14 Dead in Murder Suicide

A Friday is really no different than any other day of the week in quiet Binghamton, New York. Binghamton has a population of 40,000 +, and is located in the Southern Tier, bordering Pennsylvania. It forms part of the Triple Cities which also include Endicott and Johnson City. The area was the birth place of I.B.M. and Endicott Johnson Shoe Factory. Usually the only time we make national news is when the Susquehanna and Chenango Rivers flood. Not this day though….this was our darkest moment….a time when 14 people died.

We are openly diversified in this area. The welcome mat to our world neighbors had been rolled out for decades. We have a large population of Italians, Asians, Polish, Slovakians, East Indians and Greeks. Many migrated to this area because of the vast amount of manufacturing jobs that flourished here.  Endicott Johnson Shoe factory began in this area in 1854 and by the 1920s had over 20,000 employees. Rumor has it the early immigrants knew only one phrase, “Which way EJ?” I.B.M. was also founded here and had over 6,000 employees in the 1970s and yet today there are but a few hundred left. Like so many other areas we have been hit hard by unemployment.

It was early afternoon on April 3, 2009 when my cell phone rang. My wife was at work and wanted to know what was happening in Binghamton? I mentioned there was a lock down at the high school and some sort of disturbance at the American Civic Association building. Everything in the immediate area was either sealed off and or under lock down orders. It certainly sounded ominous, especially for our little area. The American Civic Association is a place that was established in 1939 by Endicott Johnson Shoe factory where immigrants and refugees are given the tools and classroom training to assist them in language, resettlement services and a pathway to U.S. citizenship.

By late afternoon the morbid news hit the airwaves and by the evening news it was going national and international. Jiverly Wong, a 1995 U.S. citizen, who had immigrated from South Vietnam, had systematically murdered 13 people and then fatally shot himself. The deed committed remains unimaginable even to this day, but the reasons given are even more bizarre. In a letter written to the media, Mr. Wong talks about his inadequate grasp of the English language, trouble with the police, being unemployed (some say he had worked at I.B.M., although he claimed he had worked for Shop Vac), he was upset about his $200.00 per week unemployment check and basically his poor life.  Actually, the last sentence reads, “Already impartial now..cop bring about this shooting. cop must responsible. And you have a nice day.” Eerily chilling words from an obviously deranged man.