A hunter from Minnesota who killed a 14-year-old Mesa County boy in an accidental Colorado shooting last year was sentenced Wednesday to five years in prison.
Guy Pohto, 60, in January to reckless manslaughter and careless hunting in the Sept. 13 death of Justin Burns.
Justin at Big Creek Reservoir in the Uncompahgre National Forest. He was bow hunting with his father at the time.
“There was no evidence that Mr. Pohto intended to kill Justin, however a sentence to prison recognizes that even reckless conduct that takes a life will not be tolerated,” Dan Rubinstein, Mesa County’s district attorney, said in a statement to The Denver Post.
“Every hunter knows that it is not an activity to take lightly, and his actions cannot be characterized as an accident,” Rubinstein added.
Justin was a student at Palisade High School and is survived by his brother, sister and parents.
“Justin was an avid outdoorsman who loved nothing more than spending his time in the mountains with nature and his family,” . “He loved hunting, hiking, camping, fishing and 4-wheeling.”
In October, Justin’s parents seeking unspecified damages over $75,000.
The suit called Pohto’s actions “atrocious” and as “going beyond all possible bounds of decency and utterly intolerable in any civilized community.”
Recreational shooting on national forest land in Colorado since the July slaying of Glenn Martin, 60, who was shot in the Pike National Forest.
The Forest Service has introduced a plan for the popular Arapaho and Roosevelt national forests that .
Jesse Paul: 303-954-1733, jpaul@denverpost.com or @JesseAPaul
