Posted on 10/25/2005 1:09:46 PM PDT by Cagey
Surely this wasn't how the stickup was supposed to go down.
After making off with some cash, the robber was struck five times by two vehicles - first by someone police think was the suspect's own getaway driver and four more times by another driver who appears to have been trying to intervene.
Toward the end of the strange scene, the beleaguered bandit accidentally shot himself in the leg - then got hit a fourth time by the second driver, a woman who apparently knew the victim.
Here is the scene, as painted by police Inspector Vince Flores:
At 2:45 a.m. Sunday, a 33-year-old man was standing in a parking lot near N. 14th and W. Center streets. A 29-year-old man rushed up to him, pulled a handgun and demanded cash, which the victim handed over.
Meanwhile, a pickup truck - which police think was the robber's getaway ride - screeched up in reverse, but instead of spiriting the robber away, hit both the suspect and the victim, apparently by accident.
Then the pickup bolted, leaving the robber to limp away with the cash.
That's when the woman, behind the wheel of a Lexus, put the suspect in her sights, Flores said.
The woman rammed the robber with the front of her car.
Then backed up and hit him again. And again.
After the third hit, the man reached into his pocket to pull his gun, but shot himself in the leg. That's when the woman hit the robber with her car a fourth time.
Police showed up and arrested the suspected robber, who was not identified, and sent him to the hospital.
They also nabbed another man, who may have had nothing to do with the melee but was spotted running from the scene.
The suspect was listed in critical condition Monday at Froedtert Memorial Lutheran Hospital.
The robbery victim was listed in satisfactory condition, also at Froedtert, a hospital representative said.
The woman driving the Lexus is being sought.
Bump!
Stop right there! Anyone near that location deserves it!
She was stopping a fleeing felon suspect. If the cops have the right to shoot him why doesn't the driver have a right to stop him. As far as I am concerned you sound like nothing more than an enabler. The suspect stole money at gunpopint and was fleeing, he desrved to be shot or run over. When did civilians stop not having the right to stop criminals?
The day our Lords and Masters demoted us from "Citizen" to "civilian".
A bleedin heart liberal siding with the violent felons of the world........
Say hi to ET.
No, or I would not be on FR.
siding with the violent felons of the world........
No again. You guys however are siding with a violent felon. Attempted murder with a car is no better than attempted murder with a gun. I do not support vigilantism. She made herself the judge, jury, and executioner. I do not nor will not laud such conduct. Because if we do, you may as well throw the Constitution out the window.
hilarious!
. . . of course, the fact that she knew the victim indicates that she may have been motivated by something other than defense of self or others, BUT if she's smart that's the story she'll tell in court.
IF the police bother to look for her. I have a feeling her description is on a tiny 3x5 card in the back of a locked filing cabinet behind the furnace in a closet in a basement with a sign on the door reading "BEWARE OF LEOPARD".
Come to think of it, she can turn the fact that she knew the victim around in her own favor -- she had no duty to flee in her car and leave her friend, the robbery victim, at the mercy of a man with a pistol (who actually fires said pistol during the contretemps).
Codswallop! It was after she had hit him for the third time.
Nobody else is going to show up in court, given the nature of this neighborhood they probably have outstanding warrants and gave the police fictitious names. So there will probably be only three stories told in court (the robber, the victim, and the driver) and the victim and the driver will support each other.
And it sounds like there's a good chance the robber will be carried by six rather than tried by twelve . . .
Frankly, though, this is not a bad outcome. If more armed robbers were worried about having the hurt put on them, whether by Lexus or Saml. Colt, there would be fewer of them.
I still cannot condone someone who decided to be a judge, jury, and executioner. Guess we should change the Constitution then. If vigilantism is condoned for armed robbery, what next? Shall we condone it for drug use? How about speeding while we are at it? Far more people die from car related deaths than armed robberies.
We either are a nation of laws or we are not. Personally, I do not want to live in the latter.
It's not "judge-jury-executioner" and it's not "vigilantism" when the panic is still on. Never has been. Both those terms imply that (1) there is no continuing threat and (2) there has been time for reflection (to gather a lynch mob or whatever). If the victim had gone home, gotten her friend, and they both got in the Lexus and went out looking for this armed robber, that would be vigilantism.
This is well within what the courts generally call the "res gestae" - i.e. no time for reflection - and I have seen plenty of cases where the courts have held that an armed robber who is still ambulatory and able to reach for his gun is still considered a threat. Most self defense statutes also consider the stress that the person is under at the time . . . given that the driver saw her friend robbed at gunpoint, intervened to stop the threat, and the guy kept getting up and eventually pulled the gun again, it clearly would go to the jury on self defense. The fact that she's a woman makes an acquittal or even a DV far more likely. She will testify that she was in fear. It's up to the jury to decide whether that fear was reasonable, but given that this appears to have all happened quickly and continuously, it might be DV material.
Drugs and speeding are no comparison with a gun pointed in your face or in your friend's face. And car related deaths are overwhelmingly accidental, so that's a red herring too.
Sorry. I don't buy it. If the events happened as written, it was vigilantism in my book.
But don't pretend that it's anything other than your personal opinion.
"it was vigilantism in my book."
The translation in your book is a bit flawwed.
Sir, ( or ma'am) you indeed take a position that it is WRONG to FIGHT BACK, even in an instance where the truth is so OBVIOUS.
If it was YOU that had been robbed I offer that you would be the first to blame all the people that stood around and did nothing to help you. NEWSFLASH, cops are PEOPLE in uniform and nothing more. PEOPLE help people fight back against criminals and uniformed LEO or not....I am glad to see people in this country taking ACTION to kick criminals' A$$e$.
This woman in the lexus is to be HAILED and THANKED, not dismissed as a criminal. You simply ignore that the fella ROBBED a person and snap on those that FIGHT BACK.
Osama LOVES you.
I guess Jeremy Glik and Todd Beamer were just vigilanties throwing the constitution out the window too eh?
FFS dude ( or dudette) WAKE UP.
Sorry.
Don't buy into your flawed argument.
I always hated Mondays that started like this.
The train of logic you are exhibiting illustrates for me precisely why it is you also are able to grasp the concept of evolution firmly.
I can only hope that natural selection runs its course and quickly.
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