Sallisaw shooter had a history of trouble.

Sunday, November 10th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

SALLISAW, Okla. (AP) -- The Sallisaw teenager accused of killing two people and wounding eight on a shooting spree may have been hallucinating after taking cold pills and was known to be cruel to animals.

Police say Daniel Hawke Fears, 18, went on a shooting spree Oct. 26, after a neighbor scolded him for driving recklessly in a neighborhood street where children were playing.

Authorities have not said what motivated Fears to go on the shooting spree or why he was driving recklessly. He was charged with two murder counts and 16 other charges and will face a Feb. 24 preliminary hearing.

Sallisaw Police Chief Gary Philpot said the investigation indicates Fears was hallucinating after taking an over-the-counter cold medicine.

Fears was known to have taken as many as 30 of these tablets at once, Philpot said, and even wrote a letter to a friend indicating the side effects.
In the letter, Fears advised his friend "don't drive on this stuff," said Philpot, who has seen the letter. "It makes you think you're dreaming, but you're not.

Less than a month ago, Fears was known around his eastern Oklahoma community as the quiet son of a successful professional fisherman O.T. Fears.

Fears' father is one of the most successful bass fishermen in the nation. O.T. Fears has earned more than $500,000 on the pro tour and finished fourth at this year's Bassmasters Classic. Daniel Fears, was described as a quiet, eccentric but harmless high school senior who liked to wear black, worked at Wal-Mart and talked about going to welding school.

"He was really smart," said Ryan Perano, who grew up near Fears and played with him since age 3. "I'd like to have had his smarts."

Perano admitted he was scared off by Fears who was increasingly influenced by drugs and had bitterness toward his father following his parents' divorce. It was his father's 20-gauge shotgun that Fears stole and used to kill and wound his victims, police said.

Although it may have gone unnoticed, Fear's violent streak may have begun long before the shootings.

"I saw him pick up a bird one time and twist its head off like it was nothing," the 17-year-old Sallisaw resident added. "He didn't have trouble killing animals."

Fears' attorney, Clark Brewster, would not comment on the allegations of Fears' drug problems or cruelty to animals. The prominent Tulsa attorney visited the suspect in a city jail Thursday and said numerous psychiatric and neuro-psychological experts were talking to Fears.

Fears is in jail without bail and is no longer on suicide watch, Philpot said.

"He seems completely normal now," Philpot added. "He's come off whatever he was on. He shows no remorse, no emotion."

Perano said he understands. His friend has come tragically too far for that.

"Nothing matters anymore," said Perano, who has not seen Fears in jail. "He won't tell anybody he's sorry. There ain't no forgiving now."

The shooting spree began when Fears drove a 1996 Dodge pickup recklessly toward his father's house, nearly hitting two young children playing in the road. He then broke into his father's house after a bystander told him to be careful.

Fears emerged with the shotgun, firing at the bystander, Gregory Caughman, then shooting his father's next-door neighbor, 61-year-old Patsy Sue Wells, in the face.

Wells later died at the Sallisaw hospital. Her husband, Elvie Gene Wells, 64, also was shot in the face and back but survived. Caughman's 2-year-old daughter also was wounded in the initial attack.

Fears then got back into the pickup heading east on U.S. 64. He stopped at a nearby car dealership, police say, to shoot a 68-year-old Fort Smith, Ark., woman, Reba Spangler. A 58-year-old car salesman, Jimmy Nunn, was shot twice.

Fears continued east stopping to shoot two more people, Ernest and Sharon McMahon, at a Sallisaw statuary store, according to court reports. He wounded several more people along the highway before throwing the shotgun out the window and driving into a ditch 20 miles east near Roland, police say.