20 years ago: Ex KISS guitarist BRUCE KULICK is shot in Hollywood, CA

Published October 16 2023 at 15:45

20 years ago this weekend:

On October 15th 2003, Bruce Kulick attended a concert by MÖTLEY CRÜE vocalist Vince Neil at the Key Club on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, and left the with a friend at 1:30 a.m. As he walked down the Strip, he heard gunshots. He looked down to see a hole through his leather pants, right above the knee. Next thing he noticed, blood was oozing down his leg.

Kulick heard a second bullet whiz past his ear and realized he'd just been grazed in his head by it. One other person was shot in the foot.

The EMS crews arrived immediately and took him to the hospital.

"I'm very grateful for the immediate response of both the crowd and the doctors, and - obviously - the EMS crews," Bruce said the day after the shooting. "I'm fine and very thankful to be alive."

At the time, MTV reported that the 21-year-old gunman was tackled by a club patron and then beaten up by several members of the crowd before the police arrived on the scene. The gunman had reportedly been arguing with several other patrons and began shooting into a crowd of 300 people.

In 2005 the gunman who shot Kulick was sentenced to 10 years in prison in connection with the incident. "Justice is slow, but I know a lot of my fans were curious to hear what happened," Bruce wrote on his website back then.

Here's a video from 2016 of Bruce Kulick talking about the incident: