And now he has to deal with the possibility of a murder charge which, yes, they're discussing.
Man shoots and kills intruder. Police determine she was not pregnant.
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I don't care that she was lying. She was still fleeing. This is murder. I feel sorry for the old man, but I wouldn't be happy if he got less than manslaughter (though he should get worse).
If it happened immediately after they assaulted him, it would be a different story.
If it happened immediately after they assaulted him, it would be a different story.
Eppy Thatcher
God's had his chance.
Oh of course. You fire a weapon at nothing for no real reason in a neighborhood and there is legality involved. Were they in the house/not in the house. Was there continued harassing happening? If this was a woman attempting (for the 3rd time) to get away from an abusive ex-boyfriend who just smashed her orbital to pieces and she managed to shoot him as he drove his smoker truck away would we all be wishy washy?
I think everyone here understands that he has killed someone and in your everyday moving forward world that's not right. It's not the first choice and it's not going to sit with (most people) very well.
Will he serve a sentence of any sort at the age of 80? Maybe. Will the family of the girl sue? If she has any that give a shit about her they might try - no doubt.
But to straight up say absolutely not. this guy is a crazy psychopath is just.. i dunno.. eyes closed crazy to me. He's been harassed. He's been victimized. He has received absolutely no help or closure. He's just been thrown to the ground and beaten by the same people who have been doing this to him for however long. To sit here and say "why didn't he just call the police, move to a new house, change his name and buy a dog!! SO SIMPLE!!" is freaking inane to me. Especially if (and i have no idea here) he doesn't have any family to help him or fall back on.
Legality is one thing. He can pay for his crimes if they do indeed decide it was a crime. But to say "He can't do this..." "Can't do that ..." .. ridiculous.
Calm the hell down, hombre. As far as I know we only have his claim that he was hit by the same burglars three times. My point, regardless, was that the woman was no longer in a state to pose an immediate threat, and really try to find out where you would draw the line if you believe such pre-emptive self defense to be justifiable. She was running away, back turned, well outside of his property. If it was okay for him to shoot her while she was not an immediate threat moments after he had left his property, at what point would it stop being okay?
Since people defend murder in this thread love to throw out hypotheticals I have one:
What if he shot an innocent person accidentally while trying to kill the robbers?
Can you not see how completely dangerous and stupid it is to pursue and fire shots outside of your house? Not even adding in the fact she begged for her life.
What if he shot an innocent person accidentally while trying to kill the robbers?
Can you not see how completely dangerous and stupid it is to pursue and fire shots outside of your house? Not even adding in the fact she begged for her life.
That doesn't make sense. You're all over the place here, and paint it as either he suffers through it while no one helps or he shoots people as they run away. The false dichotomy is convenient to your argument but completely fallacious.
I think you know the answer to this.
I rob him and kill him first. I sell his shit, he dies after having lived a full and paranoid life. Everybody's a winner.
virtuoso88
Member
My house was burglarized 2 years ago on new years eve and I was extremely traumatized after the incident, paranoid, had difficulty sleeping, just felt all around unsafe in my house. I'm still not back to normal sleeping with a gun near by and doors locked and if my dog barks I'll get really anxious. It really messes with your mind. I can't blame an 80 year old guy who was robbed 3x to not chase down what probably caused him many sleepless nights.
There's a difference between choosing to serve and accepting the risks that come with it vs. choosing to be a societal plague that preys on others.
Doesn't matter. The person I was debating with stated that under no circumstance should someone be shot at or killed while fleeing. I was just curious if they would feel that way if someone they valued more than themselves was in mortal peril
Muppet of a Man
Member
He was wrong? I would argue rather that he was traumatized and that his action can be rationalized due to his mental and emotional state. People dying is always a horrible thing, regardless of the circumstance. However, this must be interpreted as self defense in the context of this particular circumstance, regardless of his bitter sentiments.
computers putin'
Member
exactly how I feel after pondering this situation some, whole lotta grey area here....
He was wrong and it was clearly not self defense. He can go to trial and argue he felt he was acting in self defense, or that he was so mad he didn't realize what he was doing, but those would simply mitigate his punishment and not justify or excuse his actions. He better hope they lose that interview though.
Muppet of a Man
Member
You can mitigate away any and all punitive actions taken by the state due to the particular circumstances (I.e., my argument). And the law does not dictate morality. In fact, the law is many times arguably in the wrong, especially when it ineffectively dictates the outcomes of complex scenarios just like this one.
To add to that, what is and what isn't self defense is always interpreted by the courts and never dictated by the laws on the books. So, you saying that the answer is clear is not really reflective of reality.
Imperfect self defense nor a heat of the moment defense mitigate away all punitive action since they turn murder into voluntary manslaughter. I don't think either really applies here and I think charging him with murder is justified. Because he committed murder.
And now, if you could, go ahead and highlight for me my claim that the law dictates morality.
And now he'll get jail for it most likely.
It's really not hard, the guy has really very little legal ground to stand on, they were fleeing. He might get a lenient sentence because it was after successive attacks, but the law doesn't work off emotions because then we'd just have an even worse case of bullshit spaghetti law's. As soon as they start fleeing, it's no longer self defence, what are you defending yourself against.
I remind you that self defence is supposed to be enough to make sure you're safe, make sure you're out of the situation, not murder and not playing at batman vigilante game.
I have zero sympathy for the life lost here, clearly the person lacked values to their very core and humanity has suffered no great loss, however, the laws that protect the criminals in this case are the same as the laws that protect us - this life should not have been lost and hey maybe even given a proper prison system we could've gotten a halfway normal citizen out of a long jail sentence but that's a difference story.
The morality is inconsequential, because we could sit here and disagree on the morality for days. It's a pointless debate to have.
Muppet of a Man
Member
There. You are conflating the two. The law never dictates right and wrong...moral value judgements. He may have "no right"....but this does not make him wrong given the context of his situation.
That post is speaking entirely in terms of morality. Morally he was wrong and morally he had no right to kill her. It's icing on the cake in this case that the law agrees.
Winterfang
Banned
Is it paranoia when the fear he had was actually valid? They did broke into his house multiple times.
He would argue that this is what he did.
His arguments in court will probably be that the situation he found himself in was not a one-off isolated case but was, in fact, a long and sustained period in which he saw no end to unless he stopped it. He'll probably have expert testimony on the effects of multiple victimisations. The term post traumatic stress disorder may also pop up.
LUFTRAUSER
Banned
This sounds pretty bad, honestly. However, this man is nonetheless entitled to a trail by a jury of his peers; I will let them sort it out.
RoslindaleOne
Member
Your actions leaves to consequences. Not saying what the old man did what right, but this wouldn't have happened if she broke in in the first place.
Muppet of a Man
Member
You were, in fact, responding to my valuation of the law in the context of the old man's decision to kill.
And who are you to say what is morally right and wrong in an absolutist vacuum? The law as written is not what ultimately determines if a particular action is self defense or not, either. The courtroom's interpretation of the law ultimately does. Your argument is moot given reality's uncertainty/fuzziness. I think this is actually more about you needing to be right more than anything else, though. So, with that, pat yourself on the back and continue the good fight with someone else.
Well said.
I told you multiple times at that point that the initial post you responded to to me was not in fact discussing legality. You insist on persisting that it was and that I am mixing the two.
I'm sharing my opinion on what is right and wrong. Sorry, I guess.
Legally, sure it is. If you want to discuss what morally justifies self defense, I think the law and morality align. The law does not dictate morality, it's just that morality dictated by logic shares that foundation with the law in this case.
So no one can ever interpret criminal law because a jury will decide who is guilty or not? Haha. Trust me, with reasoning like that ending this discussion with you will not disappoint me.
Eppy Thatcher
God's had his chance.
Is there no precedence along the lines of this situation though? Battered wives who - though they are not being kicked in the stomach that very moment - shoot and kill an abusive husband and are let off (of murder at least..) by the jury understanding the circumstances that lead to her actions?
It will be up to the court to decide how similar or not these situations might be but an 80 year old man being routinely victimized while receiving no help from the police over any extended period of time does not to me sound like a 100% slam dunk case for the prosecuting attorney.
I think the reason morality and emotion and "what would you do if your grandmother..." type of arguments are coming up in this thread a lot is because they will most definitely come up in any subsequent trial this elderly man goes through as well.
What about calling the cops on them the first time they robbed him?
Eppy Thatcher
God's had his chance.
I may have rambled and I aplologize for this insanely off topic post but:
Is that Christina Hendricks from when she was on Undressed?????
It was my understanding that he had contacted the cops. Multiple times..??
It does not to me come across like some cold blooded murder. Those people that set their purse out and then waited for someone to come inspect it before shooting them dead as in laying a fucking trap? Those assholes are murderers.
Are you a rich white person?
They seem to be the only group with any luck when it comes to the police going out of their way to look for and capture 2 random robbers?
Not quite that early but same time period...Firefly!
Eppy Thatcher
God's had his chance.
BrB mainlining Firefly! Gracias!
Lol, enjoy!
Foghorn Leghorn
Unconfirmed Member
One of the articles said it was an affluent area, but his house didn't look that nice from the outside.
hydragonwarrior
Member
Would it be the same if the old man managed to get into his car instead, ran her over killing her, and he said "I ran over her twice" without any remorse?
Eppy Thatcher
God's had his chance.
You'd have a harder time convincing a jury that he was scared for his life. Sure. The difference here being that if your in the car they would argue he should have driven away.
I get it that she was running. I understand that the Immediate threat to his life was no longer present in his face. I'm curious how far away she was. I'm curious if they were threatening him before he brandished his gun. I'm curious if absolutely recognized them from a previous encounter...
What - to me - it feels like a lot of people are glossing over is not the facts of his immediate situation that day/night that led to this seemingly career criminal getting double tapped by an 80 year old man as she had her back turned - but the previous multiple instances of this mans life being turned upside down. They won't be arguing from the point of insanity or "dude, he's like... 100 years old, man.." They are going to argue that these two thugs presented a persistent threat to his safety and way of life as evidenced by their repeated breakins and assault.
I've already kind of said my piece and perhaps not very eloquently but I wouldn't call this first degree murder like i see a lot in this thread. He wasn't sitting in the dark waiting to shoot these two. He didn't drive around the neighborhood and find them and execute them on the street. It sounds like this entire incident likely occured in the span of a few minutes and the shooting/killing probably in less than 60 seconds.
I'll bow out of the higher concept intellectual part of this thread and just go back to my original broad sweeping statement:
His reaction was over the top but she brought it all upon herself. We didn't lost anything special by this girl getting shot so i'm not going to defend/white knight her death.
You live a criminal life you're most likely gonna enjoy a criminal death. That's the fuckin game and she lost.
immediately safe, rather than safe over some time frame. As soon as you're immediately safe, the response is to call the cops.
TheChocolateWar
Member
Aye, there is. We were discussing that defense on page 18-19. It is possible to expand the doctrine of BWS to this case. Bit of a stretch, but thats the only really defense the man has. (from the facts given)
He had her at gunpoint and the cops were nearby. He could have waited for them. She wouldn't have gone anywhere since she was clearly terrified and, you know, at gunpoint.
Pregnant or not this entire thing is fucked up.
ProfessorMoran
Member
I agree.
They broke his collarbone, the old man was probably still in shock and in pain when he shot that criminal in the back, is he within his legal rights to do this? I don't know, but is the old man a cold-blooded murderer? I don't believe he is. Should an 80 year old man be put in jail for any amount of time having shot a criminal who robbed and broke his collarbone? I hope the judge would show leniency.
The mother of the accomplice also got arrested for suspected burglary, the whole lot of them are just scumbags. Maybe we can't shoot scumbags anymore, we can only put them in jail to "rehabilitate" them for awhile before we let them back out on the streets because we can't house them in our overcrowded prisons since it's not humane, and innocent people will be robbed, hurt or even killed, while we have to be gentle with criminals.
Whatif instead of taking your possessions, the burglar went into your home to kidnap your children? Or assault your significant other? Whatif you have a baby in the house? Are you going to just calmly stay outside and call the police? Sometimes it's not just "stuff" that the insurance company can replace, sometimes lives are at stake and sometimes the life at stake might be your own.
I'm not advocating that we get our shotguns to take down anybody who steps on our lawn, but I find it disturbing that criminals are getting more sympathy than the victims.
This, so much this.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886914002360
Some of it is due to circumstance, but that tends to be more along the lines of black-market economic activity. Many people either like doing it or just don't care about its' effects on others.
CeramicDragon
Banned
Do not attack people and rob them in their house.
ProfessorMoran
Member
So we blame it all on society whenever we do something wrong? It's never the criminal's fault, it's society's fault for "failing them"?
It's up to the individual to make the decision to do the right thing, even if you're poor it doesn't mean you're entitled to rob other people or steal their shit, it doesn't mean you can break into the house of an 80 year-old man and assault him and break his collarbone, you don't need higher education to be able to make the distinction between right and wrong, not every poor and uneducated person goes into a life of crime.
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
The old man was desperate too. So here we are.
She was running away, she wasn't staying still for the police to come. She would have escaped.
Same line of reasoning the Nazis used before they killed all the Jews, Gypsies, gays, mentally ill, communists, socialists etc.
User 100115
Banned
I never said it absolved the criminals of responsibility. I was saying that in direct response to someone who said 'the robbers lives were worthless anyhow'. That don't agree with. If we rehabilitated criminals instead of punishing them (like in some European countries) I think we'd have less crime overall.
Yes, again, I wasn't absolving the robbers of responsibility. My statement was in direct reply to someone saying the woman's life was worth nothing.
Last Hearth
Member
If there is persistent harassment that establishes a pattern that a reasonable person can believe it will continue, then that he shot her in the back does not preclude the claim of self defense. Because she's coming back again then he is in fact shooting her for self dense of a future attack.
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