Meleanie Hain sports a holstered Glock at her daughter's soccer practice in September 2008. (Lebanon Daily News File Photo)A Lebanon woman who gained national notoriety last year as a champion of Second Amendment rights after she brought her loaded handgun to her 5-year-old daughter's soccer game was shot and killed Wednesday night in an apparent murder-suicide.
Meleanie Hain, 31, and her husband, Scott Hain, 33, were pronounced dead by Lebanon County coroner Dr. Jeffrey Yocum shortly after 8:30 p.m. after a two-hour standoff with police outside their home at Second Avenue and East Grant Street. The episode ended quietly when police entered the house after trying to make contact with anyone inside.
No cause of death was announced, and autopsies were scheduled for today, said Yocum.
Lebanon police Chief Daniel Wright was guarded with information as detectives began the preliminary stages of the investigation late Wednesday night. He acknowledged that the Hains were both found dead and had suffered gunshot wounds inside their 1 ½-story brick home in a quiet neighborhood in Lebanon's southside. He would not provide any additional details, other than to say that police do not feel any other people were involved.
District Attorney David Arnold, who was at the scene, refused to comment.
Several neighbors said they heard or saw the couple's children run from the house screaming, "Daddy shot Mommy!" shortly before the 911 Center was called at 6:20 p.m.
The children, 2- and 6-year-old girls and a 10-year-old boy, were in the care of a neighbor and were unhurt, said Wright.
Lebanon County Emergency Services Unit was quickly called to the scene and the neighborhood cordoned off.
The front door of the house was open, and light could be seen inside the living room. But all inside and around the house was quiet as members of the Lebanon police and tactical team, armed with rifles, took up positions.
Petra Bossler, who lives next to the Hain home on Grant Street, said she did not hear any commotion or gunfire from the Hain home. She learned something had happened only when police came to her door and asked to come inside so they could peer from her windows at the Hain house, which is just several feet away.
Debbie Mise, who lives on East Grant Street, three doors away from the Hains, said she heard a strange sound followed by the screams of the children, which she mistook for playing.
"I heard something heavy drop or fall, and then right away I heard the kids screaming, but I thought they were playing," she said. "It was loud. But it didn't sound like a pop."
Brian Witmer, who lives between Mise and Bossler said he saw Scott Hain mowing the lawn about 3:30 p.m. Wednesday.
"He was mowing his lawn, and the dog was outside. There was nothing out of the ordinary. He didn't seem strange at all," he said.
Mise said she had a feeling something bad would eventually happen at the Hain home.
"She just wasn't right," Mise said of Meleanie Hain. "You don't bring a gun to a kids' soccer game, and you don't wear a gun when you go shopping at Kohl's."
Meleanie Hain was dubbed the pistol-packin' soccer mom by the media in September 2008 after it was first reported in the Lebanon Daily News that she wore her holstered 9mm Glock pistol to her daughter's soccer match. She became a spokeswoman of sorts for open-carry advocates - who support the right to carry a gun in the open - after complaints caused county Sheriff Mike DeLeo to confiscate her concealed-weapon permit.
Hain appealed the action, and after a hearing DeLeo was ordered to return the permit.
Hain did not let the matter end there. She filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit against DeLeo. That trial was awaiting scheduling in U.S. Middle District Court.
Meleanie Hain at last report operated a day-care center in her home.
Her husband was a parole officer in Berks County and a former prison guard at the State Correctional Institute in Camp Hill. He also had worked part-time for Lebanon County Central Booking.
