Friend walked in on a burglary.

[davsel]

I don't care which side of the argument you are on, if you are of the mindset that "because the law states THIS, then THIS is what will happen", you are wrong. There are way too many variables in self defense, and use of force scenarios to try and predict what will happen. Hell, I don't care if you are a 30 year veteran judge, unless you are a mind reader, you cannot predict the outcome of a court case.

With that said, if you have ever had any formal "use of force" instruction, you have likely heard the term "totality of circumstance". Your decisions in this particular scenario, are going to be based solely on the "totality of circumstances". If you are notified of a criminal entering your home, and you KNOW your child is at home with the babysitter, if you get home before the police are there, you are likely going to enter the home, and be completely justified in whatever actions are necessary.

Flip the script, you get notification while you are at the park with your wife and child, of a burglary in progress at your residence, you or ADT have notified the police, and they are on the way, but you beat them to the scene. What reason do you truly have, to enter the residence? Ultimately, the only reason you should ever use lethal force, or enter into a situation where you could potentially have to use lethal force, is to protect life or limb.

In the end it is up to you to determine if your property is worth having your life turned upside down over. For me unless my family is at risk, it is not worth it, i'll wait for the police. I wish we could live in a world where criminals are held accountable, however we don't, and the criminals are treated as the victims, so I will do whatever I have to do, to ensure I spend many more days with my family.

^^^^^THIS!

[JM Ver. 2.0]

I don't care which side of the argument you are on, if you are of the mindset that "because the law states THIS, then THIS is what will happen", you are wrong. There are way too many variables in self defense, and use of force scenarios to try and predict what will happen. Hell, I don't care if you are a 30 year veteran judge, unless you are a mind reader, you cannot predict the outcome of a court case.

With that said, if you have ever had any formal "use of force" instruction, you have likely heard the term "totality of circumstance". Your decisions in this particular scenario, are going to be based solely on the "totality of circumstances". If you are notified of a criminal entering your home, and you KNOW your child is at home with the babysitter, if you get home before the police are there, you are likely going to enter the home, and be completely justified in whatever actions are necessary.

Flip the script, you get notification while you are at the park with your wife and child, of a burglary in progress at your residence, you or ADT have notified the police, and they are on the way, but you beat them to the scene. What reason do you truly have, to enter the residence? Ultimately, the only reason you should ever use lethal force, or enter into a situation where you could potentially have to use lethal force, is to protect life or limb.

In the end it is up to you to determine if your property is worth having your life turned upside down over. For me unless my family is at risk, it is not worth it, i'll wait for the police. I wish we could live in a world where criminals are held accountable, however we don't, and the criminals are treated as the victims, so I will do whatever I have to do, to ensure I spend many more days with my family.

That's been my whole point...

[davsel]

Those two posts are what I'm talking about. You can't just walk in and shoot someone. You have to feel you're in danger.
Agree

If the two kids put their hands up and said, "we'll leave" and you shot them... Prison.
Maybe - if they live to testify against you

If they started to walk towards the door and you shot them... Prison.
Maybe - if they live to testify against you

If you shot them in the back... Prison.
Maybe - if they live to testify against you

Now, if they threatened you. Sure, shoot away if you want. But you're still going to be in a shit storm for going into the house knowing there could be someone inside.
Partially disagree. Yes, you will have issues to deal with whenever you shoot someone. However, just the fact I know someone was inside, I do not believe will have bearing on the case. I have a legal (and natural) right to defend my "castle." This is the part of your argument I do not understand.

[Ronin13]

Here's the deal guys.

I made statements regarding my opinion related to the OP and subsequent poster's remarks to the effect of "shoot them dead" and, in my humble opinion, the lack of justification for a clean shoot in this case. I also do believe that if you "provoke," and I do mean provoke, someone into using deadly force against you, while you may possibly be in the right to end that person under very unique and consequential circumstances, you're going to have a shitstorm on your hands. Many other statements are being attributed to me that are completely false and misleading. I'm not going to carry on the discussion with all the 12 year old name calling and false attributions.

It's obvious that we're unable to come to any sort of agreement to disagree on this topic and I really do have better things to do.

I don't care which side of the argument you are on, if you are of the mindset that "because the law states THIS, then THIS is what will happen", you are wrong. There are way too many variables in self defense, and use of force scenarios to try and predict what will happen. Hell, I don't care if you are a 30 year veteran judge, unless you are a mind reader, you cannot predict the outcome of a court case.

With that said, if you have ever had any formal "use of force" instruction, you have likely heard the term "totality of circumstance". Your decisions in this particular scenario, are going to be based solely on the "totality of circumstances". If you are notified of a criminal entering your home, and you KNOW your child is at home with the babysitter, if you get home before the police are there, you are likely going to enter the home, and be completely justified in whatever actions are necessary.

Flip the script, you get notification while you are at the park with your wife and child, of a burglary in progress at your residence, you or ADT have notified the police, and they are on the way, but you beat them to the scene. What reason do you truly have, to enter the residence? Ultimately, the only reason you should ever use lethal force, or enter into a situation where you could potentially have to use lethal force, is to protect life or limb.

In the end it is up to you to determine if your property is worth having your life turned upside down over. For me unless my family is at risk, it is not worth it, i'll wait for the police. I wish we could live in a world where criminals are held accountable, however we don't, and the criminals are treated as the victims, so I will do whatever I have to do, to ensure I spend many more days with my family.

Point of clarity for both of these statements:
1- Just entering YOUR residence is not grounds for "provocation" of the intruder. Can we not muddy the waters on that one.
2- Simply stated, some were claiming it was illegal to enter your own house if you know there are unlawful intruders *POSSIBLY* inside. ADT calling you to inform you that your alarm is going off is not 100% proof positive that a burglar is inside your home- technology malfunctions all the time. Enter the house at your own discretion. I personally wouldn't, in case they are still there, or I wouldn't want to disturb a crime scene if things were stolen. But again, scenario dependent and as we all know (or I hope we all know by now) every situation is different and there is no one size fits all way to approach it. But what I'm stating is that there is no law that says if there is reasonable suspicion that some criminal is inside your home you can't enter. That's just silly talk right there.

ETA: Davsel, your response is hilarious! Garr, dead men tell no tales!

[JM Ver. 2.0]

Davsel,

This is totally off the topic but it kind of applies. If you could lie to yourself, your family, the courts, and the family of the people you shot, when you say they "threatened you" then you've got some iron clad balls and a heart of rock solid ice... I couldn't live with myself knowing I lied about something just so I could shoot someone. If I'm going to shoot someone, there's going to be a damn good reason for it. And it's not going to be a technicality that allows me to do it.





My argument with the last part is this... bear with me..


Prosecution/Attorney for the guy you shot: Mr. D, why did you enter the home, knowing that entering the home could put you in danger, on the night in question? Why did you put yourself in danger? If you would have just waited for the police these two innocent children would still be alive today. These kids meant no harm to you. But you ran in and played hero, gunning down two unarmed innocent children!!!!!!!

How are you going to answer that and NOT sound like a raging lunatic to the jury?

[davsel]

Davsel,

This is totally off the topic but it kind of applies. If you could lie to yourself, your family, the courts, and the family of the people you shot, when you say they "threatened you" then you've got some iron clad balls and a heart of rock solid ice... I couldn't live with myself knowing I lied about something just so I could shoot someone. If I'm going to shoot someone, there's going to be a damn good reason for it. And it's not going to be a technicality that allows me to do it.





My argument with the last part is this... bear with me..


Prosecution/Attorney for the guy you shot: Mr. D, why did you enter the home, knowing that entering the home could put you in danger, on the night in question? Why did you put yourself in danger? If you would have just waited for the police these two innocent children would still be alive today. These kids meant no harm to you. But you ran in and played hero, gunning down two unarmed innocent children!!!!!!!

How are you going to answer that and NOT sound like a raging lunatic to the jury?

The previous post was meant to be "tongue-in-cheek." I hope to never take another life unless I have a damn good reason. Even then, I expect it will possibly haunt me till the day I die.

As for answering the prosecutor, "why did you enter the home, knowing that entering the home could put you in danger" I'd have to remind him that I am not a pussy, and take it from there.

[Ronin13]

Prosecution/Attorney for the guy you shot: Mr. D, why did you enter the home, knowing that entering the home could put you in danger, on the night in question? Why did you put yourself in danger? If you would have just waited for the police these two innocent children would still be alive today. These kids meant no harm to you. But you ran in and played hero, gunning down two unarmed innocent children!!!!!!!

How are you going to answer that and NOT sound like a raging lunatic to the jury?

Your attorney- if he was any good- would have said "Objection- the individuals inside the home were not innocent, they were breaking and entering and in the process of a burglary, and leading the witness, we can't know if they meant him no harm or not."

[Chad4000]

why so much empathy for the fuckheads who broke into the guys house??? regardless of any of this nonsense, those kids got lucky. sounds like there are enough of us out there who, when there is an intruder in the house, our default could include violence, (justified or not) that these kids got flat out lucky.. even luckier that they dont even have to deal with charges. why thats still something that can be opted out of is beyond me.

I have touched on this thought before, but guys, when the people dont stand up, we are fucked... that includes the day and age of the "lawyer".... we need to take control of our society....

[PugnacAutMortem]

Prosecution/Attorney for the guy you shot: Mr. D, why did you enter the home, knowing that entering the home could put you in danger, on the night in question? Why did you put yourself in danger? If you would have just waited for the police these two innocent children would still be alive today. These kids meant no harm to you. But you ran in and played hero, gunning down two unarmed innocent children!!!!!!!

These "children" are not "innocent" and I couldn't possibly have known that they "meant no harm" to me.

That's if you could even get far enough to open your mouth before your lawyer objected to the question (I assume anyways).

I think "barracks lawyer" should be your new title.

Edit: Damn it...wasn't fast enough. Good work Ronin.

[JM Ver. 2.0]

The previous post was meant to be "tongue-in-cheek." I hope to never take another life unless I have a damn good reason. Even then, I expect it will possibly haunt me till the day I die.

As for answering the prosecutor, "why did you enter the home, knowing that entering the home could put you in danger" I'd have to remind him that I am not a pussy, and take it from there.

Fair enough.

Your attorney- if he was any good- would have said "Objection- the individuals inside the home were not innocent, they were breaking and entering and in the process of a burglary, and leading the witness, we can't know if they meant him no harm or not."

By that time the damage is done. Even if they tell the jury to ignore the statement, they can't unhear what they just heard.

But either way, I still want to know what your answer would be.

why so much empathy for the fuckheads who broke into the guys house??? regardless of any of this nonsense, those kids got lucky. sounds like there are enough of us out there who, when there is an intruder in the house, our default could include violence, (justified or not) that these kids got flat out lucky.. even luckier that they dont even have to deal with charges. why thats still something that can be opted out of is beyond me.

I have touched on this thought before, but guys, when the people dont stand up, we are fucked... that includes the day and age of the "lawyer".... we need to take control of our society....

No empathy. The "empathy" I think you're talking about isn't my view.

The kids deserved charges at the least, and a good solid parental ass whooping would be more than justified. But death? That's a bit much.

In order for there to be a crime there has to be a victim... Whether it be society or another person.

Since society can't be the victim of burglary in this case there's only one option left... When that person declines to be the victim... There's no longer a crime.