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‘Lies,’ baby’s death pushed Kane

Police shooter’s anti-government sentiment grew deeper, more disturbed over time.

West Memphis, Ark., police officers and personnel look at wreaths left outside a police station Friday, May 21, in memory of two slain officers. Sgt. Brandon Paudert and Officer Bill Evans were killed in the line of duty during a traffic stop Thursday afternoon. The suspects in the shooting, former Springfield resident Jerry Kane and his son, Joseph, were later killed in a shootout with law enforcement officers. Associated Press photo by Mark Weber

Mark Weber/MBR West Memphis, Ark., police officers and personnel look at wreaths left outside a police station Friday, May 21, in memory of two slain officers. Sgt. Brandon Paudert and Officer Bill Evans were killed in the line of duty during a traffic stop Thursday afternoon. The suspects in the shooting, former Springfield resident Jerry Kane and his son, Joseph, were later killed in a shootout with law enforcement officers. Associated Press photo by Mark Weber

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Journal News, Jim Denney

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Staff Report Updated 10:37 PM Saturday, May 22, 2010

SPRINGFIELD — As a young man, Jerry Kane wanted to change government.

The extreme views against public officials that he would hold years later were not yet solidified.

But there were hints.

Born in Columbus, Kane moved to Springfield in 1975 and was a 1982 graduate of South High School.

He ran for city commission three times, the first time when he was 18 in 1983.

He was already looking askance at society, he told a recent audience of his radio podcast.

“The reason I look at things so differently is because when I was a child, I came home from school one day (and) my dad told me that something they had told me at school that day was a lie,” he said in a podcast posted online May 6 through the hosting service for his website.

“After he’d gone on about it for a while really angry, I asked him why would my teachers lie to me and — I hate to say this — but he turned into a coward at that moment. It was like he saw he had just opened up a great big can of worms and was trying to shove the worms back inside the can. He kept saying, ‘Never mind, forget it.’ ”

Kane said he wouldn’t let go of the idea that teachers could lie to their students.

“I kept pushing him the rest of the night. I did take one thing from the conversation and that is they’re lying to you. So ever since then all I’ve done is try to find out what the lie is. ...”

Kane’s first run for commission ended in ignominy when he had to drop out after being charged with stealing beer from a railroad boxcar parked downtown.

Roger Baker, the former mayor of Springfield and assistant principal of South High School when Kane was a student there, said, “I was totally amazed when I found out he’d done something illegal (back then).”

During his time at South, Baker doesn’t remember anything else that stood out about young Kane.

“I thought he was stretching to run for the city commission,” Baker said. “As I recall, he was one of those kids who never did anything spectacular, but everybody knew him.”

During his second failed attempt at a city commission seat in 1985, 20-year-old Kane said he had just received his real estate license and was working with a local company.

His last bid for city commission was in 1991, where his petitions to get on the ballot fell short by a single signature.

‘Off the deep end’

Kane served in the Army Reserves in the late 1980s, according to a friend, Tim Baulky, who served with him.

Baulky’s wife, Robin Black, was a classmate of Kane’s at South High.

Kane married the former Hope Drummond in 1991 and they lived during much of the 1990s in Hardin County, near Lima. He was a truck driver then, and their son, Joseph, was born there. Friends said they also had two daughters who survived. Hope Kane died in recent years, Black said.

The couple noticed a change in Kane about 15 years ago, after the death of a baby daughter from SIDS.

“He went off the deep end,” Black said.

Kane’s father, Jerry R. Kane Sr., died in 1999 and left his estate, with assets valued at more than $31,600 — a home on South Limestone Street, two cars and a motorcycle — to his wife, Patricia.

In the event of her death, the will left half of the estate to his other son, Thomas David Kane Sr., and just $1,000 to Jerry Kane Jr. The remainder of the estate would go to Jerry Kane Sr.’s three grandchildren — Heather M. Kane, Jessica Gullett and Joseph Taylor Kane.

A ‘threat’ to authority

Kane had had minor brushes with the law over the years — in 1992, he was arrested on a drunk driving charge, pleaded no contest and was found guilty of a lesser charge — but by 2003 he had completely rejected the notion of government and law enforcement.

In April of that year, Kane sent letters to several local businesses, including Jeff Wyler Springfield Auto Mall, U.S. Bank and Security National Bank demanding payment for “adhesion contracts.”

Kane also sent a letter to Springfield Police Division Chief Stephen Moody, advising that the police division owed Kane $10,000 — $5,000 for each time an officer “trespassed” on Kane’s property on South Limestone Street.

A former Clark County Auditor’s Office employee told sheriff’s deputies at the time that Kane was not threatening when he visited the auditor’s office.

“At no time was Mr. Kane aggressive or abusive, but (the employee) felt Kane was unstable,” officials noted in the report.

The employee also got the impression that Kane didn’t like law enforcement, as he didn’t stay long at the auditor’s office once a deputy came into the office.

In March 2004, Kane was in traffic court again for expired tags and a seat belt violation, according to Clark County Municipal Court records.

Judge Denise Moody sentenced Kane to six days of community service, a move that triggered increased anti-establishment ire.

Linda Durst, who owns a home next to Kane’s former property at 1515 S. Limestone St., said that at about the same time, Kane erected a sign in front of his house that denigrated the judge and hung a noose from a tree in his yard.

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