Gigi Jordan held in death of son at Peninsula Hotel

[Laura]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/06/ny...er=rss&emc=rss

Mother Held in Death of Boy, 8, at Luxury Hotel

By AL BAKER and C. J. HUGHES
Published: February 5, 2010

The call came in to the 20th Precinct station house in Manhattan on Friday morning from Belgium: A woman was reporting that her niece had sent her a rambling e-mail message indicating she planned to kill her 8-year-old son and herself. Officers rushed to the niece’s apartment building on Central Park West, then were directed to a luxury hotel in Midtown.

Later in the morning, officers forced their way into Room 1603 at the hotel, the Peninsula, at Fifth Avenue and 55th Street, and found the boy, Jude Michael Mirra, who was autistic, dead in bed, the police said. His mother, Gigi Jordan, was seated on the floor next to the bed, and her pulse was faint. Prescription drugs and pills were scattered about.

“We’re investigating the possibility that those prescription medications were used in such a way that resulted in the boy’s death,” said Paul J. Browne, the Police Department’s chief spokesman.

Ms. Jordan, 49, was taken to Bellevue Hospital Center, where she was in stable condition in police custody and was awaiting a psychiatric evaluation, he said.

“She’s made statements implicating herself in her son’s death,” said Mr. Browne, who added that criminal charges were pending against her.

Inside the hotel room, “there were prescriptions, drugs and paperwork sort of scattered about,” Mr. Browne said. Some of the pills were loose and some in bottles, a law enforcement official said.

Among the papers was a handwritten note that investigators believed was a “prospective suicide note,” Mr. Browne said. The note’s contents indicated she was “taking the life of a boy in addition to her own,” he said.

The note said a “further explanation” could be found on Ms. Jordan’s laptop computer. The note included a password for the computer, which investigators seized, Mr. Browne said. They were awaiting a warrant before searching its contents, he said.

Detectives were pursuing a motive in the case, and Mr. Browne said he did not want to discuss any of the possibilities “because this is a murder investigation.”

The police could not say precisely when Ms. Jordan, who owns at least two apartments at the Trump International Hotel and Tower on Central Park West near Columbus Circle, and her son had checked into the Peninsula. One official said she paid for the room in cash.

An order for room service at the Peninsula was received on Thursday night, according to a hotel employee who declined to provide his name.

Ms. Jordan’s ex-husband, Raymond A. Mirra Jr., was notified about the boy’s death by the police in Pennsylvania, where he lives, said Patrick J. Egan, a lawyer in Philadelphia for Mr. Mirra. He was not the boy’s father, Mr. Egan said, but “he knew and cared for the kid and still, of course, having known her for a long time, cared about her, and it’s just very sad.”

Mr. Mirra is a businessman and investor in the pharmaceutical industry, Mr. Egan said. “He’s terribly saddened by the news,” he said.

Mr. Mirra and Ms. Jordan were married in December 1998 and divorced in November 2001, according to public records in Nevada. Shortly after their divorce, Ms. Jordan married a man investigators believe was Jude’s father, according to the public records.

Two workers from the city medical examiner’s office moved a gurney carrying the boy’s body out of a side door of the Peninsula about 5:40 p.m. They wheeled it down the sidewalk on West 55th Street and into a white van as a crowd watched.

Toby Lyles contributed research.

[Laura]

from the NY Daily News;
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_c...she_tried.html

Emil Tzekov, dad of
dead autistic son, can't
understand what drove
Gigi Jordan to murder

BY Nancy Dillon In Santa Barbara, Calif., Jonathan
Lemire and Larry Mcshane
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Sunday, February 7th 2010, 4:00 AM

This exclusive photo shows father Emil Tzekov, a
popular yoga trainer, holding son Jude alongside his
former wife of 5 years Gigi Jordan during happier
times.

Emil Tzekov, still reeling over his ex-wife's
arrest for killing their autistic son, managed
just a single tortured question Saturday:
Why?

His son was "an angel," the popular yoga
trainer said in the driveway of his California
home. And Gigi Jordan, his former wife of
five years, devoted her life to their precious
child.

"She was not a killer," the haunted father
said, his eyes welling up with tears. "I
would love to talk to her to have her
explain the reason. ... I cannot
understand."

As Tzekov wrestled with the slaying of 8-
year-old Jude Mirra, police charged the
49-year-old Jordan with murder Saturday,
accusing her of feeding the boy a fatal
dosage of prescription pills.

The multimillionaire mom was found
babbling incoherently near the boy's body
inside a $2,300-a-night suite at The
Peninsula, a ritzy hotel just off Fifth Ave.

Tzekov said his ex-wife quit her lucrative
job as a pharmaceutical executive to raise
the boy, who couldn't speak and battled
other health issues.

"She dedicated her life to him, all of it,"
Tzekov said. "All she had was Jude, and
the idea she tried to kill him is shocking."
Tzekov said he last saw the boy in early
2007, before Jordan cut off all contact and
disappeared.

"It was distressing," he said. "She blocked
my e-mails, her cell phone didn't work."

Friends and family say he tried
unsuccessfully to find Jude - even hiring a
private investigator. But he only discovered
the boy and his mother were living in
Manhattan after the botched murder-
suicide.

"To take a life for no reason, it's just
impossible," he said. "She loved him.
Always."

Tzekov said Jordan left everything behind
for her son.

"We had no nannies," he said. "She could
afford them, but she wanted to do
everything herself. She made sure all his
food was perfect, that he was sleeping so
many hours. Everything."

It took a terrible toll on Jordan, Tzekov
said.

"She left her work, her partnerships, her
social life," he added. "She used to go to
business dinners and go shopping. But she
stopped all that to take care of Jude."

Tzekov said the last time he saw Jude was
soon after the boy underwent a complex
transplant to try to strengthen his immune
system at Chicago Children's Hospital.

"He was in pain," Tzekov said. "She maybe
saw her son dying. Maybe not physically
dying, but he was living with pain.

"It wasn't just misbehavior," he said. "It was
screaming, something that the medication
tried to help. For some reason, she felt
helpless."

Tzekov said he will return to New York for
his son's funeral to see him one last time. "I
have to find out why she did this. I don't
understand how she could go to that
place."

[Laura]

Gigi Jordan, Mom Accused of Killing Autistic Son, May Have Had Munchausen's Syndrome
By Shayna Jacobs, 3/19/10 DNAinfo.com Read more: http://www.dnainfo.com/20100319/manh...#ixzz0ixClBDUK

MANHATTAN SUPREME COURT — The mom charged with murdering her autistic son at the Peninsula Hotel had been diagnosed with a controversial illness whereby parents exaggerate the severity of their children's illness and force them to undergo unnecessary treatments, prosecutors said Friday.
Assistant District Attorney Kerry O'Connell told a judge that Jordan had a history of Munchausen's syndrome by proxy, a mental illness that causes parents or guardians to inflate symptoms and seek medical attention for their children as a way to elicit sympathy.

O'Connell said that medical professionals had diagnosed Jordan as having Munchausen Syndrome and that she was seeking unnecessary treatment for her child, Jude Michael Mirra.

Hospital staffers saw that as "medical abuse," O'Connell said.

Friday's hearing was the second half of a bail hearing to determine whether Jordan, 49, can leave the East Elmhurst Hospital jail and voluntarily commit herself to the psychiatric ward at St. Vincent's Hospital.

Defense attorney Gerald Shargel didn't specifically address the Munchausen diagnosis in court. He said that Jordan did take Jude across the country to seek a cure for his autism.

"It was devotion; it was dedication, and it was love," he said.

Outside court, Shargel told reporters that during a 2008 involuntary mental-ward commitment in Wyoming Jordan was diagnosed with the syndrome, but that it was subsequently withdrawn, the Daily News reported.
Shargel wants his client released on $5 million bail. Her assets would be frozen and she would wear a GPS tracking device on her ankle.

He claims she needs more medical attention than what is provided by the Department of Correction.

"Putting Ms. Jordan there is essentially warehousing her," Shargel said.
Prosecutors are opposed to Jordan being voluntarily committed because they say the multimillionaire is a flight risk.

"They are not going to have armed guards sitting outside her door 24/7," O'Connell said.

Both sides are due back in court on April 8 for a decision.