Rabbis Call For End To Violence

Services Remembers Shooting Victims

PITTSBURGH, Updated 9:23 a.m. EDT May 2, 2000 -- A rabbi called on the country to "wake up to the terror in our midst," at a memorial service for the first of five people who were shot to death near Pittsburgh last Friday.

Rabbi Stephen Steindel said that 63-year-old Anita "Nicki" Gordon opened her door on Friday and met "violence and death." Richard Baumhammers is charged with the fatal shooting of Gordon and four other people.

Authorities said the 34-year-old Baumhammers also shot and critically injured a 25-year-old man in a two-county rampage.

Some 450 friends and neighbors packed the Ralph Shugar Funeral Home for the service Monday afternoon in Shady Side.

Some people turned out to show support for the family, touched by the fact that the violence struck in the Pittsburgh community.

Gordon, who is Jewish, reportedly knew Baumhammers since he was 4 years old.

She was buried in a in a cemetery near her Mt. Lebanon home.

In Mt. Lebanon, the family of Thao Pham wants to get a message out: We need to do something to stop this from happening again.

Pham's 5-year-old son Chris, is having a difficult understanding what happened to his father.

"I miss my daddy," Chris said.

But sadness is not the only emotion the family is feeling.

Pham's wife Bonnie told WTAE Actions News' Ted Koppy what she'd like to see happen to Richard Baumhammers:

"We don't want him to go to jail, we want him to be killed."

Copyright 2000 by ThePittsburghChannel. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.