Armed Citizen: Oklahoma Pharmacist Defends Employees from Robbers

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I agree it's wrong to shoot if the threat has ceased...

...but it can be hard to know when that has occurred. Knowing only the few facts in the news stories, it seems to me that the pharmacist will be found to have been justified in using lethal force against the robber. The subsequent civil case will be more problematic, but I think the pharmacist will be found to have engaged in reasonable self-defense.
 
...but it can be hard to know when that has occurred. Knowing only the few facts in the news stories, it seems to me that the pharmacist will be found to have been justified in using lethal force against the robber. The subsequent civil case will be more problematic, but I think the pharmacist will be found to have engaged in reasonable self-defense.
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If the use of lethal force is justified, according to OK law I believe, then there is civil immunity for the action against the criminal.
 
Here's how I see it...

There's just a few pieces of specific and detailed information that we are lacking, preventing us from intelligently arguing this incident.

Things I want to know are.

1) How close was the kid's gun.

2)
But as he started to chase after the second robber he looked back to see the 16-year-old he had shot in the head getting up again. Ersland said he then emptied the Kel-Tec .380 into the boy’s chest."
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"getting up" is very vague. If he's just starting to prop up on his elbows with his back still on the ground he's not a threat unless his gun is in his hand. If he's on his knees or is starting to get his feet under him he's in a fighting position and is a threat regardless of where his gun is.


EDIT: As for the protestors and all this race crap people (protestors and folks here) need to cut the crap. When you do bad things, bad things happen to you, that's how society works, it's sad that someone had to die but that's the situation the kid and his friends put us in. It doesn't matter if the kid had been white, he'd be dead just the same and you know it, don't make it a race issue because it's not.

This is why I will never use a .380 ... if he'd had something like a .40 SW, .357 Sig, .45 ACP I'd be willing to bet the kid would've been dropped cold the first shot.
 
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Its not about the perps rights, its not even about the perp really. I think we all can agree that noone here cares about what happened to an armed robber. Its about whether or not the man who was only defending himself and his co workers is going to walk free or get locked up over 1 or 2 extra pulls of the trigger. Its a shame for sure, but its a shame we have to face and understand when carrying a weapon. I never plan on going to prison or getting in a gunfight, but if I get in a gunfight I sure as hell don't wanna go to prison after the fact.

As for the guy who says his department taught him to keep shooting after the threat was down. . . I believe him. I am almost positive this was not the department policy, but there are many instructors out there who come from alot of experience, many times war related, that preach alot of there own personal opinion into training. They don't want their tranees getting killed over something stupid like that. I am currently enrolled in a law enforcement program in a community college and my instuctor told me almost the exact same thing.

He also taught us that no intelligent person should ever talk to the police after being part of an incident without first talking to a lawyer. Its too easy to incriminate yourself.
 
+1 to the both of you. criminals don't have rights even though its politically correct to say they do, not even sure that is right in itself.
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Of course they have rights. They have rights before and after the incident. During the incident the potential victims right to life trumps all others.
 
Well if I'm on his jury he'd walk.
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Same here. This shoot will probably never go to trial. In OK the prosecutor is not required to take a good shoot to the grand jury. In the past two years our county prosecutor has declined to take three good fatal shoots to the grand jury.

If the family of the deceased perp is so inclined they can take up a petition for a grand jury: That will go nowhere in OK.


The subsequent civil case will be more problematic, but I think the pharmacist will be found to have engaged in reasonable self-defense.
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Not in the state of OK. If the prosecutor declines to prosecute, the grand jury fails to indict or the jury finds the guy innocent; the family of the deceased perp cannot sue in civil court.
 
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One thing I haven't seen discussed is his military background. The biggest question I've seen argued is whether or not the last two shots (or however many there were) were justified. Perhaps we should look at how his military training affected the outcome?
 
Arguing that your training led you to shoot too much admits you shot too much. And then one could argue that you should have known better as you are not in the service any more and not a robot. Dangerous path to go. But this is just horsepoop speculation.

I'm reading Joker One by Campell about Marines in Iraq and they are training in Kuwait before entering Iraq and the author (a Lt.) is discussing a class they got on when to shoot, what's a threat and when to stop. The modern military seems concerned with stopping the threat only?
 
The best part of this thread is how everyone's perception of what is a threat when is different. So, there can be no right answer. To some, if the kid is getting back up, he's not a threat just yet, because we don't know what he will do. To others, he's getting back up and getting back in the fight,with or without a weapon, no thinking required.
I would use the military training in a positive way if I had to go to court. Just like the solicitor is asking police all these questions re-affirming how trained they are to do their jobs. I would re-affirm that he was taught by the best military in the world to make the right decisions in dire times and that he made his call based on that training. I would also argue that a normal civilian might not be able to make those decisions because of the fact that they were not trained.
 
thallub said:
If the prosecutor declines to prosecute, the grand jury fails to indict or the jury finds the guy innocent; the family of the deceased perp cannot sue in civil court.
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Same law here in TN. However, lawyer types have told me that the deceased BG's family can still try to make the claim of "Use of Excessive Force". I might be mangeling the legal terms here but maybe some legal types on here can answer that? My point is that even with those statutes we aren't 100% safe from civil suit.

Glenn E. Meyer said:
I'm reading Joker One by Campell about Marines in Iraq and they are training in Kuwait before entering Iraq and the author (a Lt.) is discussing a class they got on when to shoot, what's a threat and when to stop. The modern military seems concerned with stopping the threat only?
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Glenn this is totally anecdotal but a young brand new Army Second Lieutenant (that we have known since she was three) came thru visiting on her way to Ft. Lee. She had just finished her Basic Officer Leadership Course (BOLC II) at Ft Benning GA and she said they had been taught to double tap then pause and she also said they were told that if they shot an individual with burst automatic fire they would get an Article 15 (Nonjudical Punishment).

I cannot vouch for the accuracy of this (other than I think she is an honest person) but rather pass it along in support of your statement as I think you may be right about just stopping the threat. This is new stuff I was never taught when I served but I don't think she made it up either.
 
Kyo, I'm still not sure that arguing you act in a way trained by the military - whose mission is to destroy the enemy as compared to acting to protect yourself is a good plan.

There are two military arguments:

1. Diminished capacity - killer automaton produced by the military. Interestingly, this was an old plot on a lawyer show in the distant past called the Defenders. William Shatner played a highly trained but out of the service soldier. He is accosted by a bully and despite being meek and mild, the bully grabs his shirt and Kirk goes gung-fu on him and kills him. The defense claims automatic response. At trial, the dead guy's brother accosts him across the rail and guess what - bro gets a buttwhooping in automatic mode.

Diminished capacity - complex issue but did he know right from wrong and would he be punished and/or was the action a product of mental illness (training?). Do you want to go there and even get a mental defense - that would probably take away your guns rights on any NICS check.

2. Training said act this way - so he did consciously? Then he should know that a military response is NOT appropriate - we shoot to stop - not to kill or get rid of 'scum'. Seen the military response be inappropriate in a FOF. Police were looking for a terrorist in a school. One officer was already charged up and annoyed that he had been 'killed' before. Ego involved. Thus, at perceived movement - he left off a full auto stream (not real bullets) down a corridor at movement (which was not even there as the BGs were elsewhere). The training sarge - whistles went off and the shooter was chasitzed - this isnt' Viet Nam anymore. It's a civilian locale - what the blah, blah are you doing firing full auto down a school corridor.

Get my drift - Training in a killer mode isn't the way to go. He needs to articulate the threat and the need to stop it.
 
Mr. Ersland is a genuine hero:

No doubt he saved all the employee's lives that evening. The bad guys came in to rob and shoot the victims (and did exactly that before this pharmacist even returned fire, in defense of his life). What's the problem?

Racism? Who cares what color you are when you are shooting someone in the act of a robbery? There seems to always be someone out there trying to play the race card when crimes like this are being committed on innocent people. It's called self defense, period! This pharmacist was crippled and just had back surgery, yet was still at WORK, (something these low lifes who robbed the place, know nothing about it seems). They just wanted something for free and taking it was easier than working I guess. Problem is, they got more than they bargained for instead.

As far as folks commenting on why he shot the "Kid" (again) when he started to get up? Who knows if the robber still had his gun or would not shoot the pharmacist again? When you shoot someone in the head and they get up again, it really must have scared the pharmacist. No wonder he shot him again. He was obviously in fear of his life.

It's easy for us to comment on what "we would have done" but we were not there and experienced what he went through. I think I will believe his side of the story from reading the details so far.
 
While discussing race is risky - I'm going to throw out some informative info which would be useful if race was a variable in court.

1. After Diallo, there were a lot of studies on tendency to shoot based as the 'target's' race varied. Also how we judge the aggressive appearance of folks as race varied.

2. Studies show (on the average, etc.) that normal subjects were prone to misidentify objects for gun in the hands of blacks as compared to whites. They were also prone to shoot at blacks with weapons faster than whites.
Various theoretical reasons for this.

3. However, police training (which you probably don't have) reduced this effect. The authors of these works have presented this at police conferences as they are interested in not shooting innocents and liability issues.

4. In faces, technically matched for emotional stimuli, whites thought black faces angrier than white faces.

So, in the abstract, a knowledgable practitioner and legal team should know there is a literature regard tendency to shoot and misinterpret based on race. Is it applicable here - who knows? Did the shooter ever say anything about race - you can bet they might be looking if he is billed.

Note - again - this is informative to your tactical and legal info base and not to excite social-political views of race, blah, blah.

Yes, there are references - google scholar on race and shooting - Payne, Correll, etcl
 
I think the fact the boy is 16 is pointless

he was old enough to illegally aquire a fire arm, old enough to make the decision to go rob a store, old enough to know that guns can be used to take lives, attempted to take a life, I don't care how old you are, if you can do these things you are a threat, your age doesn't change anything.

I also assume he did not run in with a big sign on his chest that said I'm only 16

If someone shot at me and they were getting back up, your stupid if you don't put them down for good, they have already proven they are an extreme threat intent on doing you harm or death, slowing them down doesn't stop the threat. You people should know this, this is the kind of person that came in armed and shot at people, this isn't a person that is going to see reason.

To those crying he didn't need kill him, asking why he didn't try to stop him without killing him etc, god help you if you ever end up in that situation because you'll probably get killed, its not like the pharmasist presented a weapon and the kid stopped then he filled him with lead, go back and READ IT.

Good on this pharamsist, need more men like him out there, its just a shame a boy was killed. Its not the pharmasists fault the boy was killed, the boy made decisions that put him in this situation and he paid the ultamite price, its the boys fault and its a shame this man is going to have to live with these problems now because this boy forced this man to defend himself.

If people can't see that for what it is, God help us all as americans freedoms and rights to defend ourselves is doomed, you people make me sad :-(
 
If people can't see that for what it is, God help us all as americans freedoms and rights to defend ourselves is doomed, you people make me sad :-(
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You mean it is somehow unamerican for folks to object to a possible street execution scenario.:rolleyes:

WildtheselfdefensewoobiestrikesagainAlaska ™
 
Spelling and grammar count if you are going to lecture us about being Americans.

Again, the question is not the need to kill him but the need to stop him. In stopping him, killing can be a consequence but not the necessary goal.

We've discussed Blood Lust before - it doesn't make the gun world look good and can come back to haunt YOU!

I went to a dinner and heard a FOG proclaimed to twenty people how if someone got into his house, he was going to KILL him. Now if he proclaims that widely and gets into an ambiguous shoot - some is going to drop the dime (Law and Order viewer) on him.

Last, we really don't know the circumstances of the movement that got the kid filled with lead yet. We will see.
 
This is a very interesting topic, with some thoughtful comments. I have a question though.

On the assumption that the "unloading the mag" shot was a bad shoot, would he have the moral and legal justification for not being charged with murder? Would he have the "reasonable person" defense, saying that a reasonable person would still be in fear for their life due to the high stress and fast paced action of the event, even if the BG had every intention to surrender (body language and intent)?

I do agree that street justice is wrong, but I have trouble condemning a man for murder because he was scared out of his mind and shot maybe too quickly before thinking.

Hope that all came out right and made sense...
 
Would he have the "reasonable person" defense, saying that a reasonable person would still be in fear for their life due to the high stress and fast paced action of the event, even if the BG had every intention to surrender (body language and intent)?

I do agree that street justice is wrong, but I have trouble condemning a man for murder because he was scared out of his mind and shot maybe too quickly before thinking.
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I wonder the same thing. Unfortunately, the "reasonable man" defense is usually being considered by a bunch of reasonable people sitting in the near absolute safety of a court room with no legitimate way to understand how it would actually feel to be in that situation. Sitting under the glare of fluorescent lights in a court room, no "reasonable man" would do such a thing.
 
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...Spelling and grammar count if you are going to lecture us about being Americans....

So says you, if my post offended you therefore you feel like bringing up my spelling, then good, its typical for those that get touched off a bit to attack someones spelling or grammar.

My point is this, the guy was CLEARLY a threat, its not like the 16 year old stopped, put his hands up, then the guy unloaded on him.
 
Spelling and grammar count if you are going to lecture us about being Americans....

So says you,
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Take note that the "you" who said it is a Moderator and take note that proper spelling, grammar and punctuation are written REQUIREMENTS of TFL member postings.
 
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