See, here is the problem with even trying to discuss this with you: What I posted wasn’t a plan. It was a brief description of of a particular condition that must be met before I will shoot another human being. It wasn’t detailed or exhaustive, nor was it meant to be.
I agree. The police train 24-7 for this and know the average scenarios inside and out.
Absolutely not. There was an investigation by the police at the time and it was ruled self-defense on the part of my husband. The truck thief had definitely threatened him with a knife long enough to be a called a sword, and as my husband is disabled he is physically less able to flee or otherwise extract himself form a threatening situation.
Also…
Indiana is a castle law state. The threat of physical harm (aside from waving a big-ass knife around, they were able to identify the thief in question - he had put several other people in the hospital with that knife prior to our encounter), the fact it occurred on our property, and that my husband is less physically able to flee made it pretty clear cut under state law. So… yes, in fact, there are places and circumstances where you can use force to defend yourself even outside the walls of your home.
Frankly, if he had just taken the truck he probably wouldn’t have been shot, but the second he started to move on the husband, the husband wasn’t going to wait to get cut up first. It wasn’t like anyone kept firing on the guy, as soon as he left the property (the arrow didn’t incapacitate him, even if it did injure him) and was no longer a threat that was it for the violent defense.
We’ve got truck insurance, too - what was most concerning was the thief’s threat to a member of the household.
Considering you live in a culture where guns aren’t just common but encouraged, I would be assuming everyone had a gun, most especially the criminal who has already proven he’s a threat by breaking into my home. Banking on his not having a gun and is willing to use it is foolishness. I can’t see the logic of, in regards to weapons, assuming that the victim is ever going to be one step ahead of the aggressor. You’re not James Bond.
If I bought a gun for home defense, it would probably be about the most valuable thing in my apartment, and therefore most in need of being defended. So, I’d have to get a safe and lock it up to keep it from being stolen, which would render it nigh-useless for a home defense situation seeing as how it’d take too long to get out of the safe.
So, no.
I can’t tell if this is sarcasm or an entirely unrealistic idea of police competence.
Just buy a gun to keep people from stealing it.
If you want to assume stuff that is decidedly not true, I can’t stop you. Ranting and raving over something that doesn’t fit reality isn’t really sensible though, and the fact is, the vast majority of people committing criminal acts are unarmed or not armed with firearms. There are a lot of people who have been beaten, killed, mutilated, and/or raped with no firearm present at all.
I can’t see the logic in ignoring the millions of successful defensive gun uses per year, or the actual statistics in how many criminals are caught with weapons.
Please furnish me with these statistics. I suspect they may not be as clear-cut as you imagine.
Nor, I suspect, are they as clear cut as you wish to present them. Statististics on tDGU are the most controversial item in thegun control debate. Both sides can present numbers that appear to support their POV…you already knew that.
My father has had a gun for the past few decades and has never used it. Granted, it’s a (I believe) bolt-action Springfield M1903 that hasn’t been fired in 80 years, but it’s still a gun.
Well, I’m not claiming to have any statistics to back me up, I’m just trying to look at it logically. It makes more sense to me that in a gun culture, criminals are very likely to have a gun with them during their illicit activities. I can’t fathom why anyone would think they wouldn’t.
I think it would depend on the type of crime being committed. Armed robbery, most likely going to be armed. Simple assault, I think the chances are much lower. But since this thread is about home defense, let’s look at a cite from a recent thread that talked about household burglary. Of the 3.7M burglaries, someone was present during approximately 1M of those. In approximately 266K, a household member became a victim of a violent crime. If you refer to table 18, of those 266K violent crime victims, a weapon was present in approximately 30.1% of those incidents.
I don’t think this speaks exactly to the remaining 750K incidents where someone was home but did not become a victim of a violent crime, but in the cases where that does happen, near 2/3 of the time the criminal did not have a gun with them, or any weapon at all.
The reason why people would think that a criminal may not have a gun with them during their illicit activities is because often times they do not. While you may be trying to look at it logically, at least in cases of violence during home burglary, your conclusion is unfounded.
If we are going to try to apply logic to the situation, then we would first have to make the assumption that criminals, as a group, behave logically. Do they?
But then…
Ah, it’s guns all the way down! 
Already own. Currently live in one of those “safest cities of size X” in a community of almost zero crime as well. Firearm is accessible in case of emergencies.
Have used a firearm defensively during the LA earthquake as I caught someone coming in through my apartment window (ground floor unit). He ran off - and I was not going to shoot through the open window.
According to the FBI, “strong-arm tactics were used in 42.5 percent, firearms in 41.0 percent, and knives or cutting instruments in 7.8 percent. Other dangerous weapons were used in 8.8 percent of robberies in 2012.” https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2012/crime-in-the-u.s.-2012/violent-crime/robbery
You can look at the Wiki page on defensive gun use, since it’s obvious you’re going to ignore any specific cite I list: Defensive gun use - Wikipedia If you believe the low end estimates, then it’s only hundreds of thousands per year, not millions, but still is a huge number that you’re simply discounting out of hand.
Not going to bother with any more detailed statistics than that.
Lock the bedroom door before you go to bed each night.
Not true.