Later in the day, Vang asked two hunters for help. They took him to a game warden, who recognized his hunting license tag. He was still carrying his SKS rifle, a simple and inexpensive firearm often used by local hunters.
"He was out of bullets or might not have been done yet," speculated Miller, who said Vang had no business being in someone else's deer stand. "You don't go wander out and sit in somebody's stand. There is no reason for him to be there. Something's really goofy."
Emergency personnel gather Sunday near the scene in northern Wisconsin where a dispute among deer hunters apparently occurred.
(Terrell Boettcher -- AP)
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Rules and etiquette on American hunting passed from generation to generation have proved unfamiliar to many Hmong, who come from Laos, where hunting is a practiced skill. The Lao mountains are among the wildest and least populated areas of the world. There are no regulations about what, where or when to hunt. Conservation officers and property owners in several states have reported conflicts with the Hmong over their hunting practices, often because they did not understand American traditions. Four years ago, Minnesota's Department of Natural Resources hired a Hmong officer to teach the community about local hunting and fishing rules.
Joe Bee Xiong, 44, is a Hmong resident who has been hunting deer near Eau Claire, Wis., since he reached the United States from Laos in 1979. He said that he was stunned and horrified by the killings, and that he wants to know more. He said Vang may have felt confused or defensive.
"To think that he shot so many people makes me think maybe something that we don't know about happened," said Xiong, director of the Eau Claire Area Hmong Mutual Assistance Association and a former Eau Claire City Council member. "Once in a while when I'd hunt I'd meet non-Hmong who would say things to me, but I speak English well and I know the laws, so I would explain myself and walk away from the situation."
Authorities said Vang spoke English well.
People in Rice Lake talked of little else Monday. One man said it was freakish and unexpected, like the shootings at Columbine High School in Colorado. Most everyone seemed to know one of the victims.
"That's been the hardest part of it. It's a really close family here," said Lynn D. Koob, a Rice Lake surgeon who tended to Drew and saw him onto the helicopter. Patricia Willers, whose husband, Terry Willers, was wounded and daughter Jessica Willers, 27, was killed, is an operating room nurse here.
The others killed were Al Laski, 43, and Mark Roidt, 28. Survivor Lauren Hasebeck, 48, is listed in stable condition.
At Fatman's, Richard Kern and two friends stopped for a drink Monday night after spending the day in the woods. Still wearing their blaze-orange hats, they could not fathom the crime, not in a community where hunting eclipses almost everything else this time of year. Many children take their first aim at a buck as soon as they turn the legal age.
"Thanksgiving isn't Thanksgiving. It's when deer hunting starts," said Kern, a 33-year-old painter. "Most of the people around here have been hunting since they were 12. It's just something we do."
Lydersen, a special correspondent, reported from Chicago. Staff writer Marc Kaufman and research editor Lucy Shackelford in Washington contributed to this report.
