Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, January 12, 1993 TAG: 9301120053
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Kathy Loan
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
VALLEY COULD BE DEADLY PLACE IN '92
Ten homicides were reported in Roanoke in 1992.Think that's bad? The New River Valley had 14, at my best count, including murder-suicides:
\ Jan. 17: Shanna Burnette, 29, died after being shot in the head with a .357-Magnum while sitting in her car with her husband at a fast-food parking lot in Pulaski. The husband, 30, later pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter.
According to testimony, the husband intended to shoot himself and there was a struggle over the gun. He was wounded as the bullet traveled through his body and then struck his wife.
\ Jan. 20: James Walter "Pete" Guynn, 75, and Bonnie Jean Owen, 56.
The father apparently used small-caliber pistols to shoot his daughter, then himself, in Pulaski County.
\ Feb. 2: William Daniel Burnett, 19, died as a result of a fight in his Floyd County home. Burnett had a congenital heart defect.
Two men, ages 18 and 23, were charged in the case. One pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, another to being an accessory.
\ May 6: Barry K. Snider, 41, and Connie J. Snider, 42.
Husband apparently shot his wife, then himself, in the head with a small-caliber weapon, on a Montgomery County roadside.
\ May 16: The body of Jeffrey Eugene Duncan, 29, of Radford was found in a small stream in Pulaski.
He had been stabbed and drowned. Two of his friends, ages 26 and 32, face murder charges.
\ June 1: Lorna Raines Crockett, 32, of Pulaski County.
The mother of three young boys was shot twice with a .32-caliber weapon after being abducted in Christiansburg as she made a bank deposit for a shoe store that she managed.
Three New River Valley residents, ages 18-20 at the time of the shooting, face murder charges.
\ June 9: Harriet Shank Allen, 77, found stabbed to death outside her Floyd County home.
A 32-year-old man, later ruled mentally incompetent, was charged with her death.
\ June 11: Daniel Ray Boothe, 36, shot by a .30-30 rifle in his Floyd County home.
His teen-age stepson was found not guilty of murder after a closed courtroom hearing indicated he was reacting to violence Boothe inflicted on his mother.
\ June 28: Joseph Weldon Young, shot outside a Dublin convenience store by a 25-year-old man.
Ruled self-defense.
\ July 26: Darrell D. Calloway, 42, Shawsville.
Shot three times through his trailer's window with a .44-caliber weapon.
A 46-year-old Roanoke man faces murder charges. The man thought Calloway had beaten his brother.
\ Aug. 30: Timothy D. Casey, 19, of Richlands was shot once in the chest with a small-caliber weapon after a dispute at a campsite along the New River in Giles County.
His friend, 26, who also was shot and wounded, was charged with malicious wounding of a third man from Montgomery County, who shot the two friends. The man was struck on the head with a piece of wood.
\ Dec. 21: The body of Lester Dale Harris, 46, of Radford was pulled from the New River near Radford by Pulaski County investigators.
Harris, who had been shot then dumped into the river, had been missing since Dec. 16. A 50-year-old Pulaski County businessman has been charged with murder.
Police believe the shooting came about because of a marijuana drug deal that went awry.
Eleven of the 14 homicides were committed with guns. The other three deaths were a result of stabbing, drowning or a fight.
Gun advocates are fond of saying, "Guns don't kill people; people kill people."
But Montgomery County Commonwealth's Attorney Phil Keith pointed out the incongruousness of that statement earlier this month, reminding me what Marshall Williamson III said as he testified about wounding a man by shooting him twice after the two battled each other in a basketball game.
Williamson - who said he carried the gun everywhere, even to church, for protection - said, simply enough, that if he hadn't had the gun, he wouldn't have shot the man.
Perhaps if getting a gun were a little less easy in Virginia, perhaps if those guns were locked away and not instantly accessible in the heat of a moment, 11 of the 14 people that were killed in the New River Valley last year might still be alive.
Kathy Loan covers police and courts for the Roanoke Times & World-News' New River Valley bureau.