail facing their SECOND murder charge, go ahead and just assume they are an unpredictable violent psycho. If you had to bring them over segregated on the bus and then you place them in solitary for fifteen days, go ahead and assume they may be a problem child. And if you just have to put them back in the regular jail population, place them with another violent psycho, preferably a bigger one.