Services Saturday for Victims of Shoot-Out in Saudi Arabia

Funeral services are scheduled Saturday for a former Orange County woman and her 10-year-old daughter who were slain in Saudi Arabia in an incident unrelated to the Persian Gulf crisis.

Kent Hinkson, who worked as a computer programmer for the Saudi government, is expected to arrive in Los Angeles on Thursday with his five children and the bodies of his wife, Kimberly, and daughter, Courtney, said his mother, Norma Hinkson of Fountain Valley.

Services will be conducted in Westminster at the Garden Grove chapel of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 10332 Bolsa Ave. Viewing is scheduled at 9 a.m., followed by services at 10 a.m..

Norma Hinkson said that her son, who moved his family seven years ago from Orange County to the Saudi capital of Riyadh, is not sure of his plans once he returns to the United States. Before the slaying, Kent Hinkson and his 32-year-old wife had been planning to leave the Middle East and buy a home in Provo, Utah, for their family.

“He will probably settle either here in Orange County, so we can help take care of the children, or else in Utah,” Norma Hinkson said. “But he doesn’t know for sure at all.”

The slaying of Hinkson’s wife was unrelated to the events surrounding the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

The Aug. 14 shootings occurred while Hinkson, his wife and four of their six children were driving back from a grocery shopping trip, Norma Hinkson said.

As they stopped at an intersection, a suspected Saudi drug smuggler being pursued by police commandeered the car and killed 10-year-old Courtney with a gunshot to her neck. Saudi police chased the car for 45 minutes, firing repeatedly at the vehicle until it stalled.

Kimberly Hinkson, who was four months pregnant with twins, was fatally wounded in the head by police gunfire. The gunman was captured unharmed.