Playing Pirates

Gunfight wounds political campaign worker
MIDTOWN: Volunteer for Murkowski hit as vehicles trade shots.

By RICHARD MAUER and MEGAN HOLLAND
Anchorage Daily News

Published: August 23, 2006
Last Modified: August 23, 2006 at 03:00 PM

.. across from The Mall at Sears as the occupants of two vehicles blasted away at each other.

...

Another man, who also had nothing to do with the original shooting, was issued a citation for disorderly conduct for pointing a plastic musket from the window of a car as it drove amid the chaos. He and others in the car, which had an "I brake for hallucinations" bumper sticker, said they were
playing pirates.

...

With the shooting long over but the traffic jam still building, Ryan Rochon looked out his pickup window into the barrel of a musket pointed in his direction from a red SUV on Northern Lights. He knew the gun was plastic, but it seemed like such a bizarre act under the circumstances that he yelled to a cop. Three squad cars sped after the SUV. The car quickly responded to the officers. Three young occupants were handcuffed and brought back to the Sears mall parking lot, where they were questioned. Their car was brought back there too, a small skull dangling from its rearview mirror.

The first of the three to be released, Trystal Hodge, 19, said she and her friends have been playing pirate since middle school. Wearing goggles against the rain, she said she had stuck her head out of the SUV and yelled pirate lines like, "Avast ye mates" to other cars on Northern Lights. Her friend waved the musket.