Careful Whom You Shoot

Sorry, but there have been too many cases of fast-talking perps being able to bluff their way into a house, disable their victim, armed or unarmed, and commit the mayhem of their choice.

While it would be tragic if a drunk person accidentally got plugged because he broke into the wrong house, that is hardly the fault of the home owner. The home owner's number one priority is to defend himself and his/her family, if he/she has one. If I assume that someone who breaks into my house has anything but violent intentions, AND is not packing a gun, I could easily wind up laying on the floor in a pool of my own blood, listening to the sounds of my wife and daughter being raped and murdered.

It's amazing to me that people who post here will back up the fact that guns don't kill people; people kill people. But when it comes to being drunk, the same rule of personal responsibility doesn't apply. If you CHOOSE to get drunk, you MUST BE READY TO BEAR THE CONSEQUENCES, whether it be driving with impaired reactions, perceptions, and judgement, or breaking into the wrong house.

Also, under no circumstances do I remember anyone here advocating the use of deadly force on anyone roaming around outside of one's home. That's when I call 911 and get the family into the safe room. If it's someone banging at the door they have to identify themselves or I call the police. I don't start blasting from a window or through the front door.
 
Riddle-Of-Steel was wise to ask for proof the people at the door were real deputy sheriffs. The deputy put the flashlight on his partner's badge, so R.O.S. let them in.

Here's a suggestion. If something such as this happened to people here, if it were I, I'd ask to see the officer's IDEE. Reason being is that badges are very easy to come by out there, but very, very few bad guys are able to come up with a Dept's identification card.

So, if I had any question, I'd ask to see his idee card. If he says he doesn't have one, DON'T LET HIM IN! Call 911 right now and tell them a man impersonating a police officer is trying to get into your home!

FWIW. J.B.
 
Fine story RiddleofSteel, but the deputies were not trying to break into your house. CMichael's scenario was about a drunk that actually go IN another person's home, not met on the patio or porch.

You used some common sense, but move the scenario further along with the two guys not being deputies, your door is crashed open, and you encounter them in your entry hall. Is your first question, "Who is it?" No, of course not.

A similar thread along these lines came up sometime back and one of the things that surprised me most where the number of people who had homes with an open door policy to friends and relatives such that on hearing a noise in the den or living room, there was a really good chance that somebody had come over in the middle of the night to grab a couple of beers because they ran out and the stores were closed - but they didn't want to wake anyone up either.

Everyone has to make their own decision based on the specific circumstance. My home doesn't look like anyone else's on the street. I don't leave my doors unlocked and I don't pass out house keys. If I can count heads and determine members of my immediate family aren't making the noise (still tucked in bed), I have no reason to assume any other than there is an intruder and that the intruder either has hostile intent or no fear of discovery since he was breaking into an occupied home. And, it isn't the police or fire department either as they would be yelling accordingly if they were there to save our lives because of some emergency.

If the person is my home, I don't have time about second guessing whether or not he is a good guy or bad guy. He certainly does not belong and has not done anything to indicate he is a good guy. I will be careful who I shoot in my own home because missing is not a good thing.
 
The point of the story was be sure to ID your target and be sure of the situation before applying deadly force.

Ok let's set the clock back to 1978.
I was living in an old rental house across the street from an apartment complex. I had an old 1950 GMC truck, a custom Harley, a good looking redhead with several tattos and real attitude. I lived on a busy street and we had folks walking thru our yard at odd times of the night and I have lost count of the times I woke up to hear people talking loudly as they walked beside the house to get to the next street. Not an ideal situation by any means but the rent was only $125.00 per month.
At that time we stayed in a couple of rooms in the center of the house. We heated with a wood stove and our only air conditioning was a single 4,500 BTU window unit. I was in the habit of staying up quite late even on week nights but to the street it probably looked like no one was home or that we were asleep. One Saturday about 2:30 AM I was sitting up watching an old movie on TV, enjoying some popcorn and cuddling with my honey. I heard voices outside, but as I have said that was not unusual in itself. Then a few minutes latter I heard the sound of a window. It was an old house and not all the windows really opened all that well. The two windows that faced the front porch were stuck with old paint and you had to really strain to open them.
When I heard the window again I reached over and picked up an old 12 gauge Winchester pump shotgun. At the time it was the only weapon I owned except for my hunting guns I stored at my dad's house for safety. When i opened the door to the front room one of two intended house breakers was in the room and the other, who's belly was a little bigger was kinda stuck in the window. I cycled the action on the shotgun, aimed and said "FREEZE!"
The little guy that was in the room had no where to go. His buddy was blocking the window and I was standing in the only other door. He spun around and threw up his hands.
"Hold on mister don't shoot!!" he screamed. His buddy was wiggling like pig in a sack trying to get back out of the stuck window.
"FREEZE!!" I said "Or I will blow your M***er F***ing heads of!!

I had no training. The shotgun was purchased for "home protection' and I had only fired it a couple of times. Now I had a skinny black guy in my front room in low light about to sh*t his pants, one stuck in my front window and an adrenaline rush that was making my knees knock. By this time my live in biker girl had come in behind me and was hollaring "Kill that sorry A**hole!" Then the guy in my front room started to try to talk me out of killing him and whinning about that he was not even armed. The fat boy in the window was starting to wimper and cry and squirm again. Suddenly the guy in the window freed himself and fell out on the front porch. As he ran off the one in my house saw the opportunity to escape and dove for the window. In the next instant I fired a round and the large potted ficus tree by the window would never be the same or the wall behind it.
When the cops arrived I had a would be robber on my front room floor, a shredded house plant and a big hole in my front room wall. I was sitting in a kitchen chair that my girl friend had brought into the room for me and she was out on the curb talking to the neighbors and waiting to flag down the cops.
You know the cops gave me a hard time about firing that round. One of them said that if i had killed or injured him while he was trying to get out I would have been charged. I moved out of that neighborhood a few months later. I do not miss the African-American colony across the road or the break-ins or the old rental house. I sure do miss that rough ass biker chick and that shotgun.
 
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