A man creeped in the backyard of a home just after midnight. Then came to the front door, where he was confronted by the homeowner before leaving. Not deterred, he returned to the home and entered through a window. That’s when the homeowner shot his ass.
The original article that led me to find out more caused me to find this one. Not only did his family tell us that he had mental health problems that caused him to hear voices, he was arrested the day before for burglarizing another house.
Too bad that he had mental health issues, but his family and girlfriend should have done more to get him help. Instead, the bailed him out of jail, left him unsupervised, and this resulted in his death.
6 Comments
Boneman · November 22, 2023 at 5:43 am
Of all the times you hear of the Baker Act being weaponized you would think that when it’s REALLY NEEDED… but NoooOOOoooOOOoooo. Hence my abject contempt for it. A damn shame, this story.
Divemedic · November 22, 2023 at 9:21 am
As someone that has initiated multiple involuntary psych holds, I can say that this case was not a candidate for a Baker Act, which requires a clear threat of the person being a threat to themselves or others.
Merely getting confused and wandering into the wrong house is, in itself, not sufficient to meet that standard.
The reason shooting someone who wanders into your home in the middle of the night is legal is that the law allows the homeowner a presumption of deadly threat. Medical providers don’t get that presumption.
Aesop · November 22, 2023 at 6:44 am
Dulce et decorum est.
EN2 SS · November 22, 2023 at 8:25 am
I just love early morning feel great stories, thank you.
jimmyPx · November 22, 2023 at 9:39 am
What did his family and girlfriend think was going to happen due to his penchant for trying to break into houses in the middle of the night ?
All the girlfriend needed to do was call the cops and tell them “he says he’s hearing voices and is thinking about killing himself”. That would get him Baker Acted, off the street and he’d be given meds to help him.
Instead they bailed him out of jail and he’s dead. I’ll bet $1 that his family will sue the poor home owner.
Big Ruckus D · November 22, 2023 at 11:35 am
This is what I like to call good old American problem solving. Quick and simple. May not be the preferred outcome for the deceased’s family and girlfriend, but that’s just tough shit. Barring the existence of a functional system for psych cases (as once existed in the FUSA, and yes I know that system had it’s disadvantages and abuses) if guys like this aren’t going to be institutionalized, then outcomes like these are what I prefer to see.
Seeing as nobody wanted to take responsibility for his supervision and care, this was pretty well inevitable anyway. Further, society is now unburdened of any potential harm this guy may have caused to people whose home he broke into. The pissing and moaning of his relatives falls on deaf ears (for me, at any rate) and is just another case of “somebody should’ve done somethingism”.
Yeah, his immediate family is that someone, and they fucked up by not doing what needed to be done. Some problems don’t have a clean and pleasant solution, and a legal adult head case who hasn’t been involuntarily committed by whatever close relatives he has, is on a short path to this sort of outcome.
There is no long term system run by the state that handles these people, at least not anymore. The reaction of his next of kin is just another iteration of the proverbial ghetto hood rat baby momma exclaiming “he wuz a goodboi and dindu nuffin!” Bullshit. He didu sumptin, and he rightly got capped for it. And now the homeowner has to live with being forced to kill a man, which sucks, even though that’s what he needed to do under the circumstances.
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