It doesn’t take a sniper to know a 130 yard shot is simple to make. Any idiot can make that type of shot.
I wonder did they tell the guy he would die after taking the shot that was supposed to be easy?
We got lucky that the perp screwed up the shot.
We have all heard of “buck fever” where a hunter misses an easy shot due to nerves. I suspect something similar happened here.
The human head subtends about 6 arcminutes at 130 yards, or one tenth of a degree. The resolution of the human eye is about 1 arcminute. Soldiers in basic training shoot (or shot) at “man sized” targets and are trained to shoot center of mass. Ballistic accuracy of a AR-15 “style” rifle at 100 yards, without wind, is about 1 arcminute, comparable to the resolution of the Mark-I eyeball. A basic training target at 100 meters subtends about one degree, or 10 head-widths, center mass. In my day, the iron sights on an M-16 were “zeroed” for ballistic drop at 200 meters, the typical distance of an infantry engagement. I believe we had one 400 meter target (I hit mine, the lag between firing and the target dropping is very perceivable.)
I do not think that a head shot at 130 yards is a gimme. Not a six inch putt, but not a Hail Mary from full court, either. I think Crooks’s results are consistent with what I would expect from a person with his experience and training.
“...Any idiot can make that type of shot...”
But not every idiot will hit in the 10 ring - the bullseye. You need a good, steady sight picture and a trigger squeeze that doesn’t push or pull the front sight off the target. Good target shooting takes a lot of time on the range just as any other sport.