Aug 31, 2005 6:59 pm US/Central
Attorney: Surviving Hunters' Statements 'Conflict'
Hayward, Wis. (AP) ―
The two deer hunters wounded in a shooting that left six of their friends dead in Wisconsin's north woods gave witness statements that are "in conflict with each other," a defense attorney told a judge Wednesday.
At a pretrial hearing, Judge Norman Yackel granted a motion that the key witnesses be prevented from hearing each other's testimony at the murder trial of Chai Soua Vang, a Hmong immigrant charged with the slayings in a dispute over trespassing on private land.
The injured hunters, Terry Willers and Lauren Hesebeck, gave accounts that differ in "major" ways, defense attorney Steve Kohn told The Associated Press.
"They gave different statements as to what each other did," Kohn said without elaborating.
Attorney General Peg Lautenschlager declined to comment on the ruling.
Willers was wounded in the neck and Hesebeck suffered a shoulder wound in the Nov. 21 shooting that they and others have described as a cold-blooded attack by a man on a rampage.
Vang, a 36-year-old St. Paul truck driver, has told investigators he was shot at first, insulted racially and acted in self-defense.
Jury selection begins Sept. 8 in Madison. Yackel ruled earlier that a jury be picked from outside Sawyer County because of publicity about the case and concern of possible anti-Hmong sentiment in the area.
Vang came to the United States from a refugee camp in Thailand in 1980 when he was 11.
At Wednesday's hearing, Lautenschlager also said no witnesses had requested that they not be photographed or videotaped at the trial, a condition prosecutors had asked for earlier.
In other rulings, Yackel granted a prosecution request to allow jurors to take notes during the trial. He also granted a prosecution request to show the jury pictures of the six victims when they were alive during opening arguments. But the judge said he needed to review videotapes and pictures of the victims after they were shot before deciding on whether the jury would see them.
Yackel also ordered the jury to be sequestered in a hotel, with no televisions, telephones or computers in their rooms.
Vang attended the hearing in an orange jail jumpsuit, his hands and ankles in shackles.
He spoke just once, answering, "Yes, your honor," when Yackel asked whether he understood his ruling regarding the witnesses' testimony.
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