Posted on 06/10/2004 6:25:02 PM PDT by nuconvert
Accomplice in Billionaire Abduction Gets 9 Years in Prison
The Associated Press
Jun 10, 2004
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) - A man who helped abduct a billionaire investor last year was sentenced Thursday to nine years in prison. Shemone Gordon, 24, was granted a more lenient sentence because he helped prosecutors find and arrest others involved in the kidnapping of Edward Lampert, one of the richest men in America.
Gordon and three others abducted Lampert from a Greenwich parking garage Jan. 10, 2003 and held him overnight at gunpoint in a motel. The kidnappers told Lampert they were hired to kill him for $1 million because of a business deal, but gave him the opportunity to buy his own life, prosecutors said.
Lampert, chairman of the hedge fund ESL Investments Inc., was released unharmed in Greenwich the next day.
Police were led to the suspects after someone used one of Lampert's credit card to buy a pizza.
Forbes magazine reported Lampert is worth about $1.5 billion, making him the richest person in Connecticut.
The alleged ringleader of the group, Renaldo Rose, was sentenced last month to 15 years in prison. Another man involved in the plot, Devon Harris, awaits sentencing on federal charges, while the fourth, Lorenzo Darnel Jones, was a minor at the time and was sentenced to three years in prison on a state robbery charge.
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