Il y a cinq ans, Harry Whittington a eu la malchance d'avoir comme partenaire de chasse Dick Cheney. On se souvient que l'ancien vice-président avait criblé de plomb l'avocat texan, alors âgé de 78 ans, en tentant d'abattre une caille. Or, selon cet article remarquable du Washington Post, Whittington attend encore aujourd'hui les excuses de Cheney.
Je cite un extrait dans le texte de l'article du journaliste Paul Fahri pour rappeler la gravité de l'accident, dont la Maison-Blanche avait d'abord imputé la responsabilité à la victime :
The shotgun sprayed upward of 200 birdshot pellets at Whittington, causing scores of wounds. His facial lacerations were the most dramatically bloody, but the injuries to his neck and chest were the most serious. Four days after being hit, the birdshot near his heart prompted it to beat erratically, forcing him back into the intensive care unit. Doctors said Whittington suffered a mild heart attack; he thinks it was something less, a heart "event."
Still, the injuries were more dire than previously disclosed. Whittington suffered a collapsed lung. He underwent invasive exploratory surgery, as doctors probed his vital organs for signs of damage. The load from Cheney's gun came close to, but didn't damage, the carotid artery in his neck. A rupture could have been fatal, particularly since it took the better part of an hour to transport him from the vast Armstrong ranch to the Kingsville hospital.
"I was lucky," he says today, sitting in his law office in downtown Austin, the same one he has worked in since 1965. "I just feel like every day is a gift. Sometimes I wonder why I got these extra years."