Prosecutor: Mich. shooting suspect cut arm in jail
OWOSSO, Mich. — A prosecutor says a man accused of fatally shooting an abortion protester and business owner in Michigan has been taken from jail to a hospital with a self-inflicted wound to his arm.
Shiawassee (shy-uh-WAH'-see) County Prosecutor Randy Colbry says Saturday that Harlan Drake suffered "a serious gash" after cutting his arm near the wrist but was expected to recover.
Drake is charged with gunning down the abortion protester and gravel pit owner in Owosso, Mich., on Friday. Authorities say the 33-year-old was arrested before fulfilling a plan to kill a third man.
Colbry told The Associated Press he doesn't know exactly when Drake cut himself or what he used to do so. Colbry says Drake was taken to a hospital for surgery.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
OWOSSO, Mich. (AP) — A real estate agent said Saturday that he and his family left their small Michigan city after police told him he was the third target of a gunman charged with killing an abortion protester and another man.
James Howe of Owosso said his family was upset after police told him he was an intended target of the shooting spree a day earlier. He paused when asked how he was dealing with allegations.
"How would you hold up if someone was told you were going to be killed?" said Howe, who spoke to The Associated Press by cell phone. He declined to say where he and his family were staying.
Howe also declined to discuss or say whether he knew Harlan James Drake, 33, who accused of shooting to death anti-abortion activist James Pouillon and gravel pit owner Mike Fuoss on Friday.
Authorities said when he was arrested Drake told police he also intended to kill Howe.
Drake was arraigned Friday without an attorney on first-degree murder charges and ordered held without bond.
Police said little about what might have led Drake — a truck driver who mostly lived on the road in his cab and had family in the area — to kill, other than that he had a grudge against Fuoss and Howe and didn't like Pouillon's graphic anti-abortion signs.
Pouillon, 63, was a polarizing figure in Owosso, a town of 15,000 best known as the birthplace of 1948 Republican presidential candidate Thomas Dewey. While inhaling oxygen from a small tank, he could usually be seen with his anti-abortion signs outside schools, the library, city hall, even football games.
On Friday morning, Pouillon was in his usual place across the street from the high school, holding a sign that pictured a chubby-cheeked baby with the word "LIFE" on one side and an image of an aborted fetus with the word "ABORTION" on the other. Authorities allege Drake pulled up to him in a truck and opened fire.
The county's chief assistant prosecutor, Sara Edwards, said there didn't appear to be a "triggering event" but Pouillon's presence outside the school seemed to aggravate Drake. It was "the fact that he was outside the high school with his signs in front of children going to school," she said.
Drake then drove seven miles and down a dead-end country road to Fuoss Gravel Co. and killed Fuoss, 61, who owned the gravel business, said Shiawassee County Sheriff George Braidwood. The two men knew each other, but authorities didn't detail what may have led to his slaying.
Someone wrote down Drake's license plate number after Pouillon's shooting and called police, who said they arrested him before he could fulfill a plan to kill Howe.
The shootings come a little more than three months after the slaying of late-term abortion provider George Tiller at his Kansas church. A man with a long history of anti-abortion views, Scott Roeder, has pleaded not guilty to the slaying.
Operation Rescue President Troy Newman said Pouillon was a member of the anti-abortion group, adding that he wept Friday when he received word his friend had been killed.
Flowers marked the spot Saturday where Pouillon was shot. A note said, "May you rest now."
Source: The Associated Press
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