I suspect that the robber’s intent was to knock the kid over and escape, not kill the kid. But the kid still has every right to defend himself, and the robber took that gamble and lost.
Police have identified the suspect as one Solomon Grundy.
And in a musical version of this story, it’d sound like this (at 1:17 and 2:39, anyway… and yes, they were falling on the floor of their studio from laughter when they recorded this).
So’s his garage, most likely. I’m glad it isn’t me that has to clean up that mess.
It’s probably a display sword. Some of them can be quite sharp. I regularly use the one I referenced above to chop up menacing packing tubes and the like. Unlikely a college student would own a real one. They are a tad pricey.
Huh. I’ve still got ours stashed in our place. I assumed they’d be more bark than, um, bite… And yeah, pretty much the cost was the only barrier to me buying one that would hold an edge properly.
It depends upon your definition of “real.” A sword doesn’t have to be old–or heirloom, or collectible–to be a well-made weapon capable of properly holding an edge.
They forgot to mention in the article that the intruder was dressed like The Gimp.
No, but to be a “real samurai sword” it should have been made for and used by a samurai. Since those have been kinda scarce since the Meiji Restoration, the sword is likely a reproduction or a wall-hanger. Doesn’t mean it can’t cause damage, of course. Just look at some of the holes in my ceiling where I was a little enthusiastic with my practice. 
I don’t think the student can credibly argue that he was aiming for the burglar’s hand, because the burglar apparently also had a serious chest wound. This seems to suggest that the student just swung in his general direction while the burglar had his hand out, presumably either to grab at that student or to ward off the blow.
And with a sword that sharp, I think it’s reasonable to assume that, as with a gun, any time one uses it against another person, it is potentially deadly.
I agree that duty to retreat does not appear to be an issue.
So the case boils down to whether the student was reasonable in believing that the use of deadly force was necessary; i.e., that the burglar posed a deadly threat. Under these circumstances, where it’s obviously a burglar and it’s not clear whether he has a weapon, I can’t imagine them charging the student with any crime.
Unless the burglar – actually, robber – was naked, how could the resident be sure he was unarmed, instead of having a gun or knife tucked into the back of his pants, etc.? Plus there’s the sundry objects to be found in the garage itself… there were probably lots of improvised “weapons” at the ready, should the guy turn violent.
I hope the sword-wielder is spared any prosecution.
Sorry - we weren’t on the same page. I was talking about a “real sword,” not a “real Samurai sword.” There are plenty of real swords (Samurai-style and otherwise) being made in modern times that are perfectly good weapons, but I understand that they aren’t “real Samurai.”
This incident happened literally around the corner from where my wife and i lived in Baltimore. We used to walk by the house every day on our way to the Hopkins campus.
The neighborhood used to get a fair number of break-ins, and after dark there would also be periodic armed hold-ups. A couple of years ago, there were three armed hold-ups within 50 yards of our front door in the space of a few weeks. There are quite a lot of trees in that neighborhood, and the mugger would often wait in the shadows until someone drove home and was parking their car on the street, and when the person exited their car the mugger would jump out and stick a gun in their face and demand their money.
Yup, I actually lived on that very block (342 E University was my place, this was somewhere on the 300 block, I haven’t heard the exact address) for my junior and senior years at JHU. It’s not a terrible neighborhood by any means - I never had any safety issues while stumbling home drunk at 2:30 in the morning, for instance - but it’s not a great neighborhood either. I knew two or three other students with houses in the same general area who were burglarized to various degrees over the course of the two years. For my part though I was never witness to so much as a hint of crime, which makes me pretty lucky I guess.
Our house had a little more in the way of alarm systems and a little less in the way of weaponry, which would have made for a less interesting story, anyways.
That’s the problem with rushing someone holding a sword; the guy holding it doesn’t even have to swing it to do you harm. It’s not like a gun, which is pretty inert until someone pulls the trigger (and a rush might startle the guy long enough for you to grab the gun). But a long sharp blade? He just has to hold it tight and let you run into it (or onto it), or slice up your hands trying to grab it. If Mr Burglar was still around, I’d like to ask “So, were you gambling it was a fake sword, or are you just really stupid?”
Or if the guy turned the sword around on the student. Even if the burglar was unarmed, his intent could still be deadly, given the deadly weapon in the room.
These arguments are a little silly. A student confronted a burgler with a long criminal record in his home and slashed him with a sword when he lunged for him. Do you really think any DA in the country is going to try and prosecute the kid for anything? It’s a clear case of self-defense. The only time it becomes an issue is when people become excessive in their zeal to defend themselves. For example, if the kid followed the burgler out and then lopped off his head to finish him off. Or if he had his friends grab him so he could go at him with the sword. None of that happened. No DA wants the political liability of trying to prosecute a kid defending his home against some piece of shit no one cares about.
I hope somebody cleans the sword right away. Blood is hell on the finish.
Hell, yes. If it were I, they’d throw me under the jail and brick it in.
Depends on whether the DA in question thinks he can make political capital out of it. Hope the kid’s not a lacrosse player.