
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, August 16, 1993                   TAG: 9308160129
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: LUMBERTON, N.C.                                LENGTH: Medium

JORDAN KILLING ARRESTS MADE

Two 18-year-old men, one recently paroled from prison and the other under indictment for armed robbery, were arrested in this rural community Sunday and charged with first-degree murder in the death of James Jordan, the father of basketball superstar Michael Jordan.

Robeson County Sheriff Hubert Stone said Larry Demery of Rowland, N.C., and Daniel Andre Green of Lumberton have been charged with killing Jordan in what sheriffs called an act of random violence unrelated to his status as father of one of the world's most wealthy and famous athletes.

Stone said Green and Demery came upon Jordan as he slept in his car on the side of Route 74 between 2 and 3 a.m. July 23. Jordan had left a friend's house near Wilmington shortly after midnight on his way home to Union County, some 30 miles south of Charlotte, Stone said.

There has been speculation that his death was in some way related to his or his son's well-chronicled gambling, but authorities said Sunday that Jordan's death was simply a matter of stopping to sleep at the wrong place at the wrong time.

"He pulled over, probably to catch a catnap, then he was approached and shot," said Stone, Green and Demery had both given statements to investigators, which he declined to characterize as confessions.

Stone said the two men, who apparently didn't know Jordan, shot Jordan on the site. He didn't specify whether Jordan was in the red luxury sedan at the time.

Jordan, who would have turned 57 on July 31, died of a single gunshot wound to the right side of his chest, an autopsy showed.

Stone said Green and Demery drove around in Jordan's car for two hours, trying to decide how to dispose of the body. They dumped it in a creek just over the South Carolina border near McColl, he said, where a fisherman found it, decomposed, Aug. 3.

After dumping the body, Stone said, Green and Demery drove the car to a wooded area near Fayetteville, where they abandoned it three days later.

Stone said Green and Demery were the only suspects in Jordan's killing. He said records of calls made from the cellular phone in Jordan's $46,000 car were "a big help to us."

Jordan, 56, was buried Sunday after a private funeral in Duplin County, N.C., where he grew up.

by CNB