The exclusive world of equestrian sports was already reeling this week from the sudden banning of one of its most popular figures, George Morris, after a sexual misconduct investigation.
Two days later, another ripple of stunning news: a woman had been shot at Barisone Dressage, in Morris County, where world-class competitor and sought-after dressage coach Michael Barisone trains riders and horses.
And then the realization the next day that Barisone was the alleged gunman.
“It is the No. 1 topic of conversation,” said Ken Braddick, who has covered dressage for more than 20 years.
“And the No. 2 topic of conversation is George Morris.”
Police had been called to Barisone’s property on West Mill Road in Long Valley, Washington Township multiple times recently, but when a woman punched 911 into her phone Tuesday afternoon, it was dire.
“I’ve been shot twice,” she told a dispatcher.
Responding police officers found a woman with two bullet wounds in her chest, and her fiancee holding down the suspected shooter.
“Michael Barisone shot me,” she said.
By nightfall, Barisone, a world-class equestrian and 2008 Olympian with a training center on his farm, was in police custody. The shooting victim was his trainee, Lauren Kanarek, who was undergoing emergency surgery.
Authorities later alleged Barisone, 54, shot her twice during their latest confrontation in an ongoing landlord-tenant dispute.
Nancy Jaffer via AP
Michael Barisone at his equestrian farm in Washington Township, in a 2009 photo.
Barisone also fired at Kanarek’s fiancee, but the shot missed, shattering a glass pane in a door, police allege. The two struggled and the fiancee got control over a pink and black 9mm Ruger handgun, which police found when they arrived.
“I had a good life,” Barisone said repeatedly as he was carted away from the property.
He’s now charged with two counts of attempted murder.
Michael Barisone
In a sport perhaps known more for its modesty and pomp, Barisone stood out.
At 6-feet, 4-inches-tall, he’s built more like a football player than a dressage rider — and his stature matches his bravado, those who know him say.
He is “quite gregarious,” one friend said, a showman who would rile up the crowds during elegant events that are judged on detail and precision.
His personality transcended the sport. He appeared in a 2012 interview with Stephen Colbert on his Comedy Central show, “The Colbert Report.” He handled Colbert’s quips with ease, as the TV host poked fun at the sport.
Barisone had built his dressage center from the ground up over 20 years at Hawthorne Hill Farm, his 53-acre property on West Mill Road. But his career as a rider started well before that, spanning from 1981 until about 2016.
He competed on the Grand Prix, the highest level in the sport, and had over 100 wins on horses he raised himself.
“He was quite a showman,” Braddick said, in a more reserved sport where riders wear formal coats and sometimes tophats (the horses wear hats too). He remembers Barisone riling up crowds years ago at the Devon Horse Show in Pennsylvania.
Stephan Hienzsch, the executive director of the United States Dressage Federation, said Barisone is one of the most recognized, distinguished trainers and competitors in the past decade or so.
“It’s a recognized name in the sport, particularly on the East Coast,” Hienzsch said. “He’s definitely a fairly well-known individual in the dressage community.”
Barisone married into the sport too.
In 2000 in Palm Beach, Florida, he wed Vera Kessels, a Grand Prix rider from the Netherlands. They filed for divorce in Morris County in 2017, records show. The papers say the couple had “irreconcilable differences”; when they split up, they divided custody of horses they owned.
Barisone got nine, and Kessels got three.
Since Barisone stopped competing in 2016, he’d been training horses brought over from Europe and coaching others on dressage, while moving between his properties in New Jersey and Florida.
Barisone drew worldwide attention 10 years ago when he dropped out of the higher level of a competition to make room for a world-renowned rider.
Thousands had flocked to Wellington, Florida in 2009 to watch a competition at the highest level of dressage. The audience was shocked when Dutch rider Anky van Grunsven, who has nine Olympic medals, failed to qualify for the freestyle competition, where riders perform movements on their horse choreographed to music, like the freestyle in ice skating.
Barisone dropped out of the freestyle so van Grunsven could take his place.
“He said, ‘all these thousands of people have come to see Anky, she needs to be in the freestyle,’” Braddick said.
Barisone’s website, which was deactivated Friday, describes him having another training facility in Loxahatchee, just north of Wellington – the epicenter of equestrian sports in the U.S.
He remained hospitalized in the Morristown Medical Center Friday evening.
Patti Sapone | NJ Advance Media
Former Olympian Michael Barisone faces two attempted murder charges after a shooting at his equestrian center property on West Mill Road in Washington Township.
Lauren Kanarek
Kanarek was newer to the scene than Barisone and competed on the domestic third level. A native of Livingston, she had been living on Barisone’s property and training with him.
Kanarek was first listed in critical condition but upgraded to stable Thursday.
“She is still in jeopardy, we are trying to focus on that for now,” a family member said Friday. “Please join us in prayer for her full recovery.”
Edward David, the family attorney, declined to comment.
“When I heard that she pulled through, I thought ‘aw man, she really is a fighter,’” said Jason McCracken, a friend who had dated Kanarek for years and grew up with her in Livingston.
The two don’t talk every day, but when they did, it was for hours, he said – about movies, music, or her training. “She was always super into the horses, really really loved those animals.”
“She’s opinionated, strong-willed, super intelligent,” he said.
“She is very loyal,” said Rosanna Williams, who became friends with Kanarek after selling her three horses. “She’s a phenomenally kind person and is very sweet and just really works hard and is driven for what she wants.”
The award-winning equestrienne had broken into the horse scene just years ago, she said, noting she moved part-time from her home in another state to train with Barisone.
“I’ve been selling horses at the international level for several years and she’s one of the most dedicated people I’ve ever encountered,” Williams said. “I’m not just saying that because she’s my friend. She’s just a phenomenal person.”
And Kanarek was set to make a debut in an internationally ranked competition next week, Williams said, but her dreams will be put on hold while she recovers.
Kanarek, an aspiring dressage trainer, touted her accomplishments and beloved horses on social media. Her Instagram biography is an endorsement of herself: a United States Dressage Federation Bronze medalist, a blogger and full time trainer at Barisone Dressage.
But her social media also showed Kanarek feared Barisone, according to her Facebook posts leading up to the shooting.
″I’m being bullied by a 6-foot-3-inch man,” she wrote. “Bullied to the point I’m afraid. It’s very complicated – I’m not sure what I can say on here – but it seems as if Safe Sport was created exactly for this reason,” the post stated.
She’d also written on her page that she planned to file a SafeSport report against Barisone. SafeSport collects reports of sexual assault and misconduct in Olympic sports.
In a separate post, Kanarek said she was told to “sleep with one eye open.”
-Bianca Velazquez, Vinessa Erminio and Chris Sheldon contributed to this report.
Joe Brandt can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @JBrandt_NJ. Find NJ.com on Facebook.
Sophie Nieto-Munoz may be reached at [email protected]. Follow her at @snietomunoz.
Alex Napoliello may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @alexnapoNJ.
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