Unarmed exchange student killed by homeowner

[Katzndogz]

Stealing from someone else is not pranking it is theft. Dede was committing a crime. He could easily have decided not to commit that crime.

 

[OohPooPahDoo]

Markus Kaarma, Montana man, pleads not guilty in shooting death of German exchange student - CBS News

Suspect in German exchange student killing pleads not guilty.

Another unarmed teenanger is sacraficed to the pro-gun pitbull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

American is the only modern Western country where unarmed burglary seems to warrant a death sentence.

Castle doctrine. He was in the home. The prosecution will have to prove the defendant did not feel reasonably threatened. That's hard to do. If the victim did in fact make an attempt to surrender, for instance - and the defendant shot him anyway - that's absolutely not legal. But how do you prove -beyond a reasonable doubt- that happened without, say, a video tape?



On the other hand - Rodney Peairs shot and killed a Japanese exchange student who was OUTSIDE his home and who had simply gone to the wrong house for a Halloween party. - AND HE GOT AWAY WITH IT -

Death of Yoshihiro Hattori - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Kondor3]

If Dede was a 'bad' guy, then Kaarma is a much, much worse one because he set a trap with the intention of shooting someone, not showing any value for human life. His intention was to kill. Dede's intention was to steal some beer.

Potentially a case of a Bad Guy protected by law, and a dumb-ass kid who suffered because he broke the law.

It's the chance one takes, when one engages in criminal activity, regardless of its scope.

It's not so much the dollar or other value of the intended theft, it's the intrusion into the home property of another under cover of darkness that tips the scales.

Scales that will ultimately see the shooter get off scot-free.

It doesn't much matter what you nor I think about him, and his alleged trap-setting.

What matter is that penetration onto home-residence property, by stealth, at night.

I doubt the guy will even get a slap on the wrist, judicially.

I could be wrong about that, but, I doubt it.

I've been robbed twice, burglarized. Nothing of great value was taken though one thing, a ring, of sentimental value was taken. In neither instance did I harbor the idea that the thief deserved the death sentence. It is not nice to be violated that way; I know that very well, but it still is not a crime worthy of death. I hope the homeowner goes to prison for a long time. He took a life without any good reason, and it was premeditated.

For the first time in the five years since we moved into this subdivision...

Two nights ago, I am downstairs in our family room, directly underneath our living room, late at night, computing.

I hear a modest collection of odd (and low-volume) noises, imperfectly, through the ceiling-floor, and down the stairwell leading to the upstairs part of the house, and I write it off as somebody in my household padding-around up there for a moment before returning to bed.

Twenty minutes later, I hear a few seconds of much louder noises, seeming to come from both the living room windows upstairs, and the family room half-windows (half above ground, half under) windows a few feet in front of me.

I rush upstairs, find the screen out of one of the living room windows, pump-up the adrenalin and scan the upstairs for intruders, and, finding none, shake my live-in son-in-law out of a sound sleep, and the two of us grab baseball bats and flashlights, and rush outside as quietly as we can.

We eyeball the front of the house, the area below the open-screen living room window, then split-apart, with him taking the north side of the house, me taking the south, and the two of us heading through the gates on both sides of the house, into the back yard, to scan the deck, underneath it, the half-windows visible in back under the deck, and the perimeter of the above-ground pool in our backyard.

Finding nothing, we work our way to the front of the house, again, and find his pet cat, trying to leap the 6-7 feet between ground level, and the bottom of the living room windows, in order to get back into the house.

It's a house-cat, never outside, yet, somehow, it managed to push the well-designed screen out of its channel-guides, and the cat got outside.

What I heard the first time, was the muffled upstairs sound of the cat getting loose, out the screen window, and what I heard the second time, was the louder sound of the cat changing its mind, and pawing the downstairs family room windows, to try to get my attention in the dark (and the half-light of the wee-hours family room lighting), and then trying (and failing) to leap the 6-7 feet, to get back into the house.

When the son-in-law and I rushed outside, the cat must have hidden in the bushes outside the front windows, until we had passed, and then we happened to catch it trying to get back in, again.

A long-winded way of saying that I've experienced that chill myself - within the past few days - even though it turned out to be a false alarm.

Notice that we did not pick up guns and rush outside.

Why

Because I don't own one.

Never have.

I was a pretty good target-shooter in high-school, on those infrequent occasions when I'd go target-shooting, and I did well with both semi- and automatic-fire on the practice ranges as s kid in the military, but...

With children in the house, I've never felt comfortable having guns in the house; one screw-up, and you've got a dead child on your hands, and I couldn't take that kind of grief.

I could very easily use a baseball bat to break the arm or leg of an intruder, without giving it a second thought, but, unless there is a clear-and-present danger to my family, my own inclination is not to take a life, under circumstances where I can, legally.

But that's MY choice, and I fully support the right of Americans to own and use firearms, in situations involving home defense, and I want that right to exist, and to be able to make such a purchase or use such a weapon, if I ever change my mind and decide to buy a gun.

I also want folks to have that right, who live in areas where such mode of defense is more closely akin to being a necessity.

But that's just me.

 

[Pogo]

We're not saying that at all. He had a baby monitor and motion detectors in the garage and knew there was an intruder in his residence.
We have yet to establish just how dark it was in the garage. Was there a street light nearby? Obviously there was enough light to discern a figure moving around in the garage but likely not enough light to be certain the figure was not a threat. The homeowner responded legally and appropriately to that threat.

The amount of light is described in the criminal complaint -- it was too dark to see what was going on, and when the GF put the outside house light on it made it worse (putting the scene in more shadow). The shooter's action confirms this, as he sprayed laterally across the facing of the garage opening, obviously an attempt to cover everything. He even lied to the police about his own aiming, apparently trying to minimize his intent.



What the kid "instigated" was illegal trespass, for which he could have been charged with a misdemeanor. That is, if he'd been given a chance for the law to run its course. That was circumvented by Kaarma. Who now has to deal with his own karma.

Again, still looking for that hamlet where illegal trespass is punishable by death. Not finding any.

This "self-defense" song and dance is rendered mute by Kaarma's actions and plans before the fact. You don't "defend" with offense. If you're legitimately in a position of self-defense, you don't know about it and predict it a week in advance.

Exactly. The punishment for trespassing is not death. Not in this country.

Also interesting: Germans open investigation into student's shooting in Missoula

Missoula County prosecutors ... paint Kaarma as irrational, angry and violent.

According to the 19-page revised affidavit, Kaarma had several instances of road rage the day before the shooting. And on April 23, he allegedly told his hairdresser that he was waiting up late at night to “shoot some (expletive) kid.”

According to court documents, Dede and exchange student Robby Pazmino, of Ecuador, were on the hunt for alcohol when Dede entered Kaarma’s garage in the early morning hours of April 27. Dede lived a few doors down from Kaarma in the home of Kate Walker and Randy Smith, his host parents.

In interviews with police, Pazmino said the teens had gone “garage hopping,” an activity that involves entering garages in search of alcohol, several times before with American students, but they had never gone inside the garages.

That night, however, Dede decided to take a chance.

Pazmino watched Dede from the middle of the street as he wordlessly went into Kaarma’s garage.

He said he heard a strange voice say “I see you there,” and ran when Kaarma fired the first shot.

Pazmino returned to Ecuador a week after the shooting.

Also that week, Missoula police interviewed two Missoula males, ages 18 and 16, who confessed to burglarizing Kaarma’s home, taking credit cards, an iPhone, two wallets, marijuana and marijuana paraphernalia. Tristan Staber, 18, has been charged with burglary and is held in Missoula County jail pending a $10,000 bond.

The 16-year-old’s case will be handled in Youth Court. His name hasn’t been released to the press.

Both suspects denied any association with Dede and Pazmino, the affidavit stated.

It was not Dede who had burglarized the home before; it was other people. He had not stolen anything other and beer. He did not deserve to die, not by any means. He was involved in pranking, not burglarizing.

If this has been posted before, I apologize. There are a lot of detailed posts in the thread and I haven't read them all thoroughly.

Some of that was posted before from different stories. But that didn't stop several agenda-driven posters from simply writing their own stories:

Because stealing had been successful in the past (this student had stolen from this homeowner twice before) he expected that he could take anything he wanted. He was wrong. The world has lost a thief. That's no real loss.

(outright lie; Dede had never been there before)

Theft is NOT a prank, further the little monster had done it twice before.

-- same fabrication

How about a culture that thinks its OK to go into someones house and steal stuff MULTIPLE TIMES?

--- It's a trifecta! Or is it a quatrafecta...

Had he not decided it would be fun to break into a man's home for the 3rd time, he would be alive, wouldn't he?

(we'll hear more from Ernie in a bit...)

I read the story and I don't care what the story says.

This piece of shit walked into a man's home uninvited. I don't care if every door ad window to the house was open no one has a right to enter someone else's property unless invited by the home owner or they are a law enforcement officer with a valid warrant.

I would never convict a home owner who shot someone who invaded his home.

(Dede never entered the home nor did he attempt to)

Katz even came back later to double-down on her own fiction, apparently once again on the basis of "they all look alike to me":

The kid did not merely walk into the garage. He walked into the garage with the intent to steal. He has done it before to this same individual. He had done it twice before. The homeowner was tired of continually replacing stolen items and took a stand.

Getting away with stealing before is what encouraged this teen to steal this time. Not only this kid but all the others who think they should get away with stealing too.

Not to be outdone in the fiction department, another one jumps in -- even after the contradicting evidence is right there in his own post:

Riiiight, because walking into an open garage is the same thing as murder.

BROKE IN...ya got that? BROKE IN...period. End of story. You used violence to FORCE your way into my home. Not gonna stand there and debate whether you are just a moron or are a rapist and murderer. You BROKE into my home which is my castle MY HOME and now you will get treated the way a criminal should be treated. Deal with it.

(we all know the garage was intentionally left wide open, yet somehow this guy needed "violence" to break an invisible force field. It was hardly the only time a simple trespass was blown into a "B&E" and "burglary" by a "piece of shit")

[EDIT] -- this just in they're still at it:

Maybe he shouldn't have broken into his garage.

He didn't.

Read the thread.

I did. He broke into the garage.

Given two chances he still goes with revisionism. I don't get it; it's like they keep throwing everything at the wall expecting something to stick.

[EDIT 2] - proving once again reading comprehension is a lost art, this one goes for a double:

No the point is he broke into a persons house and that person has the right to defend himself and family and correctly shot the punk.

Back to Ernie:

According to the other kid, karma entered the garage from the house door, not the overhead. That leaves a huge hole in the side of the garage opposite Kaarma from which Dede could have escaped.

(completely untrue and contradicted in the police report/criminal complaint posted 200 posts/3 days earlier as well as two posts prior)

Damn the facts, full speed ahead!

Makes ya wonder. Something out there is way more important than facts. That is a new concept.

 

[thanatos144]

Liberals never met a murderer they didn't love or a innocent they didn't want dead

tapatalk post

 

[CMike]

Markus Kaarma, Montana man, pleads not guilty in shooting death of German exchange student - CBS News

Suspect in German exchange student killing pleads not guilty.

Another unarmed teenanger is sacraficed to the pro-gun pitbull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

American is the only modern Western country where unarmed burglary seems to warrant a death sentence.

Maybe he shouldn't have broken into his garage.

 

[Meathead]

This is essentially for those who got burned so badly burned with Zimmerman. Seems like they object to people defending their families, property or person.

 

[Pogo]

"...Another unarmed teenager is sacrificed to the pro-gun pit bull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment..."

Epic Fail.

Not. Only a fail in the eyes of the gun nutters. In the eyes of sane, rational people, we are indeed sacrificing young people, and other innocents, for the sake an unrelenting and tenacious grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment. You all are happy these kids are dying. It's sickening.

Yeah, I hadn't even read the OP text, which was long buried when I got here but it seems to me it refers to an attitude, not a law -- the attitude that morphs a story into places it had never been and dehumanizes a human life into excrement. The key word there is grip. And btw, fail is a verb.

The entire story has centered, and continues to center, around what this guy did with the instrument, and not around whether the law allows him to have it, should allow him to have it, etc etc etc. Trying to shunt this off into a Second Amendment debate when no one is interested in or sees it that way is just another deflection from the meat on the bones.

And as already noted repeatedly, if the discussion actually were about gun laws, I wouldn't have bothered with this thread as such laws are irrelevant. But as it's about what people do with those weapons, that's entirely different and crucially relevant.

 

[Pogo]

Markus Kaarma, Montana man, pleads not guilty in shooting death of German exchange student - CBS News

Suspect in German exchange student killing pleads not guilty.

Another unarmed teenanger is sacraficed to the pro-gun pitbull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

American is the only modern Western country where unarmed burglary seems to warrant a death sentence.

Maybe he shouldn't have broken into his garage.

He didn't.

Read the thread.

 

[CMike]

And you have all the facts? I don't live in the US, though I am an American, and this is the first time I have heard of this incident. It appears the homeowner lay in wait for this guy and then shot at him in a darkened garage, not caring if he killed him and not knowing if this kid was armed or not or meant any bodily harm to the homeowners. It's murder as far as I am concerned: not self defense or defense of your home. Material possessions are not as important as human life and this was a young kid, only 17, and unarmed.

As I said: you people simply delight in killing other people.

Homeowners do not exist so that they can be prey for anyone who wants to steal from them. The student had a choice. He could not steal. Because stealing had been successful in the past (this student had stolen from this homeowner twice before) he expected that he could take anything he wanted. He was wrong. The world has lost a thief. That's no real loss.

Death is not the punishment for housebreaking or theft. You are happy he is dead. That makes you a very sick person.

It is if a reasonable person feels his life is in danger.

It was dark and there was a strange person in his garage that broke in.

I think an arguement can certainly be made that he felt his life and his family's lives were in danger.

 

[CMike]

Used to be you had to use the same amount of force to defend yourself as the attacker used against you.

Now, its pretty much open season, shoot anyone you want, lie about it and get off.

The gun nuts are cowards.

That's pretty idiotic.

If the intruder had a knife, you should not take your gun, but take a knife instead to make it a fair fight?

When my life is involved I don't believe in a fair fight.

 

[CMike]

Markus Kaarma, Montana man, pleads not guilty in shooting death of German exchange student - CBS News

Suspect in German exchange student killing pleads not guilty.

Another unarmed teenanger is sacraficed to the pro-gun pitbull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

American is the only modern Western country where unarmed burglary seems to warrant a death sentence.

Maybe he shouldn't have broken into his garage.

He didn't.

Read the thread.

I did. He broke into the garage.

 

[Pogo]

Maybe he shouldn't have broken into his garage.

He didn't.

Read the thread.

I did. He broke into the garage.

Have it your way -- I edited you into post 466 with the other liars.

SMH...

 

[Pogo]

When there is an object of intrinsic value, when there is someone trespassing on the property and in close proximity to the object of intrinsic value, we must deduce that he was there to take the object of intrinsic value. It's not hard. Whether or not she baited him is inconsequential.

Agreed, whether she baited him is irrelevant. That's not the point. The point is he never actually took anything. Moreover, "intrinsic value" is in the eye of the beholder, innit? The previous burglar had taken a bhong and a pot stash. Stuff that had value to him.

Perhaps he would have, given time. Perhaps not. We'll never know. But by all means, let us know the next time you get arrested for what you were "probably about to do".

No the point is he broke into a persons house and that person has the right to defend himself and family and correctly shot the punk.

Wrong on two counts; he didn't "break in" and it wasn't the house. But you did get the word he right. So there's that.

"Opine first, read the story later". And "damn the facts, full speed ahead".

 

[Esmeralda]

"...Another unarmed teenager is sacrificed to the pro-gun pit bull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment..."

Epic Fail.

Not. Only a fail in the eyes of the gun nutters. In the eyes of sane, rational people, we are indeed sacrificing young people, and other innocents, for the sake an unrelenting and tenacious grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment. You all are happy these kids are dying. It's sickening.

Yeah, I hadn't even read the OP text, which was long buried when I got here but it seems to me it refers to an attitude, not a law -- the attitude that morphs a story into places it had never been and dehumanizes a human life into excrement. The key word there is grip. And btw, fail is a verb.

The entire story has centered, and continues to center, around what this guy did with the instrument, and not around whether the law allows him to have it, should allow him to have it, etc etc etc. Trying to shunt this off into a Second Amendment debate when no one is interested in or sees it that way is just another deflection from the meat on the bones.

And as already noted repeatedly, if the discussion actually were about gun laws, I wouldn't have bothered with this thread as such laws are irrelevant. But as it's about what people do with those weapons, that's entirely different and crucially relevant.

But it is about gun laws. These pro-gun people in the thread would not even be here, would not even care to discuss it were it not about their right to bear arms. It is completely about gun laws, not about the minutia of legal issues regarding trespassing or burglary and the like. It's about guns; it's about the 2nd Amendment. It is because they want to have their guns and they want to blow people away: that is why they are here 'debating' with you.

 

[Pogo]

If Dede was a 'bad' guy, then Kaarma is a much, much worse one because he set a trap with the intention of shooting someone, not showing any value for human life. His intention was to kill. Dede's intention was to steal some beer.

Potentially a case of a Bad Guy protected by law, and a dumb-ass kid who suffered because he broke the law.

It's the chance one takes, when one engages in criminal activity, regardless of its scope.

It's not so much the dollar or other value of the intended theft, it's the intrusion into the home property of another under cover of darkness that tips the scales.

Scales that will ultimately see the shooter get off scot-free.

It doesn't much matter what you nor I think about him, and his alleged trap-setting.

What matter is that penetration onto home-residence property, by stealth, at night.

I doubt the guy will even get a slap on the wrist, judicially.

I could be wrong about that, but, I doubt it.

I've been robbed twice, burglarized. Nothing of great value was taken though one thing, a ring, of sentimental value was taken. In neither instance did I harbor the idea that the thief deserved the death sentence. It is not nice to be violated that way; I know that very well, but it still is not a crime worthy of death. I hope the homeowner goes to prison for a long time. He took a life without any good reason, and it was premeditated.

I've certainly had my car burglarized, once by a kid right outside my apartment window. I went to court where I saw who he was for the first time. Oddly enough he did not look like a turd or smell of feces; he had an actual face, with expression on it. You might even say he looked human Who knew. And no harm wish or death wish, either there in court or in the commission of the act, ever remotely occurred to me. That doesn't even make any sense. I can't fathom where one's head has to be to come up with an idea like that.

And I certainly didn't then start waiting by the window with a shotgun and a bhong on the front seat of my car to bait another one to go target shooting. This guy needs more than a jail cell -- he needs a shrink.

 

[jc456]

Agreed, whether she baited him is irrelevant. That's not the point. The point is he never actually took anything. Moreover, "intrinsic value" is in the eye of the beholder, innit? The previous burglar had taken a bhong and a pot stash. Stuff that had value to him.

Perhaps he would have, given time. Perhaps not. We'll never know. But by all means, let us know the next time you get arrested for what you were "probably about to do".

No the point is he broke into a persons house and that person has the right to defend himself and family and correctly shot the punk.

Wrong on two counts; he didn't "break in" and it wasn't the house. But you did get the word he right. So there's that.

"Opine first, read the story later". And "damn the facts, full speed ahead".

"A Montana man accused of fatally shooting a German exchange student in his garage pleaded not guilty to murder Wednesday, Reuters reports.

Last month, 29-year-old Markus Kaarma, of Missoula, allegedly shot and killed 17-year-old Diren Dede, of Hamburg, Germany, after the teen broke into his garage."

Not sure what article you're reading, but stating blatant lies isn't a good gesture. But what do you care right?

 

[Esmeralda]

No the point is he broke into a persons house and that person has the right to defend himself and family and correctly shot the punk.

Wrong on two counts; he didn't "break in" and it wasn't the house. But you did get the word he right. So there's that.

"Opine first, read the story later". And "damn the facts, full speed ahead".

"A Montana man accused of fatally shooting a German exchange student in his garage pleaded not guilty to murder Wednesday, Reuters reports.

Last month, 29-year-old Markus Kaarma, of Missoula, allegedly shot and killed 17-year-old Diren Dede, of Hamburg, Germany, after the teen broke into his garage."

Not sure what article you're reading, but stating blatant lies isn't a good gesture. But what do you care right?

It might depend on the media source from which your are quoting.

 

[Pogo]

Markus Kaarma, Montana man, pleads not guilty in shooting death of German exchange student - CBS News

Suspect in German exchange student killing pleads not guilty.

Another unarmed teenanger is sacraficed to the pro-gun pitbull grip on a literal interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

American is the only modern Western country where unarmed burglary seems to warrant a death sentence.

Castle doctrine. He was in the home. The prosecution will have to prove the defendant did not feel reasonably threatened. That's hard to do. If the victim did in fact make an attempt to surrender, for instance - and the defendant shot him anyway - that's absolutely not legal. But how do you prove -beyond a reasonable doubt- that happened without, say, a video tape?



On the other hand - Rodney Peairs shot and killed a Japanese exchange student who was OUTSIDE his home and who had simply gone to the wrong house for a Halloween party. - AND HE GOT AWAY WITH IT -

Death of Yoshihiro Hattori - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Yup, the Hattori case has been cited in this thread. In the instant case what undermine's the "self-defense" defense is that the defendant was clearly on offense -- having baited his garage and left it open and then having taken a sniper position outside the house, aiming back into the garage, so that exiting the garage would be impossible. He then strafed the entire facing of the garage (with a shotgun) to ensure wiping out whoever or whatever was in there, regardless whether the intruder attempted to leave or not, with no warning at all (in other words, ambush). And, he predicted his own offensive action a week before the event (it apparently took that long for anyone to take the bait).

This is all described in the criminal complaint, which is linked back in post 202 in its entirety. This offensive posture is in fact the whole reason he got booked with "intentional homicide" in the first place.


Then of course there's the matter of shooting into the darkened void, without knowing who or what one is shooting at, which could have been a child, a police officer investigating, an animal, or Flo from Progressive Insurance. No one from the kill-em-all crowd seems to want to address that little bit of firearm responsibility.

Actually it might have been better if it was Flo from Progressive Insurance...

 

[Pogo]

Potentially a case of a Bad Guy protected by law, and a dumb-ass kid who suffered because he broke the law.

It's the chance one takes, when one engages in criminal activity, regardless of its scope.

It's not so much the dollar or other value of the intended theft, it's the intrusion into the home property of another under cover of darkness that tips the scales.

Scales that will ultimately see the shooter get off scot-free.

It doesn't much matter what you nor I think about him, and his alleged trap-setting.

What matter is that penetration onto home-residence property, by stealth, at night.

I doubt the guy will even get a slap on the wrist, judicially.

I could be wrong about that, but, I doubt it.

I've been robbed twice, burglarized. Nothing of great value was taken though one thing, a ring, of sentimental value was taken. In neither instance did I harbor the idea that the thief deserved the death sentence. It is not nice to be violated that way; I know that very well, but it still is not a crime worthy of death. I hope the homeowner goes to prison for a long time. He took a life without any good reason, and it was premeditated.

For the first time in the five years since we moved into this subdivision...

Two nights ago, I am downstairs in our family room, directly underneath our living room, late at night, computing.

I hear a modest collection of odd (and low-volume) noises, imperfectly, through the ceiling-floor, and down the stairwell leading to the upstairs part of the house, and I write it off as somebody in my household padding-around up there for a moment before returning to bed.

Twenty minutes later, I hear a few seconds of much louder noises, seeming to come from both the living room windows upstairs, and the family room half-windows (half above ground, half under) windows a few feet in front of me.

I rush upstairs, find the screen out of one of the living room windows, pump-up the adrenalin and scan the upstairs for intruders, and, finding none, shake my live-in son-in-law out of a sound sleep, and the two of us grab baseball bats and flashlights, and rush outside as quietly as we can.

We eyeball the front of the house, the area below the open-screen living room window, then split-apart, with him taking the north side of the house, me taking the south, and the two of us heading through the gates on both sides of the house, into the back yard, to scan the deck, underneath it, the half-windows visible in back under the deck, and the perimeter of the above-ground pool in our backyard.

Finding nothing, we work our way to the front of the house, again, and find his pet cat, trying to leap the 6-7 feet between ground level, and the bottom of the living room windows, in order to get back into the house.

It's a house-cat, never outside, yet, somehow, it managed to push the well-designed screen out of its channel-guides, and the cat got outside.

What I heard the first time, was the muffled upstairs sound of the cat getting loose, out the screen window, and what I heard the second time, was the louder sound of the cat changing its mind, and pawing the downstairs family room windows, to try to get my attention in the dark (and the half-light of the wee-hours family room lighting), and then trying (and failing) to leap the 6-7 feet, to get back into the house.

When the son-in-law and I rushed outside, the cat must have hidden in the bushes outside the front windows, until we had passed, and then we happened to catch it trying to get back in, again.

A long-winded way of saying that I've experienced that chill myself - within the past few days - even though it turned out to be a false alarm.

Notice that we did not pick up guns and rush outside.

Why

Because I don't own one.

Never have.

I was a pretty good target-shooter in high-school, on those infrequent occasions when I'd go target-shooting, and I did well with both semi- and automatic-fire on the practice ranges as s kid in the military, but...

With children in the house, I've never felt comfortable having guns in the house; one screw-up, and you've got a dead child on your hands, and I couldn't take that kind of grief.

I could very easily use a baseball bat to break the arm or leg of an intruder, without giving it a second thought, but, unless there is a clear-and-present danger to my family, my own inclination is not to take a life, under circumstances where I can, legally.

But that's MY choice, and I fully support the right of Americans to own and use firearms, in situations involving home defense, and I want that right to exist, and to be able to make such a purchase or use such a weapon, if I ever change my mind and decide to buy a gun.

I also want folks to have that right, who live in areas where such mode of defense is more closely akin to being a necessity.

But that's just me.

-- a perfect illustration of my last post's point about shooting into the dark. While Kaarma had seen a person in the garage, there's nothing in the dark to tell him what else he's shooting blindly at. Had your cat been walking through his garage at the same time (after all it was left wide open; anyone and anything could have wandered in by then), I suspect you'd be demanding some hard answers for how he saw fit to slaughter your pet.

No one but no one has suggested anything about "rights" or "amendments" or "gun laws"; five hundred posts on that continues to be the case in spite of your bait (presumably Kaarma is better at setting bait than you are?) --- the issue is, and has been from the beginning, responsible application of firearms. Your story here demonstrates a strong positive sense of that responsibility. We simply wish Kaarma and his ilk had the same sense of responsibility you do.