One Teen Killed, Another Wounded in Home Invasion (TX)

KTBS ^ | June 19, 2006 | Staff

[DaveLoneRanger]

A 15-year-old boy was killed and a 14-year-old was seriously wounded today when a homeowner shot them while defending himself from a home invasion, Longview, Texas, police said.

No charges were immediately filed against the homeowner. Police this afternoon said they were still investigating.

The homeowner told police he was asleep about 3:30 a.m. when he heard the sound of glass breaking. He got a gun and found several people in the living room.

Police said the homeowner told them one of the intruders was holding something he thought was a gun, so he opened fire.

Trenton Joseph Houghton, 15, of Hallsville was found in woods behind the Camille Street house. He was pronounced dead at Longview Regional Medical Center.

The 14-year-old, whose name was not released because he is a juvenile, was found at a house in Longview after police got calls that a wounded boy was there. He was listed in fair condition this afternoon in the intensive care unit at Good Shepherd Medical Center in Longview.

The homeowner kept a third youth, 17-year-old Gregory Allison, at the house until officers arrived, police said.

[Xenalyte]

In Texas, the use of deadly force to stop a home invasion is pre-approved.

[DaveLoneRanger]

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---

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[ichabod1]

I suppose you realize that the headline is totally misleading.

[AK2KX]

Displaced from NO by Katrina?

[DaveLoneRanger]

I don't see how you mean, but FR mods like us to use the actual title of the story from the news source.

[Vaquero]

Badda Bing!

Nice shootin' Tex.

[Jeff Head]

Don't break into a private residence...ever...and p[articularly not at 3 AM. Your life is forfeit if you do...and should be.

If the incident occurred as reported, then the homeonwer was well within his rights and I applaud him for understanding and applying his second amendment rights to a situation that could have been dealy to he and his family.

[wvobiwan]

Excellent work. Anyone who's been the victim of a home robbery has dreams about catching the scum in the act, there's no worse violation short of rape and murder.

[AdvisorB]

Trenton, you done broke into the wrong house.

[digger48]

Not your fault for the misleading headline.

These were burglars, not "teens"

[freedom4me]

Don't mess with Texas.

[xrp]

Whoa, you beat the PING by 2 seconds.

[VRWCmember]

I suppose you realize that the headline is totally misleading.

I don't see how you mean, but FR mods like us to use the actual title of the story from the news source.

I agree that the title is misleading in that from reading the headline you would think the teens were residents of the home being invaded. The local news station website SHOULD have titled the article: "One Home Invader Killed, Another Wounded, and One Arrested in Burglary Attempt". Of course you were correct to use the original title of the story even though the "media" did such a bad job in writing the headline.

[gridlock]

I love headlines like this.

[GrandEagle]

The Headline: One Teen Killed, Another Wounded in Home Invasion (TX)

Your Comment: "I suppose you realize that the headline is totally misleading"

Very first line of post:
A 15-year-old boy was killed and a 14-year-old was seriously wounded today when a homeowner shot them while defending himself from a home invasion, Longview, Texas, police said.

Seems pretty straight forward to me, care to expound?

[maine-iac7]

The homeowner told police he was asleep about 3:30 a.m. when he heard the sound of glass breaking. He got a gun and found several people in the living room.

Any bets who would have been dead had the gun laws the libs want were in place?

[GrandEagle]

I love headlines like this.
I love a story with a happy ending....

[weegee]

Headline is wrong.

"Juvenille offender stopped dead in his tracks."

[BenLurkin]

You'd never know that these punks were the perpetrators from the title of the article.

[weegee]

The media likes to include this type of statistic in talking about the number of children killed by guns every year.

[Dustbunny]

Thank GOD and the Constitution for our right to defend and protect ourselves.

[weegee]

I know a teen who was wounded in a home invasion case in Texas. Only thing was he and his family had come home to find that their house was "invaded" and had his skull cracked with a lead pipe by the crook.

While "factually" correct, the headline is misleading. No mention (in the headline) as to whether anyone who BELONGED in the home was injured. The media is lying by ommission.

[NRA1995]

If you're in my home uninvited, you've surrendered any "rights" you THINK you have under the Constitution.....

[BlueNgold]

Believe it or not, such a provision is also found in California.

California Penal Code Section 197:
197. Homicide is also justifiable when committed by any person in any of the following cases:

1. When resisting any attempt to murder any person, or to commit a felony, or to do some great bodily injury upon any person; or,

2. When committed in defense of habitation, property, or person, against one who manifestly intends or endeavors, by violence or surprise, to commit a felony, or against one who manifestly intends and endeavors, in a violent, riotous or tumultuous manner, to enter the habitation of another for the purpose of offering violence to any person therein; or,

3. When committed in the lawful defense of such person, or of a wife or husband, parent, child, master, mistress, or servant of such person, when there is reasonable ground to apprehend a design to commit a felony or to do some great bodily injury, and imminent danger of such design being accomplished; but such person, or the person in whose behalf the defense was made, if he was the assailant or engaged in mutual combat, must really and in good faith have endeavored to decline any further struggle before the homicide was committed; or,

4. When necessarily committed in attempting, by lawful ways and means, to apprehend any person for any felony committed, or in lawfully suppressing any riot, or in lawfully keeping and preserving the peace.

Just thought you might want to know...

[Dead Corpse]

Sounds like a good shoot to me. Guy showed restraint in not plugging the third little criminal IMO.

[ichabod1]

It sounds like they were the victims of the home invasion, not the perpetrators.

[ichabod1]

I understand why you used the headline -- not criticizing you, I'm criticizing the drive-by media who makes this about the perps, not the victims.

[MarkL]

The homeowner needs to file a civil lawsuit against the families of these criminals for emotional distress, pain, suffering, the cost of the shattered window and the shotgun shells.

Mark

[Onelifetogive]

I suppose you realize that the headline is totally misleading.

Aren't they all?

[GrandEagle]

I see your point.
Seems a bit nitpicky to me, but I'll go with it.

Cordially,
GE

[weegee]

Here was another headline today that generated negative responses...

Al-Zarqawi's successor gets the credit

[martinidon]

Get ready the teens "single" parent will be filling a lawsuit against the homeowner for excessive use of force on her son who was just being a kid........

[i_dont_chat]

I'd like this headline better:

One home-invader killed; another wounded (TX)

[IDontLikeToPayTaxes]

In Texas, the use of deadly force to stop a home invasion is pre-approved.

I thought that in Texas that it is also legal to fire at somebody if they are simply on your property, not even in your house. Anybody know if that is true?

[martinidon]

"The homeowner needs to file a civil lawsuit against the families of these criminals for emotional distress, pain, suffering, the cost of the shattered window and the shotgun shells."

Post of the day!

[hellinahandcart]

Oh come on:

A 15-year-old boy was killed and a 14-year-old was seriously wounded today when a homeowner shot them while defending himself from a home invasion

From the above sentence, it isn't even made clear that the little beasts were shot inside the homeowner's house after breaking into it. Maybe they were asleep in the next house over, in their bunny rabbit jammies, and were hit by stray bullets by that bad GUNowner defending his house from invasion.

Whoever wrote this has gone to a lot of trouble to evoke sympathy for the budding criminals who were shot, instead of the homeowner, who didn't ask to be put in that situation.

[GrandEagle]

Your point is well taken. Their choice of "credit" is very telling don't you think?

Cordially,
GE

[GrandEagle]

Oh come on:
LOL!! ALRIGHT!!!!
I CONCEED!

When I read the headline the picture in my mind was exactly what happened. But then I am a suspicious person.

Cordially,
GE

[GrandEagle]

( Mumbling under breath as I walk off )
Still seems nitpicky to me.

Just had to do it - sounds just like my children sometimes...

Cordially,
GE

[cbkaty]

I thought that in Texas that it is also legal to fire at somebody if they are simply on your property, not even in your house. Anybody know if that is true?

IN Texas it is a "defense to prosecution" to use deadly force to stop malicious mischief "at night".... A defense to prosecution means you will need a lawyer.....

This law has it's origins in the cattle rustling days....

Most Texans are not in the habit of shooting unless life in threatened....

[Joe Boucher]

Don't getuptight about b.s. criticism, GOOD POST, good job.
Thanks

[newgeezer]

Seems pretty straight forward to me, care to expound?

I'm with you on this one.

A home was invaded. Teens were killed and wounded. As I read the headline, those are the facts. I want to read more. The headline worked.

To say the headline is "misleading" is, at best, a stretch. At worst, it stinks of an attempt to blame another for one's own unsupportable jump to a false conclusion.

[stinkerpot65]

In Texas, you can use lethal force to defend your property as well. A few years back, a Dallas man shot and killed two men who were stealing his hubcaps. (In a bit of racial irony, the thiefs were white and the hero black.)

On the local news, a white-trash wife of one of the thieves, tearily exclaimed, "It was only property!".

Dallas grand jury refused to indict. Heh-heh. Love it.

[GrandEagle]

I'm with you on this one.
Thanks, I was beginning to doubt myself :)

GE

[PeteB570]

Plus the first three sentences.

[Xenalyte]

Stories like that just warm my heart! ;)

[hellinahandcart]

Sorry, Big Bird. Didn't mean to seem like I was piling on. I posted before reading the whole thread (and seeing where you already acknowledged that we were right. :D)

[GrandEagle]

Sorry, Big Bird. ...
No problem my FRiend, I've got pretty thick skin. :)

Cordially,
GE

[TLOne]

Did the youths have a gun or other weapon?
It seems that this fact is missing from the story.

If it is known that the yoots had a weapon then that is a major omission by the reporter. Not having a weapon does not excuse the goons from getting shot.