3 Oklahoma Teens Allegedly Killed Australian Baseball Player for Fun
Teens were bored when they planned killing spree, police chief said.
Aug. 19, 2013— -- As the family of an Australian baseball player gunned down in Oklahoma mourns his death, police said today that the athlete was targeted by three teenagers who simply "wanted to see someone die."
The suspects followed Chris Lane, 22, as he jogged alongside a road in Duncan, Okla., Friday afternoon, shot him in the back and left him to die on the side of the road, said Duncan police Chief Danny Ford.
"They were bored and just wanted to see somebody die," Ford told ABCNews.com.
Lane, who was on a baseball scholarship at East Central University in Ada, Okla., and was in town visiting his girlfriend, died shortly after he arrived at the hospital, Ford said.
While no one witnessed the shooting, Ford said several people heard a gunshot and reported seeing a black car speeding away from the area of the shooting.
Authorities used surveillance video from local businesses, Ford said, and noticed a black vehicle had pulled behind a hotel for 11 minutes after the shooting before driving away.
A frantic three hours passed, Ford said, without any sign of the vehicle, until a call came in Friday evening "that there were three juveniles at a house with guns and wanting to kill somebody."
Ford said officers found three teens in the vehicle, which was parked at a church parking lot near the home.
"They were pretty uncooperative," Ford said. "[But] after questioning them and getting consent to search the car, we found evidence that made us believe they were involved."
Ford declined to elaborate on what evidence was found in the car. After the teens were arrested, Ford said the driver, who is 17, told police they were all at the scene of the slaying and that the 16-year-old suspect pulled the trigger.
The three teens, ages 15, 16 and 17, have not yet been arraigned on charges.
The killing of Lane has rattled the quiet town of 24,000, where Ford said he couldn't recall the last time there was a murder.
"I don't think we average one [murder] a year," he said. "Basically, we're a rural Oklahoma community."
Peter Lane told the Sydney Morning Herald his son was "a kid on the cusp of making his life."
"There's not going to be any good come out of this because it was just so senseless," Lane said.
"He was an athlete going for a jog like he would do five or six days a week in terms of his training schedule," he said. "It's happened, it's wrong and we just try and deal with it the best we can."