HAYWARD (AP) - Relatives of a man held in the killings of six deer hunters and wounding of two others huddled together and sobbed after Chai Vang was escorted Monday from a Sawyer County jail cell for a brief visit.

"We don't really know what went wrong. We don't know," said Deu Khang, describing herself as Vang's cultural wife, not his legal wife. "I am in shock. I don't have anything to say. I don't know what to say."

Mr. Vang's brother, Sang Vang, 33, said the family was devastated. He said his brother has lived in the United States for more than two decades and served in the U.S. Army.

"I still don't believe it," he said. "He is one of the nicest persons. ... Maybe something provoked him or something. He is a reasonable person."

Some Hmong leaders questioned whether racial differences figured in the shootings Sunday; authorities said they couldn't explain what could cause such an outburst.

Chai Vang, 36, of St. Paul, Minn., was arrested about four hours after the shootings as he emerged from the woods with his empty SKS 7.62-mm semiautomatic rifle, a common hunting weapon. No charges had been filed as of Tuesday morning.

Sawyer County Sheriff Jim Meier said the state attorney general's office would prosecute the case because of the severity of it.

Mary Lokken, judicial assistant to Sawyer County Circuit Judge Norman Yackel, said no court appearance was expected Tuesday.

Ms. Lokken said prosecutors' investigators will present a probable cause statement Tuesday in paperwork to Judge Yackel to determine whether there is enough evidence to warrant charges. The judge will review it and set a bail to keep Mr. Vang in jail if warranted, Ms. Lokken said.

An assistant state public defender, Jerry Wright, said he went to the jail Tuesday morning to offer his services, and was told that Mr. Vang has not asked to see an attorney.

Mr. Wright said it was not unusual for probable cause to be determined by a judge based on a sworn affidavit from investigators.

The sheriff told reporters a dispute over Mr. Vang's use of a hunting stand on private property preceded the gunfire.

He said Mr. Vang had gotten lost hunting in thick woods near Birchwood, and when he asked some other hunters for directions, they guided him to a road.

Mr. Vang ended up on 400 acres of private land, found the tree stand unattended and climbed into it to hunt, unaware that the property was private, the sheriff said. The county has thousands of acres of public hunting land, some of it "virtually around" the private property where the shooting occurred, he said.

The sheriff said hunter Terry Willers of Rice Lake saw Mr. Vang and asked him to leave.

He said Mr. Vang complied, and more of Mr. Willers' hunting partners arrived. One member of the group noticed Mr. Vang's identification number on the tag that hunters are required to wear and he wrote it in the dust on an all-terrain vehicle, the sheriff said.

Mr. Meier said it wasn't clear why Vang then started shooting, firing at least 20 shots from the rifle after removing the scope.

Killed were property owner Robert Crotteau, 42; his son Joey, 20; Al Laski, 43; Mark Roidt, 28; and Jessica Willers, 27, all of the Rice Lake area, authorities said.

Denny Drew, 55, of Rice Lake, died Monday at St. Joseph's Hospital in Marshfield, his family announced. The condition of Terry Willers at St. Joseph's Hospital in Marshfield was upgraded Tuesday from serious to fair. And an operator at the Lakeview Medical Center in Rice Lake who declined to give her name said Drew's brother-in-law Lauren Hesebeck had been released after treatment there.

The victims were in a group of 14 or 15 people who made their opening-weekend trip to Crotteau's 400-acre property an annual tradition.

Mr. Vang has no criminal record with the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Police in St. Paul said there had been two domestic violence calls to his home in the past year, but both were resolved without incident.

There have been previous clashes between Southeast Asian and white hunters in the region.

In Minnesota, a fistfight once broke out after Hmong hunters crossed onto private land, said Ilean Her, director of the St. Paul-based Council on Asian Pacific Minnesotans.

Her said she has heard from some people in St. Paul's Hmong community who said they knew Mr. Vang, though not well. About 24,000 Hmong live in St. Paul, the highest concentration of any U.S. city.

Michael Yang, a Hmong activist, said various Hmong groups held an emergency meeting Monday to talk about how to respond and avoid a possible backlash. Those at the meeting heard stories from some Hmong hunters about friction with white hunters.

The shooting has already provoked racial tension in an area of Wisconsin where deer hunting is steeped in tradition.

"It's pathetic. They let all these foreigners in here, and they walk all over everybody's property," said Jim Arneberg, owner of the Haugen Inn in nearby Haugen.

State Sen. Mee Moua, one of two Hmong legislators in Minnesota, rejected the idea that cultural differences played any role in the shooting.

There have been previous clashes between Southeast Asian and white hunters in the region.

Bull SH*T...they always love to 'hide' behind other SE Asians...its Hmong who have been causing the bulk of problems for the last 20 yrs or so...not Vietnamese Cambodians or Laotians

They are well steeped in the traditions of the other race pimps like Jackson and Sharpton

They try to rob you or assault you and if you protest or fight back you are a racist...

This POS just murdered 6 people in cold blood..and possibly he and two Hmong pals murdered another local deer hunter...on his own land...between Marshfield and Neilsville...

I have lived and worked among these folks almost my whole life...have friends in Rice Lake... Small business men there are like small business men everywhere...they are not racists nor do they rant and rave or curse at them...they always have the presence of mind to speak kindly to a potential customer....treating people with respect...firmness but with respect..

And even if they are around those who are less discreet with their language the local business men are usually the ones to find common ground or try to calm down those who are upset so that things don't escalate..

I have read Vang's confession...this was cold blooded unmerciful murder...and possibly not his first.. IMO

Hmore Hmong? Polygamous Hmong?

[Peter Brimelow writes: Current VDARE.COM record holder for angry email is Joe Guzzardi’s 8-01-03 “Hmong Wrong For America. America Wrong For Hmong.” We mean Hmundreds—the Hmong don’t seem big on democratic debate. We keep asking Joe for a sequel, but you know how shy he is. Here Brenda Walker fills in for him.]

By Brenda Walker

[Recently by Brenda Walker: Save The Sierra Club From The Treason Lobby—Act Now! and The Sierra Staff Strikes Back, With Some Help From The SPLC]

Is it possible to have family values in excess?

Hmong tribesmen from Laos, members of the mountain tribe recruited by the CIA in the 1960s to fight a guerilla war against the Communists, now refugees here in the U.S., believe that having several wives is a boon to creating the large families and clan structures that they value.

However this cultural norm clashes noticeably with the traditional American view of what constitutes a basic family unit—particularly now when defining marriage is central to the national debate.

The Hmong social norm of polygamy is simply an irreconcilable cultural difference with American values, particularly when a veritable village wants to decamp lock, stock and wives to Minnesota.

Seems the Mayor of St. Paul, Randy Kelly wanted to make nice to the thousands of Hmong who already live in Minnesota, and agreed to facilitate the mass transfer to the United States of more than 14,000 Hmong who currently reside in Thailand refugee camps. St. Paul would take most of them.

However, when talks began in Bangkok recently between the Mayor and local officials, a glitch developed when Kelly stated that polygamy would present a problem. [Polygamy hinders Hmong entry to U.S. Agence France-Presse Mar 2, 2003]

"The U.S. said they will only allow men to bring one wife for each family, which is impossible," complained Thai General Pallop Pinmanee. "Many Hmongs have several wives. How can we separate family members?" (Hmong family values include multiple wives, though not husbands.)

Perhaps the general knows the dirty little secret that thousands of Hmong living in the U.S. do indeed have polygamous arrangements. A University of Minnesota doctoral student investigated the prevalence of polygamy a few years ago and estimated that "between 270 and 450 men are practicing polygamy in Minnesota, each with an average of two wives and 14 children. That would mean that as many as 7,600 men, women and children are living in polygamous families."

When the publication Future Hmong brought the subject out of the shadows, hundreds of Hmong males wrote to defend polygamy as a lifestyle choice—despite the detail that it is a felony in Minnesota.

One reader, a 24-year-old man, believed that his ethnic status should be respected:

"When you make polygamy illegal, you take away people's rights ... People who choose a polygamist lifestyle should not be ashamed, it is your right."

Many Hmong women appear not to care for being one of multiple wives, but women have little standing in traditional Hmong society. In fact, the kidnapping of girls for marriage—also called bride theft and marriage by capture—is one kind of courtship and the chosen bride has little choice in the matter. It's not unusual for girls as young as 13 to be taken in marriage.

Many American pundits dismiss the idea that the current gay marriage controversy will lead to demands for legalized polygamy. However, it is not at all unimaginable that groups who favor polygamy—immigrant Hmong and Muslims and homegrown Mormons—will use the occasion to begin suggesting that polygamy is an acceptable lifestyle choice for our increasingly multicultural nation.

After all, having multiple wives is an arrangement that has been historically widespread. It occurs in the Old Testament without reproach.

But in practice, polygamy often is a form of child abuse and slavery, in which very young girls are sold to older men.

After the first media stories on multi-wifing appeared, the response from the Mayor was to clam up and defer to others "at a much higher level" who would presumably make the final decision. But Anthony Newman of the International Organisation for Migration, a key component of the Refugee Industry’s “iron triangle,” was not nearly so shy, He said that in practice the issue (i.e. American law) was negotiable.

"On paper, they can have one wife only. But in reality they can all move together to the United States and stay together as a family group," he said. US officials visit Hmong refugees, BBC, March 2, 2004

Is it not curious that when the American airwaves are ablaze with controversy over the definition of marriage that this case has gotten zero attention?

Whatever you think of homosexual couples getting hitched, it’s obvious that traditional marriage is far more damaged by the stealth introduction of polygamy, an institution which is based on the abuse of women and girls.

If the St. Paul polygamy dust-up were not bad enough, another mess in the controversy is that residents of the Thai refugee camp are being screened with tests to prove they are healthy and are not addicted to drugs—presumably the opiates for which Southeast Asia is famous.

"The drug tests will be one of the biggest hurdles," remarked the visiting delegation's spokeswoman, Laura Mortensen.

So will thousands of drug-addicted polygamists be welcomed into America in another escalation of multiculturalism against American values?

Or will the Mayor of St. Paul actually speak up against importing into the United States would-be refugees who are already breaking U.S. laws in two major instances?

Curious VDARE.COM readers can contact Mayor Randy Kelly at 651-266-8510 or use the city email form to contact the City of St. Paul.

Brenda Walker [email her] lives in Northern California and publishes LimitsToGrowth and ImmigrationsHumanCost.

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