I first met him in a police report, which detailed how a blind veteran was attacked on his way to the bus stop. He was with his seeing-eye dog, Derby, trying to get to the VA Hospital.

The police spelled Besaw’s first name wrong in the report. They also got his address wrong and his city wrong. He lives in Bethany, not Oklahoma City. He is Gordan, not Gordon. etc…

When I met Gordan at his house, he was a little breathless. Two TV stations had just been there, and he’d exerted a great deal of energy trying to correct all this misinformation. Both stations wanted him to walk with Derby, a German shepherd. He and Derby walk fast. He got a kick out of the fact the TV cameramen were out of breath trying to keep up with him. The downside to the demo was that his sister lives down the street, so he had to twice disappoint Derby, who thought they were headed that way, since he just walked in a loop to show how he gets around with his dog.

Derby

Of course, Derby is more than a dog to Gordan. He relies on him to see. Gordan has a tattoo of his last seeing-eye dog, Gracie, a black lab, on his right arm. Gracie died last summer at 15. She was retired at the time.

She retired early. That’s because as Gracie was walking with Gordan, Gracie stepped in a hole and hurt her knee. The two were walking through tall grass and Gracie didn’t notice the hole. They were walking through tall grass because there are very few sidewalks for Gordan and his dogs to walk on in Oklahoma City. There are no sidewalks on NW 23 where he walks to the bus stop

That’s also why he and Derby, three years ago, were hit by a car.

That experience terrified him. Gordan pointed out that yesterday’s attack was scary, but the car accident was worse by far. No cameramen or newspaper reporters swarmed his front yard then. The lack of sidewalks is a challenge each time he goes out.

Gordan could get rides. But he wants to be independent. He doesn’t want to be a burden to any one, somebody who is toted around.

A man Tuesday attacked Gordan as he went to the bus stop to get to the doctor to see about his allergies.

Derby is highly trained. He is peaceful, not an attack dog, but growled even as Gordan commanded him to stay behind him.

Gordan gave his attacker several opportunities to walk away, but a man who said he’d take Gordan to “see God” just wouldn’t quit hitting him.

That’s why Gordan grabbed the man’s shirt, threw him over his hip and held him in a headlock until police arrived.

Gordan Besaw can only see large objects in opaque shadows. He wears shades because the sun bother his eyes. He has glaucoma.

He said the takedown was instinctual, but he worries for his attacker, who he believes is mentally ill.

Here is a transcript of our interview today, in which Gordan Besaw describes his attack, the challenges he faces as a blind man, the problem of few sidewalks in Oklahoma City.

What happened?

I got not even half way to my bus stop. The gentleman came up to me and asked me if I was blind. I told him, ‘Yes, I’m blind.’ He goes, ‘Well, take your glasses off. I can make you see again before you see God.’

I said, ‘No, that’s OK.’ I wear the dark glasses because my eyes are sensitive to the light.’

He said, ‘Well I can make you see before you see God.’ And he punched me in my forehead. I was like, ‘What are you doing?’

I put dog to the side behind me because I didn’t want there to be an issue with my dog.

I’m like, ‘What’s your problem, guy?’

I tried to walk. And he hit me again in my forehead.

I said, ‘You really don’t want to do this.’

He goes, ‘Yeah, I do,’ and hit me a third time.

I reached forward with my right hand, pulled him towards me, dropped the leash, pulled him toward me and threw him over my hip.

I told my dog to stay and I put him in a choke hold.

People were coming and calling 911.

Nobody came to help me hold the guy – everybody was afraid of Derby.

I had to hold the guy until the cops came.

The guy, the whole time, was saying

‘I’m real strong, you better watch out. We can see god together, we can see God together. I can fix this for you.’

I said, ‘You can’t fix anything, you need to just chill.’

What were his intentions?

I don’t know. There was something wrong with him…I don’t know if he was on drugs or mentally diSabled, or what his issue was. I just tried everything for it to just go away.

Even though I’m a disabled vet and I was in the military, I’m just not into violence. I’m not into that.

I gave him multiple opportunities to leave me alone.

When he hit me the last time, it just kind of snapped. I just went into reflex. I just reached out. Once I knew I had him I just pulled him towards me. It just happened so fast after that.

The story seems longer than it really is until we were on the ground.

Until we were on the ground, that stuff happened very quickly.

They teach you all kinds of different hand-to-hand combat when you’re in the military.

Granted, it’s been a long time since I’ve been in the military.

I work out every day, but I’m not practicing marshall arts every day.

I guess I still have that memory in me.

I’m not in as good of shape as I want to be but I’m in better shape than what I thought I was.

It was all instinct that happened.

I have light perception and I can see shadows if they’re close enough, but I can’t really tell you want you look like. I can’t tell you what your skin is your hair, stuff like that. I can see your shadow.

Tell us about Derby

He’s a German shepherd. He’s actually my second dog. My first dog was a black lab. I actually have a picture of her on my arm I can show you if you’d like to see. Her name is Gracie. I had to retire her. She just passed away last summer, but she lived until she was 15.

Derby is focused on his owner.

And, Derby I got him from Leader Dog, and also Grace, my first dog, from Leader Dog in Rochester, Mich.
Two Lions club members are actually founders of Leader Dog.

When I got to the point where I lost my vision, just before point I got to where I am right at this moment, today, I went to a school in Little Rock. Ark, called Lions World Services for the Blind. They taught me how to do all the stuff a normal person would do. When I was done with all that training, I came home, and I got sent to Leader Dog to get Derby…

They start training them at 9 weeks, basic training for the dogs. As they’re getting closer to 1 year old, if they show a lot of aggression, they can’t be a seeing eye dog. The dog has to be calm and laid back and friendly with all animals.

But, as the dog becomes closer and closer to me as the years go on, they become more protective. German shepherds tend become even more protective. It’s just in their nature.

Would he have attacked the guy? I can’t say 100 percent he would, but I can’t say that he wouldn’t either.

He did low growl when I put him behind me. So, you know.

Was this the first time you and Derby had something harrowing happen when you were on your way to the VA Hospital?

Three years ago, coming back from the VA about 4:30 in the afternoon. We stop at every curb. He looks to make sure it is safe. So the person who hit us with the car hit us on his side, they turned into us on (NW) 23 Street. They must have not stopped at their stop sign…He wouldn’t have let me off the curb had that lady been that close to us. So, that tells me she couldn’t have even seen the stop sign or been at the stop sign.

Was there a sidewalk in this area? Were you walking in the street? And do you find that to be safety hazard?

Yeah, it is. My first dog actually got hurt. It’s the reason why I had to retire her. It messed up her knee really bad because the grass was too high. The grass wasn’t kept low so she didn’t see the hole. She walked through it instead of me. And she had several surgeries and couldn’t work any more. Not having sidewalks is a major concern because I have to go over several different kinds of terrain. And I can figure out most of the terrain just by the tactile information, or, you know, the way it feels on my feet, on my shoes, the sound as I’m walking over it. I’ll go from grass to concrete to asphalt, then to some gravel and some dirt, just to get to the bus stop. The only place I’ve had any real sidewalks is either downtown, or, they just put in some sidewalks over here on Rockwell. I think it starts around maybe 19th Street, or somewhere right in there. It’s not a very long sidewalk but I don’t have to go over that area too much.

I do have people that give me rides and stuff like that, but I try to be as independent as I possibly can, because I don’t want to be a burden on other people. So I work very hard, every day, going over everything that I learned, even on days, that the weather is not conducive to travel, I still go over his commands and stuff like that, and go over how to do stuff in my head. If I just sat around, having somebody drag me every where to me that’s not a life. That’s find for some people if that’s what they want to do. I’m not getting down on any blind people that are not active, but I try to be as active as possible, as well as safe.

Why do you speak at schools and churches?

When I had my first dog, and I got home from Michigan, I had several people ask me not to come in their store with a dog. After the third time, I got very frustrated with that. I keep the law book the school gives me in his harness.

It covers all states.

I thought, you know, the dogs have been around since, well, the leader dogs have been around since 1939, but the dogs have been around longer than that. And people not to know by this day and age what the laws are of what I can and can’t do is upsetting to me. I just started going to Lions clubs, to churches, to schools. I have two short videos to show how I learned how to do what I know how to do today from the school in Arkansas, and also, from the school in Michigan, showing how they do the dogs, how they train them. I just educate the kids and adults on how to come up on me. Some people will give me a wide berth because they’re afraid. They were afraid even when I had my lab. But there are ways to approach me, and if I’m not real busy and there’s not a lot of people around me, I don’t mind a quick pat to his head. That’s like an acknowledgement that you’re acknowledging the dog, that you’re aware that he’s there. I don’t mind stuff flike that as long as I’m asked and I’m not in a crowd.

My colleagues and I are continuing to track trends in Oklahoma City homicides. It has been a busy (total understatement) few weeks for breaking news, and I finally grabbed a moment tonight to start blogging again.

Along those lines, one of my first tasks was to look into homicides in Oklahoma City in the first quarter of 2013.

Bill Citty

I started by arranging an interview with Oklahoma City police Chief Bill Citty. He relayed that while homicides are lower in the first quarter of 2013 compared to 2012, violent assaults have been trending upward for the last 10 to 15 years. Police are deploying more of their stretched resources to areas of Oklahoma City where violent assaults are high by using overtime programs, he said. Homicides – the most extreme form of assault – tend to occur in areas where violent fighting happens.

I took that nugget of info – and two photographers – with me to Willow Cliff apartments, a complex in northwest Oklahoma City that has experienced its fair share of violent crime this year, including the unsolved slaying of a 27-year-old woman found dead in a burning car.

The photographers and I rolled around the sprawling complex, which is flanked by ponds that draw ducks, geese and cranes. I stopped and talked to 11 people. The first eight declined to be interviewed. Most of them walked away, shaking their heads, when I told them who I was.

As we were pulling out of the complex, a bunch of squad cars ripped into the place and we turned around.

A fight broke out right in front of us.

About a dozen young people were yelling. The group pulsed with energy, a back-and-forth that looked like it was about to explode. Cops jumped out of their cars, people scattered and one youth got thrown into the back of a squad car.

Some of the young people in the mix had just declined to be interviewed.

The action drew residents out of their homes. Two men, neighbors, shaking their heads, told me that the complex has gone down hill in the last few years, and that “The drama is in the back,” meaning the back of the complex. One man worked for the city, the other was in the Army. They were upset that this fight happened in the front, which people living at Willow Cliff feel is safer. Neither of them wanted to be named in an article.

We were about to leave when I had the photographers turn back. A man paced back and forth near the action, looking concerned. He looked like he cared. I got out and introduced myself.

He wasn’t so sure about me at first.

I’m not in the business of making people talk to me, I explained. We kept walking and talking. I motioned for the photographers to come on over.

“I don’t have to live with the consequences, if there are any, and I don’t know if there are. You do,” I said.

I pointed out the positives – if no one ever speaks out, nothing changes – but cautioned him to weigh his options.

He decided, on his own, to talk. We stood outside. It was close to freezing that day, and windy. He told me that he fishes in the ponds, catching bass and crappie. Children play soccer in the near by park and residents like the walking paths there. The sounds from Putnam City High School marching band float over homes some evenings. He lives by his mother’s place, and won’t leave his mother because she won’t leave. In her little apartment, family gathers – as many as 40 or 50 family members at a time. They hold hands and count heads, then they pray. She’s lived there for about a dozen years and this is her home. They’ve had so many happy times in that apartment.

I named him in the story but for this blog I’ll just call him Bennie. He’s a retired Army veteran who now works in manufacturing.

Here’s what he had to say about recent violence:

A lot of the things we took for granted — the peace, the quiet in the evening. It’s gone. It’s gone now.

Bennie lives around violence and it disappoints him that young people lack respect for each other, for anyone. Parents are absent and so, too, are values in their children, it seems to him. He said young people have fallen away from the church. While he didn’t want to speak on the topic of religion, he said,

“I am a Christian, amen, and thank you Jesus.”

Besides the woman found dead in the burning car, there has recently been a stand-off and an incident in which a man broke a police officer’s leg as that officer tried to arrest him. Last year, police shot a man after they responded to a call. Bennie lives by the dead man’s parents.

As for the recent fight that drew Bennie and his neighbors outside – police didn’t even bother to make a report.

It was just another day in Bennie’s neighborhood.

This is my story.

Below is Bennie, an Oklahoma City man and an Army vet who lives around violence.

Bennie. Edited in Instagram,

Secondly, I’ve been on maternity leave since Dec. 5. Sorry I never mentioned this. Life got a little crazy!

I will return to blog again.

Unfortunately, I won’t be able to track homicides and other major crime stories here until I return.

These crimes are still important of course and newsok.com has them covered.

I’ll be keeping tabs on goings on as a regular reader of The Oklahoman and newsok.com until I’m back.

Best wishes for 2013,

Juliana

Randy Ceniceros,

The man and his wife were staying with a woman and her 12-year-old son for Thanksgiving. The man got bored Friday and decided to take a walk with the 12-year-old. Naturally, part of the outing involved a plan to find something to rob.

That didn’t go so well. The the dinner guest (allegedly) robbed a store clerk of cash and Lotto tix at knifepoint around 10:30 p.m. at Portland Express Mart, 3701 N Portland Ave. A police dog found him hiding under a car with the boy an hour later.

The man told police a bum with a fade haircut made him do it.

The 12-year-old told another story, including the detail that he didn’t want to participate in the robbery but was dragged along.

Police arrested Randy Ceniceros, 23, of Las Cruces, N.M., on a complaint of armed robbery.

Two people died in separate weekend homicides, one southwest, one northwest OKC. Details, like the victims’ names, are scant Monday and homicide detectives are catching up on their zzz’s following the weekend violence.

Sunday: About 7:15 p.m., a white man in his 30s was shot multiple times outside his vehicle at a car wash in the 2100 block of SW 51. He was taken to OU Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead.

Monday:Police responded about 2:30 a.m. to 6712 W Wilshire Blvd. near W Wilshire Boulevard and N MacArthur Boulevard. One man was pronounced dead at the scene and another man was taken to OU Medical Center where he was in fair condition with a gunshot wound.

While I took a break from blogging to delve into the climbing homicide rate and possible reasons it’s tracking higher this year, I missed noting a few killings.

Those who died are:

Christopher Allen, 34, was found shot to death Nov. 9 at 2217 NW 117.

Jose Plancarte, 23, was stabbed to death Nov. 13 at the Copa Cabana Club, 3544 Newcastle Road.

Janet Kay Hume, 77, was discovered by police Nov. 14 at 11000 S Bryant after a standoff with her son. What’s not clear is how long she’d been dead. Her son, Gerald David Hume, is accused of shooting her and dismembering her body.

Jonathan Charles Braggs, 19, was shot to death during a drug transaction Nov. 15, police said. Police arrested Jonathan Daniels in the killing.

Oklahoma City Police officer Karl Pulliam talks to children at Sooner Haven Apartments, a federally subsidized housing complex that has experienced three homicides in 2012.

That’s why, as of late, I had to take a break from blogging, and Tweeting and other distracting things, and tighten my focus on the good old fashioned information gathering process that explored the rising homicide rate.

I spent time at a Baptist church, in a squad car and at a community center, talking to preachers, police, children and others working and living in a pocket of violence on the northeast side.

I spoke to a gang investigator and learned that Oklahoma City is tracking more gang members than ever before and drive-by shootings are on the rise this year. At the same time, there are fewer cops on the street than in 1989.

At the church, I met smiling kids with dreams of being firefighters or hip hop dancers. Bad stuff, like drugs, gangs and violence, is everywhere in their neighborhood near the state Capitol.

Hopefully, besides reporting on a high number of deaths, I’ve painted a picture of life around one of the places where the bodies most often fall.

This is what I wrote.

These are the people who died in the small area I explored.

View our maps that track the violence.

Below, read what people are saying about the homicide rate.

OKC Homicides (New)

“This year in particular, some of our gangs in that part of the city that have been very active. They have been responsible for a lot of the violent activity going on the east side of town. We’ve had several homicides and tons of drive-bys. It starts a perpetuating cycle. It’s hard to stop sometimes, until you get both sides locked up.”–Tim Hock, an Oklahoma City police gang investigator and president of the Oklahoma Gang Investigators Association

“It’s discouraging to know our children are involved in this type of activity, but it is our responsibility as a community to redirect them. We are making every effort to do so.” –Deena Thomas, a former Douglass Mid-High School English teacher whose former student, Israel Jackson, was shot to death in June. Thomas grew up on the northeast side and returns to tutor at Prospect Baptist Church.

“We’re in the heart of the ‘hood. We’re here on purpose. Every day you’re going to see homeless people walking. You see lots of things, definitely drug activity going on. Prostitution, you name it. You’re going to see it in our neighborhood.” –Youth pastor DeWayne Walker, who founded a nonprofit called Earthquake to facilitate events like the weekly Youth J.A.M. (Jesus and Me) at Prospect Baptist Church. The program gives children a safe and positive place to go.

Kevin Durant

How does this relate to crime? It doesn’t, really, except for the police chief’s cameo that was given quite a lot of ink. Police Chief Bill Citty, who grew up here and has worked for the department since ’77, gave the writer a three-hour tour of OKC. As a long-time resident and member of the

Bill Citty

As a teenager in the 1960s, Citty watched as the new malls and highways started sucking all of downtown’s energy out into the suburbs, leaving behind the usual inner-city decay. In the 1970s, after some years of hippyish drifting, he decided to cut his hair, shave off his beard and join the City of Oklahoma City Police Department.

As someone new to Oklahoma and OKC, I really enjoyed the details about the city’s (and Citty’s) and the Thunder’s transformation. Now what’s this about hippyish drifting…

There are probably more cases, but police released two investigators believe are connected this week in hopes of generating some leads and saving other seniors from getting duped.

Here is a photo of the woman believed to have scammed two victims, 84 and 88.

Oklahoma City police believe this woman has scammed at least two seniors out of cash since July. If you’ve seen her, call Crime Stoppers at 235-7300.

Here are more details from an article I wrote:

The victim in the first incident told police she had been shopping at Crest, 4502 NW 23, when a young black female approached her and asked if she remembered her from church.

The young woman followed her through the store and helped her with her groceries before following her home. When the woman insisted she didn’t need help, the young woman left. The victim then realized her wallet was gone. Her bank card was used later that day at an Oklahoma City convenience store. That incident occurred July 18.

And in the second case…

A bank teller became suspicious Sept. 4 when a regular female customer, 84, came to the Bank of Oklahoma inside of Buy for Less, 2500 N Pennsylvania Ave., with a young black female and made a large withdrawal from her account. The victim returned the next day and said her money had been stolen.

On Monday, Nov. 5, Cody Davis was found shot in parking lot of an apartment complex at 11:30 p.m. at 2706 N Meridian Ave. He later died at OU Medical Center.

Thursday night, Nov. 8, Antonio Pereyra, 20, was shot to death at 1233 SW 58 during a confrontation with several people.The shooting suspect has been identified as Christopher Lance Wildman, 20. Both men were armed, police said.

We have few details so far but will continue to follow these stories.

Pereyra’s death was the 81st homicide in 2012.

There have not been more homicides in Oklahoma City since 1993, when police reported 92 homicides. (That is excluding the Oklahoma City Bombing in 1995, in which 169 people were killed). From 2000 to 2011, yearly homicides ranged from 43 to 75.

Michael Rogers, 31

My colleague Matt Dinger wrote a detailed story on the arrest that followed the golf club v. machete attack. It went down after a man heard a crash and saw a man wearing a painter’s respirator mask puncturing the tires and smashing glass of his neighbor’s pickup. He grabbed a golf club and tried to stop the man messing with the pickup. That didn’t go well. ‘Cause the pickup attacker in the painter’s mask grabbed a machete, which trumps golf club.

Here’s what Matt came up with.

After the Halloween attack, Michael Rogers, 31, later identified as the machete-wielder, posted a confessional video defending himself in the whole shabang on You Tube, which was picked up by local TV stations like KFOR before being erased from You Tube. The 31-year-old was booked into Oklahoma County jail on a complaint of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon.

If you watch it, the rambling account of girlfriend troubles, politics and various other complaints about “the system” is laced with profanity.