Archive for July 23, 2010

Two people were killed and another shot Friday afternoon during a domestic dispute at a Stillwater apartment complex that ended in a shootout with police.

A man shot and killed his wife and shot and injured her daughter around 4:30 p.m. after he grew angry that his wife, worried about his health, had called for an ambulance to come pick him up. When police responded, he got into a shootout with them and was killed.

The incident occurred at the Victoria Villa apartment complex, 1451 Greeley St. S.

The man was identified by neighbors as Gerald Propps, 62. He lived on the first level of the building with his wife, Trudy, also 62. Trudy was taken to Regions Hospital where she later died. The daughter, who was not identified, was treated and released at Lakeview hospital for a bullet wound to the arm.

It was unexpected fury of violence from a quiet couple neighbors said.

Kathleen Gavegnano, 79, had been waiting for her pastor to bring her dinner Friday afternoon when she heard a commotion in the hallway.

Wondering what it was, she opened to the door to see Trudy on the ground, bleeding from the stomach. Propps’ daughter and another neighbor, Bobby Yates, were tending to her in the hallway.

“I looked down and I knew,” Gavegnano said. Yates told her to get back into her apartment, at which point her pastor arrived.

“We went into the apartment and started praying,” she said. “But when the bullets started coming through my kitchen, we hit the floor.”

Bullets began spraying out of the walls of the Propps’ apartment across the hallway, several ripping through Gavegnano’s kitchen cabinets (Kitchen cabinets are the built-in furniture installed in many kitchens for storage of food, cooking equipment, and often silverware and dishes for table service. Appliances such as refrigerators, dishwashers, and ovens are often integra, a cutting board and ricocheting off of her stove.

“It was just horrendous, it was horrific,” she said. “It just happened so quick.”

The bullets had started again after Stillwater Police officer Brad Allen, a 15-year-veteran of the force, went into the apartment.

Yates said Allen asked Gerald Propps three times to put the gun down. When he didn’t, shooting ensued.

“I froze,” Yates said. He stood and saw bullets popping out of the walls on either side of him.

Stillwater Police Sgt. Jeff Stender said Allen would be placed on routine administrative leave while the investigation of the shooting is being done.

“[Allen] seems to be doing well at this point, based on what he’s been through,” Stender said. “I think he did a fabulous job. It’s unfortunate what had to occur, but he saw what was occurring and took the necessary steps to prevent any further loss of life.”

Gavegnano, who in January will have lived in the building 30 years, was in shock Saturday afternoon.

She’d been close with both Gerald and Trudy. She said the Propps had been childhood sweethearts, but had each gotten married to other people. But both of their first marriages had ended. Seven years ago, they finally married.

They had both served in the armed forces, she in the Navy and he in the Army. Gerald had served as a sheriff’s deputy in Kentucky.

They seemed like a happy couple, Gavegnano said, there were no signs of any problems.

“He was a southern gentleman,” she said. “There were no domestics, there was none of that. That’s what so traumatizing about he whole thing. They were good people.”

But Gerald had been deteriorating in health. Gavegnano said he’d had an aneurysm and was scheduled to have surgery this next week.

He was on heavy medication, and over the last year his health had diminished dramatically, Yates said.

“He went from about 200 pounds down to like 120 in eight months,” he said.

Trudy, who worked as the apartment manager during days and at Wal-Mart stocking shelves at night, had been worried about his health and called 911 Friday about just that, Gavegnano said.

“When they said he had to go in, it just sent him right over the edge,” she said. “He wasn’t ready to go yesterday.”

“They were good hearted people,” Gavegnano added. “He just went over the edge. He just snapped.”

Allen was hired part-time by the police department in 1990, and hired on full time at the department in 1995. He’s served on patrol and as an investigator. He is currently a field-training officer and a certified drug recognition expert, according to Stillwater Police.

Yates, the neighbor who’d helped Trudy during the shooting, said the fact that it had happened just a few doors down was still hard to handle.

“It’s a shock when it happens right down your hallway,” he said. But the bigger shock, he said, was who was involved.

“It’s sad,” he said. “Stress does things to people that nobody can understand.”

Peter Cox covers crime and the cities of Stillwater and Oak Park Heights for the Gazette. He can be reached at pcox@acnpapers.com or 651-796-1108.