Exercising the Right
To Shoot or Not to Shoot?
A shooting in a small Houston eatery became a national news story after it was all caught on video. KHOU.com reported that a masked robber armed with what appeared to be a loaded gun entered a Mexican fast-food restaurant on January 5 just before midnight and demanded cash from the people inside. As the armed robber made his way around the store collecting cash and other valuables from the customers, one of the patrons pulled out his own gun and shot the suspect multiple times. The wounded robber died at the scene, and the armed customer retrieved all the stolen money and returned it to the other customers before driving away from the restaurant. The whole ordeal was caught on surveillance video, and police were soon searching for the armed customer.
Some details in this story added to its newsworthy nature. One detail was that the investigation revealed that the suspect was not actually handling a real gun, although the victims had no way of knowing that. Police investigators later determined that the gun was either a BB gun or an airsoft gun. Another detail that contributed to the incident gaining so much attention was the racial dynamic, as the shooter was a white man and the deceased robbery suspect was a black man. KHOU reported on January 15 that the robber’s family and local left-wing organizations publicly called for the shooter to be prosecuted. Quanell X of the New Black Panther Nation stated that the man “should be charged with something because we cannot have a society where our citizens are judge, jury and executioner.”
KHOU legal analyst Carmen Roe explained that the shooting appeared to be a straightforward case of self-defense, but police will still need to investigate and interview the shooter to confirm the facts. “One of the reasons that law enforcement is seeking out this individual is to find out whether he was in fear for his life or the lives of the people around him because that’s absolutely essential to a self-defense claim under the law,” Roe explained. She added that the burglar’s gun not being real didn’t really matter, because the armed customer had a reasonable belief that it was real. Furthermore, the armed customer was under no obligation to stay in the store and wait for the police to arrive.
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