Wisconsin Squirrel Hunter Fatally Stabs Immigrant
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WAUSAU, Wis. — A squirrel hunter fatally stabbed a Hmong immigrant in self-defense after the two argued and the immigrant shot him in the hand, the fiancee of a man being questioned in the case told the Associated Press.
Authorities have released few details about the slaying of 30-year-old Cha Vang of Green Bay, pending formal charges in the case, but the fiancee of James Nichols said Tuesday that Nichols had acted in self-defense after being shot in the hand.
“There was a verbal confrontation first,” Dacia James, 20, said in a telephone interview from her home in Marinette.
“Jim didn’t intend to do this. He wasn’t going out hunting for people. He was hunting for squirrels. He was defending himself,” she said. “Jim is not racist at all. He has friends from every ethnic background he has ever come in contact with.”
Vang’s wife has said the victim spoke no English and could not have provoked an attack.
The stabbing followed an “accidental meeting” between Vang and Nichols at a public hunting area, according to Marinette County Sheriff Jim Kanikula. Nichols, 28, has not been charged in connection with the slaying but was jailed early Saturday on a probation violation as a felon in possession of a firearm.
Nichols’s fiancee said Nichols didn’t immediately report the incident to police because he panicked and was frightened because he was on probation for burglary.
Marinette County District Attorney Brent DeBord said yesterday that he was still reviewing police reports and could not say when other charges might be filed.
“This is a very serious matter and needs to be handled correctly from the beginning,” Mr. DeBord said.
Vang’s death came a little more than two years after Hmong immigrant Chai Soua Vang, 38, of St. Paul, Minn., killed six white hunters and injured two others in northwestern Wisconsin. He claimed one of them fired in his direction after they shouted racial epithets. He is serving multiple life terms.
The two men are not related. Vang is a common name among the Hmong who have emigrated from Southeast Asia to the Midwest in large numbers since the end of the Vietnam War .
