Father and daughter, mistaken for deer, are fatally shot, officials say

A South Carolina man and his daughter were killed after they were mistaken for deer and were shot during a New Year’s Day hunt, authorities said.

The victims were among four hunters who “were attempting to move deer, also known as driving deer, near Barracada Road in Walterboro when two hunters were shot after being mistaken for a deer,” according to a statement released by the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources. It was not clear whether they were wearing brightly colored safety gear.

David Lucas, a department spokesman, said the details of the shooting would not be released until the investigation was complete. The department did not release the names of any of the hunters.

Richard Harvey, the Colleton County coroner, said the victims were Kim Drawdy, 30, and his daughter Lauren, 9.

Harvey said they were shot with a shotgun. Their autopsies will be performed on Sunday.

“They were deer hunting, so they were using what we would call buckshot,” he said.

The shooting took place about half a mile into the woods in Colleton County, about 50 miles west of Charleston, according to Colleton County Fire-Rescue, which responded to the scene.

“I was devastated,” Drawdy’s brother Benny told WIS-TV in Columbia. “I couldn’t believe it when I got the news. I said, ‘It couldn’t be.’ It broke my heart and I couldn’t believe it.”

The father and daughter shared a love for the outdoors, Johnny Powell, who said he lived near the family, told WCIV-TV in Charleston.

“They were just, you know, side by side,” he said. “She loved him to death, and he loved her.”

The girl was a fourth grader at Cottageville Elementary School, according to the Colleton County School District.

“We are devastated by this news, and we send our deepest sympathies to Lauren’s family,” the school district said in a statement. The district said it would have a support team in place at the school on Jan. 6 to help students process her death.

South Carolina has four game zones. Hunting season began Aug. 15 and ended Wednesday where the Drawdy family was.

Licenses and permits are required for hunting in the state. Before they can obtain hunting licenses, people born after June 30, 1979, are required to successfully complete a hunter education course approved by the state. Children under 16 are not required to have a license, according to Lucas of the Department of Natural Resources.

“They typically would be under the supervision of an older family member or mentor,” he said.

South Carolina has several hunting accidents each year, according to Lucas. In 2018, there were 16 hunting accidents, he said. Eleven of those involved firearms, which resulted in two deaths.

He said he didn’t know the total number of accidents for the 2019 season, which ended Wednesday. In November, a 9-year-old boy died after he was shot by his father as they were rabbit-hunting in Orangeburg County.

“Any accident is bad and a fatality, doubly so, but when it’s a young person, I think it really hits everyone hard in the hunting community,” Lucas said. “Everyone is thinking about the family now.”