Man Held in Montana Shooting Hoax Released From Jail

BILLINGS, Mont. (AP) — A Washington state man says he thought he was "spending the rest of my life in jail" after his arrest in the shooting of a hitchhiker who apparently shot himself in a bizarre publicity stunt.

Fifty-two-year-old Lloyd Christopher Danielson III was released Thursday — 13 days after he was blamed in the shooting of a West Virginia photographer along a rural Montana highway.

Danielson pleaded guilty in Roosevelt County to driving while intoxicated and was sentenced to time served.

Authorities say the hitchhiker, Ray Dolin, has admitted he shot himself in the arm. They say it was part of a hoax meant to draw attention to his plans for a photographic memoir.

Danielson says he does not know and never saw Dolin, but that authorities were convinced he shot the hitchhiker without provocation.