Firethorn said,
Maybe it's my upbringing, but I might of done the same. You see, even wounded he's still a threat. The police have shown that they can't contain him. He's made threats indicative that he'll still attempt to kill me and my loved ones as long as he's alive.
That is fine and you would have broken the law if you performed as described in the article, shooting a person in a situation that no longer warranted the use of lethal force. It may be construed as murder.
Back in 2001 in Utah, a homeowner shot a naked man trying to break into his house. The single shot was mortal, but the homeowner went over and capped the guy in the head, called the cops. Guess who went to jail and was charged for the killing? The first shot was justified, as described in this case. The second was not.
We don't know if he did wrong in shooting twice...
Do we know that the perp had dropped his weapon? Do we know that he wasn't a threat still?
The reality is that all we have to go on is a newspaper article and a few quotes... which is not much info...
It's possible for someone to have been shot, dropped his weapon, fell on the floor and still pose an iminent threat of great bodily harm and/or death.
Yes, it is, but the shooter apparently didn't know and the downed man wasn't making any aggressive moves...as per the statements.
Heck, if you want to run with the idea that we don't really know what went on because it is just a newspaper article, then we might as well not discuss it at all as we don't know if anything in it is correct, do we. What we are discussing is the information as presented. That is all we have to work with at this time.
I don't see the second shot as a big problem.It was a borrowed gun and he was unfamiliar with its aimpoint and the effect that a gunshot would have on a person.The second shot was erring on the side of caution,making sure that the ex didn't recover the handgun.
Then the second shot is manslaughter and not murder because of ignorance? Ignorance of the law isn't a valid excuse and you have to know that. You don't get to preemptively shoot people for something they might do. Otherwise I suspect many of us would have been dead a long time ago.