This is for everybody who continues to insist that anyone in their home is a threat

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After knocking, yelling and calling for several minutes I finally panicked and kicked in his door, fearing the worst.
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I see a major difference between someone that was supposed to be expecting me, and then knocking on the door and identifying yourself versus sneaking into a dark room a failing to identify yourself.

I believe Forrest Gump summed up the cop's actions..

"Stupid is as stupid does"

One of the previous posts talked about "practical" jokes. I've never seen anything humorus about laughing at someone else's expense. The TV show "Punked" was mentioned. Gee, pretend to be the police, call someone and tell them that their child was just killed in a car wreck. Yeah, that's a real laugh riot. Those idiots should have been beat with a club.
 
I simply can't imagine intentionally taking action that could result in the death of a human bieng without confirming that the individual in question had, at a minimum:

  1. The ability to do myself or an innocent grave harm; and
  2. The manifest intent to do the same.
I guess experience and frame of reference play heavily in one's opinion on this matter.
 
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None of us no matter how carefully we have planned know exactly what we would do in the same situation.

The bottom line is pretending to be an intruder as a practical joke was idiotic.

The man is lucky to be alive and in my opinion should not be a LEO.
 
I find the shooter more at fault. He was not in serious danger according to the story.

There are many stories like this. I hear about one periodically and it makes me wonder what I would do if I were the one holding the gun.

One that happened about ten years ago was a guy that came home with his wife and heard a noise in the closet. He grabbed his 357 and started to shoot into the closet. He opened it to find his dead 14 year old daughter inside. She was hiding to play a joke on her parents. :banghead: :(
 
Lucky said;
As Dallas 239 kindly posted, Jeff White has already dismissed Jeff White's argument as tissue paper. Jeff White tore Jeff White a new one!
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Wrong answer. There is nothing inconsistent in my two posts. I stand by the assertion that anyone who is not mature enough to identify his target before he fires should not have a gun, knife or pointy scissors. The officer in New York acted on what information he had. Giving the benefit of the doubt to the shooter here, we can say he acted on the information he had. But the shooter here was in his home, in an environment he could almost totally control. Unless the brother in law literally jumped out him, the story doesn't say that, the story says;
"He didn't tell the family he was coming and decided to sneak in the back door," Lewis said. "The resident asked him to call out who he was, and he didn't, and he shot him."
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That doesn't sound like the shooter was jumped by the brother in law. It sounds like he had time to issue a challenge. If he had time to issue a challenge, he had time to light up the scene. As I stated before, we have lights in our homes now. We have flashlights now. We even have lights that mount on our weapon. There is no reason to shoot a target you can't clearly see if you have the time to call out who's there.

The brother in law's stupidity isn't the issue here. The world is full of stupid people and we all have to deal with them.

To those of you who insist you have to live with your magazines stacked and the pins straightened on your grenades I say get some help before you ruin your life. It is a dangerous world, but it's not that dangerous. If you are so paranoid that you feel your best option is to hide in the dark and shoot anything that doesn't answer your verbal challenge, then you should re-examine your decision to own firearms and keep them ready for defensive purposes. You control the environment in your home. If you can't arrange to have some light available to identify your target, then maybe you should forgo the newest super man-stopping ammunition and extended magazine and get yourself some training and a flashlight. There is a lot more blowing and chest thumping from people who haven't been in a fight since the third grade in this thread then there is common sense.

The point is, a mistaken identity shooting can happen to you. I don't care if you say your door is always locked. It's your responsibility to identify your target. If you have time to call out a challenge, you have time to turn the light on.

A few years ago my (then) teenage son was out camping with his friends, about 3:00 am it started raining and their gear was swamped. About 3:30 am I was awakened to my back door opening. By the standards of many people posting in this thread I'd have been within my legal rights to lean out my bedroom door and gun down the four teenagers who were dragging their wet camping gear into my basement. No one answered when I asked if it was James (my son) he was out at the car getting a second load of wet gear and didn't hear me. Instead I shined my light down the hall and identified the home invader as my son's best friend John. I suppose by the standards some of you set, that makes me a coward, after all I had a perfectly legal reason to lean out the bedroom door with my duty carbine and stack the bodies up on my back step. I suppose if I had, I'd get all kinds of support from those same members. After all, how was I, the hapless homeowner supposed to know who was coming through that door. Even after I identified John, perhaps I should have shot him anyway, after all, he had no business in my house at 0330. Would have taught him a good lesson about going into peoples homes at 0330 and not answering challenges. After all, that was pretty stupid of him and we all know, stupid should hurt.

Jeff
 
Was the cop BIL wearing a mask? Carrying a "fake" weapon? Attempting to add "realism" by intimidating his BIL? We don't know.
Perhaps the homeowner made every effort to I.D. the intruder and was unable due to the actions of the now perforated BIL.
Did he shoot too soon? Maybe. Did he wait until what he felt was the last posible moment? Maybe.

Is it a bad situation? Sure. I'd like to think that my friends and family take the security of my home and family more seriously than this. Sneaking in on a mans' home and family might not end well for you.

Jeff, I agree with your larger point. I.D. your target. However, this appears to be a case of a supposed good guy doing a mite too well at playing bad guy. Assuming my BIL did the same but I I.D.'d him before firing, he'd get a serious ass whipping for screwing around with my family and home.
 
Jeff, the "prank" was to scare his BIL my making him think it was a REAL BREAK IN. There's a big difference between your son and his friends knocking on the door because their camping trip got ruined due to rain, and someone acting like a BG to scare someone for a "prank". I'm not saying a little hesitation on the part of the homeowner wouldn't have gone a long way to avoiding this whole mess, but it seems likely, given the circumstances, that his BIL was acting in a threatening manner as part of the gag, which is practically asking to come out of the encounter with extra holes.
 
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Jeff's right on target. :)

Also.

If you have time to call out "Who's there?", then why in the world aren't you yelling "You're about to be shot!" as well?* These are words that may make a prankster change his mind about his continued silence. That, and turning on the lights, as Jeff has said.

I haven't read many better THR posts than the one Jeff wrote up there. I gotta go back and read that one a few more times.

* Note: Yelling this does not mean you have to shoot, kay?
 
I appreciate th OP point to not take every unexpected person in your house as a threat. I 'usually' have a bright flashlight near the home defence gun. But since it is not mounted it's possible to not pick it up with the gun. This thread reminds me to always always always pick up the light with the gun.

However the story posted is really lacking a few important details. Did he use a light or were the room lights on but the BIL masked by clothing (ski mask ect) or partially behind furnature? There likely was some light as the shot went COM. What did the home owner call out? "Who's there?" in a normal voice or "Tell me who the #$!! you are or I'll shoot" in a panic voice. This event we may never know enough to fully judge.

Even if it were a true threat, how can I know they don't already have a member of my family held in front of them hostege if I don't light them up real well? So I guess logic brings me to acknowledge: A bright light is necessary for low light self defence shooting.
 
Jeff I agree with.
I grew up with 3 Rules of Gun Safety:


1. All guns are always loaded .
2. Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy; your gun pointed in a safe direction at all times: on the range, at home, loading, or unloading.
3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on the target and
you are sure of target, what it is, what is in line with it and what is behind it.

Often said a bit different, gist always the same...
I was raised learning to shoot and taking lessons on a Hot Range with these 3 Rules, which later Rule 3 was split and made into what is Rule 4 Today.


I hope nobody ever gets hurt , injured, and due to Auditory Exclusion - gets shot, or shoots someone else at the back door or any other part of a house or structure.

Reality is, one cannot be in a state of awareness 24/7/365, the human anatomy and physiology just cannot do this .

So with Serious Situations, such as Riots, or Cop being shot at a traffic stop and Cops in the neighborhood, or Plains clothes/Undercover arriving at the scene when a Armed Robbery is going down...

I can honestly state I have never had a Firearm discharged at me, by "Like Kind" - even with stress, adrenaline pumping, Auditory Exclusion ...because them 3 Rules of Safety / 4 Rules of Safety were adhered to.

On the other hand I have had BGs and some pro-gun folks, not adhere to rules and trust me when I share, it don't make a damn if the person is pro-gun, a thug, or even anti - ends of muzzles are not attractive and Incoming has the right of way.


Front door comes in, 3 adults and I have 3 younger kids under my charge during Riots.
Gun shots, firebombs, and all hell breaking loose and I stopped that threat.
Threat was real, these adults busted down the front door and in no uncertain terms verbalized intent and were armed.

Kids stayed put, scared, crying, not knowing what has happened or if I am hurt or dead, just they did hear me call out to Threats and heard gun shots (mine).

Adults come to my aid, there was no 911 back then.
I am in survival mode and have just fired a gun, and stopped threats - I could not hear the kids , nor the Adults, but I was scanning and trying my damnedest to remember what Mentors & Elders had taught me so far and were teaching me.

My muzzle never covered a Adult that came to my aid.
I was kid, and had my fun being a kid, and Mentors & Elders and I had our fun, razzing and all...
Not with serious "tools" such as firearms, knives, axes, and the like we did not.

Mentors included those Vets from previous Conflicts and some were amputees, blind, and had awful scars and burns and other injuries...
Tough lessons, still I appreciate these hard to share lessons they shared...
Heck, we had "skeleton keys" on many homes, it was normal to use one's key to open another home...still we had common courtesy, respect and 'Lessons' on all this...
Like checking on one of them Vets, or a Widow women, or similar and "letting ourselves in" as we did.



I agree with Jeff.
I agree to the degree I walked off from some things that involve Shooters, these types folks scared the hell out of me then, and continue to.

Then again, what do I know, I was raised with only 3 Rules of Gun Safety...
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I agree with both sm and Jeff White. Nothing I can add to what they said.
 
If you're facing imminent deadly force, hesitation = death. Life doesn't always give you a nicely lit target and absolutely positive ID. You have to make your best determination from facts and circumstances. Other folks may have strangers wandering into their homes at all hours, and may be related to laconic men who like to lurk in shadows. But for most of us such a scenario would be the prelude to very bad things. Horrors so unspeakable I hope none of you ever has to experience them. Idiot bros in law aside, most people willing to creep into an occupied dwelling in the dark who fail to run like hell when discovered aren't there for the good china. They're there for you and yours, to take you down to the bottom level of hell and keep you there for awhile. There are people out there with thoughts so dark they'd make a demon blush.

So yeah, if some idiot "friend" or relation pretends to break in then fails to ID himself I'd shoot the fool in the chest with a rifle and sleep easy the next night. It's his fault for being stupid, not mine for being cautious.
 
Without reading all four pages,

I never would have said; 'anyone in my house is a threat'. I actually like how the Utah law is written, where deadly force is authorized when the person enters your home either by violence or by stealth, with the intent to commit a felony. This narrows out the UPS guy who pokes his head in the back door and yells, or my army buddy who let himself in to crash on the couch while I was out. (In reality, the former would lost his job, and the latter would know better.)

If an UNIDENTIFIED person is in my house, without my permission, and fails to ID and comply when confronted, THEN I will regard them as a threat.

A person's home should offer the highest degree of safety the law can allow. Entering another man's dwelling without their permission is to endanger everything he holds dear. If there are those in society who don't understand this, they MUST learn.
 
I don't believe having time to verbally challenge an unknown threat equates to having time to respond to a light switch, turn it on, squint at where the threat was when you last looked for it (unless your eyes adjust to sudden light from darkness instantly) and identify positively. Not to mention you can verbally challenge from behind cover, not always the case for turning on the lights.

We don't all have weapon mounted lights or remote switches or clap-ons.

The blame rests solely on the invader. Its ESPECIALLY stupid to do this to someone who you know owns a gun.
 
Cosmoline said;
Life doesn't always give you a nicely lit target and absolutely positive ID.
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There is no excuse for not having a nicely lit target that can positively ID in your own home. You have almost 100% control of that environment.

I live in a single story ranch type house with a full basement. The kitchen, dining room and living room are all at the South end of the house. All three entrances are in that end of the house. The bedrooms and bathrooms (except for what's been added in the basement) are down a hallway that leads off from the dining room. The steps into the basement are in the kitchen, right in front of the door that leads from the carport. That is the door that is used most of the time. The house was built in 1975. The stairwell used to be enclosed with a short wall and turned wood stanchions. Very 1970s. Last summer we completed a kitchen/dining room remodel. We enclosed the stairwell. But on the North end of the enclosure I built in a window that is covered with a decorative wrought iron wall hanging. I did that deliberately so that I can still see the door from the master bedroom door.

It's your home and there is no excuse for not having a light next to your bed and knowing where the light switches and blind spots are.

There might be an excuse out on the street for not having a light, and not controlling your environment, but there is no excuse in one's own home.

Jeff
 
Thanks for starting this thread Jeff.... the discussion is important.

I often end Home Defense Tactics courses with a dramatic FoF situation that is absolutely 100% not a justified shooting if you use the "only if my family or I are threatened with harm" definition of such, which is obviously what I advocate. These scenarios are designed specifically to counter the "in my state I can shoot an intruder" hyperbole.

"can" doesn't mean "should".


-RJP
 
Jeff, I don't see where anyone disagreed about the importance of identifying your target. But there seems to be a disgreement over what is sufficient "identification" and what constitutes a "target". Also, no one disagreed that any course of action, even the "right one" (whatever the hell that means) will sometimes result in tragedy.

You might have a good point to make, but you seem unable to make it without creating strawmen for counterarguments and attempting to preemptively demean anyone who might not agree with you. You also seem to be under the impression that your personal experience can and should be generallized into rules that the rest of us should live by. I have no idea what your personal experience is, but I am confident that whatever you've learned from it isn't going to work for everyone in every circumstance.
 
So yeah, if some idiot "friend" or relation pretends to break in then fails to ID himself I'd shoot the fool in the chest with a rifle and sleep easy the next night


really? that based on supposition? in my life folks that say that often haven't done it. and absolutly no one thats ever done it felt that way after it REALLY happened. but heck you might be exceptional
in my experience , not to beconfused with imagination, one of my friends killed his brother in a similar scene . was never the same did eventually use same gun to blow his own brains out
 
I actually have been in a situation where I was 100% legally justified to shoot an “ intruder” in my home who refused to Identify himself and who I couldn’t clearly see (due to sun glare) had I shot I would have got the wrong guy. I am really glad that I went above and beyond to clearly identify my target. And I do keep my house lit enough at night that I could I.F.F. and intruder. After hearing all the tactical discussion here I’m still left with the fact that there is a human life in my hands anytime I pick up a firearm. I do not want a human beings blood on my hands if it is at all avoidable (I don’t care how “justified” the shoot is) I agree with Jeff with more could have (and IMO should have) been done to Identify the target before pulling the trigger​
 
Alright. Let's try a different scenario:

Chaplain (homeowner) says, with a gun pointed at the person- "Identify yourself." Recieving no response, he reaches one hand off the gun to flip on the lights. The criminal there has a perfect target and shoots the chaplain. The chaplain, shoots back. Both are shot and taken to the hospital.

Is that the outcome you would prefer?

As for your scenario, Jeff: Living with teenagers should necessarily change your strategies. You now have individuals in the immediate household with a high probability of stupid and/or thoughtless (as in, not thinking about consequences) acts. As such, you have to shift your tactics. As this story is written, the Chaplain had little reason to think the person menacing him in the dark was friendly.

Your situation is rather different from the one reported: You knew you had a teenage child not currently at home. You know teenagers are more unpredictable than adults. You also knew it was raining. As such, your intuition told you in all likelihood it was your child rather than a prowler. The Chaplain had no such probabilities running around in his intuition.

As such, this is a sad scenario, but I would not suggest basing your tactics off of it.
 
There might be an excuse out on the street for not having a light, and not controlling your environment, but there is no excuse in one's own home.
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How about being broke enough not to be able to rewire/remodel/afford a home to your own specifications? I shoot maybe 3-4 times a year, these days, using bullets I cast myself from scrap lead, and very low powder charges, just to save on $. I can't afford remodeling, a surefire, or new guns (my guns are mostly hand-me-downs from a time that did not know weapon mounted lights). I have a min-maglite, and that's not exactly a great light for this kind of situation, but it's all I can afford.

I see your point that you have MORE control over the situation in your own home, but it isn't always 100% (spouse, family members, zoning laws, HOA bylaws, etc), as things can prevent you from having the perfect tactical environment in your home.

Unfortunately, Jeff, I don't think you are fully acknowledging the high likelyhood that the BIL here was acting in a threatening manner.

To some others: Bravado & machismo are not an asset. Blithely stating you will throw down on any intruder is neither admirable, nor legally sound. Having said that, hesitation can surely get you killed. Sure the chaplain should have either given initial warning "ID yourself or get shot!", or given a last warning before firing. But once they don't ID themselves, and they have been warned of being fired upon, you can pretty well guess they are a threat. Lighting is good, provided it doesn't give away your position or blind you, and you ALREADY KNOW WHERE THE PERP IS, more or less. Otherwise you are just advertising yourself.

The bottom line, however, is that even with a light, it may not have been possible to ID the perp, and if he WAS lit up, who's to say he wouldn't have jumped at the homeowner screaming "BOO!" before he had a chance to figure out who it was, and plugged him.

Could the homeowner have prepared better? Certainly. Do we have enough detail to call this a good or bad shoot? Hell no. Who is overwhelmingly at fault? The idiot/intruder. End of story until we get more info.
 
Originally posted by Jeff White:
Why does the shooter have to dig for a light? Why can't he just turn the lights on?
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Jeff:

Your comments are usually well thought out....but not this time. It smacks a wee bit of the old "Why didn't you just shoot the gun out of his hand instead of mortally wounding him?"

Both (turning on lights and trying to shoot a gun out of an attacker's hand) place the GG in jeopardy. Illuminating myself to an intruder is NOT part of my plan.

The shooting you reported is a tragedy....but in my state (Louisiana) it certainly violates no statutes (neither criminal nor civil).

Calling out a challenge to an intruder may, in and of itself, pose a threat to the homeowner. You have allowed the intruder to know roughly, or maybe specifically, where you are. You have given up a tactical advantage. Expecting a homeowner to do more is ill-advised.

Yes, (again) this was a tragedy. However, if the intruder had been a psychopath and had mutilated and murdered the chaplain and his family, I would consider that to be a tragedy.

Bottom Line: The BIL screwed up. Regretfully, he (and the chaplain) have paid a high price for the incredible stupidity of the BIL. You can turn on all the lights in your home if you wish.......but this is not part of my plan.

In case you wonder, my plan is to hole up in the master bedroom, call 911 and neutralize anyone who forces his way through the bedroom door.........UNLESS I have kids and grandkids visiting. IN THAT CASE the intruder gets neutralized ASAP.
 
I think that many are missing this point: There is no necessity to TAKE AGGRESSIVE ACTION (arguably including any form of searching and possibly even calling out and/or turning on lights) until you have identified a threat. The proper response to an unidentified and non-threatening intruder (as Dawg indicated in the above post) is to barricade your & yours OR LEAVE and call the police. Movement towards an exit or to secure family should be cautious ("tactical") and may bring you into contact with a threat, but heading towards the sound of intruder for no other reason than forcing an engagement/identification could be considered reckless.

Yes, "pretending" to break into someone's house is certainly reckless as well, but it is not a lethal act like shooting into the dark.

-RJP
 
Some of y'all are setting up scenarios where the bad guy has the upper hand. Jeff's point, I think, is that this is your home turf. Why haven't you set it up ahead of time so that you have the upper hand? Why have you turned it into a quick-draw contest where you have no time to identify the intruder?
 
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