Lawful Use of Force? (You Decide) USCCA

[Nathan57]

@Shamrock

The difference in this case being that there is no clear evidence the person is actually trying to break into the home. The windows he is breaking were over his head and would have been very difficult to climb into. The person was observed, likely by the other person who ran him over, breaking other windows with no attempts of entering other buildings.

This looks like an unhinged person committing vandalism. Destruction of property does not justify lethal force in the absence of an imminent threat of death or severe bodily harm. I personally would not have used deadly force in this case. I didn’t see anyone in imminent danger when the guy was run over. This fact significantly elevates the legal risk for the cart driver.

I agree completely.

There are many variables that are substantially different between these cases.

[Shamrock]

@Mike164

Like throwing bricks, not a single brick but BrickS, through the windows?

Which is apparently what he was doing at vehicles and other buildings before this one without trying to gain entry into any of them.

You can throw bricks at windows to try to gain entry or you can do it to break glass. If he was trying to gain entry I think he would have chosen windows that would have been much easier to enter through. Even if he somehow broke all of the glass out of these windows he would have had a hard time climbing up into them. And if he did decide to try that would have been the perfect opportunity for the 3 or 4 men who where watching him to make a move to stop him while his hands were busy trying to pull himself up.

Though it seems clear to me based on the video and the story of his previous actions that he was not trying to get in.

[Shamrock]

@Dave17

Kind of like getting hit by a nerf dart, maybe?

As unpleasant as it is when my son sneaks up on me and shoots me at point blank range with a nerf dart, I would take that any day a thousand times over instead of being run over once by a couple hundred pound golf cart with a couple hundred pound guy sitting in it!

[Mike164]

@Nathan57

many variables that are substantially different between these cases

1. Stranger - Acquaintance
2. Mid Day - Midnight
3. No contact - Sent a text
4. No warning - Tried to card the door first

A few differences but to me, a stranger in the middle of the day breaks my window unannounced? I’m in self defense mode.

[Karacal]

@Mike164

stranger in the middle of the day breaks my window unannounced? I’m in self defense mode.

They have to cut through all the crime scene tape before they can get to your window.

[Mike164]

What do you mean, cut through crime scene tape? I don’t get it??

I just duck under it when the cops aren’t looking…

[Shamrock]

@Mike164

a stranger in the middle of the day breaks my window unannounced? I’m in self defense mode.

Given that I’m pretty sure your window is several floors up it is unlikely someone standing on the ground chucking rocks is going to have much chance of getting in:)

Also given your stories of walking the streets of SLC you seem to know the difference between the need to get into self defense mode and the need to go straight to guns or golf carts blazing;)

If this guy is chucking cement blocks through my ground floor window I’m getting my family to our safe area and calling the sheriff. I wouldn’t know if he was armed or had friends and would want to make sure my family was covered and I had all the advantages if he/they actually enter the house. If I didn’t have time to do that then he would receive a proper welcome the instant he clearly made a move to enter our home.

[William191]

Breaking my window with a brick gives me reasonable probability that the person throwing the brick means harm to me and my family. Something IS going to be coming back at them.

[Mike164]

We are several floors up but we do have this window. The area is difficult to access, red hatch, and a couple of locked doors down below.
We have had people on the roof, I talked about one instance a while back. So in my case a person has to be there on purpose and is probably looking for some kind of entry…

[Dave17]

@Shamrock

Though it seems clear to me based on the video and the story of his previous actions that he was not trying to get in.

Looking through the lens of a sane, sober person, I presume.

[Shamrock]

Sober and reasonably sane (in my biased opinion) for me the vast majority of the time:)

But in this case I was observing the actions in the video of a clearly unhinged and mentally unstable person. I would have been very on guard for his attention to suddenly turn from his window breaking addiction but I would need a little more evidence in this case before assuming he was trying to gain entry or trying to go after someone.

[Shamrock]

@Mike164

So in my case a person has to be there on purpose and is probably looking for some kind of entry…

Sounds very unlikely that a mentally deranged window breaker would go through all the effort to access that roof simply to throw paving stones through your window. I would definitely be reaching for your new shotgun if I saw someone in that image throwing objects through the window. Once the glass is out of the way it looks like a simple step to get inside. The main issue being that if you did decide you needed to fire it looks like there aren’t a lot of safe backstops if you happen to miss your target.

That is the other reason I prefer retreating to our safe area if possible. There is only one direction to get to us from there and if I did miss the shot still has to go through several walls before hitting our sloped driveway and or going into the thick forest across the street that has less than a dozen vehicles driving by in any 24 hour period if you include our own pulling in and out of the driveway.

[Mike164]

@Shamrock

there aren’t a lot of safe backstops

To be Honest, It Scares the hell out of me. I often think about putting the 9mm away and using a .380 for inside defense. On another note, I ran accross these the other day,

The tests I’ve seen look like they may be a good option for close quarters like I live in, they dissipate energy pretty well upon impact,

[Shamrock]

I was looking into those when I got my new shotgun. Seems like a lot of the pellets tend to under penetrate after splitting but in your current situation risking under penetration is likely better than risking over penetration.

The one thing I couldn’t find on this ammo was how it behaves after going through glass and drywall. If it only splits in tissue it might still have the same chance of going through walls and glass as 00 buck. Would be interesting to find a test through barriers with this ammo compared to #1 and #4 buck and maybe a heavy turkey load. Regardless I think you would want to find something that patterns really tight from your gun to minimize the risk of having a few stray pellets heading towards your neighbors.

Or you can just move to the country where you can pick whatever shot or slugs you like without having to worry so much about the neighbors. Both the good ones and the bad ones:)

[Mike164]

@Shamrock

Or you can just move to the country where you can pick whatever shot or slugs you like without having to worry so much about the neighbors.

OK So you had to Rub it in
Panguitch is really starting to look really good to us.

[Shamrock]

Just doing my part to keep nudging you in the right direction:)

That area would make my list of places I would consider moving to if we had to move from here for some reason.

[Winston1]

Yes, I believe this incident would be justified as long as a less use of force was not readily available. I would agree that waiting a very short time for LEO to arrive would be best but I think that a man got to do what he has to minimize the property damage at the moment.

[Karacal]

Hello and welcome @Winston1

[Bill168]

Good for her for protecting herself.

[Doug101]

But does he have to be throwing them at a person? The guy more than likely doesn’t know if anyone is in the house or not and doesn’t know where that person may be. He could be thought to be endangering anyone in the house at the time. Golf cart guy doesn’t know whether his child, grandchild, or his wife is near the window or not. I say he did the least of what he could have done.