[gunsmith]

Like Ron Dixon,another uppity peasant
had the nerve to defend his life!
He will probably serve time for this :banghead: :cuss: :fire:
NY City- it's worse then PRK!
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/news/wabc_052603_harlemshoot2.html

[benewton]

This story is a PLANT!

No store could have been robbed, 'cause the POLICE protect us all.

Thus, there's no reason for a personal firearm, since we are safe and secure from all possible harm.

Plus, by accident, of course, you could possibly hurt somebody with one of those things, should you have one.

\Sarcasm off\

With a .22? Gotta be close, a good shot, or just plain lucky.

May my attempt be as good!

[2dogs]

Here's another take on the story:



TERRORIZED NEIGHBORHOOD MERCHANTS HAIL VIGILANTE JUSTICE

By DOUGLAS MONTERO
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

May 28, 2003 -- THE reign of terror is over - they hope.
Merchants along a six-block stretch of Frederick Douglass Boulevard are applauding the clerks at a neighborhood bodega for fatally shooting one of three stickup men - a crew that had been terrorizing the neighborhood for months.

"They were like an old-style Mafia - the way that they would intimidate the neighborhood stores," said Alberto Campocano, the owner of the Leonel Mini Market, where Luquarn Washington, 19, was shot Sunday night.

"Over the past three to four months, there have been about 20 robberies, and many people didn't say anything to police because they were afraid."

There is no proof positive that Washington was mixed up with the gang, but the m.o. of Sunday night's shooting fits the mold.

Several merchants told The Post that three, sometimes four young men, all armed with handguns and black stockings over their heads, would bum-rush into stores at lightning speed.



Senan Azafary, 48, recalls the May 16 robbery at the Douglass Food Mart on 126th Street, where he and a customer were pushed into the store's rear bathroom - with a 9 mm pointed at their faces.

"I was saying, 'Please don't kill me, don't kill me,' " Azafary said. "I kept thinking about my six kids, and I kept telling them, 'I'll give you whatever you want.' "

The gang targeted the cash register, the Lotto-machine register, Newport cigarettes, calling cards, jewelry and the wallets of their victims. And they would usually strike between 7:30 and 10:30 p.m.

Store owners and their workers say they'd like to have guns to protect themselves, but the process of getting a permit was too painstaking.

Conrado Gomez, 59, said he wished he had a gun when the same gang rushed into the grocery store where he worked on West 130th Street.

At gunpoint, he was shoved under a sink, his wallet taken and a silver chain ripped from his neck.

"Shoot anybody who goes through the door," he recalls hearing one of the thugs bark at his accomplices.

"I was just hoping that no one would do anything stupid," Gomez said.

José Acosta, 69, sits in a jail cell because he allegedly pulled out an illegal gun and took on three armed thugs who seemed used to steamrolling unarmed, hardworking immigrants.

Let's hope there are more José Acostas out there who can help this Harlem neighborhood end this reign of terror.

[ball3006]

the PRNY has had the Sullivan Law since 1908, or so. It's against the law for most newyorkers to possess a handgun. Where were the cops???? If a neighborhood is having problems such as this, someone needs to open a donut shop and the cops will come around. Whether or not they do anything is something else.....chris3

[Battler]

I despise how the author said "vigilante justice". It looks like a case of self defense - the storeowner didn't hunt the criminals, the criminals attacked him.

[Standing Wolf]

Store owners and their workers say they'd like to have guns to protect themselves, but the process of getting a permit was too painstaking.

By design: leftists love victims.

[Shaggy]

I'll tell you what really tics me off about these stories besides the fact that they are in toruble for "unlicensed" guns....oh my gosh...unlicensed guns in the hands of honest folk..... anyway.....what really tics me off is they are called vigilantes.

It is not vigilante justice to defend yourself or others.

A vigilante is a person who goes after somebody after the fact. Like shooting the perp coming out of the courthouse while he's on trial. That's vigilantism(is that a word?) Same thing happend in Cincinnati. Guy was carrying a gun in a bar, concealed. Two thugs walk in waving handguns around and one of them puts the gun to this guys friends head and says hand over your wallet or I'll blow your brains out. The guy who was carrying shot one of the thugs and they labled him a VIGILANTE. All the news story's had the word vigilante in the headline. The guy who did the shooting of the thugs did get a no bill in the grand jury though. Even though it is illegal everywhere to carry a firearm in a liquor establishment. The headline read "Vigilante gets off"

[2dogs]

CRUEL TWIST: SELF-DEFENSE SLAYER MAY FACE DEPORTATION

By DOUGLAS MONTERO
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------




May 29, 2003 -- A HARLEM grocery clerk-turned-vigilante could face an even greater opponent if he is convicted of gun charges, the U.S. government said.
José Acosta, 69, who has been a legal resident of the United States for about 25 years, may be deported if he is convicted of using an illegal gun to shoot one of three armed thugs who tried to rob the grocery store in which he worked Sunday night.

"Anyone convicted of a weapons-possession charge could be placed in a removal proceeding," said an INS official.

The rule applies to any gun-possession charge regardless of the circumstances, the official said, explaining that the decision to deport an offender is in the hands of an immigration court judge.

The news has infuriated supporters of the vigilante, who believe that he shouldn't have even spent 21/2 nights in jail for shooting suspected stickup man Luquarn Washington, 19.

"How about if we deport the three kids who broke into the store," said the Rev. Brian Jordan, an immigrant advocate at St. Francis of Assisi Church in Manhattan.

Manhattan DA staffers declined to discuss the issue, perhaps because they face the same dilemma encountered by their counterparts in Brooklyn and Queens who were legally bound to prosecute two vigilantes who used illegal guns to kill attackers.



The Acosta case, however, raises the stakes because a man considered a hero by local merchants who were being terrorized by a gang of thugs could be thrown out of the country.

"What? I didn't know that," said Acosta's shocked son, José Acosta Jr., of Scarsdale, whose wife gave birth to a boy Monday.

"That's a huge problem. I'm definitely going to fight" the immigration officials who may seek to deport his dad.

Flustered, the son said, "What bothers me is the whole concept: the reality that you penalize someone for defending themselves."

A lawyer told the Harlem vigilante not to talk to the media, but his son said: "He didn't even know that the guy was hurt until Monday."

http://www.nypost.com/commentary/76997.htm

[Jim March]

Don't spread this beyond this board.

I just had a phone conversation with Father Brian Jordan. He's going to give my contact info to Acosta's lawyers, so that I can help them build a racial discrimination case in permit issuance on behalf of Mr. Acosta.

(No, I'm not kidding. I've always said that going on the offense on CCW issues in civil court is the *preferred* method, but playing defense in criminal court isn't impossible.)