Phoenix boy, 14, shoots armed intruder while watching three younger siblings - Polidicks

Source: [url]http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/06/23/phoenix-boy-14-shoots-armed-intruder-while-watching-three-younger-siblings/[/url] [quote] A 14-year-old Phoenix boy shot an intruder who broke into his home while brandishing a gun as the teenager watched his three younger siblings, police said. The teen and his brothers and sisters were at home alone at their residence at 55th Avenue and Baseline when a woman rang the doorbell Friday. The teen didn't open the door because he didn't recognize her, Police Officer James Holmes said Saturday. Soon after, the teen heard a bang on the door, rushed his siblings upstairs and got a handgun from his parent's bedroom. When he got to the top of the stairs, he saw a man breaking through the front door and point a gun at him. The boy shot the 37-year-old man, who is in critical condition but expected to survive and be booked into jail. Holmes said the suspect did not get a shot off. He declined to release his name until he is booked into jail. The woman who rang the home's doorbell got away. Holmes hailed the teen's actions and his parents for teaching the kids to never open the door to strangers. "The police and indeed our community does not ever want to see a situation where a teenager of that age has to take a weapon to protect his family ... but this young man did exactly what he should have done," he said. "I'm not sure he gave full thought about what he had to do. He just acted." Holmes said that the gun the teen grabbed was his father's, but did not know whether the boy had been trained to use it. He said the family, whose names were not released, is declining to speak to reporters about the ordeal, saying that they "are all pretty traumatized." "The dad was pretty much out of his mind with distress, officers couldn't even talk to him," Holmes said. "It's going to take them a while to recover mentally." He said police don't yet know what the suspect's intentions were and that will be one of the first questions they ask him when he is well enough to talk. "This was mid-block in a neighborhood, at 4:30 in the afternoon in summertime and children are there," he said. "They just took a heck of a gamble for this particular house, and we've got to try to figure out why." Holmes added that the family is lucky that the teen acted so swiftly and effectively. "As ugly as this is, and as much as this family is going through, we don't have injured children on our hands," he said. [/quote] Good kid. Protected his life and the life of his siblings. I hope he isn't messed up from all this.

Holy shit.

Bad ass. But i still think guns should be kept away from minors. I don't mean this in the sense that: Minors should not be taught anything about guns and should never *gasp* see them or learn about safety. What i mean is that they should be taught about them, safety, and how to use them, but kept under lock unless under supervision. How many cases do we get every year where a child brings a gun to school?

That kid has to be overwhelmed with emotion right now. I couldn't even imagine shooting a home intruder, let alone at the age of 14 while babysitting younger siblings. It must have taken a lot of will power to aim a gun at a stranger in your doorway and pull the trigger at that age. Still, an intruder going into a home of 4 children was not going to end well under any circumstance. [QUOTE=Remscar;36471608]Bad ass. But i still think guns should be kept away from minors.[/QUOTE] I think it should be mandatory for children to take a gun safety course. I'm not talking about 6 or 7 year olds, but in the young teens. They need more than "guns are bad" to know how to properly react to a scenario like this. I would much rather have my child educated in gun safety and control than just scare the shit out of them from wanting to ever see or touch one. This kid had to have gotten a talk to by his dad about the weapon, because I don't fully believe he would have known instinctively how it worked.

What a badass kid.

[QUOTE=Remscar;36471608]Bad ass. But i still think guns should be kept away from minors.[/QUOTE] Yeah totally, because he could have easily fended off a 30 year old man who is three times the size of him. Get real will you. This is a perfect example of teaching kids gun safety and what they're for. Lots of kids his age participate in gun sports. You educate kids on it, allow them to use them in a controlled environment and it takes the mystery out of the gun. Good on the kid though, can't image how he must feel but he did the right thing. He was being a big brother and taking care of the family.

Woah, having a gun in your home actually do good? This should happen more often.

[QUOTE=Remscar;36471608]Bad ass. But i still think guns should be kept away from minors.[/QUOTE] That is the stupidest idea ever. Proper education will prevent mishaps. Not keeping guns encased in cement like you're inferring. [editline]24th June 2012[/editline] [QUOTE=Warship;36471677]Woah, having a gun in your home actually do good? This should happen more often.[/QUOTE] CNN will flip their shit about this and call him a criminal.

Just imagine what the kids back at school will think of this guy. Coolest kid in school for the entire year. Well, it's either that or everyone stays the fuck away from the crazy kid who shot a guy, but hey.

[QUOTE=Warship;36471677]Woah, having a gun in your home actually do good? This should happen more often.[/QUOTE] It does happen more often, but you never hear about it.

Hopefully this doesn't land the parents in hot water for having a firearm easily accessible to a child.

The kid did right by defending the family home, even though a kid should not need to sling lead at that age; if the neighbourhood is a safe one then a daylight armed burglary should be a rarity. Nonetheless, coulda been worse; the kid coulda accidentally killed the guy or ended up receiving a high-speed lead smooch himself. Good job he fired the way he did, otherwise things wouldn't have turned out so well.

He has my support if you rob a bank, a house, a store, a grandma and get shot and die, then I'm fucking sorry, you took the risk when you decided to do that. There's really nothing else to it. I admit, killing isn't a good thing, but I can't really feel bad if someone gets severely hurt doing something so dangerously criminal. If I was in the situation at my current age (18) I'd do the same if I had to (I wouldn't like it), I mean, what else are you going to do? you know? It's a tough decision, and when someones robbing a place they likely already know about the risks involved, so the best thing to do is defend yourself incase he tries to attack you.

[QUOTE=BANNED USER;36471624]I think it should be mandatory for children to take a gun safety course. I'm not talking about 6 or 7 year olds, but in the young teens. They need more than "guns are bad" to know how to properly react to a scenario like this. I would much rather have my child educated in gun safety and control than just scare the shit out of them from wanting to ever see or touch one. This kid had to have gotten a talk to by his dad about the weapon, because I don't fully believe he would have known instinctively how it worked.[/QUOTE] Complete agreement from me. The age that parents start trusting the kid that he/she's okay by himself at the house should be the age that they teach them how to use a weapon for defense. This reminds me, we don't have a gun unfortunately. People have snuck into our yard and stole a very expensive bike (a cruiser something) and we live around a very sketchy area. So, if someone sneaks into our house, the best I can do is paintball their eyes. :v:

[QUOTE=J!NX;36471818]He has my support if you rob a bank, a house, a store, a grandma and get shot and die, then I'm fucking sorry, you took the risk when you decided to do that. There's really nothing else to it. I admit, killing isn't a good thing, but I can't really feel bad if someone gets severely hurt doing something so dangerously criminal. If I was in the situation at my current age (18) I'd do the same if I had to (I wouldn't like it), I mean, what else are you going to do? you know? It's a tough decision, and when someones robbing a place they likely already know about the risks involved, so the best thing to do is defend yourself incase he tries to attack you.[/QUOTE] Yep. If someone ever broke into my house I would feel shitty that I had to shoot them (if they continued after I announce that I am armed) but I would feel good knowing me and my family are safe...

[QUOTE=faze;36471849]Yep. If someone ever broke into my house I would feel shitty that I had to shoot them (if they continued after I announce that I am armed) but I would feel good knowing me and my family are safe...[/QUOTE] They're not even going to get a warning from me, once they force themselves in my home its fair game. Its not to be a sick person or wanting blood, its just the robberies in my area are all armed robberies and I'm not even going to risk the chance of them knowing my position in the house or let alone know what type of gun I got. They're going to learn the hard way.

[QUOTE=MR-X;36471924]They're not even going to get a warning from me, once they force themselves in my home its fair game. Its not to be a sick person or wanting blood, its just the robberies in my area are all armed robberies and I'm not even going to risk the chance of them knowing my position in the house or let alone know what type of gun I got. They're going to learn the hard way.[/QUOTE] Depending on the state you have to give them a chance to flee.

Good kid, he did the best thing he could've done in this situation. Always cool to see things like this where educated people used a firearm for self defense legally.

[QUOTE=faze;36472033]Depending on the state you have to give them a chance to flee.[/QUOTE] That's a dumb law, that gives them plenty of time to react, and attack you.

That's awesome. Is that kid gonna need therapy or something though?

[QUOTE=BigOwl;36472085]That's a dumb law, that gives them plenty of time to react, and attack you.[/QUOTE] It also prevents somebody like a drunk who stumbled into the wrong house time to get out.

That kid is smarter than me. I usually answer the door to anyone regardless if I know him/her or not. [QUOTE=faze;36472033]Depending on the state you have to give them a chance to flee.[/QUOTE] I don't think that law would count when the intruder is aiming at you.

[QUOTE=faze;36472141]It also prevents somebody like a drunk who stumbled into the wrong house time to get out.[/QUOTE] Oops, I accidentally stumbled right through your window/locked door.

[QUOTE=BigOwl;36472167]Oops, I accidentally stumbled right through your window/locked door.[/QUOTE] If you shout from your bedroom "I'm armed" and they continue, feel free double tap their ass. You want to deal with the civil suits that WILL come from shooting an intruder?

[QUOTE=Corey_Faure;36471839]Complete agreement from me. The age that parents start trusting the kid that he/she's okay by himself at the house should be the age that they teach them how to use a weapon for defense.[/QUOTE] I can see the logic behind that; knowing how to be safe with a weapon, even if you never need to use it, is likely a viable policy of "personal life insurance", wherein a person knows how to survive a hostile encounter where their life is imperiled. However, if weapon safety for kids is actually necessary, it can be kinda telling about the environment in which the kids are growing up, unless of course the kids live in an area where hunting is a common pastime (is deer-hunting popular in Maine?), in which case things aren't as bad as they could be in places like Detroit or Hell's Kitchen. Nonetheless, weapon safety is indeed important for hostile environments; it's just that I feel that kids shouldn't be growing up in a place where crime is high, they should be somewhere with less concrete and more trees, where it's far more likely to receive a gentle motherly kiss than a searing leaden kiss. I grew up in a town many train-stops away from the concrete jungle where the lions sleep, so i've never felt the terror that comes with someone pulling a piece out at me, nor the fear that i'd come home to find someone looting my house, but I know that such occurrences can happen outside my relatively-safe suburbubble of comfort, and I [B]know[/B] that kids shouldn't really need to have such fears if their surroundings are safe. Nonetheless the universe is a dangerous place, and despite my wishes that all kids could grow up safe and happy, it is necessary for a human being to know how to fight and defend themselves, even in their early teenage years, since you can never really know when someone will jump out of the shadows clutching a gun or a knife or even their disturbingly-furious cock, so it's a good idea to learn how to avoid getting hit or worse; knowing how to incapacitate an attacker without killing them would also be a rather valuable life skill, so long as you don't abuse such powerful knowledge for insidious purposes.

[QUOTE=faze;36472141]It also prevents somebody like a drunk who stumbled into the wrong house time to get out.[/QUOTE] yeah darn those drunks who break open a locked door because they're trying to get into the wrong house, they're so innocent

I wonder if it's possible, maybe kids that have access to firearms should be taught obviously gun safety, but also how to neutralise an intruder with reduced chance of killing them. I don't know if that's feasible, or how lucky the kid got in this case, but it's good that he managed to shoot him without killing him.

Well to be fair, if they're drunk they're not exactly thinking straight, so they're probably more likely to do things that don't turn out as they should. Then again, i've never been drunk enough to mistake which doors are which, or decide "fuck it I don't need keys anyway; *BOSH!*", so I could be wrong. Besides, if you're drunk you probably wouldn't be able to properly hold a gun, let alone fire off an accurate shot, unless muscle memory is involved.

Just an FYI criminals are using a tactic of having a female to knock on the doors of homes since people are most likely to trust a female and open a door to one. Usually then a man (or men) will spring out of hiding and force their way into the home, or after the female knocks on the door and no one answers she'll give an OK that no one's home, and someone will break in. [QUOTE=The DooD;36472257]I wonder if it's possible, maybe kids that have access to firearms should be taught obviously gun safety, but also how to neutralise an intruder with reduced chance of killing them. I don't know if that's feasible, or how lucky the kid got in this case, but it's good that he managed to shoot him without killing him.[/QUOTE] YOU DO NOT SHOOT SOMEONE TO WOUND, NEVER EVER. YOU SHOOT TO KILL. Rule of thumb is if you shot someone to wound them then you weren't so intimidated that you needed to use lethal force against them. The only person who got lucky in this story is the man who got shot, since he didn't die. Also I'm sure this kid had a shit ton of adrenaline pumping through him, it's hard to control a gun, let alone a pistol with pin point accuracy when you're scared and the guy just a few feet from you also has a gun. If he tried aiming for a knee or something he probably would've missed or just pissed off the guy breaking in enough to get himself shot. Shooting to wound is just a dumb idea overall. Chances are if the kid was attempting to shoot anywhere besides center of mass he would've gotten killed and this story would be tragic instead. [QUOTE=Valdor;36472252]yeah darn those drunks who break open a locked door because they're trying to get into the wrong house, they're so innocent[/QUOTE] Some guy who lived in a cookie-cutter subdivision was dropped off "at his house" by his friends while he was drunk off his ass. After walking up to his house and checking the door he realized it was locked, and he forgot to bring his keys. So he decided to hop over his back wall and just enter his house through the sliding glass door. After he entered the house he was shot to death from a terrified neighbor. All the houses looked the same, he entered the wrong one by accident and he was shot to death. (let it be noted that this happened at night.) I'm not saying every stranger who finds their way into your house is an innocent drunk, but if you have the drop on the guy you should probably give them a chance and yell at them to get on the ground or something.

All those hours spent in Call Of Duty payed off.