Laura Vito met Tawana Frye for the first time Tuesday night. The east Allentown resident tried consoling Frye and her family, less than 24 hours after Vito had tried to comfort Frye’s 27-year-old son, Hansan Gordon, who was gunned down in a rain of gunfire.
“They told me that I am part of their family now,” Vito said Wednesday, the day after family and friends of Gordon held a vigil near Vito’s East Fairmont Street home. “The family members were absolutely wonderful in such an awful situation like that.”
The Lehigh County coroner’s office ruled Gordon’s death a homicide from multiple gunshot wounds. The shooting took place between Tacoma and Sherman streets in a seemingly quiet block of neatly kept brick homes near the Bethlehem border.
Pam Lehman, a spokesperson for Lehigh County District Attorney Jim Martin, said Wednesday the investigation is continuing, and Martin declined further comment. Allentown police referred comment to Martin.
“He was like a brother,” said Lensye Clavell of Allentown, who wore a T-shirt with the letters “SIP” for “Sleep in Peace,” and also “SOS,” which she said stood for a nickname given to Gordon, whom authorities say lived in Bethlehem.
Clavell was one of the first to arrive at the vigil. She placed a candle under a Canadian maple tree, where neighbors had also placed flowers in a makeshift memorial.
And she bent down and began sobbing. Neighbors John Hagemes and Vito, who said she also has a 27-year-old son, Collin, held Clavell and tried to console her.
Red and white votive candles were later lit; one of them had the words of the title “The Lord’s Prayer” in English and Spanish, adorned with a picture of Jesus Christ.
Many people stayed several hours, sharing stories and reminiscing about Gordon, according to Vito. Two Allentown police cruisers stopped during the vigil at Tacoma Street; an officer said they were there on routine patrol.
Alfred Frye, Gordon’s father who said he raised him since he was 4 years old, said police have obtained videotape of the incident, and he believes they are nearing an arrest.
“We’re thinking it was a robbery gone bad,” Frye said, adding Gordon was staying at the house of Gordon’s girlfriend near East Fairmont Street and had left the home wearing slippers. “We think he was drawn outside. Somebody he knew drew him out here.”
Frye and other people described Gordon as a big-hearted person, but he also encountered trouble with the law. In October 2013, he was sentenced to 31/2 to 10 years for his role in a shooting near Allen High School that wounded two students.
Frye said Gordon had served eight years and was released in April from state prison, and he was adjusting to his new life.
“He was working since the second week he came home,” Frye said, adding he was a packer working for a Bethlehem company. “He was in the house at 9 p.m. He was getting up early.”
In front of approximately 50 people, including Vito, Hagemes and other residents of the neighborhood, Frye said he was grateful to those who tried to rescue Gordon and those who came to the vigil.
“Thank you for coming here and showing respect for my son,” he said, afterward clinging to Gordon’s mother, his sister, Tiana, and brother Alfred.
Delivering brief remarks to the 50 or so people who attended, Nah-Tarsha Cherry, lead pastor of Reach Ministries in Emmaus and a friend of the family, urged people to “let the law handle this. There will be justice; you don’t have to see it, but know that it will be done.”
Cherry offered prayers for the family, that they would find “peace that surpasses all understanding.” She said Gordon, despite his past, was still “the very best kid ever.”
Gordon didn’t deserve to die, she said, no matter his past transgressions.
Vito and residents, most of whom interviewed have lived years on the block, said their neighborhood had not seen a murder previously.
“I don’t ever want to see something like that again,” Hagemes said. “It was my first time.”
Vito saw irony in that the Tuesday evening vigil happened while Allentown and other Lehigh Valley communities participated in the annual National Night Out against crime. Part of the events include residents turning on porch lights and opening their doors, and to try to get to know their neighbors a little better.
“I don’t believe you can stop this violence unless everybody takes a stand, opens their doors, says what they have seen and stands up for the white hats, the good guys,” she said Wednesday. “I just have to believe there are more good people in the world than bad.
“I just want the violence to end.”
Morning Call reporter Anthony Salamone can be reached at aslamone@mcall.com.
