SC CCW Shoots Restaurant Robber

In 2006 South Carolina enacted a law called 'Protection of Persons and Property Act'. Twice in the wording of the bill they mention "castle doctrine"

Yes SC's Protection of Persons and Property Act applies to people at their place of business.

Section 16-11-440. (A) A person is presumed to have a reasonable fear of imminent peril of death or great bodily injury to himself or another person when using deadly force that is intended or likely to cause death or great bodily injury to another person if the person:

(1) against whom the deadly force is used is in the process of unlawfully and forcefully entering, or has unlawfully and forcibly entered a dwelling, residence, or occupied vehicle, or if he removes or is attempting to remove another person against his will from the dwelling, residence, or occupied vehicle; and

(2) who uses deadly force knows or has reason to believe that an unlawful and forcible entry or unlawful and forcible act is occurring or has occurred.

(C) A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in another place where he has a right to be, including, but not limited to, his place of business, has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his ground and meet force with force, including deadly force, if he reasonably believes it is necessary to prevent death or great bodily injury to himself or another person or to prevent the commission of a violent crime as defined in Section 16-1-60.
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The citizen who used his firearm in this case is not covered by SC's castle doctrine because he was in his place of business - the Waffle House. The citizen who shot Dante Williams does not own the Waffle House.

However, the citizen is covered under Protection of Persons and Property Act by the clause in sub section C which says " A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in another place where he has a right to be.."

The citizen had a right to be there. While I think it should be against the law for a grown man to say "rutti tutti fresh and fruity", it's not, and that's a different restaraunt anyway... so basically the man who shot Dante Williams is covered under South Carolina's Protection of Persons and Property Act, also called South Carolina's castle doctrine.
 
I graduated college in Spartanburg in 2005 and my parents, sisters and brother in law live in Spartanburg and general area still.. I left that place as soon as possible and can't figure out why my family still lives there. It's a dangerous city. I really liked my college, but that's about it!

But to stay on topic, I do appreciate the laws in the state that favor the person defending himself, not the attacker. I seriously doubt the CCW gets charged with anything, based on the small amount of info we were given.
 
Double Naught Spy said:
I am not sure that crime was prevented. The story documents a considerable amount of crime that occurred against the business, each employee, and each patron. That the crimes were not brought to successful completion by the bad guys was prevented, but the crimes definitely occurred.
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An attempted offense is quite different from an offense. For instance, attempted murder is quite distinct from murder, so no I stand by my contention that crimes were definitely prevented in this case, and the severity of crimes was as well.
 
Why would the robbers want to herd the employees and patrons into the back room if they were not wanting to eliminate all witnesses?
 
Nothing to speak of future crimes these two would most likely gone on to commit as well. Even Jesse James was shot up by a town prepared for him. Put a real damper on his crime spree back in the day. Nothing wrong with all the good guys having a firearm.

Not sure why America spends so much energy idolizing creeps like Jesse James, Billy the Kid, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance kid, but we do to our shame. Nothing special about these two creeps that held up the Waffle house either. Time to put the good guy hero back in proper perspective. Time to support CCW across this entire nation and move towards constitutional carry once again.

Thankfully, the situation turned out well with no innocents hurt in this attack. It could have been much worse and I am sure that they would have only been emboldened to do more such holdups where the likelihood of harm to an innocent person would have been quite high.

Time to put his partner away for a good long time.
 
Crimes committed before the good guy drew his weapon were not prevented. After the good guy drew his weapon he prevented an armed robbery (at a minimum) and perhaps one or more homicides. When I think about it, this may be true of all (or nearly all) lawful and successful self-defense uses of a firearm, i.e., the facts that make the self-defense use of a firearm lawful always (or nearly always) require an unlawful act by the bad guy.
 
sagamore said:
Arrest of the second bad guy;
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Thanks, I missed that in the local news.

Looks like at 29 years old the second BG had enough sense to run.

BTW, for those that don't know. Here in SC I have never found one single store, restaurant, etc that has a posting against CCW. This includes large chain stores down to mom/pop stores.
 
We discussed this incident at length on The High Road. Everyone agrees there that it was a job well done by the shooter.

Madmag: Is this area a suburb of a major city? It seems like the area has a lot of problems.
 
I am not sure that crime was prevented. The story documents a considerable amount of crime that occurred against the business, each employee, and each patron. That the crimes were not brought to successful completion by the bad guys was prevented, but the crimes definitely occurred.
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Let me see here:

1. The robbery was foiled; no good person was injured and no money lost.
2. If the BGs had been planning on executing anyone, that crime was stopped before execution (pun intended)
3. Neither one of them will be committing any other robberies or assorted crimes in the future.

Nope, no crimes were prevented here. :rolleyes:
 
The population of Spartanburg is around 150,000. I live about 25 miles away and only go to spartanburg as on a "have to" basis.
 
Things ended up turning out alright for the shooter.

If the debate is over whether he should have drawn his pistol, I agree he should have drawn. If the debate is over whether he should have shot the gunman Dante Williams - I agree he should have shot him.

But there are a few things here tactically that he could have done better and could have really gone badly.

1) Trying to hold the perpetrators for police.

IMO, he should have just drawn his own firearm and shot. Period.

Dante Williams could have shot him, or could have just "started shooting" and shot other patrons. The accomplice could have done the same thing. An initial report said that the accomplice was unarmed, but a subsequent report says that "two armed men entered the restaurant and tried to rob it." and:
"Deputies arrested Kenneth Jowan Craig, 29, and charged him with armed robbery and possession of a deadly weapon during a violent crime."

2) According to another report, he got into a physical scuffle with the second robber Kenneth Jowan Craig.


the second suspect tried to leave. They said the customer tried to stop him, leading to a struggle and the suspect went for the customer's gun.

The customer fired one shot and the second suspect fled on foot, according to deputies.
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http://www.foxcarolina.com/story/165...-armed-robbery

I'm glad that no innocent people were hurt, and the citizen should be commended for a defensive gun use that stopped a crime, but there are some bad tactics that were employed.



.
 
Madmag: Is this area a suburb of a major city? It seems like the area has a lot of problems.
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I live in SC but about 70 miles from Spartanburg. I think this was is a city area. It has a reputation for lots of crime.
 
Why would the robbers want to herd the employees and patrons into the back room if they were not wanting to eliminate all witnesses?
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Crowd control. They can't watch people over a large area so they confine them. This isn't an uncommon tactic.

When I think about it, this may be true of all (or nearly all) lawful and successful self-defense uses of a firearm, i.e., the facts that make the self-defense use of a firearm lawful always (or nearly always) require an unlawful act by the bad guy.
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Right. So a robbery was prevented, but attempted robbery occurred. You still have crime being committed. This is why these events don't produce noticeable changes in crime rates, even when the bad guys are killed.
 
This is the same sheriff that offered 30 women free training for CCW about a month ago after a woman was forced off the road after being followed from a convenience store. She was unarmed and was murdered. That incident was discussed on this forum.
 
Subsection A actually deals with "castles" - residence, dwelling, vehicle etc..

Subsection C just says:

A person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in another place where he has a right to be, including, but not limited to, his place of business, has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his ground and meet force with force, including deadly force, if he reasonably believes it is necessary to prevent death or great bodily injury to himself or another person or to prevent the commission of a violent crime as defined in Section 16-1-60.
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Not sure why they mixed place of business with any other place a person has a right to be but anyway...

You can never tell what a jury is going to do but, in Illinois, most juries would consider being herded into a room as being in immnent peril. There have been too many instances where employees and patrons were herded into a room and killed execution style, including the infamous Palatine Brown's Chicken Massacre.

It may not matter under SC's Protection of Persons and Property Act any way because he also had the right to use deadly force to prevent a violent crime. The authorities aren't splitting hairs in this case, they obviously beleive the law covers the patron. I guess we'd have to see if the relatives of the deceased or the remaining assailant brings a challenge of it to court.


But the whole thing of being herded into a room - in Illinois at least would meet the criteria for resonable belief of impending death.
 
The sadness of that life lost happened a good bit of time before the bullet hit him.
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Yes and no:

It is sad, but no life was lost. This guy did not lose his life, he threw it away, gambling it for the money in the till. Guess he did not value it much...... that is sad.
 
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