Doering enters guilty plea in federal court

By Bev Pechan

The Hill City shooter, aka Paul Doering, appeared in federal court in Rapid City last Thursday, entering a guilty plea to the charge of evidence tampering following the incident during Hill City’s Wild Bunch shootout on Main and Elm streets on June 17 of last year.
Doering, a four-time convicted felon who has served time in Minnesota, was originally charged as a felon in possession of a firearm, but that charge was later dropped in exchange for his plea agreement to the tampering charge.
According to law enforcement reports, Doering, 49, Summerset, was accused of firing live ammunition from two handguns during the shootout performance and later asked his girlfriend, Phyllis Masten, to remove the guns while he reportedly buried the ammunition and spent casings to keep them from falling into the hands of authorities.
The evidence was later retrieved at the scene and no charges were apparently filed against the woman. Doering originally maintained that he didn’t know his weapons were loaded. He has not publicly stated why he had live ammunition in them.
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