Dallas: Resident arrested after shooting intruder

[A-R]

How in the world did this situation get this far? Why did authorities not deal with the nuisance of this crazy man sooner and/or better? These are hugely important questions. I'm a huge police supporter as most of you know. But this looks as bad for the "authorities" as it does for this homeowner. What good is police protection if a lunatic can continually try to "reclaim" your house from you? Was there ever discussion of a restraining order? Some other increased legal protection for this homeowner?

I agree that going outside to confront him makes the woman look bad. Her tactics were ill-advised. But look at this from her perspective: crazy guy, changing locks, attempting (obviously it seems) to either come in or take back control/ownership of her house, at night.

Certainly she should've called police/911 if only to let her next actions be recorded by authorities. As for waiting in the house for him to actually enter? I don't agree with walking outside to force the confrontation. But waiting inside for something "more" to happen isn't necessarily sound either ...

1. Where in the statutes does it say you must wait for someone to illegally enter your home before resisting and defending yourself and your home? In all of the relevant statutes, "attempted" crime can be resisted with force and deadly force the same as a crime fully in progress. Does it "look better" if the criminal has already breached the threshold? Of course, but if someone is actively picking the lock of my front door at night? I'm going to shoot them before they ever get my door open. They are actively attempting to commit a crime. Just because they haven't yet succeeded and entered my house doesn't mean squat IMHO (IANAL etc).

2. Tactically, waiting could be a mistake too. If this woman is "all alone in a big ol' house" she is vulnerable. Perhaps the picking of the front door lock (I'm assuming which door) is a diversion to draw her attention from the crazy guy or one of his buddy's sneaking in the back door? Tactically, being "reactive" instead of "proactive" in your self-defense can be a fatal mistake. Reactive means you are caught off-guard and unprepared. In its worst extreme, it means you have gone immediately from "condition white" to "condition black" and you are very likely to be seriously injured or killed.

In some situations, "forcing the issue" is the best tactical decision because it puts you on the proverbial "higher ground" being proactive to a developing situation. Of course, you still must wait for the proper legal and tactical "point of no return" before utilizing deadly force. And you cannot "provoke" the other side into crossing the line or claiming they were the party defending themselves because you approached them aggressively, showed a gun, or whatever. This is especially true in cases when you "force the issue". If someone is harassing you but hasn't crossed the line into being a true lethal threat, you can "force the issue" by demanding they stop, leave, whatever. Inform them that if they do cross the line you WILL use lethal force to stop them. This is the point when you wait for them to make the next move. You're in "control", showing confidence and resolve to deal swiftly and surely with any escalation of the situation, and whether or not it does escalate at that point is purely up to the decision of the potential "attacker" who is harassing you. You've "stood your ground" but not let passions and anger inflame you into making a rash decision that you cannot defend later.

I agree that what has been reported so far "looks bad" for this woman. And we need to wait for all facts to be known. I think the DA is right to pursue charges in this case because it's not necessarily a clear-cut black-n-white case of self-defense or defense of property. There is the possible element of retaliation or "I've had enough!" mentality that needs to be explored by the judicial system.

If it can be proven that she truly did walk outside to confront the crazy guy out of frustration, anger, and a desire to "end this all right now right here", then premeditation has been established and I'd find her guilty - possibly of murder (though the "passion" defense seems in play here to at least get her a reduced sentence).

But we're way ahead of ourselves here. We all have theories. We need to wait for the facts.

[seamusTX]

3. Head shots in any situation seem to cross the line. I wonder if she had fired the first couple of rounds COM if it would have made any difference.

I don't think so. Being shot in the heart versus the brain are about equally bad for one's health.

We tend to look at the faces of other people. We tend to shoot where we are looking. In fact, there's a book with the title Shoot Where You Look.

I think the fact of the kook being unarmed it the biggest factor in this case.

I set up alerts on these stories that I find interesting. Nothing more has come out.

- Jim

[A-R]

Again it should never have happened as it should have been dealt with by the authorities in the beginning.

The reality of our legal system is that it doesn't deal with recidivists of any stripe very well. Violent criminals with long rap sheets and sentences in the decades are released early or even very early. Why would we expect that same system to handle a less violent type any better?

with both statements above

My Monday morning quarterback take out of this is:
1. This was not an IMMEDIATE violent threat because it was still outside her house. In all such cases, the best action is to get on 911 right away. Had she done that, it would have established her feeling threatened by the actions that were being taken against her. I recognize that her previous calls to police were for naught but even contemplating the use of deadly force seems to mandate another attempt.
2. Texas laws say that you can "stand your ground". The fact that she was advancing undermined that, even if she only advanced outside her home. I consider that anytime that I exit my house with gun in hand, I'm risking being seen as the aggressor, not the defender, especially if I'm not in immediate contact with law enforcement. Maybe that is just me.

I think you're confusing the justification for self-defense with the justifications for defense of property, and should carefully reread PC 9.41 and 9.42, as well as PC 28.03 Criminal Mischief, PC 30.02 Burglary, and PC 31.03 Theft (not sure under which of these three areas this crazy guy's illegal actions fall, but confident what he did falls in there somewhere - especially since this all apparently happened at night - hope I have that part right). I'm the first to say that just because you CAN use deadly force doesn't always mean you SHOULD use deadly force. But the black-n-white of the law seems to back up her actions IF (big IF here) the amount of force she used to stop the crime was "reasonable". Seems to me all of this boils down to whether her reaction was "reasonable" and whether it was clouded by premeditated anger/frustration/retaliation.

IANAL etc etc

3. Head shots in any situation seem to cross the line. I wonder if she had fired the first couple of rounds COM if it would have made any difference.

On what do you base this? Just because someone is a good shot or got lucky and placed a round in an attacker's head doesn't mean anything at all. And you're assuming she aimed at the head and didn't intend to hit COM. The story only says he was hit in the head and three shots were fired. This could mean anything. Even if she did aim at the head, what's the difference? She could've aimed at his leg and it's still deadly force under the law. Gunshots land in crazy unexpected places during high-stress defensive shooting situations. Many attackers are shot in the hand which held their weapon because the defender is so fixated on an attackers weapon that the gun is unknowingly aimed where the eyes go without even realizing it.

4. Demonstrated anger erodes the premise of either fear or rational thought. In the book "Strong on Defense", the recommendation is to get angry, really really angry to give yourself the mental drive and adrenaline to face an armed assailant. That same anger against an unarmed opponent can be counterproductive.

Anger "looks bad" I agree. But it doesn't necessarily demonstrate bad intentions at all. And it really doesn't matter if someone attempting to illegally gain entry into your home at night is armed or not. They're a threat. Period. The law says so. Common sense says so. Again, we don't know all the facts. If the woman walked out angrily to confront this guy, saw he was not armed, he did nothing more than stand there and yell at her, and she shot him? Yeah, that's murder. But there are plenty of other possible scenarios that would be very justified in shooting this guy who was attempting to illegally enter her home. Again, we don't know all the facts we need to know to make a determination here. Which is why this case will go into the judicial system to sort out.

So what we have is a situation that touches the fringes of general acceptability on several counts. My guess is that most LEOs have a "centerist" approach. Anything that isn't really cut and dried is going to get handed to the lawyers to figure out. I do understand that under duress, one doesn't always have the opportunity to sit down and rationally consider how many fringe elements are part of the situation being faced. I'm trying to learn from the mistakes of others and will try not put myself in a similar situation. In "Strong on Defence" , the recommendation is to always give up personal property immediately. If it was possible for me to safely exit my house in the face of a situation like this, I would do so. The "big picture" says that using deadly force against someone who doesn't have a weapon is going to put me at greater legal risk in spite of what the laws actually say.

My goal is to protect myself - both physically and legally if I can.

Some great points. Except that "personal property" and your "home" are two distinctly different things both in the eyes of the law and in the "real world". Your home is "real property" not merely "personal property" and is held at a higher "value" in society for a number of reasons I won't go into wonkish detail about at the moment.

[seamusTX]

Except that "personal property" and your "home" are two distinctly different things both in the eyes of the law and in the "real world".

I agree.

I someone wants my Starter jacket (if I owned one), it's cheaper and easier to replace that than hire a lawyer for even 15 minutes.

Having one's home invaded is a completely different issue. That's why we have a legal principle called Castle Doctrine.

That's why I think this woman is going to walk, though at the moment she probably is not getting a lot of sleep.

- Jim

[Hoi Polloi]

I'm repeating my earlier post because some haven't seen it:

Someone named Redd714 left these two messages in the comments section, which could change things significantly if they're accurate:

"The locksmith was there the day before, not at the time of the shooting."

and

"When the real story come out it will show he had shot her dog in the past. Broke into her house before. He had been arrested at that address before. She had a gun because of him. You guys talking about calling 911, next time let someone beat your but, while you wait for the cops to come,"

[chasfm11]

I think you're confusing the justification for self-defense with the justifications for defense of property, and should carefully reread PC 9.41 and 9.42, as well as PC 28.03 Criminal Mischief, PC 30.02 Burglary, and PC 31.03 Theft (not sure under which of these three areas this crazy guy's illegal actions fall, but confident what he did falls in there somewhere - especially since this all apparently happened at night - hope I have that part right). I'm the first to say that just because you CAN use deadly force doesn't always mean you SHOULD use deadly force. But the black-n-white of the law seems to back up her actions IF (big IF here) the amount of force she used to stop the crime was "reasonable". Seems to me all of this boils down to whether her reaction was "reasonable" and whether it was clouded by premeditated anger/frustration/retaliation.

Good advice. I'll re-read those sections. I'm afraid, however, that I'm of the persuasion that LEOs and even DAs don't seem bothered by the letter of the law. It is how the situation is regarded. The "reasonableness" may or may not be confirmed by a jury.

3. Head shots in any situation seem to cross the line. I wonder if she had fired the first couple of rounds COM if it would have made any difference.

On what do you base this? Just because someone is a good shot or got lucky and placed a round in an attacker's head doesn't mean anything at all. And you're assuming she aimed at the head and didn't intend to hit COM. The story only says he was hit in the head and three shots were fired. This could mean anything. Even if she did aim at the head, what's the difference? She could've aimed at his leg and it's still deadly force under the law. Gunshots land in crazy unexpected places during high-stress defensive shooting situations. Many attackers are shot in the hand which held their weapon because the defender is so fixated on an attackers weapon that the gun is unknowingly aimed where the eyes go without even realizing it.

Nothing but my reading of the various situations that have been reported on this forum. It seems to me (and I might be totally off base) that a head shot is deemed as an attempt to kill someone rather than protect the defender. I do recognize that in a high stress situation or a gun fight, shot placement cannot be predicted. This situation, however, was NOT a gun fight. What I was trying to present is that the head shot, coupled with the anger coupled with her exiting the house combined to present a picture that could appear to some as other than defensive.

4. Demonstrated anger erodes the premise of either fear or rational thought. In the book "Strong on Defense", the recommendation is to get angry, really really angry to give yourself the mental drive and adrenaline to face an armed assailant. That same anger against an unarmed opponent can be counterproductive.

Anger "looks bad" I agree. But it doesn't necessarily demonstrate bad intentions at all. And it really doesn't matter if someone attempting to illegally gain entry into your home at night is armed or not. They're a threat. Period. The law says so. Common sense says so. Again, we don't know all the facts. If the woman walked out angrily to confront this guy, saw he was not armed, he did nothing more than stand there and yell at her, and she shot him? Yeah, that's murder. But there are plenty of other possible scenarios that would be very justified in shooting this guy who was attempting to illegally enter her home. Again, we don't know all the facts we need to know to make a determination here. Which is why this case will go into the judicial system to sort out.

That is what I was trying to observe. When elements that are further from the center of accepted "norms" are included, the situation goes to the legal system to be sorted out. I just finished reading the account of a CHL/instructor who fired on two women and a man who were attacking him on another thread here. None of them had weapons and they presented a very different representation of the situation that what the facts supported. He was tried twice and both situations ended up in hung juries. The failure of both juries to acquit him was that some people could not get past his attackers being unarmed. The law was clearly on his side but it took expert witnesses on his side to keep him from going to jail.

So what we have is a situation that touches the fringes of general acceptability on several counts. My guess is that most LEOs have a "centerist" approach. Anything that isn't really cut and dried is going to get handed to the lawyers to figure out. I do understand that under duress, one doesn't always have the opportunity to sit down and rationally consider how many fringe elements are part of the situation being faced. I'm trying to learn from the mistakes of others and will try not put myself in a similar situation. In "Strong on Defence" , the recommendation is to always give up personal property immediately. If it was possible for me to safely exit my house in the face of a situation like this, I would do so. The "big picture" says that using deadly force against someone who doesn't have a weapon is going to put me at greater legal risk in spite of what the laws actually say.

My goal is to protect myself - both physically and legally if I can.

Some great points. Except that "personal property" and your "home" are two distinctly different things both in the eyes of the law and in the "real world". Your home is "real property" not merely "personal property" and is held at a higher "value" in society for a number of reasons I won't go into wonkish detail about at the moment.

Again, I will read about those differences in the eyes of the law. I have to admit to being more than a little cynical and believe that some of those shades of difference are lost on a DA who doesn't want to acknowledge them and may even try to gloss over them. I consider myself to be a pragmatist. I'm going to do what I have to do in a true emergency situation. I didn't read this situation to be a true emergency and am worried that the DA might not either. It will be interesting to see how it turns out.

When my kids started learning to drive, we had more than one discussion about "being in the right" versus avoiding an accident. I've managed to avoid being an traffic accidents for 30 years with that approach. That avoidance didn't happen, however, when I was hit by a driver at an intersection who admitted to driving over 50mph in a 25mph zone. I learned from that. I'm trying to do the same here.

[chasfm11]

I'm repeating my earlier post because some haven't seen it:

"When the real story come out it will show he had shot her dog in the past. Broke into her house before. He had been arrested at that address before. She had a gun because of him. You guys talking about calling 911, next time let someone beat your but, while you wait for the cops to come,"

I'm not one of those advocating abandoning taking action with a gun in favor of calling 911. What I believe is that if she had tried to call 911 prior to using her gun that night, she might not be facing the charges that she is. I can certainly understand and appreciate that such calls in her past yielded no results. I also understand that timing might be involved. Somehow, if she had time to bolt out the door, I would have expected that she had time to dial 911 in advance of doing it. I could be completely wrong.

[Hoi Polloi]

If he's shot her dog in the past...or even if she just believes that he has...it might significantly increase her fear over whether he has a weapon and whether he might use it. If I believed someone had shot my dog in an ongoing conflict, I would be fearful that he would have a gun and would also shoot me in the future.

[DONT TREAD ON ME]

3. Head shots in any situation seem to cross the line. I wonder if she had fired the first couple of rounds COM if it would have made any difference.

I don't think so. Being shot in the heart versus the brain are about equally bad for one's health.

We tend to look at the faces of other people. We tend to shoot where we are looking. In fact, there's a book with the title Shoot Where You Look.

I think the fact of the kook being unarmed it the biggest factor in this case.

I set up alerts on these stories that I find interesting. Nothing more has come out.

- Jim

I used to work for a county coroner. If you want to kill yourself the best place to shoot is in the heart and not the head. You cannot live without a beating heart. You can still be "alive" and be brain dead. Society has made the head shot the worse of the two. In reality it is more "deadly" to shoot COM.

[chasfm11]

I used to work for a county coroner. If you want to kill yourself the best place to shoot is in the heart and not the head. You cannot live without a beating heart. You can still be "alive" and be brain dead. Society has made the head shot the worse of the two. In reality it is more "deadly" to shoot COM.

Exactly. It is society's view of head shots, not the reality of the damage that they cause, that I was commenting on. By itself, it might not have been a major consideration. In conjunction with the other factors in this case, at least as it was reported, it may be having an impact.

It is bad enough to have to have resorted to gun violence to resolve this matter for the woman involved. I agree with Jim that the DA may be "piling on." There has to be some reason behind his action. It may well be that his view of the head shot, based on his expectation (or maybe even the actuality) of public pressure to pursue this.

[3dfxMM]

How is what she did any worse than what Joe Horn did? She was arguably in more immediate danger than he was.

[seamusTX]

Joe Horn shot burglars who had accomplished a burglary and had loot in their hands. It helped his case that the burglars were illegal immigrants. He still got off lucky.

In this case, it is not clear the elements of the crime of burglary were met.

- Jim

[gabe]

The actor's belief
the deadly force was immediately necessary
is presumed to be reasonable if the actor
knew or had reason to believe that the person against whom the deadly force was used
was attempting to enter unlawfully and with force, the actor's occupied habitation

[A-R]

The "reasonableness" may or may not be confirmed by a jury.

Exactly

That is what I was trying to observe. When elements that are further from the center of accepted "norms" are included, the situation goes to the legal system to be sorted out.

My goal is to protect myself - both physically and legally if I can.

Everyone has to decide for themself whether it's better to be judged by 12 or carried by 6. Sometimes you can't protect both as well as you'd like. If I know in my heart that my action was justified, then I'll prefer to be alive to face that trial and let the chips fall where they may.

Some great points. Except that "personal property" and your "home" are two distinctly different things both in the eyes of the law and in the "real world". Your home is "real property" not merely "personal property" and is held at a higher "value" in society for a number of reasons I won't go into wonkish detail about at the moment.

Again, I will read about those differences in the eyes of the law. I have to admit to being more than a little cynical and believe that some of those shades of difference are lost on a DA who doesn't want to acknowledge them and may even try to gloss over them.

Hard to gloss over the Castle Doctrine that is embedded in much of our penal code now. It is after all a "castle" doctrine and not a "trinket" doctrine. The law gives you quite a bit more leeway when defending the castle than when defending personal property.

I consider myself to be a pragmatist. I'm going to do what I have to do in a true emergency situation. I didn't read this situation to be a true emergency and am worried that the DA might not either. It will be interesting to see how it turns out.

I agree whether the situation was a true "emergency" and whether your reaction was "reasonable" will be the difference between freedom and prison for her.

When my kids started learning to drive, we had more than one discussion about "being in the right" versus avoiding an accident. I've managed to avoid being an traffic accidents for 30 years with that approach. That avoidance didn't happen, however, when I was hit by a driver at an intersection who admitted to driving over 50mph in a 25mph zone. I learned from that. I'm trying to do the same here.

Great analogy. I agree it's best to avoid the accident and the violent confrontation if at all possible. Better to be "wrong" and alive and free. Than to be "right" and dead or in prison.

Anyway, good discussion

[A-R]

The actor's belief
the deadly force was immediately necessary
is presumed to be reasonable if the actor
knew or had reason to believe that the person against whom the deadly force was used
was attempting to enter unlawfully and with force, the actor's occupied habitation

BINGO!

I think Seamus is correct that Burglary may not have occured because actual entry may not have occured. Criminal mischief at nighttime may have occured, but we don't know facts yet. But I've always thought anyone will have a hard time convincing a jury that deadly force is "reasonable" reaction to a crime called "mischief".

But what gabe sites above would definitely seem to apply to a crazy man who had the locks on YOUR house changed - plain as day in PC 9.32.

Of course, "reasonable" and "imminent" and "immediately necessary" clauses will all still come in to play. But I think the clause above "was attempting to enter" provides her quite a bit of leeway, even enough to walk outside and stop the threat before her threshold is breached.

In some ways, the authorities' inability to take care of this situation sooner could benefit the woman if this goes to trial. What may be unreasonable at first becomes more reasonable if you know the police can't seem to do anything to help you with the situation. Still doesn't explain imminent and immediate necessary. But as I've said before someone outside at night tampering with my door locks gets shot. Period.