HOUSTON — From his perch in hide-outs above battle-scarred Iraq, Chris Kyle earned a reputation as one of America’s deadliest military snipers. The Pentagon said his skills with a rifle so terrorized Iraqi insurgents during his four tours of duty that they nicknamed him the “Devil of Ramadi” and put a bounty on his head. 
 
 The insurgents never collected, and he returned home to become a best-selling author and a mentor to other veterans, sometimes taking them shooting at a gun range near his Texas home as a kind of therapy to salve battlefield scars, friends said. One such veteran was Eddie Ray Routh, a 25-year-old Marine who had served tours in Iraq and Haiti. 
 
 But on Saturday, far from a war zone, Mr. Routh turned on Mr. Kyle, 38, and a second man, Chad Littlefield, 35, shortly after they arrived at an exclusive shooting range near Glen Rose, Tex., about 50 miles southwest of Fort Worth, law enforcement authorities said Sunday. The officials said that for reasons that were still unclear, Mr. Routh shot and killed both men with a semiautomatic handgun before fleeing in a pickup truck belonging to Mr. Kyle. 
 
 “Chad and Chris had taken a veteran out to shoot to try to help him,” said Travis Cox, a friend of Mr. Kyle’s. “And they were killed.” ||||| Former Navy Seals Sniper Chris Kyle, is pictured in this handout photo from Harper Collins. Kyle, the former U.S. Navy SEAL sniper who was responsible for 160 kills during his career as U.S. Navy SEAL sniper, was shot and killed with another man at a gun range on February 2,... 
 
 The cover of American Sniper, written by Navy Seals Sniper Chris Kyle, is pictured in this handout photo from Harper Collins. Kyle, the former U.S. Navy SEAL sniper who was responsible for 160 kills during his career as U.S. Navy SEAL sniper, was shot and killed with another... 
 
 Eddie Ray Routh is pictured in this booking photo provided by the Erath County Sheriff’s Office. Routh is a suspect in the shooting and killing of former Navy SEAL Sniper Chris Kyle. 
 
 The man accused of gunning down former U.S. Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, a prominent military sniper, and a second man at a Texas shooting range has been arraigned on two counts of capital murder, the Texas Department of Public Safety said on Sunday. 
 
 Eddie Ray Routh, 25, was accused of killing Kyle, 38, and Chad Littlefield, 35, a neighbor of Kyle, on Saturday afternoon at the Rough Creek Lodge, about 50 miles southwest of Fort Worth, the department said. 
 
 "They were shot at close range," said department spokesman Sergeant Lonny Haschel said. 
 
 Kyle, considered one of America's deadliest snipers after killing 160 people during his career as U.S. Navy SEAL sniper, wrote the book "American Sniper" about his military service from 1999 to 2009. 
 
 Routh, described in local media reports as a former Marine who suffered from post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD), was arrested at his Lancaster, Texas home several hours after the shooting, having led police on a chase in his pickup truck. 
 
 "He was taken into custody after a brief pursuit," Haschel said. 
 
 According to a posting on a website run by members of the Special Operations Forces community, Kyle had been volunteering his time to help Marine Corps veterans suffering from PTSD and mentoring them. 
 
 "Part of this process involved taking these veterans to the range," said the posting on SOFREP.com. 
 
 WFAA-TV in Dallas-Fort Worth reported that the two men had taken Routh to the shooting range for the day to help him deal with his PTSD. 
 
 Routh was arraigned at the Lancaster municipal jail on Saturday on two counts of capital murder, a spokesman for the department of public safety said. The Erath County Sheriff's Office planned a news conference later on Sunday. 
 
 "It just comes as a shock and it's staggering to think that after all Chris has been through, that this is how he meets his end, because there are so many ways he could have been killed" in Iraq, Scott McEwen, who wrote the book with Kyle, told Reuters. 
 
 Kyle served four combat tours of duty in Iraq and elsewhere, and he won two Silver Stars and five Bronze Stars for bravery, according to his book. 
 
 After leaving the Navy, Kyle founded Craft International, a firm that provided combat and weapons training to military, police, corporate and civilian clients. 
 
 Kyle is the co-author of another book coming out in May titled "American Gun - A History of the U.S. in Ten Firearms." 
 
 In the wake of the slayings of 20 children and six adults at a school in Newtown, Connecticut in December, Kyle was interviewed in January about rising calls for curbing U.S. gun violence. He told the website guns.com he favored arming teachers who have been screened and trained and spoke against restrictions on gun owners. 
 
 (Reporting by Barbara Goldberg; Editing by Ellen Wulfhorst and Will Dunham)
– Chris Kyle's book calls him the US military's deadliest sniper—but is he the world's? Not according to a British report that credits a Royal Navy sharpshooter with tallying the most kills, the Sun reports via the Telegraph. Unnamed sources say the British corporal is still serving and has 173 confirmed kills, most of them during Britain's deployment in Helmut province in 2006 and 2007. He is said to have killed 90 enemies in a single day. Kyle, whose story is told in the film American Sniper, officially had 160 kills but guessed his true total was about 250. British armed forces refuse to name their guy for fear of revenge attacks. Meanwhile, the Hollywood Reporter says American Sniper banked a stunning $30.7 million this weekend, nearly breaking a Super Bowl-weekend record.