The Daily Toreador - Student Newspaper of Texas Tech

CANTON (AP) - The father of a high school football player shot and wounded the team's coach Thursday, fled in a truck loaded with weapons, and then tried to kill himself by slashing his wrists, authorities said.

Jeffrey Doyle Robertson, 45, apparently went to Canton High School just after classes started and shot coach Gary Joe Kinne in the school's field house, authorities said. Kinne was shot in the chest, apparently with a .45-caliber pistol, Canton Police Chief Mike Echols said.

Robertson then fled, and about two hours later the pickup was found abandoned on a rural road next to a golf course a few miles outside of town. Robertson was later found in the woods with self-inflicted wounds, including cuts to his wrists, said Tom Vinger, a spokesman with the Department of Public Safety.

Television footage captured Robertson being carried to an ambulance on a stretcher and he seemed semiconscious. A balding man with a goatee, Robertson had a tattoo on his arm of cartoon character Yosemite Sam brandishing two guns and the words ''Born to Raise Hell.''

Kinne, who also is the Canton High School athletic director, was airlifted to a hospital in nearby Tyler. Truman Oakley, a spokesman for Kinne's family, said the coach was in critical condition, but provided no other details.

Police were investigating a possible motive.

On Wednesday, Robertson's son, Baron, had apparently been banned from playing all school athletics, said Steve Smith Jr., a senior who was a defensive end and kicker on the team. He said another coach told players that after Kinne was shot but he didn't know specifics.

Robertson had been banned from the school's campus and told not to attend school functions after several confrontations with coaches over the past year, Echols said.

Echols said officers did not find a hit list on Robertson when he was arrested, but authorities were trying to get a warrant to search his truck, where several guns were visible.

''We had heard there were certain people he named off that he wanted'' to harm, Echols said.

Kinne, who was a college linebacker at Baylor University, took over as Canton coach after leaving Mesquite High School before the 2003 season. His son, G. J. Kinne, was the AP 3A All-state honorable mention quarterback last season.

Smith's father, Steve Smith Sr., said some parents had been upset that Kinne had made his son the starting quarterback as a freshman. However, he described Robertson as ''a very high-strung, hot-tempered individual.''

He said Robertson threatened his son last year - grabbing his shirt and pushing him up against a fence - over an on-field teasing. He said Baron Robertson, then a freshman, was walking off the field when some older students ''razzed'' him.

''This guy blew up,'' Smith said. ''He thought some kids were picking on his son. My son wasn't even the one who said anything. But he threatened to kill him.''

Smith said he complained to the school and police, but Robertson was never charged. He said when he arrived at the school Thursday to see his son that he told the superintendent: ''Stevie was threatened by this guy and y'all chose to do nothing about it.

''When they have someone with that temperament, they need to keep an eye on him.''

Canton school district Superintendent Larry Davis declined to comment on Smith's accusations or complaints from other parents. ''I have no personal knowledge of that,'' he said.

A local restaurant cashier said Robertson had a reputation in Canton, a town of about 3,500 located some 60 miles east of Dallas known for its First Monday Trade Days, a massive flea market the first Monday of each month.

''I wouldn't say he was respected. But he was well-known,'' said Sister's Cafe cashier Diane Price, who said she has known Robertson for 37 years because he attended high school with her daughter.

Robertson had worked for six years for Dallas Plumbing Co., leaving in 2002 to start his own business with another man, Dallas Plumbing President John Downs said. Downs described Robertson as a good employee and a devoted father who enjoyed taking his son hunting and fishing.

But Downs said he heard about Robertson getting into fights in his hometown of Canton.

The last time Downs saw Robertson was about six months ago, when Robertson had a broken leg, bruises and abrasions from a road-rage-related fight on the side of a highway, he said.

''The last conversation that I had with him was that he really needed to learn how to control his temper or he was going to get hurt worse than that,'' Downs said.

After the shooting, students spent the day, starting from about 9 a.m., sequestered in classrooms. Some watched television reports for updates and others tried to call parents from their cell phones.

Yvonne McCoy, who's studying to become a medical assistant, was in Dallas to attend a class when she heard about the shooting at the school attended by her son, Michael Tucker. She said she was so upset, crying and sick to her stomach, that she had her mother make the hour or so drive to Canton.

''That was the scary part - you don't know who's been shot, how many,'' she said. ''And then you think: small town, we're in the Bible belt.''

Eric Crapanzano, a 15-year-old sophomore receiver and backup quarterback, said Kinne's son was in his class when the shooting happened.

''We were all just joking around by the window, and all of a sudden he gets called out by the cops,'' Crapanzano said. ''It was a long day, scary. I'm pretty scared and sad and sorry to see a good man get hurt like that.''

Mark Crapanzano, 41, said he drove about two hours to pick up his son, who also sees limited playing time on the football field.

''All parents face that, you know. Some deal with it better than others. You have to be rational. Practice hard and accept it,'' he said.

Thursday's public shooting was the second for the Tyler area this year. On Feb. 24, a man opened fire with an AK-47 assault rifle outside the Tyler courthouse, killing his ex-wife and a bystander who intervened.

The shooting also marks the nation's second school shooting within a month. Five students, a teacher and a security guard were killed in Red Lake, Minn., on March 21 in an attack by 16-year-old student Jeff Weise, who then killed himself.

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