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and from the other...
![[frown]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/003.gif "Frown [frown]")
You're spoiling the fun for all the Monday morning quarterbacks out there, you know. Well said. +1 for you, sir.
God help you if you have to ever defend yourself or your loved ones with this attitude.
![[rolleyes]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/042.gif "Roll Eyes [rolleyes]")
GRAND RAPIDS -- With their car still running and headlights left on to better see the bushes they started toilet-papering in the middle of the night, Michael Newville said he and his church friends didn't think they were doing anything wrong to their friend's house with their pre-Halloween prank.
Until it got scary -- and one of them, 14-year-old Zachary VanderArk, got shot.
"We got a third of the bush done and all of a sudden a shot rang out, it sounded like an M-80. I told everyone to run to the car," recalled Newville, 22.
The prank was a spur-of-the-moment deal for five friends having a sleepover near Cedar Springs.
It was a typical Saturday night for Newville, of Grand Rapids, who said he went to work then headed to Cedar Springs where he had to get up at 8 a.m. for Sunday church with the same friends. He declined to name the church.
Believing that a mutual friend's family was out of town, one of the friends in the car said, "Let's go to Matt's house and pull a prank," Newville said. They did not realize their friend's father, 51-year-old Mark Kuncaitis, had stayed behind in the Solon Township home.
Kuncaitis, charged Wednesday with the misdemeanor reckless use of a firearm causing injury, said the Oct. 12 shooting was simply a regretful mistake he made out of fear of being robbed and possibly hurt. If convicted, he faces up to two years in jail.
"I'm very sorry. It's very traumatic," he said outside Rockford District Court. "I would never have shot at kids if I had known, not in a million years."
Police allege Kuncaitis fired a 12-gauge shotgun three times in the dark toward people he thought were thieves getting into his unattached garage. They turned out to be Newville and four teens toilet-papering his yard.
A court affidavit names the teens as VanderArk, Ryan Maike, David Rethamel and Christopher Harthorn, 18, with Newville driving everyone to the house. Prosecutors say all are being charged with trespassing, although only Newville had been charged as of Wednesday. He pleaded guilty and was fined $100.
Kuncaitis said the pranksters looked like five men to him.
"I feared for my life. I'm a disabled person. There's murders going on all around," he said, earlier telling police he was worried because of recent killings near Conklin and Kent County's Oakfield Township. "I figured they weren't coming to sell Mary Kay," Kuncaitis said.
Newville said he was surprised by the gunshot. He told his friends to run to the car.
Newville guessed they were between 6 and 10 feet from the car, "then a second shot rang out and blew out my window. I didn't know what to think," he said.
"You'd think he'd (Kuncaitis) warn us verbally. We would have dropped everything and cleaned up as well. We pulled out the drive and Zack said he felt pain," Newville said.
Kuncaitis told police he fired a warning shot above the car, then fired another to "mark" the car so police could track it down and finally fired a third time as it was pulling away. He never saw any toilet paper.
Police say VanderArk was hit by six pellets from the second shot, fired from about 60 yards away, but managed to scramble into the car. The teenager, a freshman at Cedar Springs High School, is recovering at home and expects to return to school next week, a family member said. VanderArk still has some of the pellets in his body while others were removed at the hospital.
The friends scampered into Newville's 2000 Dodge Neon. The 14-year-old was bleeding from the shotgun pellets that also ripped more than a dozen holes in Newville's passenger door.
Then the third blast came as he drove away, taking out his back window.
"The shots were really close and we got out of there in less than a minute. We noticed he had two bullets in his side and leg," 18-year-old Christopher Harthorn said of VanderArk.
Newville said his friends, "were really scared, had an adrenaline rush and were freakin' out. We were scared about getting out of there alive. It's not everyday you get shot at for TP.
"I don't know how I had the concentration to drive. We're all just thankful Zack is still alive. It could have been way worse," Newville said.
He'd rather not see anyone be criminally charged, but said he understand there are consequences.
"I guess we are all at fault for something, but I don't think he had a right to fire shots making contact with Zack."
VanderArk is not holding a grudge. He spent time with Mark Kuncaitis' son last weekend playing video games, Kuncaitis said.
VanderArk's grandmother declined to discuss the family's feelings about the shooting or the charges issued by Forsyth. No one answered the door at the house the teen and his mother share in Algoma Township.
Kent County Prosecutor Bill Forsyth said he thought the charges were fair.
"By all accounts, the homeowner is an upstanding citizen. He's never been in trouble. The kids made a dumb mistake and he probably overreacted to someone being there at the house," said the prosecutor.
Forsyth said he considered more serious charges, such as a felony assault charge, but decided against it.
That right there would hang him here in MA.
So you identify yourself in the dark first so the burgalar can shoot instead of you shooting him? I think the charge is BS, he had all the rights to shoot at those kids who were on his property after dark. Only in America can someone else violate your property and have you in trouble for defending it.
![[laugh]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/012.gif "Laugh [laugh]")
