3 dead in Levittown shooting; suspect Andre Gordon Jr. now in custody

Update: New Jersey authorities announced Sunday charges have been filed against Andre Gordon Jr., 26, for carjacking, possession of a weapon, unlawful possession of a firearm, possession of hollow-point bullets and related charges. He remains incarcerated at the Mercer County Corrections Center awaiting extradition to Bucks County.

The man police say shot and killed three people in two Falls Township neighborhoods Saturday morning, forcing a large section of Levittown into lockdown as the St. Patrick's Day parade was set to begin, has been captured in Trenton after a daylong manhunt.

Andre Gordon Jr. was believed to be holed up in a house with hostages after a violent morning, where authorities allege he killed his stepmother, sister and his girlfriend, and was searching for others to harm. The girlfriend's mother was also bludgeoned in the attacks on Viewpoint Lane and Edgewood Lane in the township. He also carjacked two people at gunpoint in Trenton and Morrisville.

But Gordon escaped the house, and was arrested just after 5 p.m. in Trenton.

How Falls Township shooting suspect was caught

Murder suspect Andre Gordon, wanted for three fatal shootings in Falls Township, was spotted just after 5 p.m. walking at Brunswick and Phillips avenues in Trenton, perhaps 100 feet from where reporters and residents gathered to watch a SWAT team enter the house in which authorities believed he was hiding.

Gordon was apprehended on New York Avenue, just a few blocks from where police believed he was.

A friend of Gordon’s father, Lorraine English, saw him and began telling the crowd, “He’s down the street, he’s not in the house.”

She said she saw him walk past the crowd of reporters, police and onlookers. “I saw him walk down the street, go into that corner store, then I saw Andre walking past all of you,” English said.

She said she told two police officers, who went down Phillips Avenue, and shortly after Gordon surrendered. Another neighbor confirmed that Gordon was a short walk from the action on Phillips Avenue when he saw him, too.

Said English: “No one saw him because you all turned the wrong way. I tried telling you but no one listened to me.”

English, who is from Jamaica as is the Gordon family, knows the suspect's father in Levittown, and said he’s an electrician. “His father put him out of the house (in Levittown),” but she said she didn’t know the details.

Authorities did not release a motive in the killings. A check of public records has Andre Gordon Jr. listed as a former resident of both the homes on Viewpoint Lane and Edgewood Lane, where the murders occurred.

Andre Gordon Jr. taken into custody in Trenton

Andre Gordon fled the house before police arrived, and was captured shortly after 5 p.m. in Trenton, police said at about 5:20 p.m. The shooting suspect is now in custody and will be returned at some point to Bucks County to face charges in the shooting and killing of his stepmother, sister and girlfriend and in the attack on his girlfriend's mother.

He will also be charged with carjacking and other offenses. He could face charges in New Jersey too.

A Trenton police officer on patrol spotted Gordon after 5 p.m., and Gordon surrendered without incident, identifying himself to the arresting officer, said Trenton Police Director Steve Wilson.

Trenton mayor: We don't know if Levittown shooting suspect is alive

Trenton Mayor Reed Gusciora, arriving at the scene late Saturday afternoon, said there has been no response from Levittown shooting suspect Andre Gordon since police arrived at the house at Phillips and Nassau streets. SWAT has been on scene and deployed tear gas.

“My understanding is that it’s been a one-way communication,” he said. He could not confirm whether Gordon was still alive inside the house.

He confirmed that people were inside the house earlier in the standoff, but got out. Trenton police said the incident in the city started between 10:30 and 11 a.m. and everyone, but Gordon, was evacuated. The neighbors were also evacuated without incident, officials said in an email.

He said Gordon is related to the residents of the home. “It’s a familial situation,” he said.

Just at about 5:15 p.m., law enforcement entered the home.

Levittown shooting victim was Pennsbury eighth-grader

Kera Gordon was just 13. She was the youngest victim in the Levittown shooting that claimed three lives Satruday morning. Police allege the girl died in her home with her mother, Karen, after her brother, Andre Gordon, broke in to the Viewpoint Lane home and shot them.

Another teen, also believed to be a family member, escaped without physical injury, authorities said,

Bucks County Distrist Attorney Jennifer Schorn said Andre Gordon then shot and killed his girlfriend, Taylor Daniel, at her home nearby on Edgewood Lane, also in Falls.

"It is with great sorrow that I inform you of the tragic loss of an 8th-grade student from Boehm Middle School that occurred in connection with the events of today. We extend our deepest condolences to the family for their loss," wrote Pennsbury Superintendent Thomas Smith to the communinty Saturday afternoon.

"When the death of a student occurs, it is particularly difficult and presents us with many questions that we may not be able to answer right away. In addition, many members of our community may be impacted (either directly or indirectly) by this loss."

He said counselors will be available Sunday from 11 a.m. - 1 p.m. at Boehm Middle School to provide support to any students, families, and staff members.

Tear gas deployed at Trenton house where Levittown shooting suspect is barricaded

The 26-year-old former Levittown man wanted for three murders Saturday morning in Bucks County remains holed up in a Trenton home Saturday evening, despite several rounds of tear gas deployed into the house.

A Trenton police officer said the 26-year-old Gordon is still alive in the Phillips Avenue home.

Once in custody, Gordon will face murder, carjacking and other charges in Bucks County, but he would need to be extradicted from Mercer County, New Jersey back to Pennsylvania in the coming days.

Trenton SWAT orders Andre Gordon out

Trenton SWAT is now on the scene at the standoff between Gordon and authorities in the city. Gordon was tracked to Trenton after police say he killed three, including his 13-year-old sister, in Levittown on Saturday morning.

While authorities said he had hostages in the home on Phillips Avenue, news reports also show authorities safely evacuating at least two people from a second-floor window of the home. A neighbor who lives near the house said she saw police officers helping an elderly woman out a second floor window to escape the gunman.

It's unclear if others are still in the house with Gordon, who is believed to be armed and was described as "extremely dngerous."

SWAT members are using a bullhorn, calling to Andre Gordon to give up and come out of the house where he’s barricaded. He's been in the house for a few hours now.

SWAT has deployed tear gas at the house and shots were fire at the house at 4 p.m.

A fourth and fifth and sixth shot was heard afterward. SWAT has entered the house.

Levittown shooting suspect's motive unknown

Falls Township police Chief Nelson Whitney said Bucks County authorities have had minor dealings with Andre Gordon but nothing that would lead them to believe he was going to go on a shooting spree. Police do not know if he has other weapons.

Bucks County District Attorney Jennifer Schorn said at this time they are still investigating the motive behind the shooting.

She said after the three murders Gordon carjacked a 44-year-old Morrisville man at gunpoint at the Dollar Tree on Bristol Pike in Morrisville and fled to Trenton, where he remains barricaded in a home on the 100 block of Phillips Avenue.

At the 2 p.m. news conference, Schorn confirmed that Gordon had hostages in the Trenton home, but did not know how many.

Andre Gordon's third victim was his girlfriend, mother of his children: DA

Bucks County District Attorney Jennifer Schorn said after Andre Gordon killed his mother and teenage sister, he fled in a stolen car to his girlfirend's home on Edgewood Lane in Levittown. There he shot and killed 25-year-old Taylor Daniel, she said.

He bludgeoned Taylor’s mother, Nancy, with the AR 15 rifle he had with him, according to the DA. His two children with Taylor were in the home, but they were not injured, Schorn said. Nancy Daniel is hospitilaized, but expected to survive.

Andre Gordon killed sister, stepmother in Levittown home: Bucks DA

During a news conference, authorities in Bucks County said Andre Gordon killed his 52-year-old stepmother, Karen, and a 13-year-old sister, Kera, at their Viewpoint Lane home Saturday morning. He drove to the home from Trenton, after the first of two carjackings during the morning, and broke in, according to Bucks County DA Jennifer Schorn.

She said Gordon was homeless and primarily stayed in Trenton.

Three other people were in the house, all family members, including a 14-year-old who are hiding and managed to elude Gordon, they said.

The Bucks County DA said Gordon was going through the home and looking for other family members.

Levittown shooting suspect Andre Gordon remains barricaded in Trenton

Trenton police Chaplain Nathan Davis arrived at Phillips Avenue to take part in negotiations with Andre Gordon, the suspect on the Levittown shootings that claimed three lives.

He said he may be called over to help negotiate Gordon’s surrender.

“The main thing is to try to keep him calm,” he said. “One of the main calming words I use in a situation like this is ‘I understand how you feel.’ Because the whole point is to get him down.

"He’s at a 10 right now. We want to get him down to. 2 or 3. My instinct, being a police chaplain for so many years is that, right now, he’s ready to give up.”

Trenton police negotiating with Andre Gordon

Trenton police say they are negotiating with Andre Gordon but it is unclear if there are people inside with him. Originally, police said Gordon had hostages with him barricaded inside a home on Phillips Avenue in Trenton.

A SWAT vehicle is now on the scene in the city. Neighbors gathered on Phillips Avenue and watched the police activity, stemming from shootings in Falls Township that left three dead earlier in the day.

The house in Trenton sits about a block from Capital Health Regional Medical Center Emergency Room, which was placed in lockdown, officials said. No one was being allowed in or out of the ER.

Police name Andre Gordon a suspect

Authorities say Andre Gordon, 26, shot and killed two in the Gordon family home on Viewpoint before driving a stolen car to nearby Edgewood Lane, where a he shot and killed a person there. NEighbors say he dated a woman who lived there.

Less than 15 minutes late, he carjacked a vehicle at the Dollar General in Morrisville, but the driver was unharmed, police said.

At about 12:22 p.m., police, in a news release, said they learned Gordon is currently "barricaded, with hostages, inside a home on Miller Street in Trenton. Earlier police found a carjackacked SUV that police believe the suspect fled in after the shooting in Trenton, according to a report on Fox 29.

The shootings do not appear to be random.

"It is believed that Gordon knew all of the victims (except the victim of the carjacking).  Gordon is believed to be currently homeless and has ties to the Trenton, New Jersey, area," police said in a release.

Andre Gordon is about 6 feet 1 inches tall, thin build and seen in dark clothing. Police said he is "extremely dangerous" and is "believed to be in possession of an assault rifle which he used to commit these crimes.  It is believed that Gordon may be in possession of additional weapons."

A police officer told neighbors on Viewpoint, “We’re heavily armed because we don’t know where he is or if he will come back.”

Where did the Levittown shooting take place?

Shelter in place ordered in Lower Bucks County Saturday morning

Bucks County issued a shelter in place around 9:30 a.m., with a telephone recording telling people to lock doors and windows and shelter in place in the central location of a building, away from the doors and windows due to police activity.

It was lifted around 12:40 p.m., by authorities.

The St. Patrick's Day parade in Bristol Townhsip and Falls was canceled and police staged at the Pennsbury High School Campus on Hood Boulevard. The parade draws thousands around the area of New Falls Road, were police activity seemed to center.

The alert was sent to Lower Makefield and Middletown as well as Falls. But officials in Bristol and various other communities canceled Saturday events to keep the public safe.

3 shootings in Falls Township

The shootings began after 9 a.m. on Viewpoint Lane, said Falls District Justice John Galloway, who lives a few doors away from the incident in the Vermillion Hills section of Levittown that sits between New Falls and Trenton roads.

Police were dispatched there at 9:02 a.m., according to a news release.

“I came home from Mass and and was getting ready for the parade and I heard something, then I saw cop cars and neighbors came out. One said they heard two shots, another said he heard 10 shots,” Galloway said, standing at the end of his blockaded street.

“The the news just kept getting worse and worse. There are kids in that house, maybe 13, young teenagers. Good kids. I say hi to them. They say hi to my dog. They’re pleasant,” he said.

Neighbors identified the home as that of the Gordon family, saying they were friendly and quiet. They said Andre Gordon's parents, Karen and Andre who have owned the home since 2008, and sisters lived in the home on Viewpoint. Police did not identify any victims as of 1 p.m.

Police said Andre Gordon turned his attention to Edgewood Lane in the Elderberry section in Falls after the shooting on Viewpoint. Bucks County detectives arrived at the home in the late morning.

Andre Gordon dating family member on Edgewood Lane: neighbor

Falls Township police have cordoned off Edgewood Lane off of Elderberry Drive, one of the two shooting sites.

Next door neighbor, Chris VanSchack said the family were a nice quiet family who had lived in the house 20 years first as renters, then as buyers.

He described them as the kind of neighbors where you would see them and wave hello. He knew the couple only by their first names, John and Nancy. John and Nancy Daniel are listed as the owners of the home.

“No drama,” VanSchack said.

John and Nancy Daniel are listed as the owners of the home, and believed to have a son and daughter. Their daughter dating Andre Gordon, the neighbor said.

John died a couple years ago of lung cancer, and at least one daughter still lived in the home.

VanSchack said he peaked through the fence that separates their homes and noticed the window to the door was broken, possibly by a bullet.

“They don’t bother anybody,” VanSchack said. “This is one of those things you say, ‘not in my neighborhood,’ until it happens in your neighborhood. It’s kind of crazy.”

Viewpoint Lane neighbors heard shots

Back on Viewpoint Lane, neighbor Arlene Flanagan said she "heard weird noises."

"After the two, I heard another one and came to the front door. I looked out and saw a man shrouded in black clothing with a hoodie. He was holding a black, long-barreled gun. He got in his car, and he waited until a police car sped past him, then he pulled out really fast down Vine (Lane) and was gone.

"Nothing like this ever happens in our neighborhood.”

Police cars from around Bucks County were seen racing up and down New Falls Road and some were stationed at intersections.

A spokesman for Bucks County referred questions on how far the alert extended to Falls police, who were busy with the incident.

Pennsbury School Superintendent Thomas Smith issued a shelter in place for students participating in Saturday activities at the high school campus. Conwell-Egan Catholic students were also placed in lockdown at the Fairless Hills schools.

Anyone with information regarding Gordon is asked to contact 911 or 215-328-8501.

This is a breaking news story and will be updated continuously throughout the day. Check back often to stay informed.

This article originally appeared on Bucks County Courier Times: Falls shooting: Police confirmed three killed in Levittown