commentary by Patrick H. Moore
I’m always amused by the cockamamie notion that fathers have to be weird about their daughters’ boyfriends. For example, in another lifetime, I used to work as an estimator in a sheet metal shop at Land’s End down by the East Palo Alto junkyards in Northern California.
Our General Manager, who was known as Big Pat, and I were more or less pals. We’d play basketball at lunch and talk about the Lakers and the Warriors. Dude knew everything about sports and had been an ace pitcher as a kid who was not at all shy about resorting to the old brush back when the situation called for it. In fact, he told me with considerable pride that he had once nailed two batters in a row to get out of a jam, no mean feat.
Dude also gleefully described how he was going to handle his daughters’ boyfriends (he had three little girls).
“Our bedroom is at the top of the stairs and if I lie in bed with my 12-gauge with the door open (something he may have enjoyed doing given that he weighed in at a solid 305), I can sight right down the stairs. Any time any punks try sneaking up the stairs to get fresh with any of my girls (all the bedrooms were upstairs), I can mow ‘em down before they’re halfway up the stairs. KA-BOOM!”
Big Pat was like a cartoon character in some respects and I really did like him, even though we disagreed on almost everything.
Since that was many years ago, Dude’s daughters are all grown up now and he’s no doubt had plenty of chances to blow his daughters’ boyfriends to Kingdom Come. Hopefully though, he’s managed to control himself…
Shannon Kepler, a 24-year-veteran with the Tulsa Police force, was not able to control himself on August 5th when he shot and killed his adopted daughter Lisa’s brand new boyfriend, 19-year-old Jeremy Lake, with his wife, Gina, also a long-term veteran of the Tulsa force, riding shotgun in his truck.
Now admittedly, Lisa was somewhat of a handful and reportedly suffers from Reactive Attachment Disorder, which apparently means she is unable to socialize normally. Her parents, Shannon and Gina, had apparently had it “up to here” with her and had “booted” the 18-year-old out of their house, dropping her off at the Tulsa Day Center for the Homeless, a few days before Shannon allegedly murdered Jeremy.
Sasha Goldstein writes of the New York Daily News writes:
A Tulsa police officer who gunned down his daughter’s boyfriend was charged with first-degree murder Monday stemming from the off-duty shooting of the transient teen.
Shannon Kepler, 54, was also charged with shooting with intent to kill because he aimed and fired at his daughter, 18-year-old Lisa Kepler, during the deadly Aug. 5 confrontation, prosecutors said.
(Although Big Pat might have conceivably shot and killed one of his daughter’s suitors, I don’t believe he would have also have tried to take a piece out of his own flesh and blood.)
Now here’s the deal: If you, as a parent, dump your obstreperous daughter off at a shelter as some kind of “tough love” gesture, it stands to reason that she’s going to hook up with someone, and Lisa, whatever her faults may or may not be, is not an unattractive young lady.
And sure enough, it didn’t take Lisa long before she and Jeremy were a duo. If fact, within a few days, Jeremy had allegedly invited Lisa to move in with him at his aunt’s house and she did.
So a few days later, Shannon and Gina are off-duty and they drive over to Jeremy’s aunt’s house. Sasha Goldstein writes:
Shannon Kepler allegedly pulled up to Lake’s aunt’s house, where the two teens were staying, and opened fire. Lake was killed and left lying in the street while Lisa Kepler cowered behind a bush as her father shot at her, she told the Tulsa World.
Her mother was sitting in the front seat of the black SUV.
“I really hope they rot in prison for a very long time,” Kepler sobbed as she addressed reporters the day after the shooting.
This is nasty. Shannon Kepler should not have shot and killed Jeremy, who wasn’t necessarily a bad kid (and even if he was a bad kid, that’s no reason to murder him), and then firing at his poor troubled daughter (assuming he did) is way over the top. Kepler is scheduled to appear in court on Tuesday to face the charges.
Kepler’s arrest followed Lisa phoning the police and turning him in for the shooting. Her version of the events is as follows:
She and Lake were walking home when a black SUV pulled up and her dad got out, shouting at her.
“I walked away and Jeremy tried to introduce himself, and my dad shot him,” KJRH-TV reported.
Lisa’s mother “Gina Kepler was originally arrested for being an accessory after the fact of murder and later released on $30,000 bond, but prosecutors decided to drop charges for lack of evidence.”
Gina’s attorney Scott Troy told the Associated Press they’re “taking it one day at a time” and that “it’s unclear if she’ll remain with the police department.”
To their credit, the Tulsa authorities appears to be handling this like any other seemingly open-and-shut homicide:
“We’ll treat this like we treat any other case,” Tulsa County District Attorney Tim Harris told KJRH. “Shannon Kepler, because he is a police officer, won’t get any special treatment. We will go forward like we do with every prosecution.”
* * * * *
Now although it’s been reported that 18-year-old Lisa suffers from Reactive Attachment Disorder, it would not seem inappropriate to suggest that Shannon Kepler may suffer from the exact same condition. The big difference is, though, he had a gun and appears to have shot Jeremy Lake (assuming the reports are accurate) like he was shooting fish in a barrel.