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csmintx wrote:I can only speak for myself here, but at the risk of appearing paronoid, I believe one must always view any approach by a stranger on the street as a threat.

You speak for me.

No one approaches a stranger with entirely benevolent intentions.

At best they are religious proselytizers that want you to join their church instead of the one that you currently belong to, as if you didn't know the correct route to salvation.

They might be selling something legally, but people figure out pretty quickly that you can't make a living selling stuff on the street.

More likely they are bums, scammers, robbers, kooks, or purveyors of some illegal trade.

- Jim

Beiruty wrote:Instead of letting the parolee or released convict on their own to start from scratch, there should be transition program and employment in a "controlled" public sector until those convicts can support themselves and stay clear from resorting to criminal activities.

There are such programs, but the convict has to express a desire and eligibility for them. There also are charitable private employers who will go out of their way to hire released convicts.

However, felons are prohibited by law from working many jobs. They can never work in a school or hospital or hold any licensed position such as electrician or commercial truck driver. Also many are functionally illiterate, have no computer skills, and posses a "who you talkin' to?" attitude and foul vocabulary.

Beiruty wrote:BTW, why we do not have anymore "the rock" an island where no one ever wants to visit?

Alcatraz was too expensive to maintain.

More unfortunately, going to prison has become a right of passage among gang members, and it's more like a family reunion for them than punishment. Some of them actually do better in the structured environment of prison than on the street, where they are subject to violence from rivals and trying to make a living by very unreliable criminal methods.

- Jim

baldeagle wrote:Reading this story had me wondering what the heck is wrong with Ohio. The BG who died was 20 years old. He had just gotten out of prison from a two year sentence for "robbery and weapons charges" and that was his second prison sentence.

Every state has this problem.

First, they have limited budgets because tax revenue is down (because the economy is down). Second, many drug offenses have mandatory minimum sentences, while other crimes have more flexible sentencing and parole.

Prisoners who keep their nose clean can get out sometimes in 1/3 of their sentence.

This guy was obviously a very bad actor, probably a sociopath; but he figured out how to work the system.

Beiruty wrote:One has to ask, when one is hungry has no money and effectively homeless, he most likely will attack like mad grizzlies. Not justifying the crime, but one has to offer jobs for those convicts.

Most poor people do not commit violent crimes. They may beg and shoplift, live at the Salvation Army or in a box, or figure out what resources are available in terms of homeless shelters, soup kitchens, and missions.

Convicts generally get into the prison system at an early age. They have little education and a complete lack of work ethic or ability to cooperate on a job. Their job prospects are extremely limited.

Some are reformed, but not many.

- Jim

Excaliber, I bow to your superior experience.

I just keep thinking of the idiots who walked past a cop car to rob a donut shop, or the guy who tried to rob a gun store with a knife.

- Jim

IIRC, there were a dozen or more instances of a gun being taken away and used against the "owner" -- and the "owner" was always the bad guy.

I don't personally know any murderous felons, but I think the mentality is that having a gun will cause the victim to quake with terror and do whatever the bad guy wants.

Armed robbers are not bright people and probably do not have a plan B for when events do not go as they expected.

(This would not apply to hardened criminals, ninjas, or terrorists.)

- Jim

ELB wrote:So why is a hand-to-hand struggle not "tactical?"

I don't know any more about this incident than what was in the article that I linked to (it was the most detailed of several articles).

It sounds to me like the victim was bushwhacked, exactly as I said about myself above. At some point he realized that events were going rapidly downhill, and he might end up floating face-down in the Cuyahoga River. What he did was a desperate move. Courageous and successful in this case—but he had already let events get out of control.

I think of tactics as planned movements. For example, we often discuss what to do when someone is trying to get into your occupied residence. That's what I consider tactics.

I was mainly responding to the discussion of how many rounds are in someone's magazine and how many to use per attacker.

- Jim

Or maintain distance.

I was the victim of a strong-arm robbery by three men once. I was in condition white and literally walked into it. They were all obviously unkempt, ill-dressed thugs, which I realized when they grabbed me.

The comic-book scenario where a man with a handgun or big knife jumps out of an alley is history. Most robberies of individuals now occur in parking lots or similar environments where people are outdoors, or by home invasion. You should be able to see them coming.

- Jim

This is an area where state law makes a huge difference.

In Texas we can use deadly force in response to robbery or kidnapping, which was the case here. The robbery need not be armed robbery. Only the threat of force by the robber is required. The kidnapping was an accomplished kidnapping, even though they were taking the victim to his own home.

Deadly force against all of the criminals would have been justified.

I don't know what Pennsylvania law says in this respect. In many states, deadly force is considered justified only in response to presentation or use of a deadly weapon.

- Jim

This was not any kind of tactical situation. It was a hand-to-hand struggle that ended up with the robber shot. It could easily have gone the other way.

I don't know and have no way of knowing if the victim who turned the tables had ever fired a gun before. He just seemed to know that he needed to resist or possibly be killed.

Which gives me an opportunity to repeat the principle that one should do anything possible to avoid being taken captive or hostage. It rarely ends well, and the experience of being captive for hours or perhaps days, tied up, beaten, and almost certain raped in the case of women is extremely traumatic.

- Jim

I am conscious of magazine capacity, but we have to distinguish between thugs and crazed ninja assassins. Thugs run when the odds turn against them. I think the operative term in acceptable language is, "Oh, poop."

I also expect the victim will be doing whatever one has to do in Ohio to get whatever they call the equivalent of a CHL.

- Jim

In Cleveland, Ohio, Thursday, four men allegedly committed an armed robbery. The victim seized a gun (presumably a handgun, but I don't know) from one of the robbers and fatally shot the robber. The deceased robber had recently been released from prison on parole for robbery.

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/08 ... _shoo.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Reading between the lines, I don't think this incident occurred in a high-rent district.

- Jim