NW Harris County homeowner shoots burglar in face.

[surprise_i'm_armed]

Forum friends: I sourced this at http://www.thearmedcitizen.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
How does someone get shot in the face, yet be in "stable" condition?
Mouse gun? SIA

Houston, Texas

From KTRK of May 12, 2010

Homeowner shoots would-be burglar

A homeowner opened fire on a man breaking into his home in northwest Harris County. The would-be thief broke into the house on Heather Hill Street around 10:30am Wednesday. The homeowner said he was in the shower, heard the noise and grabbed a gun.

Relatives of the homeowner say the suspect picked the wrong house, because the man who lives there is a retired member of the military and was not afraid to protect himself.
Deputies say the homeowner was taking a shower at around 10:30am when he heard a loud noise and grabbed a gun.

Lt. Jeff Stauber with the Harris County Sheriff’s Department Safe Home Task Force said, “As he came into the living room, he spotted the suspect leaning inside his house from the window he had broken out.”

That’s when the man told deputies he fired a single shot, hitting the home invasion suspect in the face.

“Just imagine coming out of the shower and seeing someone you don’t know in your house,” said Lt. Stauber. “I mean, any one of us would be in fear of our life.”

The wounded suspect fled, but he made it just a few miles before deputies caught up with him in a fast food parking lot near Veteran’s Memorial and West Mount Houston. He was taken to Ben Taub Hospital, but deputies believe there could be a second person involved. Neighbors say burglaries in the Northwest Park neighborhood have become all too common.

Neighbor Raul Garza said, “This is ridiculous, that a person can’t be at peace at home.”

According to the Harris County Sheriff’s Office, since January 1 there have been 50 calls to report burglaries in this neighborhood alone. That’s why retired police officer Raul Garza says his neighbor did the right thing.

“The homeowner has that right to protect himself, his life as well as his property,” Garza said.

Other neighbors say they agree.

Neighbor Howard Halasz said, “I think he had every right to shoot the home invader.”

Investigators say the case will go before a grand jury, but they say under Texas law it doesn’t appear that what the homeowner did was illegal, since the man was allegedly on his property.

Lt. Stauber said, “As a homeowner you have a right to protect yourself.”

The suspect is in stable condition at Ben Taub Hospital. As for the homeowner, he did not want to talk on camera, but his family says he is OK

[Quahog]

Forum friends: I sourced this at http://www.thearmedcitizen.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.
How does someone get shot in the face, yet be in "stable" condition?
Mouse gun? SIA

Perhaps he just haired the BG

[seamusTX]

How does someone get shot in the face, yet be in "stable" condition?

"Stable condition" is medical jargon for not likely to die within the next 24 hours.

The guy could be missing an eye or half his jaw and spend the rest of his life trying to relearn how to eat with a knife and fork.

- Jim

[The Annoyed Man]

How does someone get shot in the face, yet be in "stable" condition?

"Stable condition" is medical jargon for not likely to die within the next 24 hours.

The guy could be missing an eye or half his jaw and spend the rest of his life trying to relearn how to eat with a knife and fork.

- Jim

Yep. You can get a bullet right through the heart, and be in stable condition.... ....after you have been stabilized. The perp in this case may not have been stable when he was transported, but the ER got him stabilized. Or, as Jim said, he might not have had a life-threatening injury to begin with.

Ever see the movie about Frank Serpico? Per the wiki:

Questionable shooting and public interest
Serpico was shot during a drug bust on February 3, 1971, at 10:42 p.m., during a stakeout at 778 Driggs Avenue, in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. Four officers from Brooklyn North had received a tip that a drug deal was going down.

Two of the officers, Gary Roteman and Arthur Cesare, stayed in a car out front; the third, Paul Halley, was standing in front of the apartment building. Serpico got out of the car, climbed up the fire escape, watched from the roof, went out the fire escape door, walked down the steps, watched the heroin buy, listened to the password and then followed the two kids out.[6]

The police jumped out at the two kids, one of whom had two bags of heroin. Halley stayed in the car with the two kids with the heroin after Roteman told Serpico, because he spoke Spanish, to make a fake drug buy to get the door open for the rest of them. The three officers went up the steps to the third-floor landing. Serpico knocked on the door, keeping his other hand inside his jacket on his 9mm Browning Hi-Power. The door opened a few inches, the chain still on. Serpico pushed and the chain snapped. It was enough for him to wedge part of his body in but the dealers on the other side were trying to close it. Serpico called out to his partners who did not come to help him.[6]

Serpico was shot in the face at point blank range with a .22 LR handgun. The bullet penetrated his cheek just below the eye and lodged at the top of his jaw; he lost balance, fell to the floor, and began to bleed profusely. Serpico's colleagues failed to place a "10-13", a dispatch to police headquarters indicating that an officer has been shot.[6] Instead, Serpico was saved by an elderly Hispanic man who lived in an apartment adjacent to the one being used by the suspects; the man called emergency services and reported that a man had been shot, and then stayed with Serpico to help keep him alive until an ambulance arrived.[6] A police squad car arrived prior to the ambulance, however, and the officers, unaware of the bloodied Serpico's identity, took him to Greenpoint Hospital.

Serpico was deafened in his left ear by the gunshot, which severed an auditory nerve, and has suffered chronic pain from fragments lodged in his brain. Although he was visited the day after the shooting by Mayor John V. Lindsay and Police Commissioner Patrick V. Murphy, while he lay recovering in bed from his wounds, the police department harassed him with hourly bed checks. He survived, and ultimately testified in front of the Knapp Commission.

The circumstances surrounding Serpico's shooting quickly came into question. Serpico, who was armed during the drug raid, had only been shot after briefly turning away from the suspect when he realized that the two officers who had accompanied him to the scene were not following him into the apartment, raising the question whether Serpico had actually been brought to the apartment by his colleagues to be executed. The accident was not properly investigated and the officers involved were in fact awarded medals.[7]

On May 3, 1971, New York Metro Magazine published an article about Serpico titled "Portrait of an Honest Cop". On May 10, 1971, Serpico testified at the departmental trial of an NYPD lieutenant who was accused of taking bribes from gamblers. On May 14, 1971, Serpico was awarded a gold shield by the police commissioner and promoted to detective.

I've seen people shot dead with a .22 to the head, so the fact that this was "only" a .22 LR doesn't by itself explain away Serpico's survival.

[seamusTX]

Serpico. That's a blast from the past.

Many people have been brought to the hospital in a basket, stitched together, and survived for decades.

- Jim

[WildBill]

Serpico. That's a blast from the past.

A great movie and, even greater, book.

[tacticool]

How does someone get shot in the face, yet be in "stable" condition?
Mouse gun? SIA

Maybe it didn't hit anything important.

[ELB]

This cop got shot under the right eye and thought he was going to drown in his own blood (after thinking that he was already dead, and then thinking he was about be kicked to death, and then thinking he would be shot with his own gun). But he lived. He even eventually got up and returned fire.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X14ID3zy ... ature=grec" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It left a small hole under his eye and he looks pretty good in the video, but the shot took out some teeth, part of his jaw, went between his carotid and esophagus, and finally fractured the C-1 vertebra. Several surgeries to repair the damage.

[seamusTX]

... the shot ... went between his carotid [artery] and esophagus, ...

That guy cashed in every winning Powerball ticket ever printed.

I wonder what he is being saved for.

- Jim