What is it about, "Know your target and what is beyond.", that some people do not seem to be able to understand?http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nb/ ... 69129.html
May 9, 2008, 11:38PM
Stray bullet finds a tragic mark
Two charged after Conroe campground resident is killed
By BILL MURPHY
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle
RESOURCES
Accustomed to hearing gunfire from those taking target practice in the distance, Perry Hook hardly felt in danger when he sat down outside his recreational trailer to relax while his wife cooked dinner Thursday evening.
Even as he lay dying outside his trailer door, he didn't realize that he had been shot and that there was a link between the gunfire coming from a stand of trees about 400 yards away and his suddenly feeling so ill, a neighbor and relatives said.
"He kept on trying to raise his head. I stuck a pillow under it. He said two or three times, 'What happened? What happened?' " said Julie Russ, his next-door neighbor.
Hook, 58, was shot in the stomach while sitting outside his trailer at a KOA campground on Texas 105 about 8:15 p.m., the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office said.
Eliseo Maldonado, 23, of Conroe, and Gregg Lamon, 32, of Montgomery, were charged with criminally negligent homicide and booked into the Montgomery County Jail, the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office said. Maldonado is being held on $25,000 bail. Lamon's bail status was unavailable.
Investigators believe that one of the two men taking target practice with a rifle similar to an M-16 fired the shot accidentally, said Hook's son, Perry Dan Hook, a deputy in the Harris County Sheriff's Department.
Maldonado and Lamon were shooting on private land, and the woods screened their view of the campground, the son said.
Shooting went on
As Russ and Hook's wife, Helen, scrambled to call 911 and comfort Hook, the target shooting continued, and Russ worried that she, her daughter, who was hiding in the family's trailer, or Hook's wife might be shot, Russ said.
The target shooters didn't realize that a man had been fatally wounded until police arrived on their property, Hook's son said.
Montgomery County Sheriff's deputies found Hook suffering from a gunshot wound to the abdomen. He was taken by ambulance to Conroe Regional Hospital where he was pronounced dead.
Russ and Hook's relatives wondered why the men were shooting at targets so near a campground, homes and the growing number of businesses that have opened along Texas 105 near Lake Conroe recently.
They shot target practice so frequently that Russ concluded that the site, adjacent to the campground at 19751 Highway 105 West, was a gun range, not private land.
"You heard them shooting all the time," she said. "This was totally uncalled for."
Mike Gast, corporate spokesman for KOA, said he had noted the increasing development around the campground while visiting it about a month ago. He questioned whether it should be legal to take target practice near homes and a campground.
Hook's son said his dad and other relatives worried that he might be hurt on the job as a deputy.
"Here it was my dad who has something happen to him," he said.
Hook had been sitting outside the trailer in a plastic lawn chair. In front of him lay a sloping meadow. His wife was in their small trailer that had been their residence after he leased their home in The Woodlands.
Took job at church
Hook was a superintendent at a remodeling job at a Methodist church in Montgomery. He took the job in part so he could live near two of his grandsons, his son said.
Born in Louisiana, Hook lived in Missouri before moving with his family to Houston in 1976.
He left school before finishing the 10th grade but had a good mind and mastered skills needed in the construction trade, his son said.
"He was just a hard worker. He worked every day of his life," his son said.
Funeral arrangements were being made Friday. A visitation will be held Tuesday in Montgomery. He will be buried in a family plot in Moss Bluff, La.
Besides his wife and son, Hook leaves a daughter, Sherri, and two other sons, Christopher and Sam.
Chronicle writer Jennifer Leahy contributed.
Apparently someone was practicing with an AR type rifle when the stray bullet struck the guy. He never knew what hit him. According to the story, all he knew was that he suddenly felt very ill, ans was asking, "What happened?" when he passed away.
How can we get people to make sure they have a good backstop to shoot against? It is all that difficult to teach people that a stand of trees is not a proper bullet stop?
A few years ago there was that little kid in Hays County. Now this. And you know the gun banners swoop down on incidents like this like the vultures they are, exploiting avery last drop of emotion that they can.
