Testimony begins in Roger Barnett's trial

BISBEE - Arturo Morales began to sob as he told jurors how he tried to console his young granddaughter and her friend as a furious Roger Barnett, handgun holstered at his side, told them to get off his property or he would start shooting.

"They were asking, 'Why does he want to kill us?' and I just held their hands," said the 59-year-old Morales, one of the plaintiffs in a civil trial accusing Barnett of terrorizing a hunting party during an incident in 2004.

"I could not stop them," Morales continued, "honest to God, I could not stop them, they were crying so much."

Morales told the Superior Court jury that he and his son, Ronald Morales, were taking his two granddaughters, ages 9 and 11, and an 11-year-old friend on their first hunting trip when he encountered Roger Barnett's brother, Donald Barnett, in an undeveloped area northeast of Douglas.

"I tried to explain to him that we had permission, that we had a pass (to be on the land)," Arturo Morales said. "But he said I was in the wrong place."

Donald Barnett told Arturo Morales to leave the property, which he said belonged to the Barnetts. But Morales explained that his son and one of the girls had gone off looking for deer, and that he couldn't leave until they returned.

Donald Barnett then drove off to examine an access gate that the elder Morales told him had been left open. A few minutes later, as Arturo Morales waited for the two hunters to return, Roger Barnett drove up.

"He said, 'Get the (expletive) out of here or I'm going to start shooting," Arturo Morales said. "He accused me of taking down his (no trespassing) sign, and he said that I was an (expletive) ignorant Mexican."

Arturo Morales said he told Roger Barnett that he was waiting for his son and granddaughter, and he began honking the horn of his truck to get their attention. When they finally arrived, Ronald Morales asked Barnett what his name was.

At that point, according plaintiffs' attorney Jesus Romo Vejar, Barnett ran to his truck, took out an AR-15 assault rifle, chambered the weapon, and said: "My name is Roger (expletive) Barnett and I'm going to shoot you."

The family then left the area, called 911 and later filed a complaint with the Cochise County Sheriff's Office. When the county attorney decided not to press charges in the case, the Morales', with the help of the Tucson-based civil rights group Border Action Network, filed a civil claim against Barnett.

The suit accused Barnett of assault, false imprisonment, negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress, and asked for $200,000 in damages.

Arturo Morales testified Tuesday that since the run-in with Roger Barnett on Oct. 30, 2004, he has suffered loss of sleep, sexual dysfunction, an aversion to guns and a general sense of anxiety. He said his granddaughters continue to live in fear of Barnett and refuse to hunt again.

During cross-examination, however, defense attorney John Kelliher asked the elder Morales why, if the episode had affected his life so adversely, he had never sought medical or psychological treatment. And he pointed out that while Arturo Morales testified that he was now afraid of guns, he acknowledged he had gone on hunting excursions since the 2004 incident.

Kelliher also noted that Morales had made previous statements that his 9-year-old granddaughter started crying not because she thought Barnett would shoot her, but because she was afraid her grandfather was going to be arrested.

And the attorney hammered away at the fact that Morales, an experienced hunter with a long history in the area, was never certain as to whose land he was on.

During his opening remarks to the jury, Kelliher said only one member of the Morales party had a valid license to hunt on Oct. 30, 2004. He noted that the date marked the first day of hunting season, and that Roger Barnett has a long-established history of not allowing hunters to use his land without written permission.

Furthermore, Kelliher said Arturo Morales had had a previous encounter with Roger Barnett in which he was cited by a sheriff's deputy for hunting on Barnett's property. Therefore, the attorney said, Morales knew well before the 2004 confrontation that Barnett restricted hunting on his ranch.

Arturo Morales, however, testified the incident prior to 2004 had involved a Barnett sibling and not Roger Barnett himself. And the Morales' claim asserts that the land in question was not the rancher's private property, but state-leased land, which made it permissible for them to hunt there.

Both parties have promised to present evidence proving their interpretation of the land's status.

As for the confrontation between Roger Barnett and Arturo and Ronald Morales, Kelliher acknowledged the situation became heated and that it involved people carrying guns. But he said evidence would show the dispute was a two-way exchange that did not incriminate his client more so than the Morales adults.

"I don't doubt that there were words exchanged," Kelliher said. "What I do doubt is that Roger Barnett threatened to kill anybody."

One issue auspiciously absent from Tuesday's proceedings was illegal immigration.

Roger Barnett estimates he has made citizen's arrests of more than 12,000 illegal border-crossers who have trespassed on his ranch since 1996. In the process, he has become both revered and reviled in the border issues debate.

Starting in 2003, the Border Action Network and other civil rights groups began targeting Barnett with civil claims such as the Morales suit in an effort to drain the rancher's coffers and expose what they say is a pattern of racially motivated vigilantism.

But in a pre-trial ruling, Judge James Conlogue precluded from evidence hundreds of pages of law enforcement reports dealing with Barnett's apprehensions of illegal immigrants. Romo Vejar may only present the documents to impeach contradictory statements by witnesses.

The Morales-Barnett trial continues today at 9 a.m. at the Cochise County Superior Courthouse in Bisbee.