Creswell man shot before standoff.

Byline: REBECCA NOLAN The Register-Guard

CRESWELL - Guy Einer McClure was shot in the face with his own .44-caliber handgun before police arrived at his trailer Jan. 17, but the wound wasn't life-threatening, a deputy medical examiner said Tuesday.

In an eight-hour standoff with police, McClure, 35, shot at officers and told 911 dispatchers that he wanted to die. He eventually stepped out of his trailer at Creswell Court with the gun in his hand and refused to drop it. When he moved toward police, nine Metro Area SWAT officers fired their weapons at him.

Officials from the Lane County sheriff's office, Eugene police and Oregon State Police, as well as the county medical examiner, continue their investigations into the case - the first fatal shooting in the SWAT team's 27-year history.

McClure called a neighbor Jan. 17 and said his fiancee had shot him in the face with a .44 Magnum. The neighbor called police at 8:27 p.m. and deputies soon surrounded the trailer where McClure and the girlfriend had lived for about four months. The SWAT team arrived a few hours later.

Officers tried to drive him out with tear gas, and negotiators and dispatchers urged him to come outside unarmed. But McClure, who was drinking whiskey throughout the night, refused to come out. He told dispatchers he was bleeding to death, that he wanted to die and that he would shoot anyone who tried to make him leave. Police said he fired his gun at least three times.

Deputy medical examiner Lynn Walter confirmed that McClure had been shot in the right side of his face near the cheek before police arrived.

McClure was bleeding, but he wasn't experiencing life-threatening blood loss and would have survived the injury, Walter said.

The medical examiner's office was still working to determine how many times McClure was shot by police, Walter said.

The task is complicated because each bullet could cause multiple wounds, Sheriff Jan Clements said last week.

For instance, a single bullet could enter an arm, exit the arm and enter the torso, only to exit again, he said.

As a result, the analysis could take some time. Authorities haven't released the number of times McClure was hit.

"Sometimes I'm amazed at the preoccupation people have with the number of times the person was hit," Clements said during a news conference at the sheriff's office.

"I'm not going to second-guess that," he said. "Each one of those officers has the wherewithal to independently assess the threat to themselves, fellow officers, as well as the citizens at large."

Investigators also are working to determine whose bullets pierced surrounding trailers and mobile homes. "We're confident a number of bullets came from McClure," the sheriff said.