Posted on 09/11/2009 4:50:07 AM PDT by Red in Blue PA
LITHONIA, Ga. (MyFOX ATLANTA) - A Lithonia homeowner who shot a man who allegedly tried to burglarize his home will face charges. The shooting happened Thursday morning on Gadwall Circle in Lithonia. Police said it appeared that the suspect was outside of the house.
"It came in through here went through the garage, hit the electrical panel, went through the bathroom and lodged in the wall," said Eric Thomas of the bullet that hit his home after a neighbor shot at an alleged intruder.
The shooting happened Thursday morning when police said the burglar entered a house located a couple of doors down from where Thomas lives.
Police said the unidentified homeowner interrupted the burglar and apparently shot him as he fled.
DeKalb County police said the homeowner who shot the suspect was charged with aggravated assault because the shots were fired outside of the home.
Investigators said the homeowner was taken to jail.
(Excerpt) Read more at myfoxatlanta.com ...
And maybe that is the lesson. Swear you shot him in the house and he ran outside and went down. Blame it on a lower caliber or something.
I’m an advocate of an “Open Season Doctrine” similar to the “Castle Doctrine” but which would apply out side of the home. Pull a gun and openly threaten peoples lives, and it is now open season on you, and no charges can be brought against anyone who may kill you. Period.
This would bring down the crime rate immensely, and IMO is common sense (not to mention the moral thing to do).
(admittedly, that would not apply in this case, as I do not believe the burglar was armed......but nevertheless, I always side with law abiding citizens over perps unless the case is so egregious it warrants otherwise)
Lessons:
- Keep your firearms safe but accessable
- Practice “point shooting”
(you don’t need ammo to practice raising your weapon into position and “then” check your sight view, repeat and adjust as necessary)
- drag the bastard back inside if you need to
I disagree a little.
A jury, who does not have intimate knowledge of a criminal act, hears testimony from others who do have intimate knowledge.("I saw the suspect running away", for instance).They use that information to arrive at a decision.
The homeowner, though, witnesses the crime and is intimately aware of the nature of it. He does not need the testimony of others. You might even consider him an expert. Thus, when he shoots the fleeing perp he KNOWS the perp is guilty beyond a doubt.
Thus, I cut the homeowner some slack.
OK, I stand corrected, but I’ll bet the homeowner who won that case in Florida was fighting an aspect of state law.
Two other considerations:
First, are you willing to shoot a fleeing intruder and risk spending the next 20 years in jail based upon his not-so-immediate presence.
Second, even if you win the case in court, are you willing to lay out the big bucks for your legal defense?
This is an excellent post, not written by me, but which I keep handy. It pretty much sums up my thinking and addresses some of the points you raise:
I’ve read through the thread here, and I have seen some things with which I agree, and some I don’t. The one sure thing that has been written here is that no plan survives first contact. It will always be different than you envisioned it to be.
To those who have written that it is not worth shooting someone over $25.00, I ask you this. At what level of money in your pocket is it worth shooting somebody? $100? $500? Do you carry more than $500 in your pocket? Next question for you. How do you know that the bad guy is going to stop bothering you once you give him money? Perhaps you just emboldened him to take more of whatever you have. Maybe he thinks you didn’t really give him all your money. Maybe he wants your watch and your jewelery too. Maybe he will want you to perform an unnatural sex act on him. I’m sure that will draw some snickers, especially coming from me, but I remember years ago when I read in the paper about a guy being carjacked and forced to go down on his carjacker. How far are you going to go so as not to have to shoot him?
Here is my point of view. It is not about how much money I have. It is about someone invading my space and trying to take what I have by force or threat of force. I give a lot of money, time, and other possessions to people freely, but I will not let someone take it. It is that simple. And I am not talking about some drunken stumblebum begging a few bucks so he can buy his next bottle of Thunderbird. Those requests usually come in the form of asking for money to buy food. I have bought food for people like that in the past. But that takes being able to read a person, and even then there is the chance that someone may be playing you for a fool to get close to you. You always need to keep your guard up and be ready for anything.
But the guy who comes to take what I have by force or intimidation? No. He isn’t getting anything but the bum’s rush, and if he gets nasty, he is going to be met with violent hostility. I will be in fear for my life, you can be guaranteed of that. There was a comment made about the worth of a human life, or something to that effect in the early part of this thread. If someone is going to have so little regard for his own life that he will attack strangers (and this is an attack), then why am I responsible to see that he is not hurt? The answer is, I am not. He is engaging in a risky business, and so he is the one who bears both the risk and the responsibility for the consequences to his person.
And pulling your gun does not mean you have to shoot someone with it. I know. I have been there. Twice. It is an amazing thing to look at someone whose attitude has just been radically adjusted with the knowledge that you now have a gun in your hand and appear to be ready to use it. If that doesn’t scare them into retreating, then you are genuinely in danger of your life, since they obviously have no regard for their own.
In the end, it is all about me. I very rarely say that, but if I am in a confrontation with someone who is intent of relieving me of my worldly possessions, I have a judgement to make. I am a steward of the things God has given me. I have the responsibility to determine how best to use those things. Giving them to someone truly in need is one thing, but again, someone who tries to take them by force is going to go home very unhappy, if indeed he ever makes it home again. Rich has pointed out, and rightly so, that there may be an accomplice. Situational awareness is very important, and you need to be paying attention to what is going on around you. I also happen to think that open carry is a huge deterrent to these kinds of things. People who pull this stuff aren’t looking for a fight, they are looking for an easy score. My gun visibly displayed on my hip tells the world that I am armed, and that I probably know how to use that arm, and that I am not afraid to use it. Really, who wants to mess with someone like that? I know I don’t.
Oh yeah, I forgot to mention escalation. I will escalate someone right off the planet if that is what it takes to go home alive and safe. I am not going to be standing there worrying about what some DA or some judge is going to say about what I did. I am going to be concentrating on surviving. All the rest of that stuff can be sorted out later. It really wears me out to see people worrying about escalation. You only need to worry about escalating a situation if you started it, at least in my not so humble opinion. If and when someone confronts me, I am going to respond in such a way as to demonstrate that I am capable of escalating things to the point of his demise in order to protect myself and my family. But the big key here is not to get into situations where it might look like you started something. And the easiest way to do that is, don’t start stuff!
http://forum.pafoa.org/concealed-carry-145/42115-when-draw-page-3.html
Interesting post with some valuable information but it does not adddress the matter of shooting someone in the back.
And that last paragraph about escalation contains dangerous information. I once had a district attorney explain that even though you may not start something, if any point you escalate it you lose all your self-defense rights. This blustering of sorting things out later could result in jail time, heavy fine, and of coure, those legal fees.
Interesting post with some valuable information but it does not adddress the matter of shooting someone in the back.
And that last paragraph about escalation contains dangerous information. I once had a district attorney explain that even though you may not start something, if any point you escalate it you lose all your self-defense rights. This blustering of sorting things out later could result in jail time, heavy fine, and of coure, those legal fees.
Sorry for the double post. I point the finger at the guilty computer.
Forgot to add: the law does not (and cannot) acknowledge all of these MILLIONS of possibilites, so the “law” as it is, is usually an insufficient arbiter in things such as this.
There was a recent pice on television about how many walls different calibers went through. For many of them, it was 7 or 8 walls, so your advice would in fact preclude the use of firearms within the home.
I draw no distinction between the two. The same backstop rules apply whether you fire from inside or outside the home.
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