The first doctor who treated the Cheney gunshot victim wanted to send him home:

According to the afternoon daily, located about 60 miles from the shooting site, the first doctor to treat Whittington immediately after the Saturday shooting contended that his wounds were superficial and not in need of further hospitalization.

“If it were just a normal citizen, he would have sent him home with antibiotics,” said Ofelia Hunter, Echo-News Journal editor, who talked to the doctor. “He felt that it was more royal treatment that he was getting.”

Hunter’s comments referred to Dr. Raj Subnani, who treated Whittington at the Christus Spohn Hospital in Kingsville where he was first taken before being transferred to the Christus Spohn Hospital Memorial in Corpus Christi, where he remains.

Hunter, who plans to run a story about Subnani this afternoon, said she interviewed the doctor Monday. The editor, who is one of three newsroom staffers at the paper, indicated that the doctor was not in favor of transferring Whittington because he did not believe he required further hospitalization.

“He felt he was transferred because of his prominence, and that he was already stable,” Hunter said. “It was more because of who he was.” That is in marked contrast to reports in most major newspapers that Whittington required intensive care treatment, was hit with more than 100 pellets, and that some of the wounds were so severe the pellets could not be removed.