Tearful Fiancee Tells Of Deadly Blast Grangeville Man Faces First-Degree Murder Charge

With a halting voice and occasional tears, the fiancee of a Grangeville man killed by a dynamite explosion Feb. 8 recalled events surrounding the fatal blast.

Tiffany Scott, 20, was the first witness in a preliminary hearing Monday in Magistrate Court for Gary L. Gordon, 25, of Grangeville. Gordon is charged with felony first-degree murder in the explosion death of Stacey V. Calhoun, 28, also of Grangeville.

Scott said she and Calhoun had spent the day shopping with two of their three young sons. Shortly after they returned home, Scott went outside to look for children’s bedding she thought she had left in her car. While she was searching her car, she noticed a light blue Mustang pull alongside Calhoun’s pickup. Scott said a man threw something into the bed of the truck, which she assumed was a cigarette or firecracker.

“I thought it was some jerk … trying to be funny.”

Scott was walking to the house when she noticed the object in the back of the truck was smoking. She told Calhoun, who looked into the bed of the truck and said the object looked like a firecracker.

“I told him not to touch it, and then there was a loud explosion and I heard him scream,” she said.

Scott said she noticed Calhoun was bleeding after she ran around the truck to him. She drove him to Syringa General Hospital, but doctors decided to transport him to Lewiston later that night. Doctors performed surgery, removing several pieces of shrapnel from his legs and abdomen. But they told his father, Johnnie V. Calhoun, his son was dying.

Meanwhile, police found the car they were looking for. It belonged to Kristie Harris, whose boyfriend, Gary Gordon, was at her apartment.

Police questioned Gordon and others at the apartment, all of whom denied being near Calhoun’s house that night.

At about the same time, Gordon’s brother, Chris, called his landlord and a close friend of Calhoun’s, Dave Reilly, to tell him he had heard about a bombing.

The next morning, a suspicious Reilly and Chris Gordon searched Gary Gordon’s apartment, which he shared with his brother. Underneath Gary’s bed, the two men found a box of dynamite and a fuse.

Chris Gordon said his brother had told him he had stolen the dynamite from the McKinley mine where he worked.

Investigators planned to outline Tuesday the evidence they have against Gary Gordon. Judge Michael J. Griffin will determine if there is enough evidence to bind him over to District Court.