Stray bullet grazes too close for comfort

Keith Paul

Wednesday, Nov. 24, 1999 | 11:09 a.m.

Metro Police will meet with the president of a shooting range near Red Rock Canyon's campground today to discuss a large-caliber bullet that hit a camper's rental car.

A French camper, Jean-Rene Pouget, told authorities a stray bullet struck his rental car Thursday about 10:30 a.m. while at the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area's 13 Mile Campground. No one was injured by the bullet.

The bullet was retrieved from the car's air filter Monday, Metro Sgt. Greg Weeks said.

Since it was a large-caliber, probably a .50-caliber bullet, Metro Police want to speak to the operators of the Desert Sportsman Rifle and Pistol Club.

The range's president, Lee Avant, said there is a 12-foot-high dirt berm to catch bullets and doubts that any bullet could have made it through the berm and then travel a mile to the campground. "But if it was a .50-caliber bullet that narrows it down a lot. To me that is pretty much a sign that it probably came off my range," Avant said.

The 430-acre range is about a mile away from the campground.

There have been similar reports of stray bullets recently. "A couple of our volunteers who live at the campground have told me that over the last three week there have been six different incidents of bullets coming through the campground area," Bureau of Land Management spokesman Phil Guerrero said.

BLM officials are considering closing the campsite. "We are very concerned about public safety," Guerrero said. "If we closed the site we wouldn't know what to do with the campers. I might have some unhappy campers, but I would prefer to have some unhappy campers compared with someone getting hurt."