A St. Tammany Parish man says he is lucky to be alive after his cell phone blocked a bullet from slamming into his chest while he was riding on his lawnmower in his backyard Saturday.

R.J. Richard said he isn’t sure why he clipped his cell phone to the front of his overalls before cutting his grass on this occasion but he said that shortly after beginning his chores he felt something thump on his chest.

“All of a sudden, something hits me in the chest and I wasn’t thinking bullet,” he recalled. “I’m thinking, ‘how could something pop up from the lawnmower and hit me. That’s all I could think of.”

Richard said it felt like a punch in the chest.

“I had a sweatshirt on,” he said. “I stopped and I lifted up my sweatshirt and I took out the cell phone to check it to see if it was damaged and this bullet falls out.”

It was a .45 caliber bullet, and it hit his cell phone.  Investigators said the bullet was probably shot a quarter of a mile away or more, and was probably falling at the time it hit Richard. 

But they said, if not for the cell phone, Richard may not have survived. 

"To have such an impact at such a vital location and to be saved by your cell phone, I'm sure has given him time for pause, and to be thankful,” said Sheriff Jack Strain.

According to Strain, shooting guns in the area around Lee Road, is not unusual.

“We have no reason to believe that there was any type of criminal intent,” he said. “That this truly was just an incident where someone discharged his weapon, whether it was target practicing or hunting."

But Strain did caution that if you fire a weapon anywhere, you are criminally and civilly responsible for where the bullet comes down.

Richard’s wife Mindy said the shooting has impacted their lives.

"You just appreciate everything so much more, and how fragile life really is. (If not for the cell phone) he would not be with us."