I’m not sure if anyone clearly answered your question, but you have it right. If you and a partner go downtown to commit a felony and you don’t have a gun but he does, even if you do not know he has a gun, and he kills someone during the commition of the crime, you are now charged with murder during a felony too. Getaway car driver is just as responsible even if he stayed in the car the whole time.
Even though you didn’t shoot, didn’t carry a gun, you get the same charges. Typically the police use this to convince you to testify against your partner in exchange for a lessor charge. Because they really want the shooter.
Many a poor boy sitting in prison asking himself “what the hell happened!??” I thought we were just stealing beer and cigarettes and now I’m in jail for life!
Because I believe the death penalty is not appropriate for a robbery? Because I believe that even if it is, we are all (even criminals) entitled to due process and the protection of that is one of the foundations of a just a society? Because I believe that nobody should ever calmly walk over and unload a gun into an unconcious unarmed human being?
I know that his use of force was excessive and I know that you’re all right about condoning vigilantism but I just can’t change my opinion on this one.
Yes, the pharmacist went too far but that kid shouldn’t have tried to rob him. I’d rather err on the side of the citizen defending his business than the criminal trying to rob him.
This reminds me of something funny that happened yesterday.
As I drove along I-270 I noticed that many of the cars were violating the speed limit. Which was clearly posted!
Worried that law-abiding motorists might be injured by these reckless lawbreakers, I pulled out my (legal) handgun and began shooting the driver of every car that passed me.
That forced most of them off the road, involuntarily. However there were a few that that seemed to be trying to drive away after spinning out onto the shoulder. Obviously I had to stop and pump additional shots into them at close range.
When I woke up today I was worried that possibly my actions could lead to serious legal problems, so it’s good to see so many people in this thread supporting personal administration of the death penalty, no matter what the actual legal penalty for a certain offense might be.
You would and should. See it just seems so hypocritical that it would have been okay to kill him with the first shot to the head but not okay to kill him while he is laying there. His own fault that he didn’t bring a savage enough attack to Ersland that day. Dead is dead is dead. Ersland produced a savage enough defense to keep himself alive.
And I really can’t fathom how it could be any different to try and stay alive during wartime as opposed to “peacetime”.
Isn’t it also frowned upon to shoot a wounded and helpless enemy solider in a war?
I think so.
Is it really hard to understand the objection to shooting a wounded, helpless, non threatening individual even though he may have been threatening moments before?
That’s the question for me. We have no real way of knowing but executing a helpless wounded person, criminal or not, teenager or not, doesn’t seem like self defense in any scenario.
You can’t separate the two actions in this case. They are related. If you walk up to a person you see laying on the sidewalk and shoot him out of the blue, that is murder.
I’m kind of on the fence on this one. The first shot was obviously self-defense. No reasonable human being would argue with that. The other shots are tough to gauge. I don’t think you should be able to shoot an unarmed, unconscious man even if he just robbed you. But both of those weren’t necessarily true or wouldn’t necessarily remain true. The owner probably didn’t know the guy was unarmed. His partner was, so why take chances? The unconscious thing is a tougher call. Someone a few posts back said the owner’s claim was that the guy had regained consciousness. Even if that wasn’t true, it may have became true in another minute or two. I don’t know. I would prefer that he had just held the gun towards him, but in the heat of the moment, you don’t think so well. I don’t like it, and I think his intent may have been murder, but without more facts against him, I probably wouldn’t convict him. I definitely don’t feel sorry for the robber though. And it’s definitely retarded to compare this to going to the robber’s house some other day and shooting him out of vengence.
As for a couple of other things, why should he have fled? For one thing, that’s his pharmacy. He shouldn’t have to run and leave it in the hands of armed robbers. He has a right to defend what’s his. Second, the other pharmacists (techs or whatever) may have still been in there somewhere. Nothing I saw indicated they left the building, or that he knew they left the building, so he could have been leaving them defenseless with an armed robber had he fled.
Furthermore, while I think the other robbers are sacks of shit, I think it’s ridiculous to charge them with murder. That would make sense if they went to commit this heist and an innocent bystander got shot, even if by the owner trying to defend himself. (Although that’s pretty much the definition of manslaughter.) But in this case it was one of their own. Charging them for murder doesn’t really make me feel sorry for them, but it’s completely illogical.
PS: I didn’t read through this entire thread, just the first two pages and last page, so I may have missed something. I’m not reading hundreds of posts to catch up.
And the more I read about this case, the more I feel that the Pharmacist was in the wrong.
I’d draw my weapon to defend myself. I’d shoot someone if I felt like my life or safety was threatened. And yes, I’d kill someone who wouldn’t stop, as terrible a thing as that would be. But to shoot someone, injuring them, then return and shoot them while they’re just laying there? A line was crossed - I don’t know if it’s “murder” for the sole reason that I can believe the pharmacist was running on adrenaline, but it’s certainly (IMO) some sort of manslaughter.
I agree with some in here that the law should err on the side of the crime victim. My opinion is that to err on the side of victim in this case is to bend the intent of the law on self-defense to the point of breaking.
I’m quite happy with the adults getting charged with felony murder. For one thing, they were the instigators of the armed robbery, who sent two teens in to live or die in their place. They’re fully responsible for the death of Parsons (and no, this doesn’t excuse Ersland–responsibility isn’t zero-sum).
The general reasoning behind the felony murder charge is that you’re responsible for the consequences of your bad actions, whatever they are; that by undertaking those bad actions, you’re accepting responsibility for their outcome, foreseen or not. I have no problem with that. I don’t think the adults should escape responsibility just because they sent two kids in their place.
You mean the part where I watched him walk past the downed robber twice turning his back, rooting through a drawer, and not appearing to give him a second thought, until he walked up and shot him? What’s inaccurate is implying that this guy thought the downed robber was a threat to his life, and that the only way to ensure his personal safety was to pump 5 bullets into him.
Yeah that’s the part all right. Now that you’re carefully rewording it I think you’re aware of what’s inaccurate about it. Needless or careless hyperbole in a situation where small details may matter quite a bit doesn’t help the discussion.