On October 16, 1981, Roger Hatfield, 34, was one of five men killed in a mass shooting at the Mountain Auto-Truck Parts Store in Allen, Kentucky. The shooter was 70-year-old William O. Bevins, a retired coal miner who entered the store with an automatic rifle, killed five men and wounded three others.

Accounts say the attack was driven by a personal dispute involving another victim, Roger Click, and that Bevins had planned the assault with the apparent aim of eliminating witnesses who could identify him. Bevins was arrested at his home, calmly sitting on his porch. He first pleaded not guilty at trial but changed his plea to guilty after the first witness testified and was sentenced to death for the murders of Hatfield, Michael Halpert, Jarvey Hamilton, Rufus Hamilton, and Roger Click.