Another example of why intervening in a domestic is a bad idea

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Jeff White

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Guest who confronted Glen Carbon man over beating of wife is fatally shot, police say http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/...cle_9d209ab1-9445-5817-a9c8-74311bb6b739.html

Updated at 5 p.m. with suspect charged.

GLEN CARBON • A Glen Carbon man is accused of beating his wife and then fatally shooting a guest at his home who tried to intervene.

Steven McGauley, 46, was charged Tuesday with two counts of first-degree murder and one count of domestic battery, the Madison County Sheriff's Office said.

McGauley allegedly shot Steven W. Flack, 43, of Belleville on Sunday, the sheriff's office said. The shooting happened at McGauley's home in the 100 block of Hillcrest Drive. Police said several people were at the home at the time.


McGauley had beaten his wife and was confronted by Flack, police say. Their verbal confrontation escalated into a physical fight and then McGauley retrieved a gun and shot Flack several times, police said.

Flack was found unresponsive in McGauley's backyard about 8 p.m. and taken to Anderson Hospital in Maryville, where he was pronounced dead. He died from gunshot wounds to the chest and abdomen, coroner Steven P. Nonn said in a press release.

Judge Neal Schroeder ordered McGauley held without bail.

The coroner's office said Flack lived in Edwardsville. A man who answered the phone there Tuesday evening said no one who could check Flack's address would be in until Wednesday.

Perhaps if the victim had been armed the outcome might have been different.....But the best thing the victim could have done was left the scene and called the police.

Domestics are tricky things to deal with and it's never a good idea to involve yourself in someone else's business.
 
Our state probably would have charged the victim with assault on his neighbor if he'd lived.
We recently had a motorcyclist (and CCW holder), who was filling up at a gas station, assaulted by a motorist who had taken issue with the bikers lane changing technique a few minutes earlier. The biker warned the attacker repeatedly that he was armed, and backed away until he was up against the pump- he fired twice (with a .45), hitting the motorist in the leg and hand, stopping the attack, then called the police himself. The whole thing was clearly caught on the stations security camera.
The biker was charged with ADW and unlawful discharge of a firearm and jailed for four days. The "victim" was not initially charged. When the tape was released, the DA quickly dropped the charges amid mounting public outrage.
The motorist left the hospital without being discharged and disappeared, turns out he had out of state warrants- last I heard he still hadn't turned up.
 
Guest who confronted Glen Carbon man over beating of wife is fatally shot, police say http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/...cle_9d209ab1-9445-5817-a9c8-74311bb6b739.html



Perhaps if the victim had been armed the outcome might have been different.....But the best thing the victim could have done was left the scene and called the police.

Domestics are tricky things to deal with and it's never a good idea to involve yourself in someone else's business.

Kinda hard to leave in the middle of a beating...eh? I mean, otherwise why wouldnt everybody just walk away from a good beatin'? And sometimes, cant leave after either...

OTOH, I can see a couple both being armed all the time at home, esp. if one knows the other has a temper....that would certainly prevent being ambushed when your significant other decides you need a beatin'. Cuz, you know, guns are magic and just appear in your hand when you need them....

Of course I'd get involved in domestic abuse I observed...but I may not intercede physically. There are other means and others trained to do so.
 
Kinda hard to leave in the middle of a beating...eh? I mean, otherwise why wouldnt everybody just walk away from a good beatin'? And sometimes, cant leave after either...

I think that Jeff was referring to the man who was killed should have left, then called police from a "safe" distance. It's unlikely that the killer would have let the woman he was beating up leave without following her.
 
One late night, returning from my part time job, as a Bouncer in Liverpool UK, passing a bus stop, 2 am?
Buses do not run till 4 am. A man was smacking a woman around the head, hard! I pulled up and laid him out.

The woman is now on her knees, protecting the downed beater "Leave my husband alone" she said.
Me? I just drove off.
 
Domestics suck. Plain and simple. They suck. They suck. Suck. Suck. Suck. Have I mentioned how much they suck?

You get called to a domestic by X. X wants Y to stop beating them. You get there, you arrest Y and X flips into defense mode and jumps on YOU for arresting Y even though X called to make the complaint. Think it doesn't happen? I can remember addresses where we had to go over a dozen times to keep make Y stop beating X, and X decides NOT to aid in prosecution.

Domestics suck.

Ugh.

So here we have Goober Number One beating his wife. He has already demonstrated a proclivity toward violent behavior. Yes, it is true that abusive male spouses are often cowards who will shrink from a confrontation with another man, and take out their frustrations on their spouses when they get home. Or, they are dunken abusers, who get drunk and get violent. Okay, I get it, I have dealt with every tyoe...but they have demonstrated a violent tendency so caution is the operative word. So, Goober Number One is beating his wife. The friend/neighbor, whatever the relationships sees this, recognizes that it is wrong and intervenes. I can't say he is wrong, or fault him because apparently it did stop the assaultive behavior right up to the time Goober Number one retrieves a gun and shoots him dead.

That's a bad outcome.

What's the lesson here? Maybe, even if you know you can wipe the floor with Goober Number One (because there is a high probability that he's a coward anyway)...you should just slip away and call 911 and have guys and gals who wear blue or tan show up with their friends who have the authority to remove Goober Number One and put him into handcuffs and a small room with bars on it and let the man with the black robe sanction him further. Now with you as a corroborative witness the prosecution will have a MUCH easier time securing a conviction even without the help of the abused wife. Yeah, it's a hard choice...but sometimes a coward with a gun is still dangerous.

The possibility that things would have been different if the victim (the one who wound up dead) had been armed is actually not much more than a "what if" because do we know that the assault on the wife rose to the level of "immediate and otherwise unavoidable danger of death or grave bodily harm" thereby providing justification for an armed response? Even pulling the gun could have been construed as ADW, especially if the wife was not a cooperative witness and didn't back up the claim of the intervening neighbor.

Did I mention that domestics suck?

I can relate a story of a 20 year old college kid who was home for the weekend. The kid was at his dad's house in Prescott, AZ. At about 0200 the phone rings, the kid's older sister in on the phone crying asking to talk to their dad.

The kid calls his dad, and hears dad ask "Did he hit you?" and the kid who was 6'4" 240lbs, and a baseball player at the college he went to puts on his sneakers, runs out to his Jeep and peels out to his sister's home two miles away.

When he arrives at the home of his sister, he jumps out of his Jeep, runs to the door and his sister opens it and he sees a nasty bruise on his sister's neck consistent with a choking and a swollen eye.

The brother in law, seeing the large, muscular, younger brother in law jumps over the couch as runs into the hallway bathroom, whereupon the kid runs past his sister and crashes through the door of the bathroom, literally tearing it off the hinges, to find his brother in law cowering in the bathtub, and he proceeds to drag the abusive brother in law through the house by his ponytail into the back yard and proceeds to issue a vicious punitive beating that lasted until the father and older brother arrive about three minutes behind him and pulled the kid off the battered and bleeding brother in law who has literally crapped his pants and urinated all over himself.

There is momentary speculation whether or not the kid has killed the abusive brother in law. The sister, who is a nurse checks for a pulse, finds one, and then finds the brother in law is actually playing possum because he is afraid the kid will renew the beating.

The older brother and father interpose themselves between the kid and the supine brother in law who says...."I'm gonna call the cops. You're goin to jail".

Both the older brother and the father had to grab the kid to keep him from finishing the job he started.

The sister then said "No you're not. If you even think about it, I am going to tell them you choked and punched me then went after him with a baseball bat".

Then the dad said..."You won't live long enough to crawl to the phone and we have 1200 acres to lose your body and if you ever lay a hand on my daughter again I'll kill you myself".

Thirty years later....and the brother in law has never laid a hand on the sister again.

SOMETIMES a good old fashioned beating is effective.

BUT...let's think about the possible consequences. The kid committed a felony assault. Plain and simple, it was assault and battery. Period. There was no ongoing incident where he was protecting his sister. His actions, though morally justified, were strictly punitive and not legally justifiable. He was not defending, he was punishing.

A 20 year old kid, who was by any yardstick a "good kid". He worked hard at school. He treated people decent. He worked hard on the family ranch and gas station when he was home. People had a pretty good opinion of him.

If things had gone a little different and the brother in law had not been totally convinced of the consequences of hitting the sister again or pressing charges, the kid would have a felony conviction, no 25 year career in law enforcement, be a prohibited possessor, not able to vote, and would likely have had to make a living on the family ranch and gas station instead of in the career he wanted.

In the above situation...the kid made the WRONG decision, took the WRONG action, and did it in spite of the consequences that came with it. An otherwise intelligent good kid making a bad and stupid decision.

Did I mention domestics suck?
 
"No good deed goes un-punished" - and for those who missed the message - domestic disputes are just plain dangerous as hell - particularly for anyone foolish enough to get between the "victim" and the "perpetrator" since appearances can be deceiving....

Even for folks who've been well trained and very experienced - handling a family fight is tough business... and in some neighborhoods/situations you can expect bystanders to suddenly jump in (and in my experience - not on my side...).

Glad I made it through 22 years on the street without serious injury - and always thought that if I was ever stabbed or shot - it would be at a family fight (and involving the kind of folks you wouldn't want to spend two seconds with - when they were behaving themselves.....).
 
@ Creaky old cop
We shared the same job in different AO's.
After 26 years and leaving due to LOD injurys = I agree that domestics AND people in general suck.
I much prefer dogs,and most other animals [ even though I had to put a few down ].
Had my neck nearly tore off while arresting a wife beater,by the WIFE.Who jumped me from behind while I was cuffing him.
SO, allowing ANY man to beat a woman or child [ or dog ] is just not in most of our DNA's.
None the less,think about YOUR LIFE before taking physical action.As to exactly what will I do now --------------------------- hope I can take my own advise.
 
@ Creaky old cop
We shared the same job in different AO's.
After 26 years and leaving due to LOD injurys = I agree that domestics AND people in general suck.
I much prefer dogs,and most other animals [ even though I had to put a few down ].
Had my neck nearly tore off while arresting a wife beater,by the WIFE.Who jumped me from behind while I was cuffing him.
SO, allowing ANY man to beat a woman or child [ or dog ] is just not in most of our DNA's.
None the less,think about YOUR LIFE before taking physical action.As to exactly what will I do now --------------------------- hope I can take my own advise.

That's the thing though...you and I had well over two decades of dealing with these things on a pretty regular basis because we had to. "Seen 'em from all angles" and have a perspective that most people don't (and good for them!) have and know from experience how fast they can and will go south on you.

* Note: This is NOT bagging on non-LE, consider yourselves lucky you get to sidestep the DV BS because they are a giant pain in the crotch.

No, I can't allow a male (I can't call them a man) to abuse a woman or a child...but intervention comes with even more serious risks without the mantle of authority that comes with a badge. No matter how right you might be...the law may see you as wrong. I know that I also hope I would take my own advice and call 911. One thing is for sure, my circle of friends don't include any domestic violence offenders, so an intervention in the home of someone else is extremely unlikely....but if it did happen...then a call to 911 would definitely be my first reaction. Having to explain why you, as a guest, had to take action in the home of another person would just add an additional explanation you'd have to make.

"I called 911...you need to stop NOW" could even be a trigger for an attack on you.

Did I mention that domestic violence situations SUCK!
 
You get called to a domestic by X. X wants Y to stop beating them. You get there, you arrest Y and X flips into defense mode and jumps on YOU for arresting Y even though X called to make the complaint. Think it doesn't happen? I can remember addresses where we had to go over a dozen times to keep make Y stop beating X, and X decides NOT to aid in prosecution.

I can confirm that this isn't an anomaly, but the norm. On numerous occasions we have had to take the husband to jail for beating the wife and the wife to jail for attacking the police officer who put cuffs on the husband.

Outside of deadly force situation, when I'm not in uniform I'm just calling 911.
 
I can confirm that this isn't an anomaly, but the norm. On numerous occasions we have had to take the husband to jail for beating the wife and the wife to jail for attacking the police officer who put cuffs on the husband.

Outside of deadly force situation, when I'm not in uniform I'm just calling 911.
I'm retired now...so...yeah I agree. I like to say "I don't get paid to adult for people anymore".
 
This one very good reason for the well-meaning citizen who may be tempted to intervene in a situation to "defend" an "innocent third party" to do a little risk analysis first.
 
Guest who confronted Glen Carbon man over beating of wife is fatally shot, police say http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/...cle_9d209ab1-9445-5817-a9c8-74311bb6b739.html



Perhaps if the victim had been armed the outcome might have been different.....But the best thing the victim could have done was left the scene and called the police.

Domestics are tricky things to deal with and it's never a good idea to involve yourself in someone else's business.
So sad. :(
 
Between the domestics I responded to as a LEO and the ones I knew of involving friends and family, I've seen more of this than I'd like. It would obviously be inaccurate to say that no one who's abused files charges, but I have never seen it. Without exception the abused took the side of the abuser. I remember leaving a bar years ago with a number of friends when we came upon a guy beating his girlfriend. She was on her knees looking up at him while he was repeatedly punching her in the face. As we approached them to stop it, between punches she started swearing at us, telling us to mind our own business. We asked her if she was sure she didn't want help, and she started cursing at us again. We shook our heads and left, knowing if we got involved she'd testify against us. I'll call the police if I come across this situation, but won't otherwise get involved.
 
As if this thread wasn't enough of a deterrent, don't involve yourself in domestic disputes. If you truly feel something illegal is happening domestically call 911 and let the cops deal with it.

There is nothing on this earth that would make me get involved physically with a domestic dispute.
 
Interesting responses. May I ask if people's actions would change if it was a child (son or daughter of person beating them) being physically abused? With the other parent present? (Because if you are at a residence or social event, that is very likely) That is also a domestic dispute.
 
Interesting responses. May I ask if people's actions would change if it was a child (son or daughter of person beating them) being physically abused? With the other parent present? (Because if you are at a residence or social event, that is very likely) That is also a domestic dispute.


Seems like a somewhat silly question as the topic as I understand it pertained to non-immediate DD's, i.e strangers.

But since you asked, for me it would depend on how "immediate" they were. I'm not getting involved in some 2nd cousins argument with a 3rd cousin at a reunion. If it's a grandparent, aunt/uncle or "direct" family (mom/dad/kids/wife) then yea I'm going to step in.

But at that point I don't see it as stepping in on a DD, I see it as you are part of the DD.
 
Interesting responses. May I ask if people's actions would change if it was a child (son or daughter of person beating them) being physically abused? With the other parent present? (Because if you are at a residence or social event, that is very likely) That is also a domestic dispute.
Are you asking because you intend to model your own response strategy/threshold based on those who provide answers or is the question an attempt to embarrass/attack those who disagree with you to make your point of view look better?

If it's the former, I think that a better approach would be to look at the potential consequences from the experiential information provided in this thread (and elsewhere) and make the decision for yourself based on the facts and on your own perception of risk and your willingness to engage in risky behavior.

If it's the latter, then supporting your position with facts or logical arguments is a superior debate technique than using embarrassment/ad hominem attacks to try to bolster your position.
 
Repeat after me; "Stockholm Syndrome."

You can't help someone who is unwilling to help themselves.
 
I've already contributed to this thread and like most I pointed out that these kind of situations are just plain bad juju and you are very likely to have real cause to regret any involvement...

Here's what I didn't say - and probably should have... I will not knowingly allow someone to be badly hurt or killed in my presence without taking action of some kind - a phone call, if I'm able - but if I'm certain that direct intervention is necessary to prevent someone from being killed or badly injured I hope I have the courage to intervene. Just think of all the folks in this recent tragedy that risked their own lives to come to the aid of the wounded in Las Vegas... No, it's not a good Idea - but sometimes you must act or spend the rest of your life wishing you had...
 
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