[Howard Treesong]

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Property rights matter. This guy did the right thing by calling the police. It's certainly much more controversial, but I also think he did the right thing by trying to stop the thieves when it became clear that the police would not arrive in time to stop the crime. The only real question here is whether he should have pulled the trigger.

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Howard,

I agree with many of your points but don't quite understand where you are coming from with this. Are you saying that anybody/everybody should try to stop illegal actions they see taking place?

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I don't think I'd arrogate to myself the judgment you suggest. What I do think is that our society generally should permit citizenry to stop serious crime when it can. Mrs. Treesong and I got in a discussion on this point over dinner: she articulated that she'd be absolutely furious with me if I pulled out a shotgun to defend our neighbors' house from a burglary. She had a different answer, however, when I asked about the situation where I saw two evildoers break into the house next door if I knew that only the wife were alone at home. And it's a no-brainer to defend Chez Treesong and the Little Treesongs with deadly force in the awful event that's necessary.

My own personal limits aside, I see at least some justification in what the shooter did. Enough to let him walk? I think likely yes, but I'm clearly troubled by what he did -- as we all should be.

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Especially in this situation the 911 dispatcher explicitly tells him to remain inside and says that it is alright if they get away before the police arrive.

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I don't give a rat's ass what the dispatcher tells me to do if I'm in the shooter's position. It's a judgment call based on what I'm seeing.

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As others have pointed out if people feel they have such an obligation it seems to be a very quick and slippery slope into shooting of pranksters/neighbors checking up on neighbor's houses on vacations etc...

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Yes, it does. Here, though, I think the shooter knew damn well that the guys breaking his neighbor's window with a crowbar and coming out five minutes later with a full bag of stuff aren't pranksters or caretakers. If they are pranksters who know the guys who own the house, then they of course aren't guilty of either burglary or robbery, in which case the shooter's actions pretty clearly aren't justified. So the shooter takes a risk of a homicide prosecution if he gets it wrong -- which I think is exactly the right result.


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I'm not a lawyer but wondering if that statement also impacts the applicability of the statutes?

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I don't think so. I read this statement to mean that the neighbors aren't his friends -- but that he could identify who it is that his neighbors are, and that he clearly knows the guys busting into the house aren't actually the people that live there.