He Should Be Given The Medal Of Honor;
The man behind the gun
He's been praised as a hero and condemned as a vigilante. But Joe Horn, cast by friends as a quiet Everyman, says fame has caused `untold grief'
By CINDY HORSWELL and RUTH RENDON
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicle
To his grandchildren, the 61-year-old Pasadena homeowner is simply "Papa Joe."
To longtime friends, Joe Horn is an "average Joe" who leads a rather quiet, dull life as a retired communications computer manager on the outskirts of Houston.
But since being catapulted into a national debate for fatally shooting two men he says were burglarizing the house next door, Horn is called everything from a "hero" to a "murdering vigilante."
All the furor forced him into seclusion as news media nationwide clamored for interviews and one anonymous caller even made a death threat against him. But now for the first time, he has decided to break his silence and answer by e-mail some questions about his life posed by the Houston Chronicle.
"(The shooting) has been devastating on my family," Horn wrote. "Words cannot describe how bad this has been."
Horn, who had been letting his attorney and personal friend of four decades speak for him, added, "It has caused untold grief on all of us. I feel for my daughter and grandchildren."
Horn lives in a two-story brick home with a pool in the Village Grove East subdivision of $200,000-plus homes. The neighborhood is so peaceful and quiet that he was first alerted to the Nov. 14 afternoon burglary by the sound of glass breaking.
"He was on his computer fixing a music program when he heard the shattering," Horn's attorney, Charles Lambright, said in a telephone interview.
Neighborhood residents now are trying to replace the horrifying memory of two bodies — sprayed with shotgun pellets sprawled in two front yards — with a much merrier one of twinkling lights and holiday decor. One body was found in the yard of a Pasadena police officer.
"It was really creepy to see," recalled Debra Wright, who lives a few houses down from Horn.
Diego Ortiz, 30, and Hernando Riascos Torres, 38, collapsed and died not far from Horn's house. Both were unemployed illegal immigrants from Colombia with Houston addresses. Torres was sent to prison for dealing cocaine and was deported in 1999.
Pasadena Capt. A.H. "Bud" Corbett said both men were shot in the back. After ignoring pleas from a 911 dispatcher to stay in his house, Horn went outside to see what was happening and found himself within 7 feet of and face-to-face with the suspects, authorities said.
Horn shouldered his 12-gauge shotgun, which he had retrieved from his pickup, and yelled, "Move and you're dead!"
Two moving targets
Details released by Pasadena police show that Torres ran toward Horn and then angled slightly toward the curb, while Ortiz had turned away from Horn and was fleeing in the opposite direction when both were shot.
A plainclothes officer in an unmarked car responding to the burglary arrived there just in time to witness the shootings.
Horn needed precision shooting to hit two moving targets going in different directions in a matter of seconds.
Years ago, he was an "avid hunter," his second wife, Carole Horn, 61, said in a telephone interview. But he now focuses on his grandchildren, fishing and some occasional target practice, friends and family said.
Lambright, who himself hunts with a pistol and is a competitive target shooter, agrees Horn is "no bwana" (Swahili for "master") hunter.
"I'm more of a gun nut with a concealed weapon permit," Lambright said. Horn has no such permit. Nor does he have any military experience or gun club membership.
The last time Horn shot an animal was 30 years ago when he bagged a "huge bull elk" in Idaho.
"After this hunt, I lost all my desire to kill any more animals," Horn said in his written comments. "I went hunting a few more times but I was no longer interested."
Carole Horn was married to him for 3 1/2 years, has known him for more than 20 years and admits she still loves him. "He's a little bit dominating. We're just two different people," she said of the years they lived together in Colorado.
After taking early retirement in 1998, Horn moved to Kentucky to live with his only daughter from his first marriage. His daughter, Rhonda, and her husband, Bryan Litton, wanted Horn to help raise their two young girls.
Tragedy, however, soon struck the young family when Bryan Litton unexpectedly died in 1998 from a rare heart condition at the age of 32. Afterward, Horn, his daughter and grandchildren returned to Houston.
"Horn went back to work so that his daughter could stay home with the babies," Lambright said. "About six years ago, she met her current husband (Lee Holbrook). They bought the house in Pasadena and again asked Joe to live with them."
That's when Horn retired once again.
Quanell X not a fan
A native Houstonian and an only child, Horn graduated from Sam Houston High School in 1964. His stepfather earned a living as a bricklayer.
He went to work as a 7-Eleven store clerk immediately after high school.
After two years, Horn wrote, he left that job for his first jaunt in the communications industry. He said he needed more money to better support his first wife and young daughter.
He then worked his way up in the field, receiving top test scores, and eventually became a computer program manager for AT&T before retiring in 2003.
What he never expected was that his quiet, private life would end the day he intervened in the burglary of the house next door.
The doting grandfather now needs a press agent to handle the nonstop requests for appearances and interviews with media outlets across the country, his friends say.
New Black Panther leader Quanell X, who has led two protests in front of Horn's home, believes Horn should be indicted for murder but says he would not be shocked if he isn't. "It won't be the first time a white person shot a black person and he is not indicted," he said in a telephone interview.
He pointed to an incident last month in which a 58-year-old black man, Wadie Spikes of Houston, was immediately jailed for fatally shooting a dog but later cleared after a witness said he was protecting his family and acting in self-defense.
Quanell X complained Horn was never taken into custody after claiming self-defense for killing two people.
Up to a grand jury
Ultimately, all sides agree that whether Horn is indicted will probably come down to whether a grand jury believes beyond a reasonable doubt that he acted in self-defense.
Joe Owmby, who heads the Harris County district attorney's police integrity division, explained that Texas law allows "wide latitude for individuals to protect themselves, but not as much if they're not threatened."
Lambright insists Horn feared for his life. After the 911 dispatcher asked for more information on the burglars, Horn left his house to see what was happening and to possibly get a glimpse of the burglars' car or license plate, Lambright said.
"He went outside and all of a sudden there they were," Lambright said. "And Horn tells them 'move and you're dead.' The suspects have a shotgun aimed at them and their response was to run at Joe and he panicked."
On the advice of his attorney, Horn declined to respond to questions posed by the Chronicle about the shooting.
But Owmby, who will not work on Horn's case, noted that the issue is complicated because the shooter was urged to stay in a safe place and wait for help.
Quanell X stressed that Horn on the 911 tape states his clear intention to kill.
Whether Horn is viewed as a hero or a vigilante, Lambright sees him as an average Joe from any small town in America.
"He's quite a boring guy, really," Lambright said. "He's gotten fat, lazy and old."
cindy.horswell@chron.com; ruth.rendon@c |
