Catching up with a Pilot alum

This week I got the chance to spend some time with an old friend and

former Daily Pilot reporter that some of you may remember.

Christopher Goffard was a reporter at the Daily Pilot from late

1996 until the spring of 1998. Today, he covers the courts in Tampa

Bay for the St. Petersburg Times.

He was in Orange County to visit with friends and family who still

live in the area.

We spent lunch talking over two plates of tasty crab, shrimp and

spinach enchiladas at Taco Mesa, one of his favorite haunts while he

was working for the Pilot, and caught up with each others lives.

I rambled on about my wife and two daughters and our perpetual

house hunt that we seem to be on and he told me about his wife,

Jennifer, a copy editor at the St. Pete Times and how he is

disappointed that he wasn’t able to learn how to surf on his

honeymoon in Hawaii.

I have to admit that Goffard was one of my favorite reporters and

favorite people I’ve been able to work with at the Pilot. I’m glad to

call him a friend.

His fun-loving and charming personality belie his love for

unearthing the worst of life’s underbelly, the gruesome stories of

murder and mayhem.

The guy is able to dig for stuff like no one I’ve ever seen. His

writing skills are pretty hard to compete against, too.

Some of his big stories include the Eric Bechler murder case; the

trial of John Famalaro, the convicted murderer of Denise Huber; the

murder of Sunny Sudweeks, an Orange Coast College student found slain

in her apartment; the murder of Donna Jacobson, a longtime and

beloved Daily Pilot employee; and a multi-part series on Eric Wayne

Bennett, a rapist and killer who is now on death row at San Quentin.

“I learned all the basic skills at the Daily Pilot,” he said.

That’s nice of him to say, but I’m sure his writing did more for

us, than we did for him. Still, I do believe it was the Bennett

stories that catapulted Goffard’s career.

He covered Bennett’s trial and got the death row story after

dutifully writing to the convicted killer in prison, asking for an

interview.

When he finally got it, he and all of us at the paper, knew we had

a good story on our hands.

He spent several days at San Quentin and masterfully told the

story of Bennett, a carpet layer who viciously raped and murdered a

woman he had done work for.

The stories gave readers a glimpse into the life of this man, who

had been married with children but didn’t paint him as a sympathetic

figure as much as a pathetic one, at least in my eyes.

One behind-the-scenes moment I remember during the series was when

Goffard told us how he ran into Bennett’s fellow death row inmate,

Richard Ramirez, the well-known convicted serial killer known as the

Night Stalker, who was an avowed Satan-worshiper

Goffard noted that the death row inmates have this one area that

they all congregate in.

The news at the time was that Ramirez had become engaged to a

woman, who had been visiting him on death row.

“Congratulations on your recent engagement,” Goffard said in his

encounter with Ramirez.

I guess he really didn’t know what to say to a mass murderer.

Goffard had lots of great stories to tell.

Like in the Bechler case, I remember him telling me how he had

this weird feeling about Bechler and really doubted his sincerity

during the memorial for his wife Pegye, whose body has never been

found.

Of course, we all know now that Bechler is serving time for

murdering his wife during a boat ride on their anniversary and

dumping her body overboard.

As for my good friend, I’m happy to report that he is doing well

in Florida and likes his job very much, though I still think someday

he’ll be back in Southern California, this time probably writing for

our sister paper, the Los Angeles Times.

Until then, I’m sure he’ll just keep uncovering stories and

impressing those who have the luxury of reading them.