100% Intolerance
Revelations in the wrongful death suit against TMT Development and Cornerstone
Recent filings in the wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of Freddy Nelson, Jr. provide a bracing look at the corporate culture at two of the businesses involved in the matter: TMT Development and Cornerstone Security Group.
Of particular concern is a Cornerstone internal policy memo dated January 12, 2021 — circulated just a few months before one of their security guards, Logan Gimbel, unloaded his pepper spray and his gun on Nelson and his wife. The penultimate line states: “Smile, be polite, be professional, BUT HAVE A PLAN TO KILL EVERYONE YOU MEET.”
Cornerstone added the “smile,” but it’s a quote lifted from a Marine Corps general, uttered during a time of war,¹ and oft-repeated by people who can’t go for coffee without getting strapped. It’s not the kind of mentality that your average visitor to Lowe’s garden center would be comfortable with in a private security guard. You can see how it worked out for the Nelsons.
During her deposition a few weeks ago, TMT President and CEO Vanessa Sturgeon was questioned directly about Cornerstone’s policy memo — a policy memo that was clearly labeled “Policy Memo.”
Sturgeon was asked if TMT would really want such a policy in place at their security guard company. Sturgeon’s answer — which she stated, twice — was that it did “not look like a policy to” her:
Which is interesting, because another aspect of the Nelsons’ case centers around TMT’s own “zero tolerance policy” for minor transgressions on their property, such as “walking across the grass.” According to their own documents, such conduct was supposed to result in “immediate” trespass.
Yet Sturgeon and her team are apparently conflicted — and gave conflicting instructions to Cornerstone — as to whether it was an official policy or an informal one, or if it was even in effect at the time of Nelson’s wrongful death:
One person who has not yet been deposed yet² is TMT Property Manager Marc Wilkins, who exchanged emails with Lowe’s corporate office six weeks before Nelson’s death. The emails were specifically about Nelson, and whether he had an official agreement with the Portland Lowe’s to cart away their wooden pallets.
The family points to those emails as evidence that TMT was acting with malice towards Nelson. In response, TMT claims that Wilkins “was merely attempting to resolve any miscommunication” and the emails “in no way demonstrate conduct that would give rise to malice or an outrageous indifference to a highly unreasonable risk of harm that would justify punitive damages.”
Read them for yourself (reformatted for clarity, or original bottom to top):
Wilkins’ tone was malicious, and his clear intent was to get the Lowe’s representative to act against this man they had never before heard of.
What’s also apparent is Wilkins’ hostility towards homeless people: He made sure to tell Lowe’s that Nelson was “transient” several times, and that he was “living adjacent to Delta Park Center in an RV.” For good measure, Wilkins admonished Lowe’s to secure their extra pallets so they would not become “an attraction to our transient population.” You know, like rats with unsecured dumpsters.
Wilkins’ emails were relentless, and he appears to have effectively bullied Lowe’s into agreeing with TMT’s position. But really, it was his boss, Vanessa Sturgeon, who set the tone for her company… everyone under her was “just following orders,” as the saying goes.
A year before Nelson’s death, at the height of Covid, Sturgeon used her own (still unsubstantiated) claims of danger and violence at her shopping center as an excuse to hire Cornerstone.
That is, Sturgeon described an imaginary “combustible” situation, and then willed it into existence by hiring armed guards to patrol a recycling center frequented by all walks of life… including homeless people. Having a direct line to the Governor’s office made it even easier for her to realize her fever dream.
There are currently several motions for summary judgment on the docket in the lawsuit, which have not yet been scheduled for hearing. But given this conduct described above, it’s hard to watch the bodycam footage and fail to grasp precisely how and why it all unfolded the way it did.
¹ That General James Mattis made this recommendation to soldiers patrolling Iraqi cities in 2003 makes it only slightly less disturbing.
² If TMT employee Marc Wilkins has been deposed, no excerpts have yet reached the publicly available case file.
