Take off your tinfoil hat.

yikes.

plork, you go boi

So plorky you're antigun,anti religion, anti god,hell just about anti everything!Is there anything you're not anti about?

I'm with you keck!They'll have to kill me first! Bring it on liberal stooges!

Anyone that comes for my guns better bring lots of help, three days rations, and A LOT of body bags.

Ooooh. Vern. You are so very manly. How many people have you killed?

Some men are empty cocoons without guns. Without them they would literally collapse.

The government doesn't have a problem with that. Neither does anyone else.

Buffaloes Roam: Don't like Guns don't own them, don't want to be around guns then move to a country that bans guns. If that is not good enough for you then STFU.

Have a nice day.

Have guns. Don't brag about them. I have a penis.

Hmmm. Now, I didn't get that as a moral of this story.

I did. Being scum in your genes is the same as being gay or straight. Can't fault one for being gay, same as you can't fault one for being a low life scumbucket. Only difference is that gays are harmless.

so ?

move to canada if you dont like handguns.

you are not going to ban guns in america....get that through your head, tin foil or not.

Hey bob,I here England's nice this time of year also!

bob-

Don't like guns? Don't have one.

bob-1468349: Fact you have a better chance of being killed by a drunk driver then being shot to death.

Fact: This statistic of 43 times more likely to be used to kill a family member than an intruder is a blatant lie.

Fact: Study Confirms Private Firearms Stop Crime 2.5 Million Times Each Year.

Fact: If you were to research your statistic you will find they included suicides approx 16,000 per year( A family member shot themselves)

Only 649 are unintentional shootings, 311 from legal intervention and 235 from undetermined intent (4%).

So in fact if you took out the suicides then the amount is more like 10 to 15% only pal.

@BOB Post source and independent backup or it is not fact, just more fiction running rampant on the internet.

So if he somehow figured out that it was his own kid, outside in the middle of the night, dressed in black, wearing a ski mask, and charging him with a knife, then it would be acceptable to take a knife in the chest?

Are you effing high?

Vern theses libs will scream at the top of there lungs they should have done this or done that, in the end when it happens to them some crazy person invades there home and ****s with there family or kills some or all of them. They will know in the end we were right and they were dead wrong.

He was an adopted drug baby.

First, where does it say they weren't called until after. Second, and very important, the neighbor that called was the father's sister. Third, equally important, where they live, response times tend to be very high.

By saying you want to know the father's motive, it makes it sound like you belive that the family planned the kid's murder. Is that what you are saying?

The father's motive in going out there was simple, he was protecting his sister!

Amen.

It depends. A fifteen year old can be a 90 pound little kid with commando fantasies. Or he can be a 200 pound legitimate threat.

Anyone with a knife is a very real threat. Weight is not the issue. Also, if on drugs, all bets are off. Rational thinking abilities are gone, strength increased, and fear of consequences go out the window

Maybe you might want to sit down and breathe into a paper bag so you don't tip over or something.

You're sick in the head. This man lost his adopted son. There's nothing here to laugh about, Rick.

Jeez, what a compassion.

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

Hard to argue with that.

Don't like guns? Don't have one.

Milhaus-2271724: Don't like it, move to a country of your choice that bans them... If not STFU.

You are the worst kind of idiot.

Well, maybe that was harsh. This case is upsetting. Sorry Carol. However, I disagree with you.

Too far fetched.

Robbie the robot: Wrong, the first thing you do when you kill someone is to CALL YOUR LAWYER..

Second thing you do is not make a statement to the police or anyone until you have talked with said lawyer first...

That is the smartest thing you can do in theses types of situations.

Leatherneck is almost correct. First tell the police everything they need to secure the area. I.e. are there more people involved, did anyone get away, etc. Then you clam up until you get a lawyer. Some police officers feel like a lot of people on here and will try to railroad you into prison.

No gun? Knife death.

What, you think the guy's son was out to KILL him? They get into some kind of physical confrontation with a knife, don't you think it would come out that, hey, this is my son?

Why didn't the guy shout, "HEY! Take one more step and I shoot you dead!" Or did he?

I get you about the gun. I don't have one, but I think about it sometimes. You want to have an equalizer if you need it. But hell, the risks... you have a grandkid over, people lose track of what's going on, next thing you know, you're on CNN having tragically lost a grandchild. That's what I fear. How do you keep it ready enough for emergencies (within seconds, in the middle of the night), but still safe? How do you see what you're doing and who you're shooting at in the dark? Do you have the presence of mind to turn the lights on, when your heart is practically exploding out of your chest with fear and adrenaline? Man... it's risky. I ask myself, do I really wanna get into a shootout with someone? Well, bottom line, if it's me and my family, or them... tough problem for me.

Whats missing is that possibly the father thought his son was sleeping inside of the home and did not come out. It was not until some one went to the body and ID it and found out the body is the fathers son.

whisperingsage: Another idiot who has no idea about gun's.

Absolutely NEVER fire a warning shot. The law typically requires the situation be absolutely unavoidable, with immediate threat to your life. A warning shot demonstrates that those conditions did not exist in your situation. The prosecutors will use that warning shot to put you in jail. If the situation is bad enough you feel justified in defending yourself, then defend yourself. "Warning" someone is not defending yourself. It's irresponsible.

Warning shots create a variety of legal and practical problems. It cannot be too strongly stated the bullet must landsomewhere! If the situation is stressful enough to inspire a warning shot, careful aim will not be possible; certainly not while keeping an eye on the threat. When shot into the air at a 90-degree angle, the bullet should fall back to the earth at the speed of gravity. The terminal ballistics should be uncomfortable, but not deadly.²

However, a precise 90-degree angle is not possible under stress and the bullet is more likely to plow into some unfortunate target still propelled by its gunpowder charge. There is a report of a law enforcement officer who fired a warning shot into the air to get the attention of a fleeing robber. The bullet ricocheted off a building ledge and struck the felon in the top of his head. This got his attention as no one ever had before, but it appeared that the officer had illegally shot a fleeing felon, and the wound location looked like an execution. Fortunately, the robber survived and doubtless made spirited complaints about being shot, which coincided with the officer’s report of the circumstances.

Warning shots raise questions on if shots needed to be fired at all. These may be silly questions, but they are questions. In October, of 2010 retired police Lt. Harry Thomas fired a warning shot. Two dogs had escaped their yard and were menacing the neighborhood. Lt. Thomas fortified himself with a .45 S&W Model 1950 revolver and tried to coax the dogs into his garage. Lt. Thomas had coaxed many criminals into squad cars at gunpoint during his long career, but the dogs were not so easily intimidated. One dog began chewing on his pants leg. This ended the coaxing.

In an urban area, with rapidly moving targets and off balance from the dog attached to his pants leg, Lt. Thomas decided that a warning shot was the only safe shot. The dogs departed and the police were called. Lt. Thomas was charged with firing a gun in the city limits. He was told that because he had not killed the dog, he obviously was not in any danger and not acting in self-defense.⁴ It cannot be too strongly stressed, the purpose of self-defense is not killing the threat, it is stopping the threat. Brandishing a firearm is a crime, but brandishing a firearm without firing it has long been considered to be lawful self-defense.

In 85 percent of defensive gun uses it successfully stops the threat. A warning shot is a step beyond brandishing and in rare circumstances may be the appropriate, minimum, level of force to stop the threat. It took three hours of testimony to convince the municipal judge in Lt. Thomas’s case that it was appropriate. The prosecutor was still not convinced and even joined an internet chat group to insist that Lt. Thomas had to shoot the dog in order to claim self-defense. He further claimed that he could have proved that the dogs were not vicious, a claim refuted by neighbors who were actually familiar with the dogs.

The attitude of the authorities in the Thomas case was that self-defense must equal a deadly threat. An experienced Chicago detective and commentator on personal security confidently writes that self-defense is not possible because if it were the police would find bodies of dead criminals everywhere.⁵ This is an extremely limited view of self-defense but one which must be expected if one fires warning shots.

Warning shots inhabit a legal limbo. It is legal to brandish a firearm in self-defense and legal to use deadly force in self-defense but warning shots are not specifically legal. Most justification (self-defense) statutes state that a victim can use force “including deadly force.” This indicates that there is a continuum of force between brandishing and deadly force to be used as appropriate. It is logical that warning shots are within this continuum.

But the life of the law is not logic; it is experience, as Justice Holmes wrote. The experience is that prosecutors have claimed that defendants did not have the right to claim self-defense because they only fired a warning shot.⁶

The thrust of the argument is that a defendant is only entitled to argue self-defense when he has used deadly force. Warning shots, the argument continues, are not deadly force and therefore self-defense does not apply. This argument seriously misstates the concept of self-defense but the claim that a warning shot is not deadly force can be directly confronted.

In State v Rutter, the Missouri Supreme Court found that Mr. Rutter had shot and killed an acquaintance whom he claimed was reaching for a weapon.⁷ In the course of discussing the self-defense claim, the Court made the off-hand observation that Mr. Rutter did not give a warning or “fired a warning shot or to have first tried any of a variety of less forceful options.” This indicates that self-defense includes a variety of acts short of death, to include warning shots. The federal Eighth Circuit ruled that when the defendant fired a warning shot to encourage compliance that it was a threat of force in connection with the theft.⁸

Firing a firearm in the air, even as a so-called “warning shot,” constitutes as a matter of law the use of deadly force, that is the use of a force likely to cause death or great bodily harm…

In another case, Tony Mann fired a warning shot “skyward” to discourage hot pursuit by police. The court found that this was assault on a police officer reasoning, “Here, there was no evidence from any source suggesting self-defense. The court was clearly able to infer that Appellant had the specific intent to kill or cause serious physical injury to Officer Shanholtzer.”⁹ Thus, the mere shooting of a firearm in the proximity of a pursuing police office was deadly force.

The issue was decisively and succinctly disposed of by a Florida court which ruled:

Firing a firearm in the air, even as a so-called “warning shot,” constitutes as a matter of law the use of deadly force, that is the use of a force likely to cause death or great bodily harm … A firearm is, by definition, a deadly weapon which fires projectiles likely to cause death or great bodily harm; whenever it is fired in the vicinity of human beings, as here, there is real danger that the fired projectile may hit someone, even if not aimed at anyone, as such projectiles are quite capable of ricocheting off nearby objects and hitting people in the area.

As a legal and practical matter warning shots are deadly force and should be treated as such. The safety rules demand knowing the target and what is beyond it.

A SPECIAL NOTE ON BRANDISHING, SHOOTING TO WOUND, WARNING SHOTS AND SIMILAR HALF-MEASURES. Prosecutors have another term for warning shots: attempted felonious assault, improper discharge of a firearm etc. Shooting someone in the leg rather than center mass is similarly misguided and will not evade serious felony charges. Similarly, pulling out a gun just to “defuse the situation” is a legal non-starter. Do not be tempted to do this. If the gun comes out of the holster, the gun owner had better be justified in immediately employing it fully. There is no such thing as a warning shot or shooting to wound. This will be construed as a miss, bad marksmanship and perhaps even attempted murder.