Man With Gun Killed in Court; Marshal Hurt

A chiropractor with a penchant for guns and an obsession about government officials conspiring against him was shot and killed by a bailiff in a Van Nuys courtroom Wednesday after holding a gun to a prosecutor’s head, authorities said.

Jeremey A. Sigmond, 35, of Sepulveda, who was convicted in the same courtroom Tuesday of charges stemming from a high-speed chase last October, shot Los Angeles County Marshal Cliff Wofford, 30, once in the abdomen in an exchange of gunfire.

The prosecutor, Deputy City Atty. Jessica Perrin Silvers, 49, escaped injury.

In Serious Condition

Wofford was in serious but stable condition at St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, where officials said he was expected to recover.

Silvers, who had prosecuted the case against Sigmond in Municipal Judge Michael B. Harwin’s court, said she was walking into the courtroom about 10:15 a.m. when Sigmond confronted her.

“He was yelling at me in a very paranoid tone,” she said. “He said, ‘Mrs. Silvers, you’re coming with me.’ ”

Harold S. Vites, a Panorama City defense attorney, said he was addressing the judge when a man with dark glasses and wearing a dark blue suit entered the courtroom with an automatic pistol.

Vites said he heard the man say, “ ‘Silvers, we’re going to settle this. I want a new trial.’ ”

At that point, Vites said, the seven or eight people in the courtroom dropped to the floor.

“The whole thing was really scary. It seemed to take an eternity,” Vites said.

As the courtroom’s bailiff, Deputy Marshal Pat Warford, reached for her weapon, Sigmond yelled, ‘ “Don’t touch your gun or I’ll kill her!’ ” Silvers said.

Harwin electronically signaled bailiffs in the marshal’s office nearby as Warford threw her gun to the floor.

When Sigmond moved to pick up the weapon, Silvers said, she broke away and ran into the jury room, where she barricaded herself behind the closed door.

Police and witnesses said that Sigmond, who was wearing a bulletproof vest, pointed both weapons at Harwin and demanded a press conference.

Wofford then entered in response to the alarm. Police said Wofford ordered Sigmond to drop the gun. Sigmond fired and the gun battle erupted.

“After the first of shots, I was able to get the guns from” the mortally wounded Sigmond, Harwin said.

Wounded Bailiff

Sigmond, who was still struggling, was then handcuffed and placed on the floor, where he died. Wofford left the courtroom holding his side with one hand, his gun with the other, and stumbled to a nearby sidewalk to await an ambulance.

Sigmond was arrested last October after leading California Highway Patrol officers on a high-speed chase that reached 115 m.p.h. and ended near his home in Sepulveda. He was wearing a leather jacket, two bulletproof vests and a crash helmet, officers said. He also had a loaded .38-caliber revolver in his car.

Sigmond maintained that he wore the vests and had a gun because he was afraid of organized crime figures. He said he fled from officers because he believed they were hit men.

Lt. Charles Massey of the Los Angeles Police Department Major Crimes Unit said Sigmond was distraught over the outcome of his trial.

“Our information is that he was a very eccentric individual,” Massey said. “I don’t know if he planned to kill someone. Obviously, things got out of hand.”

There are no metal detectors in the courtroom, and security measures are generally increased only when dangerous defendants are scheduled. Prosecutors complained about that Wednesday.

‘End of His Rope’

“The perception that misdemeanor defendants aren’t dangerous is wrong,” Deputy City Atty. Rick Schmidt said. “We get a lot of defendants in between felonies who pick up misdemeanors and a fair number of people with psychological problems who pick up misdemeanors, and then folks like this--a guy who was deranged and came to the end of his rope.”

In Orange County, Marshal James C. Byham said metal detectors are placed at courtroom entrances only when officials believe that a particular case could result in security problems.

“We have on a number of occasions considered doing what the federal courtrooms do, which is closing the courtrooms to the general public by putting X-ray equipment and metal detectors before them,” he said.

But the county’s judges, who oversee the marshal’s office, have been reluctant to permanently place such imposing security measures in the courthouse.

“They feel very strongly that the courthouses should remain open to the general public,” the marshal said.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Leonard Goldstein, chairman of the Orange County Superior Court’s marshal’s personnel committee, said he was satisfied with present security arrangements at the county courthouse.

“Even with a very fine system in place, it’s always possible to circumvent it,” Goldstein said.

At present, all but a few of the county’s 100 or so courtrooms are protected by at least one armed bailiff, Byham said.

The marshal said he was not contemplating adding special security measures as a result of the Van Nuys shoot-out.

“We think twice every day (about security),” he said. “Today it’s certainly a problem, but it is every day.”

In response to Wednesday’s incident, City Atty. James K. Hahn said he will ask county supervisors to require metal detectors at the entrance of all court facilities.

“We really ought to get serious and get serious very quickly,” he said. “We have to keep weapons out of the courtroom.”

The state Board of Chiropractic Examiners revoked Sigmond’s license in February, because his October arrest violated probation prohibiting him from possessing guns, said state Deputy Atty. Gen. Earl Robert Plowman. He was placed on probation after the attorney’s general’s office sought to have his license revoked in 1985, alleging he was too mentally ill to practice.

Sigmond repeatedly complained that government officials and the Mafia were involved in a conspiracy against him and his family, Plowman said. He wrote letters to authorities and the media, including The Times, outlining his contentions.

Jurors who convicted Sigmond said the defendant acted agitated throughout the four-day trial and rambled about a conspiracy against him when he took the stand.

‘Tightly Wound’

“He was very tightly wound throughout the whole thing,” said Maria La Ganga, a Times reporter, who was the jury’s foreman. “He wasn’t a very credible witness for his defense, and he was really the only defense witness. He faced the jury at all times while testifying. He looked each of us in the eye and talked very loudly and very agitatedly.”

During his testimony he boasted of going 145 m.p.h. and readily admitted he was carrying a loaded gun, La Ganga said.

“He burst out several times that, ‘Of course the gun was loaded. Wouldn’t you carry a loaded gun if your life was threatened?’ ” she said.

Another juror, Billy Thomas of Van Nuys, said Sigmond’s contentions of conspiracy were not believable. The jury convicted Sigmond after 45 minutes of deliberation.

After the shooting, a police bomb squad went to Sigmond’s home in the 9300 block of Woodley Avenue after receiving information that Sigmond had a large cache of weapons and possibly explosives in the home, which may have been “booby-trapped,” Massey said. No weapons or bombs were found.

Sigmond’s attorney, Norman Edell, said his client was a Air Force veteran who held a second-degree black belt in karate and was a collector of weapons, primarily combat rifles, but had recently sold almost all of his weapons to pay attorney fees.

‘Totally Shocking’

“There was no indication of this,” Edell said. “He was very distraught because the case meant a lot to him. He didn’t take it passively. But there was no indication of this. It is totally shocking.

“I would assume that this was the amalgam (of the frustrations) of his entire life over the last five years.”

Edell declined to discuss his client’s conspiracy claims.

“Put it this way, I believed in my client,” he said. “It’s a long story, and the newspaper can’t give me 10 pages to tell it. I’m not trying to be funny, but it’s a dead issue.”

Times staff writer Jess Bravin in Orange County contributed to this story.