Thin Ice

by Frank Coffey

  The conversation turned gruesome at that point. Gillooly failed to make himself clear, failed to express precisely what he wanted done to Kerrigan, so it wasn’t long before suggestions of murder were hanging in the air.

  “It wasn’t phrased exactly like that,” Eckardt told ABC’s PrimeTime Live. “Jeff used the term … he just said, ‘Well, why doesn’t somebody take her out?’ And then I immediately came to the conclusion that it might have meant, you know, some sort of, you know … something that it possibly may or may not have been. I just sort of popped up real quick and said, ‘No, we don’t need to do that. There’s other things you can do to disable somebody.’ ”

  So they talked about staging a car accident, and they talked about breaking into Kerrigan’s hotel room, tying her up and breaking her legs or cutting her Achilles tendon. Gillooly liked the idea of breaking a leg. He liked it a lot. He suggested they go for the right leg, which happened to be Kerrigan’s strong leg—the leg she planted on when she jumped, and landed on when she came down. They ultimately decided to use a telescoping police baton to strike her on the knee. The baton was designed to cause pain and damage, but not break bones. It was the ideal tool for their plot.

  That wasn’t even the best of it. Before leaving the hotel room—or wherever it was the attack would actually take place—the assailant would drop a note. The note would be a warning, an alarm, declaring the attack on Kerrigan the act of a skater-hating psychotic. He was still on the loose, the note would say, and he promised to strike again.

  Smith and Gillooly shook hands and agreed on $6,500 as a fair fee. They were giddy with excitement. All of them. It was a simple plan, a beautiful plan. They didn’t even have to kill her, just hurt her enough to prevent her from skating. And the act would surely send ripples of fear through the skating community. It would be a financial windfall for all of them:

  • The president of World Bodyguard Services, Inc. would have more business than he could handle.

  • Jeff Gillooly would be the manager of an Olympic gold medalist.

  • Derrick Smith and Shane Stant would be able to start their own school for would-be Rambos in the desert.

  Perfect.

  “Smith liked the idea because it would possibly open up the door for more business,” Eckardt said. “He wanted to take the proceeds from the protective service operations and open up this training facility. And he wanted me to run it for him.”

  Later they talked more about money, about how to get it and how to hide it. Gillooly asked Eckardt to compose a “threat-assessment” to be used as a plea to the USFSA for funds. If he could demonstrate that Harding’s safety was at risk (he had the alleged death threat from November as evidence that it was), then the association probably would not deny the request. All along, however, Eckardt said the money was intended for Derrick Smith and Shane Stant; in effect, then, the U.S. Figure Skating Association would unwittingly help fund an assault on one of its own athletes.

  The day ended with Gillooly handing Eckardt $2,000 in cash. Eckardt gave the money to Smith, who in turn drove Stant to the airport. Stant then took a flight to Boston, where Kerrigan was training, and where the hit was supposed to take place.

  In Boston, Stant proved to be a lousy stalker. He tracked Kerrigan but never got close enough to carry out the plan. Meanwhile, from Phoenix, Smith repeatedly called Eckardt, who by now was acting as the official conduit between Gillooly and the hit men. Smith wanted more money. He said it had been promised and he wanted it delivered. He needed money to get around Boston, he said, and without it there was no way the assault could be effectively completed.

  Gillooly was reluctant to wire any more money. He trusted neither Stant nor Smith, and as the days passed, he began to suspect that perhaps the two men had no intention of disabling Kerrigan. Perhaps they were simply trying to rob him a nickel at a time. Perhaps Stant wasn’t even in Boston.

  He wanted proof. He wanted receipts.

  Smith, who was also growing agitated, wanted something else:

  He wanted to punch Gillooly’s lights out.

  Cooler heads prevailed, though, and Gillooly eventually relented. He asked Eckardt to meet him at the Clackamas Town Center skating rink during one of Harding’s midnight training sessions, on or about December 31. Eckardt, who had a history of back problems related to his weight, was in bad shape that night, so he had taken a prescription painkiller that left him feeling drunk.

  At the rink Gillooly approached Eckardt and asked him to find a professional, someone who could really get the job done.

  “And then he pulls out this $10,000 check from the United States Figure Skating Association,” Eckardt told The Oregonian. “And I’m debating whether or not I should even bother with it. I should just let these guys break his legs.”

  Later, Eckardt said, Harding skated over to him at the edge of the rink and asked how he was feeling. When first arrested, Eckardt indicated that Harding knew nothing about the plot against Kerrigan, but later he changed his story in an affidavit to law enforcement authorities. He cited two or three incidents in which she spoke directly or indirectly about the plot. One of those incidents occurred at the midnight skating session.

  “You know, you need to stop screwing around with this and get it done,” Harding allegedly said to Eckardt.

  Eckardt shrugged. “Why don’t you call Stant yourself?”

  “No, I want you to do it,” she said, and then she skated away.

  According to the affidavit, Harding also actively participated in the plot by making two phone calls to the Tony Kent Arena near Boston, where Kerrigan was working out. The purpose of the calls was to determine Kerrigan’s practice schedule, thereby assisting Stant in his mission.

  Telephone records indicate that someone did place calls from the Harding house to the Tony Kent Arena in Boston during the first week in January. Similarly, a representative of the arena said she did receive calls from a woman wanting to know about Kerrigan’s schedule, though the woman did not identify herself.

  Stant left Boston without completing his task. On Jan. 3, with money sent to him by Smith, Stant bought a Greyhound bus ticket from Boston to Detroit. Both he and Kerrigan arrived in town the next day. Smith phoned Eckardt to tell him that the assault would be carried out at the nationals. Eckardt told Gillooly, who did not take the news well. He suspected that Smith was stalling, trying to milk him for more money. That same day, however, Stant left a message on Gillooly’s answering machine.

  “Jeff, this is Shane. I’m in Detroit.”

  Gillooly smiled when he heard it. If not proof, at least he finally had some indication that Stant was actually trying to get the job done.

  On Tuesday, January 4, Stant checked into a $32-a-night room with a queen-sized waterbed at the Super 8 Motel near Detroit Metro Airport. His arrival was recorded by a camera in the motel lobby—the first of several mistakes made by Stant. He passed time in the room by renting and watching two videos: “Hollywood Fantasies” and “Girls of Beverly Hills.” He then made several phone calls through the motel switchboard, thus adding to his own clearly-marked electronic trail. This man was not a master criminal; he was more like a member of The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight.

  Gillooly withdrew $3,000 from the bank that day. He gave $750 to Eckardt, who wired the money to Smith in Arizona. Smith needed the cash so that he could travel to Detroit to drive the getaway car for Stant.

  On Wednesday, January 5, Eckardt and Gillooly wired $1,300 to Smith and Stant in Detroit. They sensed that the new plan was going to work. Stant would have enough money to complete his assignment. He was to break or sneak into Kerrigan’s hotel room, tie her up, gag her, injure her knee, and leave her to be discovered. On Wednesday evening, Stant phoned Gillooly from Detroit. They agreed that the hit would take place the following day.

  Eckardt was awakened by a phone call around 10 a.m. PST on the morning of January 6. It was Gillooly. He was excited, yelling. He’d just heard on the news that someone ha
d attacked Nancy Kerrigan; some maniac in a black jacket and black hat had just run at her in a hallway after practice and whacked her on the knee.

  How about that?

  A little while later the phone rang again. It was Smith. He told a similar story.

  Eckardt was in a state of panic. After all the lying, all the stories, this one had come true, and now he didn’t know how to deal with it. He went into the living room and turned on the TV. There he saw the pictures himself for the first time. He saw Nancy Kerrigan on the floor, holding her leg, her face contorted in pain. She was crying, screaming, asking the world—asking Shawn Eckardt—“Why me? Why me?”

  Eckardt got up and turned off the TV.

  Then he walked into the bathroom and vomited.

  “I was very upset,” Eckardt told The Oregonian. “I couldn’t believe I had done this.”

  He had, though. He was in the thick of it. He was the middleman in a plot that would become one of the most intensely-covered news events of the year. And now there was no way out.

  Ten

  On Friday, January 7, Smith called Eckardt again. He wanted more money. Stant wanted more money, too. They needed $1,250 to finish the job, to get safely out of town and back to Arizona.

  Eckardt phoned Gillooly, who immediately drove over to Eckardt’s house. The two men then went to a Cub Foods store on Southeast 82nd Street in Clackamas and wired $1,300 to Smith. But that wasn’t enough. Smith called Eckardt again on Sunday, demanding more money—another $4,600, which he felt would settle Gillooly’s debt for services rendered. Eckardt called Gillooly again, and Gillooly said he would need time to come up with the money.

  A few hours later, though, Gillooly boarded a plane for Detroit to be with his ex-wife when she skated for the national championship. He wanted to bring Eckardt with him; he wanted a “bodyguard” present so that it would appear as though he and Tonya were fearful of a copycat attack. But Gillooly didn’t have enough money for another plane ticket, so Eckardt stayed behind with instructions to meet Gillooly and Harding at the airport when they made what was expected to be a triumphant return from the nationals. There, in front of an adoring crowd and hundreds of reporters, 320-pound Shawn Eckardt—owner of World Bodyguard Services, Inc.—would make his public debut.

  By this time the outpouring of sympathy for kerrigan was immense. The world cried for her, suffered for her. She received hundreds of letters, phone calls, telegrams, faxes, cards and flowers. One letter read: “We are so thankful you weren’t harmed. We both know how difficult it can be to live in the public eye.”

  It was signed: Ronald and Nancy Reagan.

  Meanwhile, as far as the public and the media were concerned, the assault looked like nothing more than the inexplicable act of a psychotic (though not a skater-hating psychotic—Stant forgot to leave a note). There was no reason to suspect otherwise. Police had recovered the telescoping baton outside Cobo Arena, and there was word that a fuzzy picture of the assailant could be seen in a videotape of the practice session.

  That’s all, though. That’s all they had.

  Supposedly.

  Harding, skating to music from the film “Jurassic Park,” performed beautifully Saturday night. She took first place, offered a word of sympathy for Kerrigan, and expressed fear that this could happen again, to somebody else. After all, the madman was still on the loose.

  Harding and Gillooly returned to Portland on Monday, January 8, to a hero’s welcome. Eckardt was there to greet them at the airport. He played his role perfectly, forcing his massive frame through the crowd to reach the diminutive skater, then cutting a path to the parking lane outside. He guided Harding to her father’s truck; she drove off with Al Harding. Gillooly got into Eckardt’s car; they sped off together.

  Immediately Eckardt sensed that Gillooly was anxious about something.

  “We have to talk,” Gillooly said.

  Eckardt knew what was coming. He was nervous.

  “They asked me who Derrick was,” Gillooly added. “I just told them I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The investigation had begun, and Eckardt knew now that the FBI was already onto them. Gillooly told him that they also had asked about Eckardt. They wanted a description. When Gillooly told them his friend weighed more than 300 pounds, the investigators were disappointed. At that time they still had not identified Stant as the assailant, and they were hoping that Eckardt’s description might be a match.

  There were many unanswered questions still, a lot of pieces to the puzzle floating around. Gillooly was confused. He didn’t understand how it could be falling apart so quickly.

  Where did the cops get Derrick Smith’s name?

  How did they know?

  Eckardt feigned ignorance. The truth was, he knew exactly what had happened. He knew that the whole outrageous and ugly scheme was about to come crashing down around them, because he was the agent of its demolition. Deliberately, stupidly—first out of some silly and pathetic need for attention, and later out of guilt—Eckardt had talked.

  The expert in counter-terrorism and espionage, the man with a résumé that would make G. Gordon Liddy proud, had babbled like a child to anyone who would listen.

  There was, for example, the meeting with Eugene Saunders, a 24-year-old minister from Gresham, Oregon. The two were classmates in a legal investigation course at Pioneer Pacific College in Wilsonville, Oregon, where they were studying to become paralegals. It was January 2, and the two men were working on a project together. But Eckardt didn’t want to talk about the project. He didn’t want to talk about school.

  He wanted to talk about the meeting he’d had with Gillooly, Stant and Smith.

  “He said, ‘Here, I want you to hear something,’ ” Saunders told The Oregonian. “And he handed me a tape recorder to listen to. I said, ‘Well, what’s on it?’ Because obviously it didn’t have anything to do with our homework. And then he begins to explain to me that he recorded a meeting concerning a hit on Kerrigan.”

  Saunders could not understand most of what he heard—it was a poor recording—but Eckardt filled in the gaps.

  “He began to explain that there was a meeting that took place, I believe at his home. He said Tonya Harding’s husband was there. He said there was a discussion … concerning eliminating one of Tonya’s competitors.”

  Saunders did not believe a word of it. He knew Shawn Eckardt. He knew about the lies and the bloated résumé, and he assumed this was just a particularly impressive example of Eckardt’s overactive imagination. Saunders asked Eckardt to give it a rest. Eckardt refused. He continued to talk about the plot. Eckardt would later say he talked to Saunders in the hope that Saunders would turn him in; it was, he said, a form of confession. But Saunders later indicated that if it had been a confession, there was none of the remorse usually associated with such an act. Eckardt seemed excited about his story, almost proud.

  The bragging continued over the next couple of days. Eckardt would corner Saunders and talk about the plot and the tape recording. Saunders by now was growing tired of the whole ridiculous affair, and so he threatened Eckardt.

  “I gave him an ultimatum, basically,” Saunders told The Oregonian. “I said, ‘I can’t keep it quiet. I will turn it in to the authorities.’”

  Eckardt then told Saunders that the plan had been called off; there would be no assault. But a few nights later, at school, Eckardt approached Saunders and said, breathlessly, “Did you see the news?”

  “No,” Saunders said.

  “It happened … Kerrigan.”

  Saunders was stunned. He didn’t know what to think. He and Eckardt continued to talk over the course of the next two days, and Eckardt continued to back away from his story. He said he’d been lying, there never was a plot, it was just a hoax. Saunders asked for a copy of the tape, but Eckardt wouldn’t give it to him.

  The tape, incidentally, never did materialize; Eckardt said he burned it, out of fear. It should also be noted that Eckardt never once indi
cated to Saunders that Tonya Harding knew anything about the plot. On January 8, Saunders decided to talk with Gary Crowe, a Portland private investigator who also happened to be the instructor of Saunders’s paralegal course. Crowe advised Saunders to take his story to the FBI.

  Saunders was not the only person Eckardt talked to about the plot. Russell “Rusty” Reitz of Portland, also a classmate of Eckardt’s, said Eckardt had engaged him in a bizarre conversation just two days before the attack on Kerrigan. For no particular reason, as far as Reitz could tell, Eckardt asked him if he would be willing to kill someone for money. Specifically, he asked Reitz if he would kill someone for $65,000.

  “I thought he was kidding,” Reitz told the Portland Oregonian. “I blew it off. I said no. He said, ‘Would you break somebody’s leg?’ I said, ‘Well, I don’t know, Shawn, I’m not that way.’ And he says, ‘Well, I got a job in Detroit. I’m going to send a team there.’ ”

  Reitz did not see Eckardt again until January 6, the day Kerrigan was attacked in Detroit. Eckardt was excited. He asked Reitz if he had seen the news.

  “I said, ‘Naw, I didn’t see the news,’ ” Reitz said. “And he said, ‘Well, Kerrigan got it,’ or something like that. And I said, ‘Who’s Kerrigan?’ And he said, ‘It’s the job I had in Detroit.’ ”

  Like Saunders, Reitz was at first highly skeptical. He, too, knew all about Shawn Eckardt. He, too, had listened to the stories and the lies. Surely, he thought, this was just Shawn being Shawn, trying to be larger than life.

  “I didn’t even think he was really a bodyguard,” Reitz said.

  To his surprise, Reitz spotted Eckardt at Tonya Harding’s side a few days later, on a TV news report. Eckardt was identified as the skater’s bodyguard. The investigation was unfolding by this time, and Saunders’s name had been tossed around in the media. Reitz heard one classmate’s name, saw another on TV, and suddenly began to wonder if there was a nugget of truth in Eckardt’s ridiculous story. He decided to call Saunders. They talked. They swapped information. Saunders suggested that Reitz call the FBI, and Reitz agreed.