Facing shotgun barrel, couple fought for their lives
 
Since 09-28-08

By BILL MILLER

wmiller@star-telegram.com

http://www.star-telegram.com/804/story/882830.htm l

BLUE MOUND — Grappling over a shotgun with a 300-pound man who had just burst into his home and threatened his wife, Keith Hoehn had but one thought.

"It was like a horror movie," he said. "I thought I was a dead man. We’re fighting for our lives."

He and his wife, Kellie, both 34, fought with two gunmen early Wednesday, until Keith got the shotgun away from the larger of the two attackers and turned it on both of them.

Dakota Scott Benoit, 20, of Richland Hills, was fatally wounded, and John Garland Pierson, 25, of Haltom City, was in critical condition and in police custody at a hospital.

"Very overt, very crazy," is how Blue Mound Police Lt. Thomas Cain described the fracas.

The attack began about 12:23 a.m., when two intruders kicked in the Hoehns’ front door.

"I was sleeping and all of a sudden they busted through the door," Keith Hoehn said. "My wife had a 12-gauge in her face, and he told her, 'Don’t you scream, -----, or I’ll blow your ----in’ head off.’

"Well .?.?. she did scream."

"I screamed for my husband," Kellie Hoehn said.

The gunman turned the Remington 870 pump-action shotgun toward Keith Hoehn.

"I thought he was going to blow my head plumb off," he said.

But Kellie grabbed the muzzle, and the struggle began.


"We just tackled him," Keith said. "I’m 220 [pounds]. All I could do was try to hold onto that shotgun.

"My wife was trying to keep the muzzle away from the kids’ rooms. I looked down and I saw he was pulling on the trigger the whole time.

"I found out later that the safety was on — praise the Lord."

Kellie let go long enough to grab a jar candle, Keith said, "and she popped him in the head."

Then she fought the attacker’s accomplice, who had a handgun, Keith Hoehn said. Meanwhile their son grabbed his little sister and they hid in a closet with a pellet gun, Hoehn said.

He finally seized the shotgun when the fracas spilled out onto the front lawn.

He turned the safety off and shot Pierson, who had already gotten into a van.

"My wife said he had a gun," Keith Hoehn said. "I didn’t know if he was going to shoot us."

Then he fired at Benoit.

"He got right back up," Keith said, "and started charging me again.

"Well, I shot him again, and I guess that was it."

'Snatch and grab’

Police believe the two men who stormed the Hoehns’ home also invaded a home in north Fort Worth late Tuesday night, robbing the family and stealing the family’s minivan. The minivan was found in Blue Mound parked at the Globe Street home of the Hoehns.

The first home invasion was reported at 11:11 p.m. on Calico Rock Drive in Fort Worth, about a mile east of the Hoehns, according to police reports.

Cain and Lt. Paul Henderson, a Fort Worth police spokesman, said they didn’t know how the robbers chose which houses to hit.

Perhaps, Cain said, they were "crimes of opportunity."

"Just snatch and grab and go," he said.

The gunmen entered the home on Calico Rock Drive through an open garage door and confronted the 38-year-old homeowner and his wife in a bedroom, Henderson said. They demanded valuables, he said.

The homeowner, Henderson said, is a participant in the Police Department’s Code Blue crime watch program, and the gunmen took his police radio.

They also took a laptop, a wallet, a jewelry box, and the family’s a red Honda Odyssey minivan, Henderson said.

"Children were inside the house asleep and were not harmed," Henderson said. "There were no reported injuries during this robbery."

The aftermath

Emergency personnel took Benoit to John Peter Smith Hospital. He died 1:13 a.m. in the emergency room from gunshot wounds to the chest and abdomen, according to the Tarrant County medical examiner’s office.

Pierson, Henderson said, ran about a mile north to the BNSF Railway office complex, 2600 Lou Menk Drive in Fort Worth.

Railroad police found him trying to clean up in a company fountain, Henderson said.

Pierson was turned over to Fort Worth police and was taken to JPS, where he was in critical condition Wednesday, Henderson said.

Cain said he was preparing an arrest warrant for Pierson on a charge of burglary of a habitation with intent to commit another felony.

Henderson said Keith Hoehn probably won’t face charges for killing Benoit, although it is common for a grand jury to review such a case.

Tarrant County records show that Pierson has nine convictions dating back to 2000 on drug charges, theft, assault and unlawfully carrying a weapon.

On July 17, he was sentenced to 45 days in jail on a misdemeanor conviction for possession of marijuana, records show.

Benoit was sentenced to three years’ deferred adjudication probation in May 2007 on two charges of possession of a controlled substance; one charge was out of Haltom City, the other out of Euless.

Court records show that he also had a misdemeanor conviction for criminal trespassing.

The Hoehns were still trying Wednesday to understand everything. "Why couldn’t he just steal my car?" Keith Hoehn asked. "Why come into my house? You wouldn’t have gotten anything more."

He concluded that his family was alive through God’s protection and his wife’s courage.

"I’m sorry it had to happen, but I can’t help the way people are."

Staff writer Deanna Boyd contributed to this report.