USARMY i do agree why would you ever draw back or raise your wearon if you aren't 100 percent of what your shooting
Just my opinion.

I am kinda leaning this way also...
just real hard to believe.

Like Ray Phillips, this happened close to where I live and hunt. Very sad situation, and I feel for both families. I keep coming back to the same question, didn't the shooter know that 99.999% of turkeys would have been roosted long before it was dark?

My sons have started hunting the recently, so I sat through the IL hunter safety course with each of them, once in 2007 and 2008. I think there needs to be a mandatory hunter EDUCATION course for young hunters. Alot of parents drop the kids off and have no idea what they have learned (or not) and assume its now safe for their kids to hunt alone. Nothing could be further from the truth IMO.

real tragedy..i am from and hunt around xenia illinois and heard about this..i know it was an accident but arent you suppose to b sure of your target before even thinking about taking a shot at it???!!

Sad story, but I have to ask; Who the hell can't tell a man from a turkey? I thought it was a Cardinal rule to identify your target.

Tragic, but the idiot who shot his friend should be tried for manslaughter. Being a dumb a$$ is no excuse for the death of another person.

we do not know many things, hate to jump to conclusions here, however, very very very sad and unfortunate

I wouldn't jump to accuse anyone until it is investigated. I see you are from Virginia, I grew up there, not where you are, but in the S. West part of the state near Ky. About 40 yrs ago squirrell hunting there was the big thing. One day after school there was some boys that went hunting after school. They were up on a ridge, and one of them got turned around and somehow thought he saw a squirrell. It was his friends hair sticking out from the side of the tree. It was investigated by the police and ruled an accident.

There must be some humongous turkeys out there? I've shot a lot of turkeys with a bow and I gotta tell you not one of them have I ever snuck walked up on in bow range.

Not sure if the friend was bow hunting as well but last I knew turkeys didn't wear camo?

One thing is for sure either this was no accident or this kid shouldn't have ever been allowed to play with anything sharper then silly putty.

that jus sux

I've read somewhere that 90% or higher of hunting accidents aren't really accidents.

I tend to believe that. They more often than not are not accidents. Merely convenient excuses.