
                         THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
                 Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 8, 1994                    TAG: 9406080441 
SECTION: LOCAL                     PAGE: D1    EDITION: FINAL  
SOURCE: BY MIKE MATHER, STAFF WRITER 
DATELINE: 940608                                 LENGTH: VIRGINIA BEACH

WORKER HELD IN KILLING AT GO-GO

{LEAD} As fire destroyed a Military Highway go-go bar Monday and charred the body of a man believed to be the manager, bar employee Reginald J. Gilbert Jr. blended into a group of distraught co-workers who gathered to watch the blaze.

On Tuesday, police charged Gilbert with setting the fire, killing the manager and robbing the bar.

{REST} The victim, believed to be 55-year-old Edward Brooks Hamilton, died after he was shot several times in the head, and not from the raging fire that destroyed J.B.'s Gallery of Girls, police spokesman Mike Carey said.

Because the body was so badly burned, the victim's identity has not been confirmed.

Gilbert, of the 500 block of Hyde Park Road in Norfolk, was charged with capital murder, robbery, arson, using a gun to commit a felony and illegally having a firearm.

Police said Gilbert is a felon, but his criminal record was not available late Tuesday.

Police and fire investigators said Gilbert shot the victim and set the fire in an apparent attempt to conceal the robbery.

An employee of a J.B.'s Gallery of Girls in the 600 block of South Military Highway said the bar's safe probably held the weekend receipts to be deposited in a bank Monday.

Detectives theorized that an employee was involved because the killer knew the bar's business practices. They also said the killer probably knew the victim because the victim was shot without a struggle in the store's rear office.

Firefighters battling the intense blaze found the victim dead in a chair in the office, but retreated from the building when the roof began collapsing.

Carey did not know what Gilbert's duties at the club were. The employee said Gilbert worked as an ID checker and bouncer.

The fire began Monday about 10:30 a.m. and quickly spread through the building. Two firefighters were slightly injured when a huge fireball rolled over them as a wall collapsed.

Gilbert is in jail without bail and was scheduled for his first court appearance today.

{KEYWORDS} ARSON FIRE MURDER SHOOTING

by CNB