Woman shoots through wall and kills ‘peeping Tom’ outside her Texas home, cops say

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Did I miss the part where she called the police because there was someone outside her house?

The article mentions Houston police, not somewhere it might take the police a long time to get there.

From the minimal info in the article, it sounds like she over reacted. Killing someone because they looked at you through a window, maybe even in TX that might be a stretch.
 
I propose a new law. People with a rap sheet a mile long, can't civil sue people with a clean record, under any circumstance what so ever.

Pretty safe bet that this guy has a B&E record. Hopefully she'll be fine.
 
I don't like the victim of the shooting being characterized as a peeping tom. We have no evidence of that.

Hopefully he was a bad person, because he's dead either way and it'll be real tragic if he noticed her headlights were on in the driveway and wanted to get her attention.

Merely being present isn't enough. If someone is trespassing and you shoot them without a verbal challenge first thats just not right in my opinion.

You need to IDENTIFY your target. This is how dad's shoot their daughter who is sneaking home after a secret party.
 
I propose a new law. People with a rap sheet a mile long, can't civil sue people with a clean record, under any circumstance what so ever.
That may sound gratifying to the arm chair cop wannabe who is ignorant of the fundamental principles of law, but it would be entirely improper to deny anyone the right to be made whole after a tort because of unrelated prior events, or even character.

Pretty safe bet that this guy has a B&E record.
Your basis for that?

Hopefully she'll be fine.
I most seriously doubt it.

She is likely looking for funds to pay legal expenses already being incurred--and that's just the beginning.
 
it was Yahoo.... so maybe the "wall" was an interior door and he was breaking it down with an axe at the time.

SHINING_AXE.jpg


You made me think of this...

Don't axe me why? :rofl:
 
I don't like the victim of the shooting being characterized as a peeping tom. We have no evidence of that.

Hopefully he was a bad person, because he's dead either way and it'll be real tragic if he noticed her headlights were on in the driveway and wanted to get her attention.

Merely being present isn't enough. If someone is trespassing and you shoot them without a verbal challenge first thats just not right in my opinion.

You need to IDENTIFY your target. This is how dad's shoot their daughter who is sneaking home after a secret party.

That's a good point. "Peeping tom" is likely just reporter spin.

Who does that in Texas? Crime is so high and violent there, you have to assume that skunking around like a criminal, is going to end up badly. There's a ton of people in Texas on high alert right now. It would be stupid to knock on the back window if someone's cars lights or on, or to deliver a FedX box with stolen contents, at night.
 
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bdickens writes:



Texas also does not have the death penalty for rape, robbery, or burglary.

While "loitering and prowling" (the usual actual term for "peeping tom") is not typically a crime for which deadly force is warranted, there are many others that can indeed warrant it, but that also do not qualify for the death penalty. A crime need not be a potential death-penalty offense to justify a deadly-force defense.

You're missing the point. Based on what little information we have so far, nothing the alleged perp did justified deadly force. That and shooting through a wall is the very definition of negligence and recklessness.
 
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I have no sympathy for people that break
the law, especially if they're impaired by
the intake of intoxicants. Everybody knows
better, so I don't listen when misplaced
sympathy and excuses are made for them

23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint, dill, and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others. 24 You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel!" MT 23:23,24
 
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Who does that in Texas?
Well, Ricky Williams was notorious for doing this at girl's dorms at that sill school in Austin.

Dumb is pretty universal. And assumptions are far too easy to make.

And clearly "journalism" is too easy to crank out from the back of coffee shops by simply loading it down with "knee jerk" language then dropped as clickbait pretending to be "news."

And, now, we are all lathered over the details of this thing, which is likely to be less than 25% accurate at best.

We know less than Jon Snow about this. Could have been the dirtbag was busy trying to film the woman through her blinds and refused to go away. Could have been the guy down the street using the phone as a flashlight to try and find his lost maltypoo in the bushes. Who is the female in this thing? A simple cosmetic-school graduate? Or a crazy cat lady who often shouts at clouds?

The only S&T-worthy thing about this is that you need to be iron-clad compliant on ORE before firign through any opaque wall (and less-than opaques ones, too).
 
We know less than Jon Snow about this.
We know that a person inside a house shot someone who was outside. A defense of justification would be difficult unless the man were shooting or starting a fire.

Could have been the dirtbag was busy trying to film the woman through her blinds and refused to go away. Could have been the guy down the street using the phone as a flashlight to try and find his lost maltypoo in the bushes.
Doesn't matter.

The only S&T-worthy thing about this is
The foregoing is S&T related.

that you need to be iron-clad compliant on ORE before firign through any opaque wall (and less-than opaques ones, too).
The alleged fact that she fired through a wall may influence a jury, but it would not have any real legal bearing.
 
+1000 for the "peeping tom" being reporting slant (or the reporters not being smart about what the police said). I've heard plenty of reports around here where gas company guys checking for leaks or meter readers working late in the winter or so on and so on are drawn down on because "skulking in the bushes in the dark." Hell, Atatiana Jefferson saw someone outside her window, went to get her gun and got shot for that because the unidentified "peeping tom" was a police officer on a call with the neighbors.

Need more info.
 
If my gas meter guy is outside my house at night, he's definitely going to be drawn on and flash lighted.

Be a pro, and do that during the day with a properly marked vehicle. Or deal with it.
 
If my gas meter guy is outside my house at night, he's definitely going to be drawn on and flash lighted.
We have had gas company techs in the yard at night--all over the neighborhood. They were looking for the source of a gas leak. Serious business.

A flashlight is okay, but displaying a firearm could start with arrest and end with conviction and a lifetime loss of gun rights
 
If the man didn't attempt to break into her "castle", she might be in some trouble.

Probably best to try and take a cell phone photo of the man while on the phone with 911. With the rifle at the ready, of course.
Exactly. If I observed a "peeping Tom" outside my home I would first take a photo, then call 911, and be ready to shoot if he breaks the glass.
 
Just as a hypothetical, suppose a guy outside a window is looking in and when he sees the woman inside looking at him, he draws a gun and points it at her.... he hasn't tried to break in at that point, but would she be justified in shooting?
 
For me personally, given the circumstances as portrayed, it's also a question of morality. To kill another human being for committing the "passive" act of voyeurism might be "legal" but for me, it would be wrong, very wrong, and I would have to answer to my God, if not a judge or a jury holding Court in this vale of tears. Likewise and for instance, if I caught sight of an unarmed person leaving my home with my tv under one arm and my toaster under the other, though it might be (and probably should be) legal, I am not going to use deadly force to stop this kind of crime.

To be clear, I am only speaking for myself and how my sense of ethics constrain some baser motives and behaviors that are predicated on the inherently evil nature of humankind.
 
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Likewise and for instance, if I caught sight of an unarmed person leaving my home with my tv under one arm and my toaster under the other, though it might be (and probably should be) legal, ....
Lawful in Texas under some circumstances, but nowhere else under any circumstances.

I am not going to use deadly force to stop this kind of crime.
Nor would I.
 
Assuming that the news reports are accurate is always problematic, as the reporters often get so much wrong.
With that said, what I see:
  • Maybe he was a peeping tom, maybe not. He was outside her residence in the dark.
  • She feared that she was in danger & fired several rounds through a wall, at least one of which struck him.
What I do NOT see:
  • Any indication that the deceased attempted to enter the home.
  • That the deceased's actions, while potentially creepy and skeevy, created a danger of death or bodily injury to the shooter.
 
Just as a hypothetical, suppose a guy outside a window is looking in and when he sees the woman inside looking at him, he draws a gun and points it at her.... he hasn't tried to break in at that point, but would she be justified in shooting?

I would shoot, hopefully faster that he would if I was dumb ("compassionate") enough to give him the chance.
 
ust as a hypothetical, suppose a guy outside a window is looking in and when he sees the woman inside looking at him, he draws a gun and points it at her.... he hasn't tried to break in at that point, but would she be justified in shooting?
It would give here some basis for a defense of justification.

I would shoot, hopefully faster that he would if I was dumb ("compassionate") enough to give him the chance.
Why?

I would much rather try to deprive him of a target.

Trying to shoot him would entail some chance of getting shot; it would surely put the shooter into a process in which he or she would not want to be; and the probability that a defense of justification would fail is greater than zero.
 
He's pointing a gun at me. I have a gun. I can shoot faster than I can duck a bullet. That's why
It appears that you would expect to shoot first and to effect an instant stop. The first is questionable, and the latter is not at all realistic.

I think that gravity could put one out of the man's sights much more quickly.

The defender's first objective is to avoid harm. The best way to do that is to stay out of a gunfight.

The defender's next objective is to stay our of the legal system. The best way to do that is to avoid shooing at anyone, if that is at all possible.
 
The stipulated hypothetical makes no mention of distance between the two armed combatants nor the if there is a "barricade" nearby, so I am assuming the worst case scenario for the sake of argument: the guy with the gun pointed at me is five feet or closer and there is no handy couch to hide behind whilst I'm dialing 911. Knowing nothing else regarding the circumstances as presented, in a real case event, I would assess the situation in the flash of time granted, act accordingly and trust my thirty years of training to bring to fruition my survival-not his.
 
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