Category: Self Defense

Des Moines homeowner, police shoot armed suspects after report of robbery

DES MOINES, Wash. – Detectives are investigating a police shooting that left at least one person injured Sunday night in Des Moines. 

Around 8:30 p.m., officers responded to a report of suspicious circumstances in the 24000 block of 16th Avenue South.

Police said a woman reported that her home was being robbed.

When officers arrived, they encountered an armed suspect and officers opened fire.

The armed suspect that confronted the officers was taken to Harborview Medical Center and is expected to survive his injuries.

According to investigators, a second suspect was also involved in a shooting with the homeowner.

Police said two Des Moines Police Department officers were involved in the shooting.

The Valley Independent Investigative team (VIIT) is serving as the independent investigative team for this OIS. VIIT is a multi-agency team made up of investigators from seven south King County Police Departments (Auburn, Des Moines, Federal Way, Kent, Renton, Port of Seattle, and Tukwila). The Des Moines Police Department is exempt from this investigation since officers with the agency were involved.

Killadelphia Update

Last year, the per-capita homicide rate in Philadelphia was worse than Chicago. It takes a lot of effort to be worse than Chicago, but Philadelphia — a/k/a “Killadelphia” — is up to the challenge, and is now on pace to break the city’s all-time annual murder total of 500, a record set in 1990 at the height of the crack cocaine epidemic. Basically, you could put police crime-scene tape around the entire city; every sidewalk in Philadelphia is covered in chalk outlines of slain victims.

OK, maybe I got a little carried away there, but it’s difficult to exaggerate how deadly conditions are in Philadelphia now:

Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner said on Monday that whoever was responsible for killing a pregnant woman and her unborn child as she was unloading gifts from her baby shower will face two counts of murder.
The victim, identified as Jessica Covington, 32, was shot 11 times in the head and belly on Saturday night in what police believe was a targeted shooting.

Deputy Police Commissioner Christine Coulter demanded that progressive DA Krasner take action amid a massive surge of gun violence.
‘Children are getting shot, unborn children getting shot, what is the city doing about this?’ she asked.

Police were said to be questioning a suspect in connection with Covington’s killing on Monday, but no arrests or charges have been announced as of late afternoon.
Speaking at a press conference on Monday, Krasner said Covington’s killing made him ‘sick.’ He said the person or persons who took the pregnant woman’s life and that of her unborn baby will ‘very likely’ face two counts of murder.
He praised police for ‘working nonstop and doing an amazing job with this case.’

Krasner has cut the number of prosecutions for gun crime and cops are blaming him for a huge spike in shootings a homicides.
Police in Philadelphia have made a record number of arrests for illegal gun possession this year – but the suspects’ chances of getting convicted dropped to 49 per cent from 63 per cent in 2017, analysis by the found.
There have been 491 homicide victims in 2021 – a 14 per cent increase from last year’s number of 436, and 283 in 2019.
Krasner boasts on his website that he has cut incarceration rates by 24,800 years, cut supervision by 102,400 years, never used the death penalty and helped exonerate 23 people.
Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw has said that Philadelphia’s criminal justice system has become a ‘revolving door’ for repeat gun offenders since Krasner was sworn into office in January 2018.

This is the problem with Democrats talking tough on gun control. You hear them talk about “getting guns off our streets,” but they don’t want to prosecute the people who are actually committing crimes with those guns — because all the criminals are Democrats.

Dana Pico at First Street Journal has been following the grisly “Killadelphia” death toll, and Ed Driscoll at Instapundit calls attention to the role of “progressive reforms” in the nationwide crime wave:

[Milwaukee County DA John] Chisholm, who was elected in 2007, supports deferrals for some misdemeanors and “low-level” felonies in order to cut down on incarcerations. And he’s taken credit for inspiring a new wave of prosecutors in cities like San Francisco, St. Louis, and Philadelphia who have enacted similar reforms. Chisholm congratulated San Francisco district attorney Chesa Boudin following his election in 2019, and the pair spoke at a forum earlier this year on the status of the progressive prosecutor movement.

Chisholm and other progressives support reforms to the cash-bail system, which they say criminalizes poverty. He has acknowledged that his reform-minded approach could put murderers back on the streets of Milwaukee.
“Is there going to be an individual I divert, or I put into [a] treatment program, who’s going to go out and kill somebody?” he told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel in 2007. “You bet. Guaranteed. It’s guaranteed to happen. It does not invalidate the overall approach.”
The Milwaukee DA said his office recommended $1,000 bail for [Waukesha massacre suspect Darrell] Brooks following his arrest on Nov. 5 on charges that he punched his girlfriend in the face and hit her with his vehicle in a gas station parking lot. The woman is identified only by her initials in court papers, which indicate they have a child together. Brooks was also charged with eluding police officers when they arrived to take him into custody.

What Democrats don’t want to admit is that crime is a people problem. It is easy to focus on guns, but the inanimate object does not kill people. Democrats have trained their media allies to mindlessly repeat the phrase “gun violence,” but my guns are not involved in violence. My podcast partner John Hoge has a rather substantial arsenal of firearms, none of which has ever been involved in “gun violence.”

Rhetoric that demonizes law-abiding gun owners is necessary to the Democratic Party agenda of absolving themselves and their constituents of responsibility. Nothing that goes wrong in Philadelphia — or Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit, St. Louis, etc. — is the fault of the people directly involved, because those people vote Democrat. The voters who elect Democrats must be held blameless for their problems, and the blame must be transferred to scapegoats — which is why phrases like “white privilege” and “systemic racism” have entered the political lexicon.

The kind of “reforms” implemented by Philadelphia DA Larry Krasner are aimed at ending the “racial injustice” of putting criminals in prison, as if there were something deliberately unfair about the demographic profile of the prison population, as if law enforcement and the court system were letting white criminals go unpunished. Well, where are all these white murderers in Philadelphia? What has Larry Krasner done to end the “white privilege” that lets these perpetrators get off scot-free?

These are rhetorical questions, obviously. The population of Philadelphia County is 44% black and 34% non-Hispanic white. Fifteen percent of the county population is Hispanic and 8% are Asian. But these other demographic groups are not implicated in the “gun violence” epidemic that has Philadelphia on pace to set a new homicide record.

In 2020, Joe Biden officially won Pennsylvania by a margin of 80,555 votes. He got 603,790 votes in Philadelphia County.

So the dishonest blame game will continue, and the bodies of homicide victims will keep piling up in “Killadelphia,” because Democrats like Larry Krasner don’t want to arrest the criminals whose votes elect them.

Celebrity crap-for-brains on display once more.

Warning; Obscene language

BLUF:
Basically guys, all the outrage over this trial is because the left is terrified of losing another tool in their toolbox. They love lawless mobs terrorizing you and wrecking your stuff. They love having you too scared of the system to stand up to their dirtbags.

FISKING ONE OF THE MANY DUMB HOT TAKES ON THE RITTENHOUSE CASE

In the aftermath of the Rittenhouse trial there are a bunch of posts like this floating around social media. They all work off the same talking points so they are basically interchangeable. These are all being shared to bamboozle the gullible and shore up the dedicated idiots. I picked this one because of how many lies and distortions it packed into one post.

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The Rittenhouse Trial Underscores the Left’s Determination to Eliminate the Natural Right of Self-Defense

The American left’s determination to conduct a media-inspired political trial of Kyle Rittenhouse had as its objective the ultimate disarming of Americans and the elimination of the Second Amendment.  While Kyle Rittenhouse was listed as the defendant, it was the right of self-defense that was on trial.

To what extent does man have a natural or God-given right to self-defense and protection of himself and his property?  This question has been bandied about for thousands of years and that issue, not guns (which are an instrument of self-defense), is at the heart of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution.

The United States is the only nation in the annals of mankind to be established on the basis of a political and social philosophy centered on natural, or God-given, rights.
Among these are self-defense and property.  Property rights are the bedrock of the American political system; without that foundation, there is no freedom.

The Founders held that property rights encompass not just physical property but also one’s life, labor, speech, and livelihood, as individuals own their own lives; therefore, they must own the products of that life which can be traded in free exchange with others.  Further, as there is a natural right of self-preservation, man has the right and duty to defend himself against transgressors, including the state, that would deny, abrogate, or unlawfully seize his property.

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North Raleigh homeowner shoots person breaking into house

RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) – A homeowner in North Raleigh shot someone breaking into his house Saturday afternoon, police said.

Officers responded to the shooting report around 1:50 p.m. along the 3500 block of Teravista Way. The neighborhood is off of Louisburg Road and north of Mitchel Mill and Ligon Mill roads.

Police said a man came home to find someone breaking into his house. The homeowner shot the break-in suspect in the leg in what police described as self-defense.

The person who was shot was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

 

Suspected intruder shot and killed in St. Louis

ST. LOUIS — A 60-year-old man shot and killed a suspect who he said was trying to break into his home in the College Hill neighborhood Friday night.

St. Louis police responded at 11 p.m. to a burglary call at a home on the 1500 block of E Grand Avenue. When they arrived, they found a man in his 20s lying on the back porch with a gunshot wound. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Police have not released his identity.

The man who lived there told police he was inside when he heard the suspect at his backdoor. He said he then grabbed his gun and shot the man as he tried to climb through the kitchen window.

The homeowner was taken into custody, police said. A homicide investigation is underway.

That’s just how fast things can happen and just how fast and furious the response should be.

Uber driver shoots 2 during attempted robbery in Mayfair

 

MAYFAIR – Police say an Uber driver shot and killed and man and badly injured another during an attempted robbery overnight in Mayfair.

Investigators from the Philadelphia Police Department said a group of three armed men approached the driver as he was getting out of his car on the 3200 block of Longshore Avenue just after midnight Saturday.

The driver, who police say is licensed to carry a firearm, shot at least two of the alleged robbers several times and may have injured the third. The men, both in their 20s, were taken by responding officers to Jefferson-Torresdale Hospital where one died.

Investigators were unsure if the third alleged robber who fled from the scene was injured during the shooting.

Inspector DF Pace told reporters that the unnamed Uber driver remained at the scene of the shooting and described what happened to officers.

An update from the Philadelphia Police Department said an arrest was made and two weapons had been recovered.

No charges in deadly shooting in Casselton; case of self defense prosecutors decide

FARGO, N.D. (KFGO) – The Cass County State’s Attorney’s Office has decided not to file criminal charges against a man who shot and killed a man in Casselton late last month.

Prosecutors decided they could not prove that 54-year-old Edwin Kester Jr. intended to kill 58-year-old Randell Burton in an apartment connected to Club 94, a bar and restaurant on October 18.

In a report obtained by KFGO News, prosecutors said, “under the totality of the circumstances, the State is unable to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Kester’s use of deadly force in self-defense and/or defense of others was unjustified.”

Under North Dakota law, an individual is justified in using deadly force to protect the life of themselves or others.

Burton broke into the apartment where his girlfriend was living. Kester was staying with the woman because she feared that Burton may try to hurt her.

The investigation determined that Burton had threatened the woman’s life days before the shooting and was arrested for terrorizing and domestic violence. He had been released from jail the day before the shooting and was under court order not to contact the woman.

Kester shot Burton in the chest with a handgun when he broke through two locked doors and was headed toward the woman’s bedroom. Kester called 911 shortly before 2:00 a.m. Burton later died at the hospital.

Employee reportedly shoots suspects in armed robbery at cannabis store in Spanaway

SPANAWAY, Wash. – Two teens were shot Thursday night during an alleged armed robbery at a cannabis store in Spanaway.

The Pierce County Sheriff’s Office says a store employee called 911 around 9:30 p.m. to say that their business, Blessings Cannabis, had been robbed by four or five males with guns who were wearing hooded jackets and masks.

The employees told deputies that the suspects pointed guns at them while they stole money and marijuana. At one point, an employee retrieved a gun and shot at the suspects.

A short while later, two 19-year-olds showed up at a local hospital with gunshot wounds. They were arrested and booked into jail for robbery in the first degree, the sheriff’s office says.

The investigation is ongoing and the search for the other suspects continues. Anyone with information is asked to contact the sheriff’s office.

Facts over feelings in Kyle Rittenhouse verdict: He was acting in self-defense.

When Kyle Rittenhouse shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, and injured Gaige Grosskreutz, he was acting in self-defense. So says a jury from Kenosha, Wis., and their verdict is correct because that’s what the facts showed. But facts don’t always line up with feelings.

The trial started out on a sour note when Judge Bruce Schroeder blocked prosecutors from referring to the victims as “victims” — but allowed the defense to call them “rioters,” “looters,” and “arsonists.” Some said this was the judge being biased, but judges routinely impose restrictions on prosecutors that aren’t imposed on defense attorneys. And judges regularly ban the word “victim” in many jurisdictions, including in Massachusetts, disproportionately so in rape cases.

Banning words is silly, and sometimes unconstitutional, but judges have been doing it a lot since the idiot judge in the Kobe Bryant case notoriously ordered everyone in the case not to use the word “victim” when talking about the woman Bryant attacked. (Where was the outrage for that victim?)

Defense attorneys say the word “victim” is unfair because it presumes guilt. But if that were true, the word “witness” would be banned, too, because it presumes that a person actually saw what they say they saw. It’s all nonsense. If there is a legitimate concern about a word, the judge can instruct the jury not to use it unfairly.

The same people who complained about the word “victim” being banned in Rittenhouse’s case didn’t care about the five child “victims” Rosenbaum was convicted of raping. This evidence would have been admissible against Rosenbaum under Massachusetts law, even though it’s not relevant, but those who supported the prosecution said it was unfair even for the media to mention it. They should remember this the next time a defense attorney tries to use a rape victim’s past against her.

While the defense demonized Rittenhouse’s victims, the prosecution did the same to Rittenhouse by suggesting that he went to Kenosha with an assault weapon because he was planning to kill people. Rittenhouse said he wanted to help protect the public after riots broke out when police shot a black man named Jacob Blake seven times — hitting him in the back four times. Cops were cleared of wrongdoing, but people were upset because Blake was shot only a few months after George Floyd was killed.

Prosecutors said Rittenhouse was guilty of murder because he was the aggressor, but video evidence showed that Rittenhouse was leaving the area before he shot any bullets, and that he only started shooting when Rosenbaum and others started chasing him. Rosenbaum lunged at Rittenhouse and grabbed his gun. Rittenhouse said he shot Rosenbaum to stop him.

Video evidence also showed that Rittenhouse shot Huber only after Huber started hitting him in the head — and tried to take his gun.

Grosskreutz, who was armed, also put his hand on Rittenhouse’s gun before he was shot.

The prosecution claimed Rittenhouse provoked his victims by openly carrying a large weapon, and that this nullified any self-defense claim, but video evidence showed the victims were also provoking Rittenhouse. Provocation does not justify murder, but it does bolster Rittenhouse’s claim that he was acting in self-defense.

To assert a valid self-defense claim in a murder case, evidence must show that the defendant “exhausted all reasonable means to avoid killing someone.” Once that evidence is presented, however weak it is, the prosecution must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did not act in self-defense. The prosecution had no hope of meeting that burden in this case. It’s not that the victims deserved to be shot, it’s that the law permits jurors to find defendants not guilty if they kill in response to a threat of death or serious bodily harm.

It was a highly emotional case, with strong feelings on both sides. The defense says it was a big political farce, and that Rittenhouse never should have been charged. The prosecution says Rittenhouse had no business bringing a rifle to a riot, and that he is responsible for the violence that followed.

Both sides are a little bit right.

[No they aren’t, but I think this is just the author trying to salve his butthurt at having to acknowledge fact over his feelings]

David French’s Irrational Fear of Guns is No Reason to Outlaw Open Carry.

Instead of asking why a then-17 year-old was there helping to guard a business and putting out fires, the question should be why the governor didn’t call out the Guard in the same way he is before this verdict. The question should be how elected officials failed to protect the community they represented and made a teenager feel like he needed to go and offer what protection he could as a substitute. My grandfather was Kyle Rittenhouse’s age when he signed up to serve on the USS Alabama in WWII. Men a year older can openly bear arms to fight overseas but not to defend their own communities when rioters are allowed to turn a town into a war zone?

Rittenhouse had every right to be in Kenosha. His father lives there. His grandmother lives there. He works there. His rifle was there too, (not driven across state lines) despite media’s best intentions to turn Rittenhouse’s short 20 minute drive from his mom’s house in Antioch to Kenosha into the modern journey of Odysseus. In fact, you might argue Rittenhouse had more of a reason to be in Kenosha than the rioters from California or Oregon.

It makes no sense that [David] French is arguing against open carry by citing the case of a teenager (the court determined he was legally open-carrying a rifle) who can’t carry concealed because a) how do you carry a rifle concealed and b) he’s too young to purchase and carry a handgun, much less carry it concealed.

No law-abiding person should feel persuaded to forfeit their rights because someone harbors an irrational fear of the inanimate object they possess. A person’s comfort level doesn’t determine the extent to which a right can be exercised. If you dislike open carry then carry concealed, but no one has the right to determine for others how they may lawfully carry.

— Dana Loesch in Kyle Rittenhouse Isn’t a Villain and There Is Nothing Wrong with Open Carry

William A. Jacobson-
My appearance on Chicago’s Morning Answer:
“if you can’t defend yourself in those circumstances and the full weight of the state and the full weight of the media is going to come down on you, then we are in a really bad place”

 

Free States Must Defend the Right to Self-Defense

The jury is still out as I write this; I wish I could be confident that our justice system will provide what it promises and that the unjustly accused will leave the courthouse wearing a smile instead of handcuffs. Kyle Rittenhouse, who went into the void created by the cowardly leftist officials who refused to protect decent citizens from the militarized wing of the Democrat Party, might well be convicted.

He got dragged through a legal nightmare, and if that’s all that happens to him, then that’s the best-case scenario. Us lawyers understand that evidence and law are not what determine jury verdicts; they are merely factors in a much bigger picture. Instead of facing life in prison, Kyle ought to get a medal for taking out several degenerates, including a promising potential Lincoln Project intern.

If you are looking for justice, you won’t necessarily find it in a courthouse.

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This was clearly ‘something personal’ as we can see the deadhead was waving out of the way what turned out to be an off duty cop that TCOB.
‘Stupid is as Stupid does’

Also, lesson learned from other’s experience?
‘Check 6 isn’t just for fighter pilots’

Hero off-duty Baltimore cop kills gunman who fatally shot barber

The gunman, identified as Carlos Ortega, entered The Bladi Style barbershop in Baltimore’s Medford section Saturday afternoon with a handgun and “fired it at one of the barbers” working there, killing him, Police Commissioner Michael Harrison told reporters Saturday.

An off-duty cop in plainclothes who was getting a haircut from another barber reacted immediately and “with great bravery produced his firearm” and fatally shot the attacker, Harrison said.

Cops identified Ortega, 38, early Monday as the man who killed barber Rafael Jeffers, 33, the Baltimore Sun reported.

Investigators believe Ortega was tied to two earlier Saturday shootings, including one that left one person dead. Another victim was listed in critical condition following gunfire near the city’s Greektown section.

While they’re being simplistic when it comes to actual ‘use of force’ and do the standard clueless journalist bit about confusing “Self Defense” with “Stand Your Ground”,  at least they’re acknowledging that self defense and concealed carry are ‘normal’.

Amid crime surge in Seattle, some take steps to defend themselves

Reports of violent crime this year in Seattle have already surpassed the historic high number that were reported in the city last year.

It is perhaps not a coincidence then that more people are turning to ways to defend themselves and opting to stand their ground.

From self-defense classes to skyrocketing gun sales, more people are looking for ways to defend themselves amid concerns that they are on their own when it comes to random street crime.

Just a few weeks ago, Morgan Zion, who lives in Seattle, could be heard on cellphone video standing her ground from an attacker.

“I hate to be the person who says, ‘Oh Seattle has gotten so much worse,'” she said. “But it has.”

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Alleged burglar shot by homeowner with shotgun in Camp County

CAMP COUNTY, Texas (KETK) – A burglar was shot twice by a homeowner while attempting to break into a storage building around 4:30 a.m. on Saturday.

Not long after, the homeowner heard a noise and discovered a man breaking into his storage building with tools that belonged to the owner. Officials said the homeowner then went to get his shotgun and shot the intruder.

“However, the man got up and they then struggled for the gun. The suspect was shot again before he managed to take the gun and flee,” said the CCSO Facebook post.

Investigator Randy Huggins also responded to the scene and several of the homeowner’s tools were found along with blood from the intruder.

The subject was then identified as 39-year-old Tony Gross.

Off-duty officer fatally shoots man kills suspect linked to 3 shootings in Baltimore

BALTIMORE (WBAL) – An off-duty police sergeant from Baltimore is being praised for his bravery after he fatally shot a gunman linked to three shootings that left two people dead and another hospitalized.

While an off-duty Baltimore City police sergeant was getting a haircut, a suspect opened fire in a barbershop on O’Donnell Street shortly after 3 p.m. Saturday. A barber was shot and killed, according to Baltimore Police Commissioner Michael Harrison.

The sergeant, who was in plain clothes but armed, pulled his gun out and shot the suspect, who died at the scene. Harrison praised the sergeant for showing “great bravery.”

Others, including Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott, say the sergeant protected the others in the barbershop and could have saved even more lives.

“We don’t know what would have happened if he was not able to respond in that way and how many more incidents could’ve happened tonight in Baltimore City,” Scott said.

Police say the suspected gunman is connected to at least two other shootings earlier Saturday afternoon.

The first happened shortly after 2 p.m. Police say a 37-year-old man was hospitalized in critical condition after he was shot multiple times. He was reportedly involved in some sort of argument with the suspect.

Police say the suspect then got in his car and showed up 15 minutes later at a barbershop on Eastern Avenue, where he got into an argument with another man. That victim died after being shot multiple times.

“You hear us talk about this time and time again: petty, mindless, stupid disputes ending up with people losing their lives, and we have to be understanding of that and, again, grateful that our officer was here,” Scott said.

Harrison did not go into specifics on how detectives were able to determine the shootings are connected or a possible motive.

Fort Smith man fatally shot at Scott County home

State police are investigating after a Fort Smith man was fatally shot Thursday night inside a Scott County home, authorities said.

Deputies responded to an armed disturbance at 3220 Yearling Ridge Road, south of Boles, shortly after 11 p.m., according to a news release from Arkansas State Police.

James Simmons Jr., 34, was shot inside the residence, and transported to Mercy Hospital Waldron, where he was pronounced dead, authorities said.

Simmons had left the area of the residence when deputies arrived, state police spokesperson Bill Sadler said in an email.

No law enforcement were involved in the shooting, Sadler added.

State police special agents questioned the homeowner about the shooting, the release states. Authorities said no arrests in connection with the shooting have been made.

An investigative case file will be sent to the Scott County prosecuting attorney’s office to determine whether criminal charges should be filed, the release states.

State Police Investigating Home Invasion in Grant Parish, Armed Suspect Shot

Grant Parish – On November 10, 2021, at approximately 10:45 p.m., the Grant Parish Sheriff’s Office (GPSO) requested the Louisiana State Police Bureau of Investigations/Alexandria Field Office (LSP AFO) to investigate a home invasion near Georgetown. The home invasion resulted in the suspect being shot. Detectives from LSP AFO responded to the scene to investigate the incident.
The preliminary investigation revealed an armed subject, later identified as 39-year-old Chad Scott of Pollock, forcefully entered an off-duty Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries Agent’s residence. As Scott entered the residence, an altercation ensued and the property owner discharged a firearm. Scott was struck and sustained critical injuries. He was transported to a local hospital for treatment. There were no other injuries reported.
The Louisiana State Police will serve as the lead investigative agency. The investigation is on-going and additional information will be released after evidence is processed and interviews take place

If more guns caused more crime, we would know it.

BLUF:
The violent crime rate fell by about 38 percent over two decades while the number of guns sold each year almost doubled. The implied number of gun owners also doubled. If anything, this data shows that firearms sales cause a decrease in violent crime.

Gun Ownership versus Crime in the US 2000-2019

I’ve seen analysis that relates guns and crime. In particular, the data looks at the growing number of firearms in civilian hands in the United States. It compares gun ownership with the rate of violent crime across the country. Unfortunately, that data is a few years old. It is easy to get raw numbers, but it is very hard to get good data. This is what I found.

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