A suspected thief shot multiple times by a Stevens County sheriff’s deputy disputed law enforcement reports Sunday that he was armed with a pistol even though authorities say they recovered a gun and several other stolen items at his home.

“I woke up with my body hit like a freakin’ target,” said Trinidy C. Lopez, 23, who explained during a brief telephone interview from his hospital bed that he had been asleep in his bedroom after a night of partying when deputies arrived at his Loon Lake home early Saturday and one of them began shooting. “I woke up in excruciating pain.”

Stevens County Sheriff Kendle Allen, however, said Lopez was wielding a stolen pistol. “It was either pointed at the deputy or coming to bear onto the deputy,” Allen said of the firearm.

Read Jonathan Brunt's story here.

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