Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game Update on CO Bowhunter fatality

Never been in that situation. If there were no suspicious circumstances my co-workers and I charged negligent injury/homicide. I'm guessing an expert might try to impress the jury on how easy it is to think you saw something you didn't. That has happened to us all but hopefully we held our fire until we were sure. No way this wasn't a wrongful act and if he truly mistook a man for a legal game animal he should be convicted of at least negligent homicide in a criminal trial.

This hunter could have vision deficiencies but he would be responsible for knowing his limitations. When I was teaching hunter safety I always mentioned that in our state a legally blind person could buy a hunting license and take a high powered rifle out into the woods and hunt alone.

Maybe an expert will use the man's vision deficiency to explain to the court that his client did not have intent. I'm not familiar with Colorado law.

I wonder about the wisdom of it being legal for sight impaired people to hunt especially on public land. And that is no argument against them owning firearms.

Thanks Hastings.

Betting the truth is that it has nothing to do with sight
impairment and everything to do about being reckless

Here's how it SHOULD work. Years ago my BIL's father was deer hunting with some co-workers. He was glassing a brushy area and spotted a buck moving through. He could clearly see the antlers and top of the back as it walked with it's head down. He was just ready to touch off a shot when he seemed to think he got a glimpse of orange. How could that be? He lowered the rifle and started glassing again. What he'd seen was for real. One of his friends had shot the deer and was carrying it over his shoulder. He'd just seen the top of his friend's cap above the deer's back.
This is what's called being sure of your target.

I've been hunting for 60 years and have yet to see a man who looked even remotely like an elk or deer.

Another good reason not to carry a deer on your shoulders during hunting season........

The following incident happened in 2015, just like the OP incident. Bow hunting and shot by NR muzzle loading hunter

By: Jesse Paul, The Denver PostPosted at 9:37 AM, Jul 06, 2016 and last updated 10:37 AM, Jul 06, 2016
A federal magistrate has recommended an award of more than $2.5 million to the family of a 14-year-old Mesa County boy killed last year by a hunter who apparently thought he was shooting at an elk.

While the payout, stemming from a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the teen’s family, is still pending review by a federal judge, the lawyer representing their case says it sends a loud and clear message at a time when accidental recreational shootings in Colorado have been in the spotlight.

Magistrate Judge Nina Y. Wang, in a 20-page default judgment, wrote that Guy Pohto’s actions amounted to an extremely high level of outrageousness when he mistook 14-year-old Justin Burns for an animal and fatally shot him.

She called Justin’s death “undeniably tragic.”

“We want people to realize that when you come, especially to Colorado, and you are going to go into the mountains and take a gun with you that you have a responsibility,” Justin’s mother, Karla Burns, said Tuesday. “You have a responsibility to the other people in the woods.”

Pohto, 60, pleaded guilty in January to reckless manslaughter and careless hunting in Burns’ death on Sept. 13, 2015. Pohto was sentenced in April to five years in prison and is serving his term at the Four Mile Correctional Center in Fremont County, state records show.

I remember that one. Looked up the details, the shooter said he took a "sound shot."

He pled guilty and instructed his lawyer not to ask for leniency.

Those big judgements are usually not paid if the shooter didn't have quite a large liability policy. I hope the family did collect something. Whenever I investigated hunting or boating accidents it was always a priority to pin the blame where it belonged so that an insurance company couldn't wiggle out of paying. A lot of folks don't realize their homeowner liability coverage will cover negligence away from home. As in boating or firearms accidents. If you have assets it pays to have big coverage.

The article I read said the shooter didn’t have much in the way of assets or insurance.

The guy from Pa shoots the bow hunter. Goes over to see what he has shot and finds a dead guy. Gets his friend, goes back to camp, pack up, shower and grab a meal to eat in Rico. They then stop in and tell someone what has happened HOURS after the incident. It takes EMT's 10 hours+ to find the dead bow hunter because the shooter tries to beat feet out of Co. and doesn't take them to the body. Shooter then blames the state of Colorado for not making the archery hunter wear orange.

I'd say the [bleep] needs to face the same fate the bowhunter did.

If you don't mind me asking, where did you come by this information, I haven't read anything like that?

It doesn't seem to add up though, according to what I've read. If he tried to leave, seems like they'd have set bail higher than $10K. And they allowed him to travel outside PA because he wasn't a flight risk.

Plus he wasn't hunting alone. Even if he tried to beat feet and refused to help with the search, there's no way his hunting partner would have.

I’m going off of what I was told by a coworker who was in/around Rico when it happened. He has hunted in and around Teluride, Lizard Head for 25 years or so. One of the people in town with EMS or some search and rescue guy that he knows personally told him about what was going on.

I know, I know, it’s hearsay information but the guy I worked with is a straight up honest man. He gave me the story he was told and his acquaintance was one of the people who was in on the search. I haven’t read to much on the story myself until I saw where he was being charged back in January.

Why did it take 10 hours to find the guy if the shooter and his partner did not help lead rescuers to him?

That's a good question, I was curious about that myself. Could be the guy was so upset about shooting someone he wasn't thinking right and didn't mark the spot. It'd be hard to find a body in camo up there if you didn't know exactly where to look, lots of thick cover.

Anyway, thanks for the info, always good to hear an account from someone who was there. What you read in the papers is usually about 10% of the story.

They were in the south side of the San Juans in or near Lizard Head Wilderness. I didn't hear anything about a 10 hr search for the bowhunter, but it could've been a long ways back to camp, and take an even longer time to contact the sheriff.. There will always be lots of rumors about these incidents, especially when it involves a nonresident.

I'm familiar with the area. The reports say the bowhunter was shot at around 8:30 and the EMS call was received at 10:48. There's no cell service near the trailhead and it's a 30-45 minute drive to Rico, the nearest town with cell service. So after hiking back to the vehicle and driving down, a 2 hour and 20 minute lag is not unreasonable by itself.

And the reports do say that it took 10 hours for S&R to find the body. But I didn't read anything about the shooter or the hunting partner refusing to help with the search, or anything on why it took so long.

Says here in the news article that searchers spent 10 hours trying to locate the dead guy.

We were hunting near Sleepy Cat peak when this happened and we had a pretty good snow during that time. Don’t know the weather or conditions that were present where they were at but I can only imagine that getting a crew together and getting into the area takes time.

https://kdvr.com/news/local/hunter-...-homicide-charges-in-southwest-colorado/

Here's the latest. They had a hearing this week where the defendant's lawyer argued some pre-trial motions. All of them were denied by the judge, including a motion to suppress the statement the shooter gave to a deputy where he described what happened and admitted to shooting the Bowhunter Greg Gabrisch. I wouldn't be surprised if the shooter negotiates and pleads guilty now, things aren't looking good for him:

https://www.durangoherald.com/artic...r-trial-in-fatal-shooting-of-bow-hunter/

In my mind the real question is why CPW are running a firearms and archery hunt at the same time and area without the stipulation all hunters have to wear blaze orange....mb?

Because the Colorado Bowhunter's Association is dead set against it. Seems like they're the ones with the most skin in the game.

Am a Hunter Ed instructor here in Oregon and the orange mandate came up about 10 years ago. A poll among instructors across the state came in at about 60:40 against orange. That was a surprise given our emphasis on safety.

Legislature tried to walk the fence and made orange mandatory for kids 17 or younger during firearms seasons. Not required for archery or us elder hunters. We do have some archery/firearms overlaps.

No excuse on the being sure of one's target regardless of implement. Even if the victim was packing a rack the shooter should do some time.