George Doughty a 48-year-old from Lafayette, Colorado, was working in an office when he walked next door into the bar he owned and announced to patrons that he was going to shoot his laptop computer, local newspapers said.

Mr Doughty then reportedly warned customers to cover their ears, before shooting the laptop four times.

He later hung the hapless computer on his bar wall in the style of a hunting trophy, police said.

Local police said that the only similar case they had seen before involved a computer shot with a rifle by a man whose wife had claimed it in a divorce settlement.

"It's sort of funny, because everybody always threatens their computers," police officer from the Lafayette police department Rick Bashor told local newspapers.

"[But] it's the first time someone shot a computer because he was upset with it."

Police added that because Mr Doughty put customers and the bartender in danger, he was arrested on suspicion of felony menacing, reckless endangerment and prohibited use of weapons, before being released to appear in court on a later date.

Mr Doughty admitted in police reports that he should not have shot his laptop, but said that at the time it had seemed appropriate.