Fla's new no-retreat law works just fine..

[LynnMassGuy]

And there are legit reasons to fire through a door, not many, but there are.

Are there? A closed door that you can't see through?

 

[P-35/53]

The guy might have mental problems but torches on the front porch at 2:am isounds like they were egging him on. As for voices in his house- when I was a boy my Grandfather lived two doors down the street and had a very powerful CB radio. He was blind and would stay up all night on it. When he would transmit we could hear his voice faintly thru our tv even if it was off.

 

[Sindawe]

A porch is private property, is it not? At 2AM, uninvited, with torches, banging on the door...hmmm...

Works that way here in Colorado. IIRC, the first test of our "Make My Day" law involved a slaying that took place on a fellows porch. He was exonerated.

Yup. Absolutely, but a threat deserving of deadly force?

Yep. Absolutely. Torches have long been used to fire a building. In my book, if its a choice of shooting through a door at goblins holding torches, or burning to death in my home, the goblins will loose everytime.

 

[LynnMassGuy]

What evidence is there that he was at risk of burning to death in his home? The shooters own words attest to the fact that he shot because he heard banging on his door not because he feared his house would be burned down.

Hey, I love the law. I wish we had it here. We need it here but I think the way that situation was handled is at the extreme end if the spectrum and enough examples like that could be what the gun grabbers need as ammunition to repeal it.

Was a good shooting by law. Sure but don't we need to be better than that and not operate on the fringe of what we're allowed to do. Just because you can shot doesn't mean you should shoot.

I just don't buy that if their intention was to burn his house down they would have done it at his front door with tiki torches yelling in a fashion that would alert the whole neighborhood.

Maybe it was. Who knows? Maybe it's a whole neighborhood of mental patients.

Regards
John

 

[Radagast]

Looks like the peasants hit the wrong place. They wanted the castle up the road that's constantly being struck by lightning. Harrassing Igor on his night off had predictable consequences. I wonder where they hid the pitchforks before the police arrived?

 

[Coronach]

What it looks like, as usual, is we don't have enough information.

People, if you're prepared to exonerate or convict this guy based upon that news blurb alone, I sincerely hope you mention this conversation during vior dire at your next jury duty.



Mike

 

[Kodiaz]

I'm Lynnmass please don't move to Fl. I'm sure you would be much happier if that poor guy was beaten to death or had his house burned down. When you go to someone's house late at night to beat on their door you deserve what you get too bad that guy didn't have a 12 ga full of buckshot. I'm sure that guy begged those people to leave him alone and they probably laughed at him. If they knew anything about civility they wouldn't be in the hospital.

+4 to that guy

Go Jeb!

 

[Coronach]

More specifically, I can think of plenty of reasons why this would be a good shoot. I can also think of plenty of reasons why it would not. The propriety of it will depend upon exactly what the shooter and the victims specifically say happened, and the physical evidence. We have access to none of that at this time.

Also, I'll be very curious as to an examination of the shooter's mental condition at the time of the shoot.

Mike

 

[LynnMassGuy]

I'm Lynnmass please don't move to Fl. I'm sure you would be much happier if that poor guy was beaten to death or had his house burned down. When you go to someone's house late at night to beat on their door you deserve what you get too bad that guy didn't have a 12 ga full of buckshot. I'm sure that guy begged those people to leave him alone and they probably laughed at him. If they knew anything about civility they wouldn't be in the hospital.

+4 to that guy

Go Jeb!

Man, you just ain't reading what I'm posting.

 

[Tom Servo]

Anybody who claims to hear Stephen King over the wires in their home is seriously unstable and needs help.

Heck, Stephen King's nothing. I just get Spalding Grey

Ganging up on someone's porch at 2:00AM, wielding torches? Yeah, that's asking for it. I don't know that I'd shoot through the door (rule #4 and all), but I'd be within my rights taking some sort of action. If this scenario doesn't seem so threatening, ask a black person.

I'm not baiting or waving any fish here, but an angry mob is an angry mob, especially when all this follows a campaign of harrassment. The south has a particularly scary history of this involving guys in white hoods.

A local officer told me about it this afternoon, and as far as he saw it, in Georgia, the guy was in the right. He might have received a slap-on-the-wrist citation for unlawful discharge, but no criminal charges.

 

[cbsbyte]

I was apalled that Mr. Devries was not proscuted for his actions. If the information is accurate in the story, I came to the conclusion that this case does not support the new Castle law in FL, in truth it is a mark against it. Do you believe any rational person would read this article and come to the conclusion Mr. Devries acted in a correct way. I doubt it, except for people on this board. Mr Devries does have a right to self defence, but this was not a rational response to the situation. This guy had no right to shoot through his door at some idiots with Tiki torches at 2 am. He could have done a number of other actions to scare off the idiots at his door without shooting them. Personally, this guy should be locked up in a hosiptal if he is hearing voices.

 

[Aguila Blanca]

Not exactly a text book case for testing the law.

Anybody who claims to hear Stephen King over the wires in their home is seriously unstable and needs help.
Not the best case for gun ownership.

Not a case at all. He was within his home, repelling what he thought was an attempted break-in. That would have been legal in FL before the new law went into effect.

 

[Aguila Blanca]

I was apalled that Mr. Devries was not proscuted for his actions. If the information is accurate in the story, I came to the conclusion that this case does not support the new Castle law in FL,

Once again: The new law in Florida is not, repeat NOT, a "Castle" law. Florida already had the castle doctine in place. The new Florida law is a "No need to retreat" law that applies outside of the castle.

Do you believe any rational person would read this article and come to the conclusion Mr. Devries acted in a correct way. I doubt it, except for people on this board. Mr Devries does have a right to self defence, but this was not a rational response to the situation. This guy had no right to shoot through his door at some idiots with Tiki torches at 2 am. He could have done a number of other actions to scare off the idiots at his door without shooting them. Personally, this guy should be locked up in a hosiptal if he is hearing voices.

Please explain for those of us less tactically astute than yourself what some of these other things are that one person can do to "scare off" multiple goblins who are pounding on the door at 2:00 a.m. waving torches.

Aside from that, you seem to miss the point that the law does not demand a rational response in times of crisis. The test is what is called a "reasonable man" test. It asks simply, "What would a reasonable man do when confronted with the same situation?" The law also asks what was the actor's belief at the moment. It has been discussed here previously that the law does not demand that a person actually be in grave danger in order for him/her to have the right to engage in self-defense. All the law demands is that the person believe him/herself to be in grave danger.

I would say that this person believed himself to be in danger and, believing that, acted as would any reasonable person who believed goblins were breaking into his house.

 

[feedthehogs]

I would hope that those of you who would shoot thru the door if some one were pounding on it at 2am never have a fire and your neighbor is pounding on the door to get everyone out.

Or a neighbor just got home and saw your car window smashed out and is trying to let you know.

What ever happened to all you who preach, "know your target and what is behind it" ?

Your shooting blindly.

Where do you think those bullets will go?
Maybe into a bad guy?
What about someone driving by in a car?
What about into the house or building across the street?
What about innocent kids walking down the sidewalk?

They were outside the door, he was protected inside his home. As soon as he determined a threat, call the cops and fire dept, retreat back beyond the door with cover and if someone did break down the door, drop them in their tracks when you have a clear target while waiting for the po po to show up.

If he had been out on the street, it would have been a totaly different set of circumstances and action needed.

 

[oldschool]

Good Shoot

Here in Kentucky attempting Arson can, and probably will, get you shot with no legal ill coming to the shooter. Lets see; 1) there is a group of unknown and decidedly unfriendly people at your door at o-dark-thirty 2) complete with fire and who knows what other weapons and 3) the police have been non-responsive recently. To me that means a “reasonable person” would be in fear for their life and an acquittal if it comes up in front of a jury that I’m on.
I have been in a similar situation to where Mr. Devries was and it was in Florida when it happened. And in that case, as in this case, it was debatable which side of the door the mental defects resided. In both cases I think the bigger mental illness(es) resided on the outside of the structure. In my case the only thing that kept me from unloading a double 12 into the miscreant lighting incendiaries on my front pouch and banging on my front door at 3am was that I only had a shot at a fleeing target. Had they stood their ground they would have stopped polluting the gene pool.
If you are going to do something stupid, like pretending you are going to lynch somebody in the wee hours of the morning, don’t act surprised when they demonstrate their objections. It’s been said before “stupid should hurt!” They should be thankful that they are only getting holes patched not pushing up daises.

 

[Kodiaz]

Some doors have windows in them. I watched my aunt's car being pushed sideways during Wilma from here little window at the top of her door. So he may have seen the tops of the torches.

 

[gunsmith]

even in CA arson is a shooting offense

I'm not sure that they were going to burn his house down but even in CA arson is a shootable offense.

The article says they were reading something he had on his door, probably some kind of nutty rant .

I've seen alot of this kind of stuff in my life, people feel it is ok to tease crazy people.
From what I see, those people were making his allready miserable life even worse and they got a reaction ,not the one they were looking for but a reaction none the less.

Crazy people shouldn't have guns and idiots shouldn't tease crazy people who have guns.

I'm glad he isn't going to jail but I don't want crazy people to own guns & I doubt this is an over amplified CB problem

 

[GT]

Bottom Line...

they won't be doing it again

 

[secamp32]

I used to live near an AM radio station

and sometimes we could hear the station on the toaster oven. It often came thru unpowered speakers as well.

 

[LynnMassGuy]

No doubt it's a "good" shooting. I just think it puts the "Castle Doctrine" and gun owners in a bad light. Not to us. We get it already. To the middle of the road, not sure how they feel about guns folks. That is all I'm saying. It makes a crappy headline. It doesn't help us.

 

[Aguila Blanca]

No doubt it's a "good" shooting. I just think it puts the "Castle Doctrine" and gun owners in a bad light. Not to us. We get it already. To the middle of the road, not sure how they feel about guns folks. That is all I'm saying. It makes a crappy headline. It doesn't help us.

In that case, why not help correct the widespread (even here, where people should know the difference) misapprehension that the new Florida law is a "Castle Doctrine" law? Why not remind "the media" at every opportunity that virtually every state has a "Castle Doctine" law on the books, and has had for many years.

The media love catchy phrases and sound bites. "Castle Doctrine" sounds so ... legal, ya know? They latch right onto that. Hold their feet to the fire and make them discuss it as a "no duty to retreat from a perceived threat in a public place where you have a legal right to be" and their eyes will glaze while their synapses short circuit. Too many syllables -- they can't handle it.

 

[torpid]

I would hope that those of you who would shoot thru the door if some one were pounding on it at 2am never have a fire and your neighbor is pounding on the door to get everyone out.

And if the neighbor is the one bringing the fire?

 

[Justin]

What part of "Hey gang! Let's go invade the crazy neighbor's property and antagonize him at 2:00AM!" is a good idea?

Don't wanna get shot?

Then don't go invading the crazy guy's property in order to harass him.

Seriously.

One would have to be severely lacking in common sense to do something so stupid.

Good shoot?

Questionable.

Lesson learned? Hue betcha.

 

[MrMex]

He forgot one thing, OPEN THE DOOR FIRST!! duh..

Honestly though, torches on someones porch that has previously recorded compliants of harrasment. No question!

 

[feedthehogs]

Here's an up date:

News Stories
Clearwater man allegedly shoots three neighbors
Link: Clearwater shooting suspect surrenders after stand-off with police

dave Bohman

Clearwater, Florida - Joy Brieske says Jeffrey Devries was a neighborhood nuisance. But she didn’t consider him dangerous.

Joy Brieske, Neighbor of Shooting Suspect:
“I really thought he was harmless… Just a goofball.”

Investigators say Jeffrey Devries shot three people next door to his home -- neighbors who were smoking outside early Friday morning.

Sixteen-year-old Samantha Frances Sipka was hospitalized after she was shot twice, once in the jaw and once in the thigh.

Nineteen-year-old Jason Thomas Biaso was shot once in the shoulder.

Mark Hoover, the children’s parents, was shot once in the arm.

Police say Devries was holed up inside his home for more than six hours before surrendering.

Joy Brieske and her family had to evacuate their home.

Joy Brieske, Neighbor of Shooting Suspect:
“It’s pretty scary.”

Devries’ behavior has been described as bizarre and paranoid by neighbors and cops alike.

10 News has obtained e-mails Devries sent to Clearwater Police in the last month, claiming his neighbors were out to harm him.

On October 23, he writes:
“I was attacked, robbed in the street by a probable celebrity, Stephen King…”

His last e-mail was November 9th:
“I have been receiving threats from…persons with the medical field pretending to have some authority, etc. which is a scam.”

Joy Brieske says she recently saw him videotaping neighbors and talking to an imaginary friend.

Joy Brieske, Neighbor of Shooting Suspect:
“And then he just turned around, and walked away and said, 'Wait until Norman sees this.' ... We don’t know who Norman is.”

Clearwater Police and Pinellas County Deputies spent most of the day investigating the scene, as Beverly Circle remained closed to traffic into Friday night.

Joy Bieske says the neighborhood will be better off if Devries is tried and convicted of the shootings, and never returns.


Dave Bohman, Tampa Bay's 10 News

Shooting Of 3 People Leads To Standoff, Arrest

By STEPHEN THOMPSON , The Tampa Tribune
Tampa Bay Online
CLEARWATER - -- Last month, Jeffrey Devries was growing obsessed over an incident during which someone struck him on his next-door neighbors' property at 2 a.m. one day in September.

Patrol Officer William Smith III stopped by Devries' house to explain that the incident was under review and to see how the former University of South Florida police sergeant was doing.

Not well, replied Devries, 44.

Specifically, he was hearing voices, according to a Clearwater police report. He was convinced they were being sent to him by his neighbors through his home's electrical wiring.

Early Friday, the tension between the two households -- Devries' home, at 1818 Beverly Circle, and his neighbors' residence, at 1820 Beverly Circle -- reached a crisis.

At 1:53 a.m., authorities received a report that Devries had shot three people who were living or visiting next door. They were Mark Hoover, 45, Samantha Sipka, 16, and Jason Biaso, 19, of Safety Harbor.

Authorities also received a report about the same time that the Devries household had just been burglarized.

By the time the three wounded people were rushed to Bayfront Medical Center -- none of them with life-threatening injuries -- Devries had holed up in his home, prompting a standoff that would last 7 1/2 hours. After talking to a hostage negotiator on his telephone, he surrendered at 9:30 a.m., Pinellas sheriff's Sgt. Jim Bordner said.

Devries came out with his T-shirt hanging over his waistband, making it impossible for the SWAT team to determine whether a handgun had been stuck there, Bordner said. Devries wouldn't comply with orders so team members could approach him safely, so they used a rubber bullet and a Taser to subdue him, Bordner said.

Initially the three shooting victims said they were in the street in front of 1820 Beverly Circle holding tiki torches when bullets started flying, sheriff's spokeswoman Marianne Pasha said.

When homicide investigators started looking at the forensic evidence after the standoff, however, it didn't jibe with the victims' rendition, Pasha said.

It did jibe with the account of Devries, who said he fired through his front door six times when he heard someone pounding on it, Pasha said.

Bullet holes were found in the door, and four rounds have been accounted for -- the ones that struck the three victims, Pasha said.

Sipka was shot in the jaw and thigh, Bordner said. She remained at Bayfront Friday, but her condition was not released. Hoover, who was shot in the arm, was in fair condition, a hospital spokeswoman said. Biaso, who was shot in the shoulder, was treated but not admitted.

Hoover declined to be interviewed through a hospital spokeswoman. A woman answering the telephone at the Biaso residence in Safety Harbor said no one would comment.

A fourth person, Miles Bailey, 23, who lives at 1820 Beverly Circle, also was with the trio, Pasha said.

One of the four, when told of the physical evidence, said they were at Devries' front door reading his no-trespassing and no-soliciting signs, Pasha said.

Ken List, a neighbor who lives across a pond from the two properties, said that after the shots rang out he heard "screaming, like they were running away from the gunfire."

No one had been charged late Friday.

Devries has told Clearwater police that he is under the care of a psychiatrist and taking Zoloft and antipsychotic medications. His father, Stanley Devries, an orthodontist in Largo, told police last month his son has been diagnosed with thyroid cancer, a police report states.

Devries was hired as a patrol officer at the University of South Florida in 1988 and retired in September 1998 as a sergeant, USF police spokesman Mike Klingebiel said.

Also in 1998, Devries' then-wife, Yvette M. Covelli-Devries, stopped living with him. The two filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in 1999, and she filed for divorce the year after that, federal and county court records show.

This year, Clearwater police have been to Devries' house roughly eight times, police spokesman Wayne Shelor said.

Devries has alleged that people have tampered with his telephone line, his mail and the power lines outside his house and that they were using microwaves to put voices in his head.

When he told Smith in October about the voices he was hearing, he said one of them told him his neighbors were going to burglarize his home.

Shooting suspect surrenders after standoff with police

The Associated Press

CLEARWATER, Fla. A man surrendered to SWAT team officers Friday morning, seven hours after he shot three people outside a neighbor's home and then barricaded himself inside his own house, authorities said.

Jeffrey Devries, 44, who was described by police as having previous mental illness issues, was taken into custody at about 9:30 a.m. without incident, authorities said.

None of the victims had life-threatening injuries. They were identified as Samantha Sipka, 16; Mark Hoover, 45; and Jason Biaso, 19. Sipka and Hoover were in stable condition at Bayfront Medical Center, authorities said. Biaso was treated and released.

Hoover was identified as the fiance of Sipka's mother. The shooting occurred at about 1:50 a.m. at the home where Hoover and Sipka live. The three victims were smoking cigarettes outside the house when the shooting started.

SWAT teams from the Pinellas County Sheriff's Office and Clearwater Police Department responded, and a hostage negotiator began talking to Devries.

Roads in the area were closed and some homes were evacuated during the standoff, authorities said

Triple-shooting leads to standoff in Clearwater
an ABC Action News report 11/18/05 - updated 4:27 p.m.



CLEARWATER - A man suspected of opening fire on three neighbors was finally taken into custody this morning after holding police at bay from inside his home for hours.

Police responded to Beverly Circle just before 2 a.m. after reports of a shooting. Investigators say Jeffrey Devries shot three people in front of a neighboring house, then retreated into his home down the street.

One 16-year-old shooting victim was flown by helicopter to Bayfront Medical Center. Devries' next-door neighbor, Samantha Sipka, was said to be in stable condition with gunshot wounds to the jaw and thigh.

Two other victims, 46-year-old Mark Hoover and 19-year-old Jason Biaso, were taken by ambulance to the hospital and said to be stable. Biasco had been treated and released by late morning.

Because the scene was on the border of Clearwater city limits and unincorporated Pinellas County, teams from both the Clearwater Police Department and Pinellas County Sheriff's Office responded to the home.

As if the sound of gunshots wasn't a rude enough awakening, Devries' neighbors then had to be evacuated in the middle of the night.



All three shooting victims were hospitalized.
"The next thing I know, all the cops were coming and everything else. So I knew something big was going down," James Yager recalled. "First they said we had a choice. We can evacuate, but they wanted to let us know that they had snipers in our yard and a guy across the street that shot three people."

Police negotiators spoke with Devries and eventually were able to convince him to surrender. But as he was coming outside, he apparently had a change of heart. Deputies said they had to use rubber bullets and a taser to subdue him before taking him into custody.

It was not Devries' first run-in with the law. Police said they'd been in contact with him before when he complained his neighbors were harassing him.

"Sometimes you wonder whether or not he has a firm grasp on reality, but we have tried to work with him," police spokesman Wayne Shelor explained. "We've been accommodating and sincerely respectful of his claims."

Friday evening, Devries remained at Morton Plant Hospital for observation. He had not been charged, though officials said charges were pending.

Seems the story is a changin quite a bit.