PIKETON – A southern Ohio sheriff acted quickly and prevented a potentially deadly situation when he stuck his thumb between the hammer of a flare gun and the firing pin of the shotgun shell that had been loaded into it by a wanted felon who called on deputies to shoot him.
Willis Bowshier, of Waverly, was in the Butler County Jail on multiple charges after he pulled a knife and the flare gun when Pike County Sheriff Charles Reader and his deputies found him at an address on Back Hallow Road Thursday night, Reader said.
The 34-year-old Bowshier ran when the deputies and Pike County probation officers arrived to serve an arrest warrant and pulled the knife, Reader said. A corporal with the sheriff’s office forced Bowshier to drop the knife and, as he was falling to the ground, Bowshier produced a flare gun, which had been painted black and loaded with a 12-gauge shotgun shell, Reader said.
“Some flare guns are chambered to accept a 12-gauge round. They will fire the round, although somewhat ineffectively, and the flare gun can explode in the hands of the person pulling the trigger,” Maj. Brock Clemmons said.
As Bowshier yelled “Shoot me! Shoot me!” at the deputies, Reader said a Taser was deployed and Bowshier was tackled into a nearby ditch by Reader and multiple deputies. He had cocked the hammer of the gun and was preparing to fire when Reader slid his thumb in between the hammer and firing pin, preventing the weapon from going off.
When he was maced, subdued and handcuffed, Bowshier admitted to deputies he had been under the influence of methamphetamine earlier that day and Reader says deputies found drug paraphernalia at the scene.
“This man is very lucky my deputies used their non-lethal training to subdue him,” Reader said. “During the scuffle, we thought this was an actual gun. It was not until after he was in custody and the scene was processed that we confirmed it was a flare gun with a deadly shotgun shell.”
Bowshier was treated at a local hospital and released.
Reader says he and his deputies were not seriously injured.
This was not the first time Bowshier had to be subdued by deputies.
Reader says, on Sept. 15, he pulled a knife when deputies went to arrest him and barricaded himself inside a house. A SWAT team from Chillicothe was called for assistance and, after tear gas was deployed, Bowshier surrendered, Reader said.