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April 20, 2000 |
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Suspect known in neighborhood for bad temper |
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| Richard Jock Glassel threatened the local gardeners. He cursed at neighbors. He blocked the community mailboxes with his car. Neighbors who knew him didn't know Glassel well, but they all remembered one thing: his razor-edged anger. If neighbors' pets urinated in his yard, "he said he was going to kill those people," recalled Dottie Coleman, 65, who lived around the corner from Glassel's former home in the 20600 block of North 104th Avenue. What is remarkable is how little else anyone seemed to remember about Glassel and his wife, Susan, even though they lived in the Gardens at Ventana Lakes, a tidy Peoria retirement community, for nearly five years. Neighbors remembered Susan Glassel as a polite and gracious woman. But they said they kept their distance because her husband was overtly hostile to nearly everyone he came in contact with. "He was disgruntled, very much so," said Mike McCarthy, who lived about a block away. "He had been disgruntled with our community for a while. We don't know the reasons why, but he was disgruntled, probably, within his own mind." Dave Cruz/The Arizona Republic After Richard Glassel and his wife moved out of their duplex in the Gardens at Ventana Lakes last fall, the interior walls, doors and carpeting appeared to have been attacked with a chain saw. |
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Neighbors last remembered seeing Glassel before Wednesday's murderous rampage when he drove a rental truck up to his home last fall to empty its contents. The house had been repossessed in a foreclosure, and neighbors later discovered the inside had been vandalized. |
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Until Wednesday, it had been months since neighbors saw Glassel. Once cleanshaven, they did not recognize the bearded gunman. It is unclear if Glassel, 61, is from Arizona. His Social Security number was issued in Arizona, but he lived in the small Oklahoma town of Grove in the early 1990s. He and his wife bought their Peoria home in December 1994. Superior Court records say Richard Glassel has children living in California, but it is unclear how many or where. Oklahoma police said he was a law-abiding citizen during the time he lived there. According to court records, problems began almost as soon as the Glassels moved into their duplex, a one-story tan patio home purchased for $84,127. "The Glassels did not have an entirely smooth relationship with either the developer or the Ventana Lakes Property Association after they moved into their new home," attorney Kathleen Coughenour wrote in a document filed in a subsequent lawsuit. The Glassels wanted an awning added to the four-room home, but the association disallowed it because it was not from an approved vendor. Their air-conditioner "continually froze up during the summer, and they were advised by repairmen that it did so because it was too small for the home, but they were unsuccessful in getting the developer to replace it with a larger unit, despite numerous requests," Coughenour wrote. Then Glassel witnessed what he thought was a double standard. The association denied a variance sought by a property owner in another complex, but later granted that individual a variance over Glassel's protests "as soon as that property owner was elected to the (association) board," Coughenour wrote. The biggest tiff was over landscaping. According to Glassel's version of events, spelled out in court documents, he was allowed to assume most of the responsibility for landscaping his lot even though the association was legally charged with landscaping for the entire community. Under that agreement, Coughenour claimed, no work could be done by others without Glassel's approval. The dispute came to a head in June 1998, when new property managers and landscapers were hired by the association. Coughenour said the neighborhood "began to appear more like a barren wilderness" as all the neighborhood greenery was cut back. "When the landscapers attempted to scalp Richard and Susan's home as they had done to others, Richard refused to permit it," Coughenour said. In an October 1998 affidavit, Elaine Petrosino, former property manager for the association, denied Glassel was ever given permission to care for his own property. "I know that the landscapers would perform maintenance, care, repair and trimming of the bushes, plants and trees on Lot 47 (Glassel's), as well as mow the lawn," Petrosino said. "However, because Mr. Glassel always yelled at and threatened the landscapers when they came upon his lot, the landscape crew would wait until Mr. Glassel was not home to perform the maintenance and landscaping of trees, bushes and other foliage on Lot 47." Faced with Glassel's refusal to let the maintenance workers on his property, the association went to court. Susan Glassel went to California to stay with the couple's children while Richard "regularly picketed the developer's sales office," court documents state. The association got a Superior Court order preventing Glassel from hindering landscapers on his property again. When a process server tried to serve him the papers, he ran the server off with hostile words. Attorneys for the association claim Glassel also tried to run the server down with his car. Later, Glassel was asked under oath in court to recall the episode. Association attorney Penny L. Koepke said she asked him if he would have done the same to her, even though she is only 5 feet 5 and 120 pounds. "He said, 'I certainly would,' " Koepke recalled late Wednesday. "At that point, I thought the judge had heard enough." That behavior fit a pattern described by those who saw him daily. His dislike for his neighbors was palpable, they said. Lynda Kolb, 62, remembered him sitting in his yard taking pictures of residents as they picked up their mail from the community mailboxes in front of his place. Though Susan was once the president of the Garden Club, Kolb recalled that Richard would attend and prevent his wife from speaking. "It would make us all real mad," Kolb said. Joyce McGuiness, whose house shared a common area with the Glassels', said she went inside her home every time he stepped outdoors. Eventually, the court ordered Glassel to pay the association $1,081 in legal fees and interest. But when the association tried to garnishee his bank account, it had a balance of only $39. Court records show financial problems had occasionally hounded the couple, but that was apparently the last straw. By November 1999, the Glassels' mortgage lender had begun foreclosure proceedings. * * * Reach the reporter at Pat.Flannery@ArizonaRepublic.com or (602) 444-8629. Copyright 2000, Arizona Central Related articles • 1. Violence begets violence (4/22/2000) • 2. Heroes stop rampage (4/20/2000) • 3. Suspect known in neighborhood for bad temper (4/20/2000) • 4. Violence mars community's quiet lifestyle (4/20/2000) • 5. Violence by seniors likely to escalate (4/20/2000) • 6. Good folks, nice neighbors become violence victims (4/20/2000) • 7. Gunman told victims he was getting even (4/20/2000) • 8. Home foreclosure racket causing violence (4/20/2000) • 9. Complex's shooting puts homeowners groups in spotlight (4/20/2000) • 10.. 12 millions dollars for faulty buildings (4/15/2000) (Association lawyer Curtis Ekmark) • 11. Owners groups - ogres or godsends? (4/15/200)
Homeowner associations: Witnesses & Experts and Victims of political, legal and judicial corruption and abuse, including several of the victims mentioned in the above AHRC article, are available for broadcast interviews, government hearings and investigations. Please call, write or email requests to American Homeowners Resource Center. |
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The American Homeowners Resource Center P. O. Box 97 San Juan Capistrano, CA 92693 Telephone: (949) 366-2125 Website: http://www.ahrc.com Email: ahrc@ahrc.com © 1992 - 2000, AHRC News Services |
