Man Sought After Attack on Woman, Boy in Desert

An all-points bulletin was issued Sunday for an armed man who terrorized a woman and her 10-year-old son in the desert. The woman was shot in the chest and back, but the boy escaped injury.

Carol Lynn Hoernke, 34, was in stable condition at University Medical Center.

Hoernke and her son, Roy, had gone to the Sunrise Mountain desert area near Lake Mead, taking a .38-caliber revolver and a .22-caliber rifle with them, Police Lt. Paul Conner said.

A man drove up, showed the boy how to fire the rifle and then asked to shoot the woman’s revolver, the lieutenant said. After she gave him the gun, however, he pointed it at her and ordered her to her knees. When she refused, the man shot her in the chest, Conner said.

The man then shot at, but missed, Roy Hoernke as the boy scrambled up a nearby hill, and then shot the woman in the lower back after she slipped while attempting to flee, the officer said.

The man fled in a late-model, rust-colored Jeep with Florida plates. He was described by Conner as a large, white male with a full beard and sandy hair, between the ages of 25 and 35.