Thursday, May 3, 2007

Hunting investigation shows Tillery accidentally shot

by Clarke Davis

Larry Burns has confessed to law enforcement officers that he did shoot his friend, Bryan Tillery, in a hunting accident April 17 near Valley Falls.

Burns met with Jefferson County Sheriff’s investigator Jerry Green the night of May 1, two weeks after the incident, and admitted he had lied. Burns told Green that he thought he was shooting at a turkey and that he was “really, really sorry.”

Burns asked to make two phone calls before he wrote out his statement.

“He called Bryan Tillery and his wife,” Green said.

Tillery had someone drive him to the law enforcement center at Oskaloosa where he greeted Burns with a hug. Burns, Tillery, and the third man in the hunting party, Dean Edwards, are long-time friends and 1982 graduates of Valley Falls High School.

The investigator believes that on the night of the accident Burns heard Tillery say something to the affect that “I must have shot myself” and for some reason decided to go with that story.

“Every day it got harder to admit the truth,” Green said. “I’m impressed that he came clean. He might have lost some integrity, but he’s also regained it,” Green said.

Green does not think any laws were broken except initially making a false report to a law officer, which has now been rectified. Prosecution is the job of the county attorney after review of the case.

Tillery has an arm in a sling and is still doctoring for injuries received when he was shot. He was air lifted to a Topeka hospital the night he was shot and remained there nine days before being released.

Tillery is a farmer and is employed by Capital City Oil Co. Burns is a physical education teacher at the local public school.