This article was originally published in The Examiner on Jan. 5, 2017.
By Eleanor Skelton
Staff Writer
In a Port Arthur neighborhood of single-family homes between two apartment complexes, many residents are reluctant to talk, speaking through cracked doors and burglar bars.
But not Grover Haynes. He says that he and his family have lived on Rev. Raymond Scott Avenue for the last 17 years.
“For the most part, my little neighborhood right here is quiet,” he said in an interview with The Examiner. He said most of the disturbances come from the two apartment complexes north and south of his house, Louis Manor Apartments and Prince Hall Village Apartments.
“I’ll be smoking at night and I’ll hear gunshots over there,” Haynes said. “There was an incident down the street not too long ago where they robbed somebody, robbed a lady. Most of the stuff is happening over there.”
A 31-year-old Port Arthur man told police that he was assaulted with a club at Louis Manor Apartments around 10:50 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 16. The victim was treated at Christus St. Mary’s Hospital for a broken arm.
An 18-year-old man accidentally shot himself in the stomach while mishandling his weapon at Prince Hall Village Apartments just before midnight on Thursday, Nov. 17. The man initially tried to conceal how he was shot from officers, Port Arthur Police said in a news release.
And on New Year’s Day around midnight, Haynes says he believes someone tried to burglarize his home. He heard suspicious noises outside and went out to investigate after arming himself with a gun. He reports seeing someone behind his privacy fence and hearing what he believed to be gunfire.
“He was on the other side, really in the alley, when he shot at me,” he said.
Haynes’ home is enclosed with a privacy fence that backs up to two houses behind him, neither of which have fenced yards. There are homes directly behind his house, and several of his neighbors are elderly. The vacant house next door that his now-deceased neighbor “Mr. Neal” lived in also has a privacy fence.
The suspect’s shots shattered his rear sliding glass door, Haynes said. He said he cut himself on the shards of glass when he ducked back inside his house.
Haynes said he returned fire with several rounds from his handgun.
“Most of the time if you let them know you got some heat, you know, they don’t wanna mess with you,” he said.
Haynes said he works as a tactical security officer out of town most of the time. He said he wants to work locally because he holds a Texas concealed carry license. Haynes previously worked at the Jefferson County Jail as a correctional office.
“I’ve been in law enforcement for almost 20 years,” he said.
Haynes’ original 911 call to the Port Arthur police said that he had been shot, Port Arthur Police said in a news release. The responding officers said they discovered that Haynes was “not shot, but cut after hitting the rear sliding glass door of his home.”
Port Arthur Police said Haynes did not tell the officers that he saw anyone in his yard, but only reported hearing a gunshot.
The officers did not find a suspect, although Haynes’ neighbors said Port Arthur Police searched the area with canine units.
When asked if his neighborhood has gotten more dangerous recently, Haynes said, “It’s a little bit worse. Just a little bit.”
Haynes said he suspected a burglar was trying to get into the vacant house next door on West Thomas Boulevard. “Mr. Neal,” an elderly man, had lived there for years but recently passed away, he explained, and his surviving sister who lives in Dallas now owns the house.
“I don’t know if he was trying to get in there or what,” he said. “I’m on my way now to go and pick my firearm up from the police station.”
Haynes said he does not expect to be charged in the incident.
“They [the police] said, ‘You didn’t do anything wrong; you have the right to protect your property.’”
Haynes’ neighbors were mostly silent about the incident.
An elderly resident on nearby West Thomas Boulevard declined to give her name, but said, “I will tell you that I heard five gunshots.”
She said wasn’t sure who was shooting, and police officers blocked off the street while they searched with dogs during the investigation Her other neighbor across the street could not come over to check on her until the police had cleared the area.
His other neighbor declined to comment.
A woman staff member at Mt. Sinai Baptist Church nearby answered the door cautiously. She said no one from the church was present at the time of the incident.
The Port Arthur police are continuing to investigate this case, Port Arthur Criminal Investigation Division head Major John Owens said.
“The homeowner did believe that someone was trying to break into his residence and in order to protect himself and the other residents, he felt it necessary to arm himself,” he said. “He was at that time, in his mind, in fear of his life, because according to him, he thought someone was in the backyard. He thought someone had possibly even shot at him.”
Due to the active investigation, Owens could not discuss whether or not officers found bullet holes in the glass of Haynes’ sliding glass door, but he did say that “there was some confusion on his [Haynes’] part as to what happened” and “it was obvious there was some broken glass.”
“The shots were from a handgun, so it’s safe to say they could travel an appreciable direction,” Owens said. “I’m not a ballistics expert, but I would think there was some chance those shots could easily have struck someone, the suspect or otherwise.”
Owens said the Port Arthur Police will be looking at all angles of the case and interviewing witnesses, both neighbors and the other residents living in the home.
“Discharging a firearm in the city is a very dangerous thing. We strongly discourage someone using deadly force, discharging a firearm, unless they are in actual threat of their life,” Owens said. “There’s too many things that can go wrong. We don’t condone it.”
“It goes back to the fourth rule of gun safety: Know your target,” said Detective Joe Paul, who teaches NRA gun safety classes and trains PAPD officers in weapons han- dling. “If you hear a noise out in your backyard and you just pop off a round, well guess what, that round could end up somewhere. If that round hit an innocent person, you could actually be charged.”
In Texas, anyone met with a “bona fide threat” has the right to protect themselves with deadly force, Paul said, but “any type of use of deadly force is going to go to a grand jury, and you’re going to have to justify your actions and what you do.”
Paul explained that verbal commands like police officers use — announcing that you are armed and telling the person threatening you to back off — can help when pleading self-defense in a courtroom.
“That way, you’re making every attempt to rectify the situation before you have to use deadly force,” Paul said.
“If one of the rounds did go through the fence, and if it had hit someone, that guy wouldn’t have been a victim anymore. He would have been a suspect.”
Eleanor Skelton 