Hypothetical: Active Shooter situation w/Citizen intervention (1 Viewer)

[Arizona Ron]

Here's the hypothetical situation:

A shooter kills multiple people in a public downtown city area during an "active shooter situation"; the shooter is cornered as police start showing up.

The shooter wounds two officers while still cornered. More officers/SWAT/Emergency Response/etc. are showing up, to help clear the area and set up a perimeter.

The shooter is in a position which allows him a vantage over the first responding officers and keeps them pinned and unable to rush in or have a clear shot.

These are only minutes going buy - not like this shooter is there for a long time.

A citizen with a legal weapon from their residential building balcony decides to take a shot at the shooter - and kills the shooter with one shot.

For the purposes of this hypothetical:

• This all happens in less then 15 minutes
• The Citizen who kills the shooter is a legal resident and all guns are owned legally
• The Shooter is found out later to be a legal resident but obtained the gun(s) used legally
• The Citizen made no calls or had contact with the police prior to firing a weapon
• The Citizen has no police/military training or background
• The Citizen's residents on the 5th floor of the downtown area - not a direct or presumed target; the building is locked and has no family.
• The Citizen wants to help the police and first responders.

Is the citizen a:

Hero?

Vigilante?

Charged for [insert lawyer stuff] but not convicted?

Convicted of a crime?

This clearly depends on laws in your state/country but for the purposes of this question: Use your locals laws as you know them (or believe to know them; again this isn't a place for legal advice)

I ask this because I really believe this is going to happen. With the amount of gun controversy (on both sides), I really think we'll have a citizen situation that really makes us question if someone is interfering with a police situation or a hero.

Thoughts? Comments?

Obviously, this would hang in court for a long time and this is only the high-level details of the discussion (heck, we don't even know what anyone's wearing in this situation).

Just wanted to have the conversation to get you guy's thoughts on such a scenario that's not far, at all, from happening today.

 

[AnonymousBob]

I think the scenario you've described is extraordinarily unlikely to happen, even with our regular mass shootings. Not to say there won't be an eventual situation involving a citizen, but in the manner you laid out? Might as well ask what would happen if this citizen had super powers and took out the bad guy with his super strength. But in the laughably impossible situation you've laid out? They'd be a hero for life.

 

[comfortably numb]

in this situation he is a hero...if he misses....then we open him up to a lot more scrutiny.

we view things from the end result usually

Sully landed that plane on the Hudson and everyone survived.

He is on Letterman, doing book tours and an American Hero...if he would have clipped a wing on the way down and the plane burst into flames and all 155 people died to an audience of onlookers from NY and NJ he would have been vilified for bringing the plane into such a populated area, what if this happened, what if that happened etc...he would have given the everyone a better chance out in the bay...

He got the job done and is a hero

 

[The General]

Just skimming that and based on extensive viewings of "Law and Order" I'm going with the shooter is guilty of a crime of some sort but doesn't get convicted. Makes boatloads from the Fox News types on speaking tours.

Gives boners to many of the gun guys out there.

 

[tommyboy]

Hero

 

[Fennis]

Wasn't this an episode of 24?

 

[knowledge dropper]

Hero. However, they will be charged with a crime depending on the jurisdiction. It becomes a media circus. The "hero" either pleads down to a misdemeanor or a hung jury lets them walk. This process would take years.

 

[Baloney Sandwich]

Hero but only if the media gives him a catchy nickname like The Condo Crusader or High Rise Hero

 

[FUBAR]

These are 3 years old but I doubt much had changed.

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2012/04/us/table.selfdefense.laws/

In my state,

You can use deadly force in self-defense or defense of others if you reasonably believe someone is using or about to use unlawful deadly physical force while committing or about to commit any of the following crimes: burglary, kidnapping, assault in the first or second degree, burglary, robbery, forcible rape, or forcible sodomy.

Even assuming the act was totally legal, there still would be protests. Even if illegal, many would call her a hero.

 

[The Commish]

What WOULD happen is probably the hero scenario.

What SHOULD happen is him thrown in jail for murder (if state law dictates such) whatever state law dictates....especially if he wasn't part of the situation in any way, shape or form (outside of shooting the jackass).