Reply #7: link to Washington Post article.....

[RedEarth]

Since Dick Cheney shot him, Harry Whittington's aim has been to move on


News accounts routinely described Whittington as Cheney's "old friend" and "hunting buddy." In fact, the two men barely knew each other. Before the shooting, they had met briefly only three times since the mid-1970s and had never gone hunting together before. "The most you could say is that he was an acquaintance," Whittington says.

The circumstances of the accident also suggest the hunting party may have pushed the limits of safety. According to eyewitnesses quoted in a brief police investigation of the incident, the accident took place around 5:30 p.m. -- essentially dusk in southern Texas in February. Visibility was fading. Whittington says the sun had already retreated below the horizon but that there was a "limited" amount of daylight. Further, Cheney was wearing safety glasses, but it's unclear from the investigation if he was also wearing his eyeglasses. (Cheney's spokesman did not respond to repeated requests for comment.)

Whittington recalls that he was standing off to Cheney's right, looking for a downed bird. He doesn't remember exactly how far away he was when Cheney, tracking a bird, twisted quickly in his direction and fired. Whittington was angled toward Cheney at the time; hence, the wounds on his right side. Cheney later told a police investigator that he was standing in a slightly elevated position relative to Whittington, meaning he was aiming downward. The police report notes that Whittington would have been wounded on the lower half of his body if he and Cheney had been on same level.

This violates two basic rules of hunting safety, says Ralph Stuart, the editor of Shooting Sportsman, a hunting magazine. The first is the shooter's obligation to ensure that he has a clear line of fire before pulling the trigger. The second is the "blue-sky rule," meaning that a hunter shouldn't fire until he can see blue sky beneath a bird, thus greatly reducing the chances of hitting another hunter or dog. "Quail often fly low and demand lower shots," Stuart points out, but that makes it "doubly important" that the shooter is aware of what's between him and the bird and just beyond.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/13/AR2010101307173_4.html?hpid=topnews&sid=ST2010101307297