Two years later ...

Third in a three-part series.

For Adam Johnson, life is being rebuilt piece by piece.

Two years is a blink of an eye, the 27-year-old says, but each day he's putting one piece on top of another.

"My eyes have definitely been opened," said Johnson, sitting at a coffee shop recently in Coeur d'Alene. "Before I was young, successful, running a business. You kind of get some blinders on."

Even after attempted murder and aggravated battery charges were dropped against him in January 2010 after a sealed grand jury found the shooting was in self defense, Johnson had questions of his own.

If the shooting was ruled self defense, where were new charges against the aggressors?

He was beaten so badly that around one year after the incident, doctors discovered he had several broken C7 and T1 vertebrae in his neck. And there were reports - which the Moses Lake visitors deny - that the visitors were kicked out of the Torch Lounge moments before the encounter.

"Do they not turn around and say somebody is responsible for this?" Johnson asked.

He had been angry too. Not for revenge, but from the stress the traumatic experience caused. For months, Johnson kept his distance from people. It was unusual behavior for the former volunteer and Post Falls Chamber of Commerce and Rotary Club member, who "fueled" off social interaction.

"I think that I kind of tumbled downward," he said. "It was kind of tough to get out of that shell and get back."

It was also the beginning of Johnson's "hyper-vigilant" stage.

After Johnson was released from jail in January 2010, he saw the posts on Brandon Burgess's Facebook page.

"Eye for an eye," one read.

"It's not so much a fear," Johnson said, "but it's something you're aware of."

He locked all the windows and doors, even in the middle of the day when roommates were home. He kept a shotgun in his bedroom, where he stayed for long periods.

Katie Ziegler, a roommate of Johnson's at the time, remembers Johnson even asking her to lock the sliding glass door as Ziegler was waiting for her black lab to come back inside after letting the dog out to go to the bathroom.

"I felt sorry for him," Ziegler said.

LOOKING FOR A FIGHT

But the real threats didn't come from Moses Lake.

Few people other than those involved witnessed the altercation on Sherman Avenue.

Those involved point to the other as the aggressor, and Johnson maintains he thought he was defending his life.

Around half a dozen shots were fired. After one hit Brandon Burgess in the stomach and Burgess's friend Bradley Phillips in the knee, the Painted Chair gallery doorway, a tire on a parked car on the south side of Sherman Avenue and the window of Tito Macaroni's restaurant, around 200 people spilled from the bars onto the street, according to police reports. Phillips was treated and released at Kootenai Health.

"The crowd was angry at Johnson and I was having a difficult time controlling them and keeping them back," one officer stated in a police report.

After Johnson was released from jail in early 2010, a pair of men followed a third roommate of Johnson's from a bar to Johnson's home after they learned Johnson lived with the roommate.

They were angry Johnson's charges had been dropped, so they barged into the Post Falls duplex off Coeur d'Alene Avenue and called from the bottom of the stairs up to Johnson, in his room sleeping, to come downstairs and fight.

"Come down," they taunted.

"I'm not coming down," Johnson yelled back. He called Ziegler for help. She heard the commotion over the phone, but the men finally fled after Johnson cocked his shotgun at the top of the stairs. He looked out his bedroom window and saw figures running down the dark street.

He never saw their faces.

TRYING TO LOOK AHEAD

Today, "999 out of 1,000" of Johnson's encounters are friendly, he said.

Still, he'll hear an occasional comment when he's out, and once in a while someone wants to fight him, but it's not typical.

"The ears burning thing," he called it. "I notice that."

He knows the incident is still a polarizing topic in Coeur d'Alene, and he has heard some of the rumors around town on why the charges were dismissed, but he dismisses those just as quickly.

He wants to look ahead, too.

"I believe everything happens for a reason. It's part of a greater plan, a greater purpose," he said. "I don't know exactly what that is. The bright 'ah ha' moment hasn't happened yet."

He thought of leaving town after the high profile incident, but figured leaving wouldn't change anything.

He wants to rebuild his life here, perhaps in local politics, a law student or a businessman again. How the population engages in local issues is even one of the reasons he enjoys Coeur d'Alene, even if he happens to be one of the hot topics.

"I'm trying to restore that," he said. "Restore the faith in some who may have lost it in me."

NO ROOM FOR ANGER

The telecommunications business Johnson helped form in 2004, Convertec Corp., closed in the spring of 2011.

It wasn't because of a loss of clientele from the shooting - though Johnson recognizes some people could have opted out of doing business because of that - but because the business had been hacked into and accounts drained, he said.

He reported the crime to the FBI cyber crime division and he has been picking up contract work as he moves forward.

In the two years that have elapsed since the shooting, Johnson would also be sentenced to 10 days in jail for consuming alcohol while carrying a weapon. He pleaded guilty for drug possession after being arrested in a Post Falls home with heroin in April. For that he was sentenced to two years probation.

Johnson pointed to a toxicology report that indicates he tested negative for the drug. He said he was in the wrong place, at the wrong time. But the arrest is also a chance to take ownership on that part of his life, he said.

He was in a lot of pain after the beating, and never learned how to cope.

That should change.

"I never sought professional treatment or counseling from a psychiatrist," he said. "I never saw anybody professionally. Maybe (the drug arrest) can be a catalyst to that. I kind of see this as 'I can turn this into a positive or not.'"

What Johnson doesn't want is anger.

On either side.

He doesn't believe either side will see, or comprehend really, what the other is feeling, but he said he harbors no ill will.

"I wish this had never happened to either of us," he said. "I think in the immediate turn it hasn't done anything good in either of our lives."

BY THE NUMBERS

After the shooting, the city of Coeur d'Alene implemented a number of rule changes geared toward improving behavior downtown.

The city had heard complaints about downtown's night time reputation leading up to the beating and shooting, but the shots were the catalyst.

"I do think it heightened awareness," said Mike Kennedy, city councilman. "It brought people to the table with a sense of urgency that was needed.

Officials said the crackdown is working. Some of the numbers spell that out.

On summer weekends in 2011, the number of police calls downtown for violent crimes such as assaults, batteries, and malicious injuries were down compared to the same summer weekends in 2010 - the first summer the rule changes were put on the books - and 2009.

Looking at police district 81, which is west of Seventh Street and south of Harrison primarily, police received 37 battery reports in 2011 weekends, compared to 43 in 2009.

And in 2009, there were 30 malicious injury reports, compared to 23 last summer.

"That's absolutely the goal," said Sgt. Christie Wood, police spokesperson. "That everyone can come downtown and feel safe."

Driving under the influence of alcohol infractions have dropped as well, from around 60 in 2009 and 2010 to 47 in 2011. So too have reports of unconscious people - people who pass out in public, drunk. Those were down to 16 from 23 the year before and 19 in 2009.

ALCOHOL CALLS UP

But alcohol infractions and disorderly reports were up in 2011.

More than 200 alcohol calls came last summer, up from 122 the year before. There were 174 disorderly calls, which dwarfs the 66 in 2010 and even the 116 in 2009.

Sherman Avenue, the downtown's thoroughfare, typically boasts three of Idaho's top 10 bars that purchase alcohol from the state, an indicator of how much alcohol is dispensed year round.

Wood attributes the rising alcohol infractions to adding full time officers to patrol the downtown on foot, and better communication between bar owners and officers, who meet quarterly now.

Previously, the area had been patrolled by part-time bicycle officers, generally less experienced than their full-time counterparts. After the shooting, the Underground bar and Baja Bargarita, another downtown establishment, began using metal detectors on patrons. Neither still do.

"It seems like it's cooled down," said J.R. Briseno, manager of Baja Bargarita. "It seems like it's gotten better."

Neither Brandon Burgess nor Adam Johnson set out to change downtown.

"I don't know, maybe some good can come out of it," Burgess said. "Maybe it takes something really bad like this."

Some changes haven't worked, and officials said they'll continue to tweak and monitor the downtown.

Cutting the outdoor drinking curfew back an hour didn't work, and the hour was later reinstated. Nor do designated taxi stands seem to be improving preventing congesting bar fronts, they said. That rule could come off the books, while new ones could be added, like increasing patrols at the 2 a.m. hour, or adding more lighting along the streets, they said.