Gun-toting soccer mom shot while on Web chat

updated 4:36 p.m. ET Oct. 9, 2009

LEBANON, Pa. - A Pennsylvania mother who became an unlikely gun-rights advocate was fatally shot by her husband while she was on a video chat with a friend, authorities said

Lebanon County officials say Meleanie Hain, 31, was shot several times Wednesday in her kitchen by her 33-year-old husband, Scott. He later killed himself.

Officials say the online friend saw Scott Hain fire several times.

Meleanie Hain became a voice against gun control last year when she fought for the right to carry a holstered pistol at her 5-year-old's soccer games. Other parents complained, prompting a sheriff to temporarily revoke her gun permit.

Officials on Friday said her gun was in a backpack when she was killed. Scott Hain, a parole officer, owned the 9 mm handgun he used to kill her.

The couple's 10-year-old son and daughters ages 2 and 6 were home at the time, police said. The two older children ran outside and told neighbors that their father had shot their mother, neighbors said. The children are being cared for by neighbors and relatives.

Worked as prison guard
Scott Hain had worked in Reading as a parole officer for the state Board of Probation and Parole since August 2008. He previously was a guard at the Camp Hill state prison, the state Corrections Department said.

Neighbor Mark Long told The Patriot-News in Harrisburg that Meleanie Hain had baby-sat for his 3-year-old son and that the couple had been having marital problems.

Neighbor Aileen Fortna, 51, said that her husband noticed the two older Hain children running past their house and crying. She said the children told another neighbor that "daddy shot mommy."

Meleanie Hain always carried her holstered 9mm Glock pistol, even to the grocery store, and was holding a rifle while she talked to someone outside her house last week, Fortna said.

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