Officials provided new details about the shooter who killed two family members and wounded three others at a high school hockey game in Pawtucket on Monday before taking their own life.
Pawtucket police on Tuesday identified the deceased victims as Rhonda L. Dorgan and Aidan Dorgan, the ex-wife and son of the shooter. Rhonda’s parents, Gerald and Linda Dorgan, and a family friend, Thomas Geruso, were also shot and remain hospitalized.
Police have identified the shooter as Robert K. Dorgan, though court records and social media posts show the 56-year-old identified as transgender and used the first name Roberta and the last names Dorgano or Esposito.
The records reveal a history of credit card debt and domestic disputes that flared up six years ago, landing Dorgan with numerous cases in Rhode Island’s court system.
Creditors began suing Dorgan for unpaid bills in 2018 and 2019. The following year, in February 2020, Dorgan accused their mother of physical abuse. (The case was soon dismissed.)
Their wife, Rhonda Lee Dorgan, filed for divorce later that month. The complaint initially listed the reason as “Gender reassignment surgery” and “narcissitic [sic] + personality disorder traits,” though the response was crossed out in pen and amended to the standard legal language of “irreconciliable differences.”
A day later, Dorgan accused their father-in-law of making threats, according to a complaint filed at the police station in North Providence, where they lived with their family at the time.
“I have recently undergone GRS surgery (sex change operation),” Dorgan wrote, “and Gerald told me, ‘There is no goddam [sic] way a tranny is going to stay in my house.’”
“My sister-in-law Jill was there also to further intimidate me because her husband is Asian and I know he has ties to Asian street gangs,” Dorgan wrote.
The Attorney General’s office later dismissed that case too, stating that an investigation revealed the brother-in-law was a doctor with a long-established medical practice in Worcester.
At a press conference about the shooting on Tuesday, Pawtucket Police Chief Tina Goncalves said the family disputes still don’t provide a clear motive for why Dorgan would shoot his son, ex-wife, ex-parents-in-law and a family friend six years later.
Goncalves said she could not comment on Dorgan’s mental health, and that police are still seeking access to medical records.
In the years since the court cases, Goncalves said Dorgan appeared to have moved away from Rhode Island. General Dynamics Bath Iron Works, a shipyard in Maine, confirmed Dorgan was an active employee of the company.
Goncalves said Dorgan still traveled to attend their son’s hockey games, so their appearance at the Dennis M. Lynch arena on Monday didn’t raise any alarms among the other family members in attendance.
“From the video, it doesn’t appear that there was any conversation or confrontation between the family before the incident happened,” Goncalves said.
Goncalves said investigators are still waiting to interview the injured victims because their health is unstable.
“We continue to look into maybe what the motivation was,” Goncalves said. “We’re not sure at this point what the trigger event was that happened yesterday. We are conducting several search warrants at this time looking for additional information.”
