Free Republic

By Reason Foundation, Wed, October 24, 2012 Critics of "castle doctrine" laws are blaming Montana's for the decision not to prosecute Brice Harper, who shot and killed Dan Fredenberg last month during a confrontation over Harper's affair with Fredenberg's wife. But as with the Trayvon Martin case in Florida, it is not clear why the legal provisions cited by the law's detractors are relevant. According to Harper, an enraged (but unarmed) Fredenburg charged into the garage at Harper's home in Kalispell on the night of September 22 "like he was on a mission." In an October 9 letter explaining why...

The domestic violence in Shepard’s past is both shocking and repulsive in detail. On February 15, 1998, police were called to then-Mrs. Shepard’s house (the couple had been separated since June of the previous year) by a girlfriend. According to the police report (.pdf file), Mrs. Shepard said of her husband: Read on. Joseph entered my home. I told him to leave. He came up to me looking angry. I put my hands up to protect my breasts as they are sore (cancer). He has hit me before in the breast. He grabbed my wrist and arm and pushed me...

While Jimmy Terry fights for his life at a hospital in Modesto, his uncle Robert will not be charged with felony assault, as the District Attorney’s Office deemed he acted in self-defense when he shot his nephew in the stomach from 15 feet away Sunday. Sheriff’s investigators are aware Jimmy Blake Terry, 25, suffered significant injuries and is expected to have an extended stay in the hospital, Calaveras County sheriff’s Sgt. Chris Hewitt said, adding the hospital has not released any further information. According to sheriff’s reports, Terry, who is wanted for parole violations, confronted his uncle Robert at a...

A Senate Homeland Security subcommittee reviewed more than 600 unclassified reports over a one-year period and concluded that most had nothing to do with terrorism. (Associated Posers)- WASHINGTON DC- Walter Travis, of Travers City, Michigan had just forgot to put the gas cap back on his Chevy Malibu. He was pulled over within a few minutes of being back on the road by a DHS officer. The officer informed him of the gas cap and that this could have EPA fines as a consequence. “How did you know about the gas cap when I didn't?” he asked “We know everything...

WASHINGTON—A multibillion-dollar information-sharing program created in the aftermath of 9/11 has improperly collected information about innocent Americans and produced little valuable intelligence on terrorism, a Senate report concludes. It portrays an effort that ballooned far beyond anyone's ability to control. What began as an attempt to put local, state and federal officials in the same room analyzing the same intelligence has instead cost huge amounts of money for data-mining software, flat screen televisions and, in Arizona, two fully equipped Chevrolet Tahoes that are used for commuting, investigators found. The lengthy, bipartisan report is a scathing evaluation of what the Department...

An 18-year-old Keokuk man has been acquitted for shooting another man while trying to protect his mother during an argument this summer. The Hawk-Eye reports ( http://bit.ly/OxwQpF) a jury found Colton Dobson not guilty on Thursday after a three-day trial. He had been charged with willfully injuring 27-year-old Tim Mondon with a shotgun on July 14.

KAYSVILLE — A suspected gunman has died from gunshot wounds after a shooting that left another man in critical condition. Just before 2:30 p.m. Friday, a gunman at Francis Peak Apartments, located at 600 West Mutton Hollow Road in Kaysville, shot 51-year-old maintenance manager Steve Bailey multiple times, "emptying the clip" and critically wounding him. Witnesses report that Bailey witnessed a domestic dispute between a man and woman in a common area of the apartment complex and tried to intervene when the man shot Bailey at close range. Police report that an armed witness shot at the gunman, but it...

WARREN, Maine — There will be no charges filed in connection with an Aug. 7 incident in which a 47-year-old man was shot in the chest at a home in Warren. District Attorney Geoffrey Rushlau said Thursday in a written statement that the decision to decline prosecution was based solely on the application of Maine law regarding the use of deadly force. “The decision is not intended to and does not contain any opinion on whether other actions could have been taken which might have eliminated the need to use deadly force,” Rushlau stated. The district attorney said it would...

PINEVILLE, Mo. (AP) - A 32-year-old man has been acquitted of fatally shooting his girlfriend's ex-boyfriend and wounding another man in southwest Missouri.

A Highland Avenue woman shot and killed a man who had broken into her home and was attacking another man, Columbia police said. Prudence Spencer, who lives at 1503 Highland Ave., told police Thomas Darnell Moore forced his way into her residence by kicking in the front door about 4:23 a.m. Wednesday, Lt. Jeremy Alsup said. Moore began assaulting Terrance Hill, who was in the residence with Spencer, Alsup said. Spencer shot Moore to defend Hill. Moore was pronounced dead at the scene, Alsup said. Spencer and Hill fled to a neighbor’s house and called 911, Alsup said. The firearm,...

SANDY, Utah (AP) — Salt Lake County's top prosecutor says a 35-year-old man who shot and killed an intruder at a Sandy apartment was justified in using deadly force. Priest Jemelle Mitchell is being cleared in shooting of 41-year-old Brendon Saunders at the Windmill Cove Apartments on June 30.

NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV) - The preliminary investigation into a fatal shooting near Fisk University on Thursday night reveals the incident may have been in self-defense. Police said Deverya Rose, 23, admitted to shooting her boyfriend Christopher T. Sims, 25, at an apartment on Blank Street. Rose told police she and Sims were involved in a violent altercation during which, she said, Sims put a gun to her head and grabbed her by the hair. Rose said while pushing her head to the floor, Sims laid the gun down. She picked the gun up and fired it, hitting Sims in the...

Nick posted a DGU story yesterday of a man who was stabbing his wife in the neck outside their child’s San Antonio elementary school when a Texas CHL holder pulled his gun and stopped the attack. The good samaritan has contacted TTAG and here’s his account of what happened: I am the guy that pulled my KelTec P3AT on the guy yesterday morning. Just to clear up the confusion, I was walking down S. St. Mary’s street IN FRONT OF Bonham Academy. I first thought that the guy was beating someone, and I ran toward him ordering him to stop....

This hits close to home. Literally — I live in San Antonio and carry a concealed handgun. And stories like this make me glad I rarely leave home without it, no matter how safe I think the destination. As we all know, just because you’re in a school zone doesn’t mean that the bad guys will stay away. And yesterday morning, an armed citizen stopped what could have been a murder in front of a school in broad daylight, all without firing a single shot. WOAI San Antonio picks up the story . . . The attack happened around 10:00...

A Melrose dad faces sentencing Friday after a jury found him guilty of slamming his 7-week-old son to the ground during a fight with his baby’s mother, in what prosecutors say was an “extremely troubling” case sparked by an argument over drugs and cash.

SAN BERNARDINO - Prosecutors declined to file charges against a Long Beach man who was arrested June 19 in a fatal San Bernardino stabbing. John Tomlinson, 55, was released from West Valley Detention Center on Friday after the San Bernardino County District Attorney's Office turned down the criminal case. "The defendant acted in self defense," said Chris Lee, District Attorney's Office spokesman. San Bernardino police arrested Tomlinson after he stabbed 52-year-old Clemonsey Thompson in the 3000 block of North Mojave Court. Thompson died about an hour later at Loma Linda University Medical Center. Police say Thompson confronted his estranged wife...

LAURENS COUNTY, S.C. -- Laurens County deputies say a woman who admitted to shooting her ex-husband will not be charged in the shooting because they believe she acted in self defense. According to the incident report, deputies were called out to a home on Vern Cora Road in Laurens Monday morning. Tammy Duvall told deputies she had a friend over at her house and was about to go outside when she heard a car door shut. Duvall told deputies she grabbed a gun and shot several times when she noticed her ex-husband, Roderick Woodruff, charging towards her. Deputies later found...

TOMPKINS COUNTY, N.Y. -- He never denied shooting his father, but Matthew Taranto said he did it in self defense. And Thursday, more than a month-and-a-half after the bench trial wrapped up, Judge Judith A. Rositer found Taranto not guilty of the crime. The 29-year-old admitted to shooting his father, Sal, in November of 2010 in their Trumansburg basement. But the defense had claimed that Taranto, who suffers from Asperger's Syndrome and OCD, feared for his life after his father threatened him with a knife and gun.

The World Is Upside-Down Conservative blogger Aaron Walker was arrested today after the Maryland hearing on the Kimberlin case. The Other McCain reported: FROM AN UNDISCLOSED LOCATION Aaron Walker, whose complaint against convicted terrorist Brett Kimberlin became a conservative cause célèbre this past week, was reportedly taken into custody today after a court hearing in Rockville, Maryland. One person who attended the hearing in Montgomery County District Court said that Kimberlin asserted that Walker’s continued blogging represented a violation of a “peace order” Kimberlin had obtained against the Virginia attorney, who says Kimberlin tried to “frame” him for assault earlier...

California state law guards the confidentiality of records and proceedings when peace officers face disciplinary investigations. Last month when suspended Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi was before the Ethics Commission, his attorney Shepard Kopp was asked whether Mirkarimi would be seeking such a closed hearing and this was his response, “We do not intend to argue that these proceedings need to be private. Indeed, we think they should be public. Because I think, at the end of the day, there’s a lot of innuendo and talk about the sheriff dissuading people. The mayor’s written charges say he ‘may have’ tried to get...