I know, it’s just so darn difficult to remember to keep extremely dangerous individuals within your line of sight, instead of turning your back on them to root around in a drawer. Such a fine point of self defense.
No, because it takes far more to kill someone than to roll them for their wallet. Note the number of assaults in the US v. the number of murders annually.
Which has shit to do with your scenario that I responded to. In that situation, the criminal who planned on a career of armed robbery was always the threat, not the guy who was manning the store.
Yes we are. My comment was in reference to you suggesting that robbers would now shoot from the bushes if we just start to shoot them while they are robbing us.
So, I’ll pose it as a formal question. Would you gamble with your life or a loved one’s by just standing by and hoping they will just leave with the money and not kill somebody. Or would you take the initiative and make the chances of that ZERO by killing the robber first.
Happens all the time because oddly enough, when confronted with real threats, people don’t always act the way they are supposed to. Go figure…
One of the most effective tricks I used when quarterbacking was looking in the opposite direction of my intended receiver. Used peripheral vision. Got 'em every time.
Unfortunately, it’s a problem here in Texas and other places as well. Mostly gangs. An ititiation thing.
Yes, but that’s in a country where muggers aren’t killed 100% of the time. You posited that. I think raising the stakes would make more, not less, trouble.
No, not always. Shooting him in the head proved effective in neutralizing the threat.
And even still, the law abiding pharmacist was still a lesser threat to anyone not attempting to rob him. You’ll note that nobody, except for the bad guys, got shot that day.
I’d shoot him were I in a position to do so. I wouldn’t go do something else then come back to finish the job, because that’s murder. And unnecessary.
My question to you is, what if you knocked the man unconscious with a rock instead of a bullet. Would you crush the head of an unconscious person with a rock? How would you argue standing next to an unconscious man is a situation in which you are in such danger that killing him is necessary? That’s how I see the pharmacist’s situation. The danger was past. The threat had been neutralized.
I’m not a lawyer, but I seriously believe that would be mentioned often in a court in Canada. The US may differ, but I was raised here, and self-defense laws aren’t the same. The fellow’s actions may not be murder in his state; the mere belief that a threat is present may be sufficient. But when it comes to asking if he’s a folk hero or a murderer, I vote murderer.
As for the hypotheticals, I also believe that a petty thief who knows just getting caught will mean his death will not be too concerned about killing someone. Or maybe they will be concerned about it. But they’ll still do it to avoid getting caught. Not all of them, sure, but some. The crime will come to fit the punishment.
So are you saying that you would do something to deliberately provoke a reaction in the downed robber, so that you would have plausible justification for killing him?
I’m sorry, but it seems to me you’re using ‘threat’ as some sort of social designator. There’s no threatometer on which the robber sits higher than the pharmacist and anyone not trying to rob him. This isn’t about good guys and bad guys, this is about whether or not person A posed a threat to person B when person B killed him. As far as I can see, person A was well and truly not a threat. As I said, I’m willing to believe the law may come down on person B’s side but that doesn’t change my opinion of B’s actions much.
Here is the deal, I was responding to the nonsense that you posted way up there…
I stuck with it the entire time while you scurried about with different topics apparently forgetting what inspired our little circle jerk in the first place. Your question was this:
My only response was that even if on the ground and bleeding, the shitbag criminal in this situation is a bigger threat to YOU than a law abiding shop keeper. See, the pharm used his gun to defend his life. The shitbag and his pal used theirs to threaten lives.
Not when he took five bullets he wasn’t.
At that point there were no more threats.
I wonder if people are treating this differently because it was in a store rather than a home.
Imagine being the victim of an armed home invasion. Some of the intruders have guns pointed at your daughter’s head.
Do you make a bet that only the ones currently aiming their guns are armed?
Now say you shoot one intruder, and they go down.
Do you make a bet that they aren’t faking and won’t regain consciousness?
Do you ask your daughter to check their pockets for weapons and wave her hand in front of their face to see if they are really out?
Betting is fine most of the time. Within 30 seconds of being attacked by armed intruders may not be one of those times.
There is no “law abiding shop keeper” in this story. Only a couple of stupid crooks and a gunhappy murderer whose continued firing of a weapon beyond the point of actual defense made him more of a threat than the original idiots.
I have little to no sympathy for the robber up to the point where he fell, but your wild claims of “threat” from a person on the ground along with your defense of murder on the grounds that “they started it” are simply not compelling.
This is ridiculous.
Even if you think the shop keeper is a murderer, it is absurd to say he was more of a threat than the gunmen who invaded his store and threatened to kill him.
It boggles the mind even imagining how you came up with that.
“See, he is more of a threat, because armed robbers never hurt anyone, but all it takes for this shop keeper to shoot a robber is for his store to be invaded by gunmen threatening to kill him.”
It boggles your mind, maybe.
Let’s say I walked into the store as he was crouched down and killing the would-be robber. He has at least 1 bullet left, and he’s looking at an eyewitness who will be telling police “I walked in and he was shooting this guy on the ground over and over and over again”. If he shoots me right then, it will be his story alone that the police will hear.
You don’t think that’s a dangerous man?
Let’s say I walked in after you, and he didn’t like my haircut so he started shooting at me. You’re right, he does sound dangerous now.
It turns out he was preparing to go on a random killing spree before the gunmen entered his store and threatened to kill him.
If anything, we should be thanking the armed robbers. If it wasn’t for their silly prank of invading stores and sticking guns up to people’s faces, this guy might have done some real damage.
I simply read the stories for comprehension. First he ran down the street shooting after the crook who was no longer threatening him, endangering anyone on the street.
Then he fired a gun into a person at close range with no concern for whether those rounds would ricochet.
So, we have one idiot who waved a gun around, (and did not even fire it when under fire, himself), and one idiot who appears to have fired around ten rounds in the middle of a city. The shopkeeper is clearly more of a threat to any bystander than the crook.