Police probe possible snipings along Interstate 44

ST. LOUIS -- Authorities are investigating whether the shooting of an Indiana truck on Interstate 44 may be linked to eight other possible snipings at motorists in recent months along the stretch of freeway.

The truck driver -- wounded Thursday on her 34th birthday -- was the first person who was injured in nine cases of vehicle windows inexplicably shattering in daylight since Feb. 26 along a 10-mile stretch of I-44 in and near Bourbon, about 70 miles southwest of St. Louis, an investigator said.

"There's no question we had a highway shooting" on Thursday, Bourbon police chief Bill Williams said Saturday. "Based on the pattern of other incidents, it's possible we may be dealing with a sniper-type situation. We're not saying it is, but we'd be foolish not to acknowledge that it's a concern.

"Definitely, we have a pattern."

Williams said he hadn't noticed possible connections among the shootings until Amy Holder was shot shortly after 1 p.m. Thursday while driving westbound on I-44 as her husband rested in the semitrailer rig's sleeper compartment.

Holder, who was shot near her left temple through her side window, was screaming and bleeding but managed to pull the tractor-trailer to the highway's shoulder. Her husband drove to a nearby gas station and summoned police, Williams said.

Holder, of Paris Crossing, Ind., was treated at a nearby hospital, where a worker told investigators his pickup truck's side window had mysteriously "exploded" while he was driving along the same I-44 stretch during the summer, Williams said.

"I never would have thought that I was shot," Holder told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch after being released from the hospital Friday, continuing her Chicago-to-Dallas run. "I'm not going to let this stop me. If I stop driving, whoever did this wins."

"I'm very lucky that I didn't lose my wife because of this," said her husband, Travis Holder.

A bullet fragment found in the truck -- the first evidence of a shooting in any of the suspected cases -- has been forwarded to the Missouri State Highway Patrol for testing meant to pinpoint the caliber of weapon used, Williams said.

Amy Holder said she saw a late-model Ford Crown Victoria passing her about the time she was shot, though Williams called that car only "a vehicle of interest," perhaps driven by a possible witness.

"At this point, we're not eliminating that [the shot] came from a moving vehicle, but we're more inclined to believe it came from a fixed location," Williams said.

On Saturday, Williams said, a businessman from nearby Cuba, Mo., reported that someone or something recently shattered a side window of his pickup truck on I-44, bringing to nine the number of suspected cases along the freeway stretch over the past eight months.

"I'm not sure there's a great deal a motorist can do other than be observant," Williams said, cautioning that the cases require perspective. "There are thousands and thousands of vehicles that travel that stretch, and we're only talking about nine instances."

The worries parallel those earlier this year in Ohio, where authorities investigated more than 20 shootings along a five-mile stretch of Interstate 270 in Columbus.

Charles A. McCoy Jr., 29, has pleaded innocent to 24 counts in shootings from October through February, including the death of a 62-year-old woman in November.

McCoy, captured in March in Las Vegas, came to authorities' attention after someone called police to say McCoy's father had guns belonging to his son. The father gave police the guns.