Gunman Believed MCA ‘Blackballed’ Him, Landlord Says

The man who emptied several magazines of high-velocity rifle rounds into MCA’s World Headquarters and an adjacent Bank of America branch Tuesday was beaten down by years of unemployment and believed that MCA had somehow “blackballed” him, his landlord of eight years said.

John Brian Jarvis was apparently pushed over the edge last month when his mother died and he could not afford even to have her body cremated, Larry Koch said.

Shortly afterward Jarvis moved out, said Koch, owner of a two-story tan stucco building near downtown Pleasanton, a suburb of about 54,000 on the eastern fringe of the San Francisco Bay area.

“He told me he was going to just pack up his old station wagon and let it take him somewhere--north, south, east or west, he wasn’t sure. He had no plans at all. Thinking back now, I guess he was pretty upset.”

Jarvis was arrested Tuesday morning after firing 35-40 shots from a high-powered rifle at the Universal City headquarters of MCA, his last steady employer. Two MCA employees were wounded by bullets and five others injured by flying glass.

Koch, who saw Jarvis once or twice a week for eight years during regular inspections of the building, said he believed that Jarvis, who had not worked during the time he lived there, survived on his mother’s Social Security benefits and the pension she received from Safeway, where she had worked for many years.

Koch said Jarvis’ spirit collapsed after his mother, Secret Jarvis, died in early March of heart problems.

“He said, ‘Boy, I sure hope they don’t bring her back and dump her on our doorstep,’ ” Koch recalled.

Koch described Jarvis as a “very opinionated, very well-informed person. He read newspapers, he watched a lot of TV and he had something to say about anything you’d want to discuss.”

Koch said his opinions were “always negative. He’s a very pessimistic, negative man and he believed our country was headed right down the drain.”

Once or twice, Jarvis mentioned his former career at MCA, describing his job as a driver. He said he had been fired and “blackballed” by the company and seemed somewhat bitter about it, Koch said.

Koch said Jarvis is not married now but has a daughter. He described the tenant’s life as that of a “complete loner. He never had company. He never went anywhere or did much of anything in the eight years I knew him.’

Occasionally, Koch saw Jarvis leaving his apartment with a bow and arrows, which he apparently used for target shooting.

Jarvis’s other pastime was working on the engine of his car, a Ford station wagon with more than 200,000 miles on it. Koch said he smoked cigarettes, had a tattoo on his left arm and he always wore Levi’s and a white T-shirt.

Koch said Secret Jarvis had lived in his building for about 17 years, including the eight years her son shared the one-bedroom unit where he apparently slept on a couch in the living room.

The landlord said he made frequent offers to paint and upgrade the apartment, but Jarvis always declined, saying, “he liked it just the way it was.”

As tenants, they were “excellent, and always paid their rent right on time,” he said.

Jarvis had made little impression on other residents of the building.

“Well, that’s hard to believe,” said one neighbor, who declined to give his name, upon hearing of the shooting. “He seemed like a plain old ordinary person to me.”