ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Thursday, August 15, 1996 TAG: 9608150067
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
Man gives $1million for son's life
ALEXANDRIA - Hubert Hoffman said thanks a million Wednesday to doctors who saved his son's life.
Hoffman donated $1 million to Alexandria Hospital, where Thomas Hoffman came, disoriented and scared, after a tree fell on him two years ago.
``He had a blood clot on the brain, and the longer it bleeds, the more serious it becomes,'' said James Burgess, the neurosurgeon who performed emergency brain surgery on Hoffman. ``At some point, that becomes a fatal injury.''
Thomas Hoffman, who turns 40 today, doesn't remember the accident, which occurred as he cut brush on property owned by his family's development company.
``I just know I was dazed afterward, standing there. When you spit on the ground and you spit blood, you know there's something wrong,'' Thomas Hoffman said., he and his doctors said.
``Somebody asked me why I am making this donation,'' Hubert Hoffman said. ``It's because my son is worth a hell of a lot more.''
- Associated Press
Gunshots killed 2, autopsies show
CHURCHVILLE - The preliminary results of autopsies on two men found slain in Churchville last week have been released.
Richard M. Fountaine, 27, of Stuarts Draft was shot several times in the head, chest and right arm, Dr. David Oxley, deputy chief medical examiner for Western Virginia, said Tuesday.
William Bryant Hester, 21, of Mount Sidney, died of a single gunshot wound to the head, Oxley said.
Thomas H. Campbell of Augusta County faces capital murder charges in the case. He awaits extradition in Lonoke, Ark.
- Associated Press
Swallowed ball kills zoo's hippopotamus
NORFOLK - Nyla, the Virginia Zoo's only hippopotamus, died from a bowel obstruction caused by a 2-inch rubber racquetball she had swallowed.
The racquetball probably was dropped into her pen by a zoo visitor, zoo spokesman Gary Ochsenbein said Tuesday.
``She never left her pen, so it would have had to have been in there. The zoo staff certainly didn't put it in there,'' Ochsenbein said. With the zoo's move toward more natural exhibits, there are few barriers around the animals' pens. Signs instruct visitors not to throw food or other objects into the pens. ``You have to rely on the good deportment of visitors,'' Ochsenbein said.
The 31-year-old Nyla died Sunday after a monthlong illness. Hippos can live into their late 40s, Ochsenbein said.
- Associated Press
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