[October 30, 2012] CF man gets 10 years for Texas hotel shooting Tweet Oct 30, 2012 (The Leader-Telegram - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- A Chippewa Falls man was given a 10-year prison sentence Monday for killing a man with a stray bullet in September 2010 after firing his gun in a Texas hotel. Lance R. Mueller, 49, of 4885 Golf view Drive, entered no contest pleas in September to reckless manslaughter and criminally negligent manslaughter, according to the Jefferson County (Texas) district attorney's office. Judge Layne Walker ordered the 10-year prison sentence, which must be served entirely in the Texas prison system, said Clint Woods, Jefferson County assistant criminal district attorney. "We're satisfied with that, and the family (of the victim) is too," Woods said Monday afternoon. "It was a relief. I knew (Walker) would do what is right and just." Woods said that Mueller has only served a handful of days in jail so far because he put up the cash bond immediately after he was arrested. "He will have to serve at least five years of his sentence before he is eligible for parole," Woods said. If Mueller obtains parole, but violates terms of it, he could return to prison to serve the remainder of the sentence, Woods added. During sentencing, Woods pointed out that Mueller was arrested in Jackson County for his fourth drunken-driving offense while out on bond. Mueller was reportedly drinking alcohol at the time he fired the gun in the hotel room. "I used that hard in my argument against him," Woods said. James Makin, the defense attorney representing Mueller, told the Beumont Enterprise newspaper that Mueller's drunken-driving charge didn't help his client. "Before he got the new DWI charge we were much more optimistic," Makin told the newspaper. "But once after ... he picked up another criminal case in Wisconsin and that doesn't look good for you." Mueller was arrested in June 2011 in Chippewa Falls. His trial was delayed several times and he pleaded guilty on the first day of his trial on Sept. 25. According to a criminal complaint, Mueller had been excessively drinking alcohol on Sept. 15, 2010, in his hotel room in Beaumont, Texas, with several co-workers. Mueller was "on a bed, messing with the pistol and loaded it," reports state. Mueller pointed the gun at a co-worker, who ducked out of the way. "Mueller pulled the trigger on the gun and it fired. The bullet missed (his co-worker) and struck the wall," the criminal complaint states. The shot from his semi-automatic 9 mm pistol went through two walls, before striking and killing 55-year-old Gregory Fleniken as he was lying on a bed in the next hotel room. Mueller, an electrician, was working temporarily in Texas that fall. He was staying in Room 349 at the MCM Elegante Hotel in Beaumont. Beaumont Police Department investigator David Apple wrote the police report, stating that Fleniken was found dead from a gunshot wound on the morning of Sept. 16, 2010, in Room 348. However, officers didn't find a gun in the room, and determined the death was a homicide. Fleniken, of Lafayette, La., was vice president of OGM Land Co. in Beaumont. His family offered a $50,000 reward for information leading to an arrest in his death. Mueller tried to cover up evidence of the shooting immediately after firing the gun by filling the hole in the wall with toothpaste, the criminal complaint states. Mueller's co-workers told police what he had confessed to them, and that led police to search the hotel rooms for evidence of the shooting. Vetter can be reached at 723-0303 or [email protected]. ___ (c)2012 the Leader-Telegram (Eau Claire, Wis.) Visit the Leader-Telegram (Eau Claire, Wis.) at www.leadertelegram.com Distributed by MCT Information Services [ Back To TMCnet.com's Homepage ]