Silly robber in St. Louis gets owned

[Paladin3]

Dirt bag criminals need to die. Too bad the store owner wasn't a better shot.

/thread

 

[Paladin3]

This story sucks, and so does anyone talking smack when so few details are known.

I think it's fair to assume the guy who went in trying to rob the stores was the bad guy. The fact that he was trying to pass off a toy gun as a real gun makes him a stupid, bad guy.

We already coddle our children to the point that they don't understand there are consequences to their decisions. Now we want to say waving a toy gun around and shouting "this is a robbery" shouldn't get you shot?

Unless it was a big orange and yellow Nerf gun it was a good shooting.

 

[Ruptga]

I think it's fair to assume the guy who went in trying to rob the stores was the bad guy. The fact that he was trying to pass off a toy gun as a real gun makes him a stupid, bad guy.

We already coddle our children to the point that they don't understand there are consequences to their decisions. Now we want to say waving a toy gun around and shouting "this is a robbery" shouldn't get you shot?

Unless it was a big orange and yellow Nerf gun it was a good shooting.

Do you have something against due process? IF the shooter hadn't already called the police and told them that he was following the guy and where the guy was going, he may rightly be facing some liability. This isn't the wild west, cowboy; it takes more to make everything right than the right bastard ending up dead at the end of the day.

Notice that I refrained from implying that you'd taken a ludicrous position that you never even mentioned, like you just did to me.

 

[DigDog]

i think if you can shoot someone who is threatening your life, you can shoot them at any time until the law has intervened. if someone pulls a gun on me, and cops dont show up, and i see the gun person the next day, i should still think they are a danger to my life.
once the cops step in, the situation resets.

or simply, the law shouldnt enforce that the only situation where you can defend your life, is the one in which you are most likely to die (i.e. having a gun pointed at your face). being "tactical" about taking down a gunman shouldn't be a crime.

 

[Paladin3]

Do you have something against due process? IF the shooter hadn't already called the police and told them that he was following the guy and where the guy was going, he may rightly be facing some liability. This isn't the wild west, cowboy; it takes more to make everything right than the right bastard ending up dead at the end of the day.

Notice that I refrained from implying that you'd taken a ludicrous position that you never even mentioned, like you just did to me.

When someone brandishes what appears to be a gun and announces they are here to commit a robbery, no, I don't think a legally armed citizen has any obligation to do anything other than shoot them and turn off the potentially deadly threat if they feel it necessary. Would a reasonable person seeing the toy gun assume it to be real and the robber a threat? I'd say most likely yes.

The robber created this situation and he is responsible for anything bad happening as a result.

 

[Ruptga]

When someone brandishes what appears to be a gun and announces they are here to commit a robbery, no, I don't think a legally armed citizen has any obligation to do anything other than shoot them and turn off the potentially deadly threat if they feel it necessary. Would a reasonable person seeing the toy gun assume it to be real and the robber a threat? I'd say most likely yes.

The robber created this situation and he is responsible for anything bad happening as a result.

I agree, that part is pretty clear. What's left out of the article is what the owner thought he was doing by following the guy, and why. If he chased with the intention of restarting the confrontation, that's really not gonna go well for him.

 

[TechBoyJK]

It isn't reasonable to assume either way, given the only information is that he "intervened"

How exactly did he "intervene" to get a supposedly armed thief out of his store with what seems to be no hassle?

Why are people in this thread telling people not to make assumptions, all the while doing the exact same thing?

Simply based on the information in that article you linked (at the state it was when you originally posted it), It is certainly reasonable to assume that the owner laughed at the (possibly drunk/inebriated) yahoo for pulling a toy gun on him and told him to gtfo, then decided to follow him, knowing all the while he wasn't armed; as it is to assume that he had no idea that the thief was armed or not.

Stop drawing unreasonable conclusions from a lack of information.

Still, as originally written, the only known "facts"

--owner gets thief to leave his store
--owner follows thief to second store
--owner pulls gun and shoots thief (in the back), when thief pulls a toy gun and makes the same threat to owner 2.

Tell me this--did the thief pull the toy gun on owner 1, and at that time owner 1 did nothing? Why is it unreasonable to assume this is actually what happened under the cover of the "intervened" description?

Yes--if owner 1 shot that dude for pulling a toy gun on him, I would say it is completely justified. We certainly know, however, that this is not what happened.

I understand all that. But even then, if he thought it was just a toy gun all along, why would he pursue him then shoot him? That's what I'm getting at. The easiest, most reasonable explanation is that he didn't know it was a toy hence the pursuit and then shooting him when he pulled the gun.

 

[TechBoyJK]

Do you have something against due process? IF the shooter hadn't already called the police and told them that he was following the guy and where the guy was going, he may rightly be facing some liability. This isn't the wild west, cowboy; it takes more to make everything right than the right bastard ending up dead at the end of the day.

Notice that I refrained from implying that you'd taken a ludicrous position that you never even mentioned, like you just did to me.

Actually, CC is for these instances. Where it's the wild wild west and no cops are around.

Come to St. Louis sometime. It's a riot!

 

[TechBoyJK]

I agree, that part is pretty clear. What's left out of the article is what the owner thought he was doing by following the guy, and why. If he chased with the intention of restarting the confrontation, that's really not gonna go well for him.

I think the fact that the guy went into the store, announced a robbery, brandished a firearm (toy or not), and THEN was shot, doesn't lend much credibility to the idea the storeowner followed him to restart a confrontation.

 

[Ruptga]

I think the fact that the guy went into the store, announced a robbery, brandished a firearm (toy or not), and THEN was shot, doesn't lend much credibility to the idea the storeowner followed him to restart a confrontation.

Think what you want, but you don't know. You're assuming, and it's not an unreasonable assumption, but let's not pretend it's more than that.

 

[StrangerGuy]

When someone brandishes what appears to be a gun and announces they are here to commit a robbery, no, I don't think a legally armed citizen has any obligation to do anything other than shoot them and turn off the potentially deadly threat if they feel it necessary. Would a reasonable person seeing the toy gun assume it to be real and the robber a threat? I'd say most likely yes.

The robber created this situation and he is responsible for anything bad happening as a result.

I love how outright stupidity these days is considered a trait that shouldn't be rightfully punished.

 

[MongGrel]

Quite a few unknowns yet here to gauge it I'd say.

If he did call the cops before following the guy and intervening, is probably the right thing.

If he went vigilante, well ............

Sounds like he probably did it right though.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

He damn well deserves to be charged.

If the owner had gunned the guy down in store 1 he would deserve a medal. But chasing the guy to another store crosses the line from self defense to assault with a deadly weapon.

As someone that is a complete advocate of using our right to carry and use arms when necessary....

I completely agree with the quoted post. The store owner had no business to follow a crime. Why would you follow a crime? You're not a super hero. Even if you were, that isn't what guns are for.

 

[zinfamous]

I understand all that. But even then, if he thought it was just a toy gun all along, why would he pursue him then shoot him? That's what I'm getting at. The easiest, most reasonable explanation is that he didn't know it was a toy hence the pursuit and then shooting him when he pulled the gun.

maybe he's an idiot just out to shoot someone and he thinks he will be able to argue his way out of it?

neither of us know, really. I predict his lawyers are going to have a tough go with this, either way.

 

[Ns1]

St. Louis Police Lt. Ed Harper said the would-be robber had tried to rob Kaiser Grand Mart, a gas station at 5008 South Grand Boulevard, before 8 a.m. Wednesday. The robber, 32, handed a note to a clerk demanding money but he did not show or imply having a weapon.

The robber ran out of the store when the clerk alerted managers to the robbery attempt, Harper said. Someone at the store called police, telling dispatchers that Kaiser's owner followed the man out of his store and several blocks to the Walgreens at 5550 South Grand Boulevard.

Kaiser's owner followed the man into the Walgreens, saw that the man was trying to rob it and pulled his own gun, Harper said.

That's when the robber pointed his gun toward the gas station owner, Harper said. The gas station owner then fired his gun twice, hitting the robber once in the upper chest.

The robber was in critical but stable condition, police say. No one else was hurt.

The gun the would-be robber carried turned out to be a toy handgun, Harper said.

The owner of Kaiser's is in his mid-40s. Police said they are not likely to pursue charges against him.

Police suspect the man who was shot may have been involved in several other recent holdups including a robbery Tuesday at a Family Dollar store nearby the Walgreens.

Police say there is surveillance video footage of the incidents at Kaiser's and inside the Walgreens. Charges are expected against the would-robber soon.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/...cle_66e0e919-8287-5c2c-b081-8f5ef0428956.html

When the suspect announced a robbery and pulled his weapon at Walgreens, the Kaiser’s Grand Mart owner pulled his gun and ordered the suspect to drop his weapon. Instead, the suspect pointed the toy gun at the store owner, who fired two shots.

http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2015/01/07/would-be-robber-shot-after-pulling-toy-gun/

 

[Ruptga]

^^ See, that's what a real article looks like.

Store owner #1 played it by the book, good for him.

 

[MongGrel]

^^ See, that's what a real article looks like.

Store owner #1 played it by the book, good for him.

:thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[highland145]

^^ See, that's what a real article looks like.

Store owner #1 played it by the book, good for him.

Well that ain't no fun for ATOT.

 

[Subyman]

Yeah, that's what I read earlier. The robber pointed the "gun" at the owner. He had full rights to pull his real gun and shoot the robber.

 

[Ruptga]

Well that ain't no fun for ATOT.

Yeah I know, but fortunately we will always have P&N where facts are optional.

 

[highland145]

Yeah I know, but fortunately we will always have P&N where facts are optional.

QFT

 

[CPA]

Did store owner 1 already know that the man was no threat (prior knowledge of his toy gun, followed him anyway, while armed, almost certainly with intent to escalate).

It's almost as if he was hunting an unarmed person.

I have no qualms about a thief being shot by an employee/owner protecting their property, but actions of owner 1 seem pretty fucked-up on the surface.


:hmm:

Unless owner one followed him to then warn owner no. 2 only to feel threatened when the robber pulled the fake gun.

 

[zinfamous]

Unless owner one followed him to then warn owner no. 2 only to feel threatened when the robber pulled the fake gun.

Well NS1 finally posted an article with actual details. Not some blurb that was just crapped out instantly for maximum sensationalism like what was linked in the OP.

 

[highland145]

Well NS1 finally posted an article with actual details. Not some blurb that was just crapped out instantly for maximum sensationalism like what was linked in the OP.

 

[Ruptga]