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Report: Slain LI Equestrian Had Been Harassed By Former Tenant In Recent Months

SETAUKET, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) - Suffolk County homicide detectives continue to follow leads days after a noted equestrian was fatally shot through the window of his Setauket home.

As WCBS 880 Long Island Bureau Chief Mike Xirinachs reported, authorities are looking into reports that Ross Reisner was being harassed by text message and had received a dead bird in a box delivered to his home anonymously, Newsday reported.

Report: Slain LI Equestrian Had Been Harassed By Former Tenant In Recent Months

The ominous gift showed up four months ago, at about the same time Resiner's domestic partner was filing a harassment complaint against a former tenant who rented a basement apartment in their home.

Police would like to question that tenant identified as Brett Knight of Manhattan, Xirinachs reported.

Reisner, 50, was shot in the chest around 8:45 p.m. Tuesday at his home on Upper Sheep Pasture Road in Setauket, police said. He was taken to Stony Brook University Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

Reisner's partner suffered a graze wound to the arm in the shooting.

"These victims appear to have been targeted," Suffolk County police Detective Lt. Jack Fitzpatrick said earlier in the week. "The gunfire did not come through the front windows of the home, but the shooter clearly stood in the yard and fired through one of the windows from the yard."

Reisner was a professional horse trainer as well as a rider. He appeared for decades at the Hampton Classic Horse Show.

"Ross was a real fixture here at the Hampton Classic - a big figure in the Long Island horse community," said Shanette Cohen of the horse show. "And it is a real tragedy and a loss, and it is very sad for the entire equestrian community."

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