Horse vic the 'villain': att'y
Olympic shooting's odd new twist
The former Olympian charged with shooting an equestrian on his New Jersey farm had been accused of child abuse by the victim — and had spoken to investigators just before the alleged run-in, his lawyer claims.
The new allegations came Wednesday as Michael Barisone, 54, made his first court appearance for allegedly pumping two bullets into Lauren Kanarek’s chest on his 53-acre Morris County farm on Aug. 7, leaving her in grave condition.
A Morristown Court judge ordered the 2008 US Summer Games athlete, who is facing charges of attempted murder and weapons possession, to stay locked up because he poses “a threat to the community.”
But Barisone’s lawyer insisted Kanarek was actually a “villain” who had vindictively reported the dressage champion and his fiancée to child services amid a property dispute.
“She’s a villain, and she is known as a grifter in the community,” attorney Jeffrey Simms told reporters.
“They started a fraudulent [family services] investigation into them,” Simms added, referring to Kanarek and her fiancé, who, like Barisone, suffered an arm injury in a struggle for the gun.
The crux of the couple’s feud with Barisone, officials have said, was their refusal to leave the home they rented on the farm — where they also quartered five horses — despite Barisone’s insistence.
“They were told to leave by him,” said Simms. “They were told to leave by the fire marshals. They completely ignored that.”
Simms claimed Kanarek and her fiancé retaliated in the spat by falsely claiming to state officials that Barisone and his wife-to-be, Mary Haskins, abused Haskins’ children.
Without conceding that Barisone pulled the trigger or had a breaking point, Simms said, “If there was [one], this incident followed almost directly the investigator coming . . . to say, ‘You have been doing this, this and that to her children.’ ”
That visit, confirmed to The Post by law-enforcement sources, came “moments” before the incident, said Simms.
An attorney for Kanarek, who remains hospitalized, did not deny the claim but said it was hardly the issue.
“We cannot confirm that it is true at all,” said Edward David. “Even so, it does not justify taking a 9-millimeter gun and shooting Lauren twice in the chest.”