IDIOT RANGERS
Randall Kesselring
one circumstance that could certainly make the ranger suspicious.
According to the original post as the bus was being searched one female
remained asleep. I have been on a bus that was stopped and entered. I
frankly don't see how anyone could sleep through that experience. I also
would have been suspicious.
Rangers today must deal with problems that probably didn't exist 30
years ago. Last July I was camping at the summit of the Tioga pass just
outside of Yosemite. My wife and I got up at dawn and broke camp in order
to enter Yosemite and maybe find a place to camp. Unfortunately, that was
the day after a ranger had been shot while seeing about a suspicious park
visitor. He didn't die because he was wearing a bullet proof vest. I was
doubly shocked. First, I was surprised anyone would shoot a ranger as
they are generally in parks to help people. Second, I was dumbfounded
to find that rangers regularly find it necessary to wear bullet proof
vests. Everyone was denied entry to the park and as you might suspect
there were some very unhappy campers. However, the rangers, most of whom
were working around the clock, handled most of the unhappiness with as
much grace as possible.
If I have any complaint about rangers in general it is the quality of
information that they provide. It seems to be horribly uneven. This
unevenness is true for rangers working in the national forests as well as
for the park service. I have at times received dangerously wrong
information when planning backpacking trips. Perhaps because of this,
most rangers seem to be very conservative in the advice they offer. The
information given should be knowledgable or it should not be given. I
don't think erring on the conservative side is any better than giving
dangerous advice. Either case can ruin a long planned for vacation.
John Reece
>My wife and I got up at dawn and broke camp in order
>to enter Yosemite and maybe find a place to camp. Unfortunately,
>that was the day after a ranger had been shot while seeing about a
>suspicious park visitor. He didn't die because he was wearing a
>bullet proof vest.
Last I heard investigators were asking him some pointed questions
about the incident, i.e., as if they suspect he might have accidentally
shot himself in the leg and covered it up by putting a few bullets
into his (unoccupied) vest. Details have been scarce since the
initial hubbub.
> Everyone was denied entry to the park and as you might suspect
>there were some very unhappy campers. However, the rangers, most of whom
>were working around the clock, handled most of the unhappiness with as
>much grace as possible.
Based on the TV coverage I saw they hadn't the slightest idea of
who they were looking for or what he looked like, so they gave
"The Fugitive" treatment to everyone inside the quarantine area.
Families standing outside of their minivans at roadblocks while
shotgun-toting rangers went through their luggage, etc. I expect solo
hikers/campers/travelers (as I often am in that area) got even
better service.
John Reece
Not an Intel spokesman
Eugene N. Miya
(John Reece) writes:
>Last I heard investigators were asking him some pointed questions
>about the incident, i.e., as if they suspect he might have accidentally
>shot himself in the leg and covered it up by putting a few bullets
>into his (unoccupied) vest. Details have been scarce since the
>initial hubbub.
The last I heard about two months ago from friends who were assigned up
there was that they were suspecting poachers. The problem is that a
number of other crimes in the Park have diverted attention away from
this incident as well as aforementioned rescue case (which prevents
people associated with that incident from talking about it).
The ranger in question would still have bruises even if he did have a vest.
Life in the big city.
--eugene miya, NASA Ames Research Center, eug...@orville.nas.nasa.gov
Resident Cynic, Rock of Ages Home for Retired Hackers
{uunet,mailrus,other gateways}!ames!eugene
My 2nd favorite use of a flame thrower is the remake of "The Thing."
A Ref: Uncommon Sense, Alan Cromer, Oxford Univ. Press, 1993.
jeffrey trust
> Last I heard investigators were asking him some pointed questions
> about the incident, i.e., as if they suspect he might have accidentally
> shot himself in the leg and covered it up by putting a few bullets
> into his (unoccupied) vest. Details have been scarce since the
> initial hubbub.
From what I'm told, people who know Ranger Kim Aufhauser, thought that it
would
be *completely* out of character for him to have done something like that
I *think* the report you are referring to originally came out of the Fresno
Bee, and I'm not sure it was substantiated. Anyway, he was responding to
a call of a suspicious person, so it's not like he just called in on the
radio out of the blue that he'd been shot. It also seems that it would be
fairly easy to figure out whether the bullets came from his gun or not.
And why, after over 15 years as a ranger (I believe most of those years
he was a full-time ranger, now he's seasonal) would he decide to do
something like this? If I hear anything
new, I'll post it.
--
******************************************************************************
Jeffrey Trust |
jtr...@huey.csun.edu or hbge...@huey.csun.edu | I speak only for myself
Student | +-----------------+
Department of Geological Sciences |_____________________________
California State University, Northridge *The Epicenter of Learning*
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Reece
> If I hear anything new, I'll post it.
Well, life is a matrix of coincidences, as they say. This appeared
in the paper the next day after my post. Plate of shrimp, anyone?
YOSEMITE SHOOTING REMAINS UNSOLVED
YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK -- The snow has melted from all but the highest peaks
in Yosemite National Park now. Purple lupine grows thick in the meadows.
Visitors are returning in droves, as they have every summer for the past 100
years.
Yet as Yosemite shakes off the chill of winter, questions linger from last
season: Who shot Kim Aufhauser? And how did the assailant ever slip away?
A decorated Yosemite ranger who lives in Boulder Creek and teaches park
management at West Valley College in Saratoga, Aufhauser gained national
attention a year ago, on July 14, when he was hit by gunfire once in the left
leg and twice in the chest while on a routine patrol. More than 1,000
visitors were evacuated from a section of the park, and a massive manhunt for
the assailant lasted three days.
Few in Yosemite like to talk about what has happened since. The case reads
like a dime-store thriller with the last chapter torn out.
Immediately after the attack, investigators searched Yosemite's high country
for an escaped convict or rogue poacher. Tracking dogs, 180 law enforcement
officers, a helicopter and SWAT teams lugging binoculars and high-powered
rifles combed the forests and meadows. Searchers found three shells from a
.22-caliber pistol near the base of a large lodgepole pine tree -- and little
else.
The case took a bizarre twist when authorities began to consider whether
Aufhauser, 38, might have shot himself. Friends are furious he was ever
considered a suspect. Investigators say they had no choice.
Meanwhile, Yosemite is left with a maddening reality: Despite hundreds of
hours of police work, interviews and FBI ballistics tests, no one has been
arrested. Aufhauser, who has never spoken publicly about the incident, is the
only ranger shot in Yosemite since 1890, when the park was established, and
chances of solving the crime now are remote.
''It's frustrating everybody,'' Chief Ranger Bob Andrew said. ''The worst
thing is not having an answer. It just isn't there.''
Though Aufhauser has recovered his health, he may not revive his career as a
Yosemite ranger. He has told supervisors he won't return to the park this
summer, despite working there nearly every year since 1975.
''He probably feels a lack of support from here,'' Andrew said. ''If I was
sitting in his shoes, it's probably not a condition I would want to walk back
into, either.''
THE RANGER'S STORY
What's left to ponder in one of Yosemite's greatest puzzles is the story
Aufhauser told investigators the day after the attack:
Midway through an evening patrol July 14, Aufhauser drove his patrol car west
along the Tioga Road, an east-west artery built by miners in 1882. It was 10
p.m.
Rounding a bend near a lonely area known as Salt Lick, he spotted a dark
figure standing by the side of the road, nearly four miles from the nearest
campsite. Aufhauser swung his car around, stopped and got out. He saw nothing
but darkness.
The air was crisp and chilly, the stars bright.
Aufhauser didn't turn on the spotlight atop his car. An excellent tracker, he
switched on his flashlight and began to walk.
He wandered off the road about 40 feet into the brush. He crouched, looking
for footprints.
Suddenly, a twig snapped.
Aufhauser turned. Without warning, three shots rang out. Two hit the ranger
in the chest -- near his heart -- then fell, bouncing away harmlessly from
the bulletproof vest he wore. The third tore into his left thigh, missing the
bone.
Aufhauser grabbed his .357 Magnum and fired three shots, hitting a thick
lodgepole pine only a few feet away. He limped to his car, radioed for help
and sped back toward Tuolumne Meadows ranger station, blood soaking his green
pants.
The first people to meet Aufhauser on the Tioga Road were rangers Dave Page
and Fred Koegler. After applying first aid, they drove him to Centinela
Mammoth Hospital in Mammoth Lakes. He was released the next day.
Park police radioed the Mono County Sheriff's Department to seal the east
gate -- the nearest exit from the shooting scene. Because of the vast
distances, deputies did not arrive until 10:44 p.m., according to dispatch
records. That would have given an assailant more than half an hour to jump
into a hidden car or hitch a ride. The shooter could have been in Utah by
sunrise.
Compounding the problem, searchers had no description of an assailant, no
footprints and no idea which direction an attacker might have fled.
''There never was a trail to go cold,'' said Tuolumne County Sheriff Dick
Nutting, who sent six officers to help look.
No weapon matching the .22-caliber shells used in the shooting has been
found.
Speculation turned toward Aufhauser for two reasons, according to
investigators: gunpowder residue on his uniform and the proximity of two
shots, which seemed to indicate he was shot from very close range. Though
early analysis proved inconclusive, final test results from Aufhauser's pants
and chest protector are due back this month from the FBI crime lab.
Many of Aufhauser's friends and co-workers feel he has been treated unfairly.
They note that investigators have not presented evidence to the U.S. attorney
in Fresno suggesting he shot himself nor has anyone established a solid
reason why he would.
''No one who knows him believes he did it,'' said Paul DePascale, an
archaeologist at Yosemite who knows Aufhauser. ''It's not in his character.''
A by-the-book ranger whose sense of right and wrong was as unruffled as the
crisp uniform he wore, Aufhauser was awarded the National Park Service's
highest honor in 1992, the Award of Valor, in a ceremony held in Washington,
D.C.
He and another ranger, Joseph Sumner, rescued a visitor who had fallen into
Yosemite Creek near upper Yosemite Falls in June 1991. After Aufhauser was
lowered down a 70-foot cliff by rope, he helped pull the unconscious man from
40-degree water, then administered mouth-to-mouth resuscitation for three
minutes, saving the man's life.
STOPPED ANSWERING QUESTIONS
Since the shooting, Aufhauser has maintained a low profile. So low, some
rangers say privately, that he has helped fuel speculation about his role. A
week after the shooting, he stopped answering investigators' questions and
hired an attorney. He also refused to take a lie detector test, according to
park officials.
Aufhauser declined requests for interviews for this story.
Attorney Kirk McAllister of Modesto, a former Stanislaus County prosecutor
who is representing Aufhauser, said the ranger ''talked the thing to death
with the FBI and everybody else to the point we said enough's enough. He
talked plenty to the authorities. He was at their beck and call, and finally
he just got tired of it.''
Turning the attention on Aufhauser, he said, was a desperate strategy when
the government couldn't find the real attacker. Yosemite officials say they
must consider all options in a case so open-ended.
''Any kind of unwitnessed shooting, you have to look at that possibility,''
Andrew said. ''It was hard for us to even ask the questions, but we had to.''
Park officials will not release investigation records, explaining the case
remains open.
Adding to the mystery, there were no escaped jail inmates in the area last
July, nor did backcountry hikers report any suspicious people. There was no
evidence of crimes committed in the region before the shooting or in the days
that followed.
One possibility: An attacker escaped on foot. Steep mountain passes top
10,000 feet along Yosemite's eastern border. Trackers believe an experienced
hiker could have slipped away on the John Muir Trail or other routes before
dawn.
Aufhauser said he was shot from no more than 15 feet away.
Some searchers think Aufhauser could have hung his bulletproof vest on a tree
away from the crime scene, shot it, then thrown the gun into the woods.
SHERIFF DEPUTY'S CASE
In 1979, Santa Cruz County sheriff's deputy Mike Gangloff reported he had
been in a gun battle along Highway 1 near Davenport. But investigators
concluded he shot his car himself, probably as a way to appear heroic.
''Do things like this happen? Sure they do,'' said Santa Cruz County Sheriff
Al Noren, who isn't involved in the Aufhauser case. ''People in all walks of
life do things like this to engender sympathy or attention.''
One of the biggest disappointments for investigators came when their most
promising suspect, a balding 38-year-old Nevada man with a tattoo of a
flaming cross on his shoulder, produced a tight alibi.
A financial scam also has been ruled out. Aufhauser is drawing no disability
pay, park officials said.
A $10,000 reward is still offered in the case.
Aufhauser is taking master's degree-level classes, heading toward a full-time
career in park management or other outdoor instruction, said John Nicholas,
chairman of applied arts and sciences at West Valley College.
He described Aufhauser, who has taught there since 1991, as an outstanding
teacher, well-liked by students. Friends and investigators know that as long
as the mystery remains unsolved, it will follow Aufhauser. Either he duped
the federal government and the public and got away with it or, as supporters
believe, he has become a victim twice. Yosemite will always wonder.
''It's not an easy situation,'' Nicholas said. ''He's just trying to put it
behind him and go down the road.''