Ever since Nick Gordon’s arrest for assault and kidnapping, people have seen this as not only confirmation that he’s a monster, but as possibly related to his relationship with Bobbi Kristina Brown before her death.
Well it turns out that the woman who reported Nick Gordon to police and lead to his arrest is thinking the same thing, and she says as much in her first interview since Gordon’s arrest.
Apparently, Nick Gordon wasn’t too “haunted” by Bobbi Kristina’s suspicious death, because he had already moved on and gotten engaged to Laura Leal.
That engagement is no longer on, of course.
Nick Gordon’s arrest for assault and battery — the documented injuries on Laura Leal’s body — could lead to a conviction.
We already know that investigators looking into Bobbi Kristina’s death consider this arrest to be evidence, but we don’t know what will come of it.
But, in her very candid and very upsetting interview, Laura Leal suggests that she now realizes that there are patterns to Nick Gordon’s behavior.
She also describes the moment when she thought that she was going to die.
“I’ve been reading the reports about Bobbi Kristina and I’m physically shaking,” she describes in her first interview since his arrest, saying that Nick Gordon was doing to her what he’d done to Bobbi Kristina.
“I read about her being isolated, her family know knowing where she was, the manipulation, the bullying — it’s the exact same thing.”
Isolation and manipulation are part of abuser 101.
It must have been so horrifying for her to realize the parallels.
“That could have been me. Only the grace of God saved me.”
The moment that she saved herself — with a little help — is nothing short of epic. We’d have cheered if the rest of her story weren’t so horrifying.
If you’re wondering why she entered a relationship with Nick Gordon in the first place, she clarifies that she’d dismissed the allegations against him as “negative nonsense.”
Manipulators can be very skilled at making people brush off stories that they’ve heard of their past, because “that’s not the man they know.”
But most abusers have a history of it — they’re only a first-time abuser just the once.
From there, her story becomes one that we’ve read too many times.
“It started with a push and a slap, it would happen at least once a week.”
Most of us assume that we would leave a partner at the first incident, but most abusers are skilled manipulators.
Also they tend to try to pick victims who will blame themselves.
“I would have to put makeup on my bruises to cover them up, especially on my face.”
That’s even more serious — the majority of abusers seldom leave marks. But then, all abuse is serious abuse.
“But I blamed myself. I thought it was my problem and that I had to work harder at the relationship to make it work.”
That’s what partner-abusers, and sometimes even child-abusers, want their victims to think.
“I thought he loved me but how can you love someone when you put them through this hell? It’s like a double personality in one person.”
Yep.
It got worse — she describes how Gordon pinned her down to the bed in a rage and brutally punched her in the face and head so hard that she saw stars and wondered if she might die.
She credits her escape — and survival — to getting a hold of a candlestick and smashing it into his nose and running to the safety of Nick Gordon’s own mother, who was elsewhere in the house.
“He’s psychotic.”
That’s not a medical diagnosis, but we can understand why she’d characterize him that way.
That all sounds like it’ll make a very upsetting Lifetime movie that I’ll never watch because I love myself too much to put myself through that.
But if Laura Leal can see these parallels, you know that investigators will see it, too.
Prosecutors could potentially get this — if he’s convicted — admitted into evidence if he’s brought up on charges for Bobbi Kristina’s death.
He’s already been held legally responsible for Bobbi Kristina’s death, but not criminally liable.
Because they’re still building their case.
