Life sentence for boy who shot woman at front door

A teenager who shot a mother in the head while she stood in the doorway of her home trying to shield her two children was jailed for life yesterday.

- HOLLY EVANS

Lianne Gordon, 42, had just returned from a holiday in Jamaica when she became the unintended victim of a gang feud on 5 December last year. At the time of the fatal shooting, Joshua Alexander, 17, was on bail for an attempted murder relating to a separate incident in March 2023.

Her murder was the culmination of a series of violent incidents between two rival neighbourhood gangs. That evening, Gordon’s son Kaymound, 21, was in the shower and her 16-yearold daughter came out of her room in their Hackney home when she heard what she thought were fireworks.

Even though the gunman was wearing a balaclava, she was later to tell police that she recognised her mother’s killer.

She said: “Mum had her hand on door handle and looked like she was trying to close it. I could see gun tip through the open door. I saw her drop. I went to her. As soon as my mum took her last breath and I was still hearing gunshots and that, I opened the front door and I was screaming at him and he stared me directly in my face.

“He was wearing a balaclava or hood, but I could see enough of his eyes and nose area to recognise him. He did not say anything. Everything happened in slow motion. We were face on for a few seconds, maybe five, before he ran off. We locked eyes, knew it was him.”

Alexander had denied being the gunman but was found guilty in October of Gordon’s murder following a trial at the Old Bailey.