Man accused of target shooting in rural intersection arrested

Headingley RCMP arrested a man accused of shooting at a stop sign from his vehicle near a rural intersection on Sunday afternoon.

Mounties were called to the intersection of Highway 248 and Road 56 North in the Rural Municipality of Cartier just before 5 p.m. on Sunday, after a man driving south on the highway saw another vehicle parked near the intersection with a gun barrel sticking out of the driver’s side window.

As the driver, a 41-year-old man from Swan Lake First Nation, got closer to the parked vehicle, he heard a gunshot and initially thought his vehicle had been struck, RCMP said. He called 911 and Mounties immediately responded.

Officers determined the suspect was shooting at a stop sign, not the driver’s vehicle. His truck was not struck nor was he injured.

But the suspect, a 47-year-old man from the RM of Cartier, was arrested on firearms offences and released ahead of a court date in May in Winnipeg.

RCMP advise everyone handling firearms to get their gun licence and to remember the basic rules of firearm safety. Those include treating every gun as if it’s loaded, never pointing a firearm at something you’re not willing to destroy, to keep your finger off the trigger until you’re about to fire and to be sure of your target and what’s behind it.