Just before midnight on Thursday, November 3, a Bonney Lake woman, Linda Green, was sleeping in her bedroom when a bullet hit her window and struck her head. A relative found her bleeding on the bedroom floor. She was rushed to the hospital and died there. Where did the bullet come from? An investigation connected it to a gun allegedly fired by Green's neighbor, Tobin Panton. While Green was sleeping (and maybe even dreaming of happy things), he was trying to stop a person who had stolen his Jeep. Witnesses say they heard someone fire a gun 10 times. One of the bullets missed the bad guy killed a good woman, a devoted grandmother.
Panton was taken into custody that night, and on Monday was charged with first-degree manslaughter. The judge set his bail at $200,000 (the prosecutor wanted $500,000) and required that he "surrender his firearm to the Sheriff’s Department should he post bail." Panton has no criminal record. He is said to be a "normal" member of his community. He is, in short, the NRA's definition of a good guy with a gun. But the fact that has shocked Green's family is that a good guy might have fired a gun several times not to protect his life but his property. What kind of person does that? One raised and shaped by American car culture and gun culture.
