Quote:$20 USC-Clemson bet led to killing, police say
Authorities say winner got rifle after friend refused to settle wager on football game
DÁNICA COTO
dcoto@charlotteobserver.com

A South Carolina Gamecocks fan fatally shot a friend over a $20 bet on a weekend football game, authorities said.

James Walter Quick watched the South Carolina-Clemson game Saturday at his friend's house in Lexington, S.C., about 100 miles south of Charlotte. The Gamecocks came from behind and won, 31-28.

Quick celebrated.

But his friend, Clemson fan Richard Allen Johnson, said the Tigers shouldn't have lost and refused to pay, authorities said. So Quick left the house and retrieved a high-powered rifle from his Chevrolet Corsica.

"He went back in and told Richard, `I want my money or I'm going to shoot you,' " said Lexington County Sheriff James Metts, adding that both had been drinking beer.

Metts said Johnson's wife and several friends told police that Johnson then said: "You can't shoot me, I'm invisible."

And Quick replied, "No you're not."

Johnson, 43, was shot once in the chest, and deputies charged Quick, 42, with murder and possessing a firearm during the commission of a violent crime. He was leaning against his Corsica, with arms crossed, when police arrived, Metts said.

The men had gone deer hunting together the morning of the shooting, police said, and they were dressed in camouflage as they watched the game with friends.

Quick and Johnson met a couple years ago after their wives became good friends and soon they were inviting each other for cookouts and to watch games, Quick's mother and sister told the Observer.

"It's always been football and NASCAR," said Quick's sister, Ann Marie Quick.

Quick didn't attend USC but always supported the team, said Quick's mother, who declined to give her name.

"You just hear so much commotion about the Gamecocks," she said. "It's state loyalty."

Quick usually watched games on TV but sometimes went to the stadium, she said. He also enjoyed playing football with his children, ages 14 and 7, she added. What happened is "totally out of his nature," Anne Marie Quick said.

His friend, Johnson, left behind children and a wife, Lynn, who didn't return calls for comment.

Johnson was a laid-back man known for teaching children how to do things, said his next-door neighbor Martha Johnson, who is not related.

"My nephew was with him every day," she said. "He always talked about how Rick showed him how to skin 'coons and deer."

Adam Branhan, 16, said he met Johnson at the beginning of the summer, when Johnson let him swim in his pond and hunt on his property.

"He cared about me," Branhan said. "He was there when I needed him."