Too Close for Comfort

By Jessica Gardner

Times Herald-Record

jgardner@th-record.com

Peter Morris was three feet from taking a bullet in the head.

A careless hunter fired a bullet into his house, missing his skull by three feet. It missed his son by six.

….It was a Tuesday in the middle of the afternoon when he was almost killed. He was standing at the sink in the kitchen washing the coffee pot. His 8-year-old son was standing behind him, pestering him about using the phone.

The two family dachshunds were shuffling around nearby.

Then Morris heard it.

Pop. Pop. Pop. BOOM.

The cabinet door swung open near Morris’ head and a cloud of dust took flight. As the particles floated to the counter top and the floor, his mind raced.

A balloon? A crazy baking explosion? Nope.

Morris stared into the cabinet, taking note of the destruction.

Pieces of Formica and Sheetrock were scattered about.

Then Morris spied the hole.

It was in the back wall, about the size of a silver dollar. Through the hole, Morris saw daylight.

The bullet had gone through the back of the cabinet and into a box of Aunt Jemima pancake mix the family uses on Sundays.

…People come up here and think they’re in the woods, but they’re not,” Myers [New Windsor Supervisor] said. “It’s just outrageous to me that this county still allows rifle hunting.

…I might be the only one you hear say this, because most politicians are afraid of the gun lobby,” Myers said.

[THE DEC SAYS SHOTGUNS ARE WORSE]

…Injury-related incidents are rare, according to Wendy Rosenbach of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. Of the 61 hunting injuries reported in New York last year, only 11 were because of rifle. Shotguns were responsible for 45 of them. There wouldn’t be any at all if people followed the rules, Sparling said.

…Rifle hunting is already prohibited in Dutchess, Rockland and Putnam counties. Westchester County only allows bow hunting. Hunting is disallowed altogether in Nassau County. Rifle hunting is prohibited in western New York, where much of the land is still rural.

Embedded within the article above:

…The hunter who shot into Tanya Marvinney’s Greenville home wasn’t identified.

Marvinney’s husband, Ray, was outside sliding the horizontal garage doors open when he heard a bullet whiz by his head. It hit the wooden door, about six inches above and three feet away from Ray’s head, then fell to the ground. Ray picked it up and gave it a close inspection. It was fired from a rifle.

It’s not the first time he and Tanya have heard bullets flying through the trees near their Monhagan Road home.

As more homes are built in the Greenville area, the danger of serious injury increases, Tanya said, adding, “This isn’t a rural community anymore.”

C.A.S.H. would like to suggest the following: All houses should be painted hunter orange, dogs, cats and people should have to wear hunter orange at all times during the hunting season. Take in all plastic ducks and mobile frogs, put in bullet proof glass windows and a concrete wall surrounding the house. Or, more economically, just live in a hunter shelter underground (remember the bomb shelters) during the “season.” After all, less than 3% of the population should be allowed to have fun guzzling beer and shooting willy nilly with high powered weapons at little animals outside your door, no?

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