Homeowner shoots suspected burglar

Seattle Police say a homeowner in Loyal Heights shot a man attempting to break into his home just after 4 a.m. on Sunday.

Detective Mark Jamieson told My Ballard that the homeowner in the 6700 block of 25th Ave. NW discovered a man inside the mud room of his home attempting to break into the house. The homeowner fired a single shot through the door, striking the man, who fled the area. The homeowner called 911.

Seattle Police said a neighbor reported seeing a dark-colored station wagon leave the scene.

Ten minutes later, Swedish Ballard reported that a man with a gunshot wound to the abdomen had arrived in the emergency room. Responding officers discovered the station wagon parked nearby with fresh blood, possible stolen property and a man and woman inside, Jamieson said. The man had an outstanding warrant and was arrested. The woman, who is the sister of the man who was shot, was questioned and released, police say.

The man with the gunshot wound is currently at Harborview Medical Center. Police are waiting to talk with him.

(Our thanks to several neighbors, including Silver, who tipped us and posted in the My Ballard Facebook group.)

Geeky Swedes

The founders of My Ballard

137 thoughts to “Homeowner shoots suspected burglar”

      1. And your response to some p.o.s. breaking into your home at the middle of the night would be? Because you have advance knowledge that they only plan to take your stuff and not harm you or your family, right?

        1. These people thought that too. Bet they wish they’d waited a couple more seconds to see what they were really shooting at…

          (Don’t blame me for the formatting. Click read more… below)

          * Father who killed teen son after mistaking him for an intruder will not be charged, Cincinnati, Ohio, January 13, 2016

          * Mom accidentally shoots, kills daughter she thought was intruder, St. Cloud police say, December 30, 2015

          * Homeowner Mistakenly Shoots Deputies Coming To The Rescue, December 29, 2015, Columbia, SC

          * She Thought She’d Shot a Burglar. Then She Realized It Was Her Roommate. Ocala, Florida, April 21, 2017

          * Rochester Hills homeowner shoots at 14-year-old knocking on door for directions after missing bus, April 12, 2018

          * Police: Man shot by Merced resident during break-in was drunk and ‘in the wrong home’, January 04, 2018

          * Frightened homeowner mistakenly shoots real estate photographer she thought was intruder, Douglas County, Georgia, April 2, 2018

          * Cops: Homeowner fatally shot teen who knocked on wrong door, Chicopee, Massachusetts, July 18, 2016,

          * Sheriff: Homeowner accidentally shoots brother after mistaking him for burglar, Blacksburg, SC, November 19th 2017

          * State briefs: Man mistakenly shoots wife going to bathroom, Winter Garden, Florida, April 29, 2018

          * Alleged home invader fatally shot by homeowner lived nearby, may have been intoxicated, PLEASANT GROVE, Utah, May 3, 2015

          * Officials: Woman Shoots, Kills Friend Believed To Be Trying To Surprise Her, Hamilton, NJ, November 18, 2016

          One estimate found about 15 to 20 of these incidents a year. It happens all the time.

          Identify. Your. Target. Always. No exceptions.

          1. Wow, Elenchos, you managed to find a bunch of stories of home defense gone wrong. Nice deflection. Is there any situation where you’d approve of our right to defend ourselves, our loved ones, and our property?But since you jumped into this one, how about you answer the question? What would be YOUR response to some p.o.s breaking into your house in the middle of night?

          2. Can you point out where I ever said I don’t approve of self defense?

            All I said was: identify your target. Know what you are pointing your gun at. Very basic firearms rule; we’ve all been taught that. I was. Were you?

            We know he didn’t identify the target: he was shooting through a door, and didn’t see the person well enough to give the police any kind of description. Cops had to go on a fishing expedition to see if anybody with a gunshot showed up in the ER.

            If the story all checks out then this guy is lucky. He’s not one of the 15 to 20 people per year who are too trigger happy. Who killed their own family, or an innocent person on their doorstep.

            I think the inability to wait a few more seconds can be put down to a climate of fear. Listen to the fantasies you invented: what if he was going to rape your twelve daughters, even the one in a wheelchair? And murder your orphan war veteran puppy? WHAT THEN? You think there’s no need to be sure it’s not your own family because maybe it’s Charles Manson or the Night Stalker? You have to make sure who it is no matter what.

            How does waiting until you can identify who you are shooting in any way prevent those twelve heinous daughter rapes? Or however many daughters you have up in your attic?

            Tune out the climate of fear spread by Fox TV and Nextdoor and the Harley Lever types, and you will be better able to overcome panic, and hold your fire until you can see their face and you know: that’s not my wife. That’s not my kid. That’s not my drunk neighbor at the wrong house again. That”s not some confused exchange student from Iceland.

            Or maybe it is your drunk neighbor again and you’ve had it, and now you’re going to blow his balls off. Fine. At least you’re not some yahoo shooting wildly through a door at whom you know not.

            Identify your target, then fire away, if you need to. Basic firearms handling. Yet you falsely accuse me of saying we’re never allowed to defend ourselvs. I said no such thing.

            Making stuff up comes naturally to the Nextdoor and Safe Seattle crowd, eh?

          3. For once, we are in agreement. Of course you should always identify your target. Yes, I grew up with guns so I understand this. Just like the other basic rule, that the gun is always loaded. This home owner obviously identified his target properly. He was some tweaker trying to bust into his house. What don’t you understand about that? If It had been the guy’s wife or someone else who didn’t mean to victimize him, then you would have a valid argument.

          4. He identified nothing. He fired at what he couldn’t see, and got lucky. Could have been a nightmare.

            All I said was, “Don’t push your luck like this guy did, just because he got away with it. Always identify your target.” That’s all I said. And you proceeded to attack me 50 times, and make dozens of false accusations, put words in my mouth, call me names.

            Doesn’t take much to set you off, does it? Stop living in fear. Turn off the TV, turn off the right wing talk radio, log off Nextdoor, and go out and see the real world. Paranoia has poisoned you.

          5. You don’t always have to “Identify” your target. I live alone with my dog. Nobody belongs in my house but me and my dog. IF you’re at the door trying to get in and haven’t identified yourself prior you are going to get shot.

            If this guy knows with absolute certainty that nobody else should be getting into his home seeing the face of the person trying to get in really isn’t needed.

          6. Perhaps if your only intent is to shoot somebody and get away with it.

            Normal people work with the assumption that you wouldn’t ever want to shoot anybody unless they really had to. The Merced man who shot his drunk neighbor in January wasn’t charged, for example. Hooray! Shot a guy and got away with it! Or the real estate photographer shot in April in Georgia. If that had been you, you’d have just fired away? Because you’re absolutely certain it’s nobody you know, and that’s all you need.

            Normal people don’t feel that way at all. Normal people would have preferred to know it was their drunk neighbor and not shoot him. This paranoid bubble where you sit around and tell each other it’s A-OK to blast away at all the scary monsters that come to your door is a sick cult. You are free to walk way and come back to reality.

          7. Wow! That’s like the whole argument behind BLM: That cops are just WAITING to shoot and kill someone. You may believe that about homeowners (or cops), but personally I think better of most people.

          8. The argument you are trying to make is stupid. I am going to assume that the shooter knew they were shooting at someone with ill intentions. Do you know what it sounds like when someone is trying to break in your back door? It’s loud and it’s scary. I would also assume that this person knew where their family was, likely in the home they were trying to protect.

      2. You assume this person was not armed and intending only to take their “crap”. Someone breaking in late at night is how home invasions and sexual assaults often occur. I have close friends who have suffered such fate here in Seattle because they did not take appropriate actions to protect themselves. I would have done the same.

      3. It’s not the stuff, it’s the violation of my home space. When someone is making me feel unsafe in my own home they need to know they might pay the ultimate price, it’s their choice, not mine.

  1. I’m never *glad* that someone has to shoot an intruder — better the crime had never been made so easy to perpetrate. That said, I hope justice is served on the thief and that the property owner is found to have used the force appropriately.

    1. “Better the crime had never been made so easy to perpetrate” …… One would think something more along the lines of “Better that people weren’t so desperate they resorted to petty theft.” It is wrong to behave like it’s the homeowners fault their home was broken into.

  2. Right on cue.
    Paging Truth and Elenchos about “evil homeowners” and “low crime in Seattle”.

    Respect to the homeowner for defending themselves against a vicious intruder. I hope the burglar’s sister enjoyed the hug and milk and cookies from the SPD.

    1. This is your whole schtick. You’ve been given piles of evidence from many different sources that prove that this crime wave fantasy has no basis. You never address that. Never explain. Instead, you cite single incidents. Look, here’s one time a burglary happened! Here’s a guy whose car window got broken one time!

      Nobody every said there is zero crime. All these single incidents prove is that there is not zero crime. We do have burglaries like this. We have them at about a rate of 10 to 11 per 1,000 people per year. In 2016 there were 10.88 per 1,000. In 2015 there were 11.4. In 2012 it was 9.9, in 2008 it was 10.76. It’s hovered around 10 to 11 per 1,000 people for the last two decades. It has not shot up.

      If you want to compare that to something, take the number of burglaries you read about here every month and multiply that times three. There were TRIPLE rate of burglaries in 1986, 87, 88. In 1987 the rate hit 34.9 per 1,000 people. That almost 3.5 times as many. Even in 1995, there were 14 to 15 per 1,000, about 50% more.

      You guys squeal and screech and act like the world is coming to an end, and in fact it is pretty much the same as it was 10 years ago, 20 years ago. And far, far better than 30 years ago.

      But you don’t care because you never cared. You’re here to take a dump on Seattle. you hate this city, and leap at every chance to put it down and denigrate everyone who lives here. You hate us and don’t share our values.

        1. We get it, Harley. There’s a lot of hate in you. You wake up angry and you’re angry all day, and you’ll still be angry when you finally step way from the keyboard in 16 hours. Tomorrow, you’ll wake up angry, and post with a bunch of new fake names. And you’ll still be just as angry, and you’ll hate Seattle just as much. Sad!

          1. we get it, elenchos. There’s a lot of faux-compassion in you. You wake up with faux-compassion too pathetic to realize that you’re really an ENABLER.

      1. “But you don’t care because you never cared. You’re here to take a dump on Seattle. you hate this city, and leap at every chance to put it down and denigrate everyone who lives here. You hate us and don’t share our values.”

        HAHA. The only people “taking a dump on Seattle” are, well, O’Brien’s Kids.

        People don’t report property crime to police often because of the MASSIVE WAIT TIMES.

          1. Cognitive Dissonance: when one holds 2 contradictory premises to be true, such as:

            “we have so many jobs in Seattle at full employment!” and “poverty causes crime” or “America is Racist and Evil” and “(Cruel) Americans who are taxed to pay for entitlement programs need to pay more taxes to pay for criminals and invaders.”

            The very fact that you have to get on here to argue against the city’s decay is evidence that the decay is underway. These aren’t kitten petting articles or fun stories about neighbors. These are vicious crimes perpetrated by people who are told they are never to blame and that their taxpaying victims are somehow deserving of violence and harassment.

          2. “The very fact that you have to get on here to argue against the city’s decay is evidence that the decay is underway.”

            Bravo! That’s a fine piece of rhetoric you’ve got there. Print that out and frame it.

            Hey, wait. Check it out!

            Check it OUT my darlings: The very fact that you have to get on here to argue for the city’s decay is evidence that the decay is not underway.

            !!!

            See! See? See what I did there? It’s magic. It’s totally true. Why WOULD you have to say the city is decaying unless it weren’t decaying? If it were really decaying, EVERYBODY would already know it. How could a whole city be falling into ruin, and Harley Lever and his 99 fake online sock accounts is the only one who knows it? Surely everyone would see it with their own eyes.

            How could Harley have polled at 0% in the mayor’s primary if the city were drowning in crime? How could Scott Lindsey have only managed to walk way with 25% if there were any truth to what Lindsey and Lever were claiming?

            I’m going to use that from now on. Every time you or one of your socks says anything, I’m going to say, THE VERY FACT THAT YOU HAVE TO SAY THAT IS PROOF THAT IT’S NOT TRUE.

            Never change, Harley.

          3. Here you are, after the rapes, the murders, burglaries and shootings bashing your taxpaying neighbors and pretending crime hasn’t gotten worse AND pretending I’m “Harley”.

            You’re a walking example of the importance of the 2nd Amendment.

          4. Don’t expect the 2nd Amendment to be around much longer in any form you recoginze if you guys keep shooting through doors at things you haven’t identified.

            But you do you. Let me know how well that works out for you.

          5. Yeah, spoken like a man who learned everything he knows about handling a gun reading a law book. Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.

            Always, always, always know exactly what you’re pointing at, kids. Always.

          6. Fun Fact:
            Guns are kept in many places throughout the world, and messing with someones herd, their home, their wive(s), kids or kin will get you in very much trouble very quickly. Travel and read more, less Huffpo – that’s all nonsense for coastal white cat ladies anyway, Elenchos. I know you got more “street” in you than that, anyway. Get real for once.

          7. It seems the victim DID know what he was pointing at, Elenchos. After all, his door was getting broken down. And now the tweaker’s got a well deserved gut wound.

          8. In your imagination, right?

            But the police had no description, did they? Went looking for literally anybody in a nearby ER with a gunshot wound. That’s all they had to go on, because the panicked member of our “well-regulated militia” was shooting blindly through a door. He had no idea who or what he was shooting, and couldn’t give the cops any description.

            Don’t shoot at anything you haven’t identified, kids.

            Shall we review the long list of times a trigger happy paranoid has shot a tourist or lost kid asking for directions? April 12, 2018, in Detroit? November 2, 2013, in Dearborn Heights, Michigan? July 5, 2014, Las Vegas? July 18, 2014, Chicopee, Massachusetts? Case after case after case.

            Well-regulated militia my ass. The biggest threat to gun rights isn’t liberals, it’s irresponsible gun owners. Don’t point at anything, don’t shoot anything, that you can’t see and haven’t identified. Don’t ever do that.

          9. Elenchos, if you’re referring to Scott Lindsay’s claim that “Seattle has the highest property crime rate per capita of any major city in the United States,” as being untrue, you might want to consider that Gene Balk, who doesn’t believe in accounting for unreported crime, wrote the article “refuting” that claim. Here’s what Balk said:

            “Only if by ‘major’ U.S. cities you mean the top 20. Because even if you look at the 25 largest cities, Seattle drops back to No. 2, after Memphis. In my column, when I refer to major U.S. cities, I typically look at the 50 largest in population — Seattle drops down to sixth place by that measure … I choose to look at the top 50 to capture a broader range of cities. Who wouldn’t consider Washington, D.C., or Boston a major U.S. city? Neither rank in the top 20.”

            So going by Balk’s own definition, we’re just number 6 for the worst property crime rate. Yay! And let’s not forget the WORST outr of the top twenty biggest cities. But go ahead, stick your head in the sand, and continue telling yourself and everyone else there’s nothing to see here, there’s no increase in criem, and things are just as peachy as they’ve always been.

          10. Then why didn’t anybody want to vote for Lindsay? Or Lever? Or any of the anti-homeless tough-on-crime candidates? Why?

          11. Elenchos is only happy when it’s a citizen getting murdered by a “marginalized, at-risk community member”. Remember only rap stars and their imitators can wave guns around, Kids!

          12. I heard that yesterday one of Elenchos’s pets assaulted a FOUR YEAR OLD at the Ballard CC. I wonder if a four yo qualifies as a vulnerable, marginalized community member in her eyes? And you probably won’t see anything in the news about it, either. So Elenchos and her friends can keep saying we’re just imagining all this and fear mongering.

          13. The King County Democrats have all the money. There is no reasonable alternative.

          14. Yeah, Kshama Sawant went toe to toe with Richard Conlin back by the the Democrat machine and what happened to her? Can’t stand up to that. Too much money behind them.

            Or…. could it be you’re unpopular? Safe Seattle is unpopular. Anybody who talks like that is unpopular. Nobody believes this crime wave hysteria because most people have better things to do than read paranoid ravings on Nextdoor.com. And they can see with their own eyes that Seattle is not an urban hellscape. They don’t see any decay.

            Or… maybe you’re right, and maybe vast numbers of voters do see all the crime and all the liberal virtue blinking and social justicing and they hate it too. But you keep losing because… um? You’re really, really bad at this?

          15. elenchos are you a 45 year old fat dude living in your grandmas basement? you have too much time on your hands. go get a job.

          16. Said the sockpuppet to the kettle. Pick one handle and stick to hit, Harley, You’re not fooling anybody.

          17. JM98107/Harley/Sockpuppet troll:
            I’VE SEEN YOU POST ON FB UNDER YOUR REAL NAME. I KNOW WHO YOU ARE. God, you’re pathetic. Over 12+years posting on Myballard alone under 12+ accounts. Get. A. Life.

      2. elenchos, you made sense and then lost it with this:
        “you hate this city, and leap at every chance to put it down and denigrate everyone who lives here. You hate us and don’t share our values. ”
        WTF? Really? What the heck are your values?

        1. Me? I keep telling you: that which can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.

          Stop telling me about all this unfalsifiable unreported crime. You have no evidence at all that people in privileged neighborhoods are underreporting crime. None. It’s a cheap cop out excuse that you made up because the facts are against you.

          Start showing me data. Show me facts. Don’t tout one crime as proof of a crime wave. That’s not how life works. Show me a consistent pattern of evidence. Rising crime goes hand in hand with declining property values, businesses closing their doors and retail space going empty. They stop breaking ground on new buildings. People flee to the suburbs or other cities. That’s what a city in the grip of a crime wave looks like.

          Seattle looks exactly like the opposite of a city with rising crime. Explain that without resorting to made-up nonsense like “unreported crime” that nobody can prove or disprove.

          The standards for truth are the same whether your’e talking about climate change or the fact that immigrants are not rapists and murderers, or Trump’s phony voter fraud claims. The fact that the presence of homeless people doesn’t cause an increase in crime is based on objective study. Not anecdotes from a guy whose Amazon package never arrived.

          It’s called the reality based community. It’s not a difficult thing to understand.

          1. Elenchos, you are an Amazon package. Fully. Return to sender. Address unknown. No such number. No one home.

      3. elenchos I work the graveyard from home 7pm to 7am. I go out in front of my building to smoke quite often at night and to walk my dog. It has gotten bad enough to where I wont go out to have a smoke unless I have my gun on me. I’m from Chicago, grew up near the Robert Taylor Projects back in the late 80s early 90s during the gang wars. And while this isn’t as bad as that the homeless people at night are effing crazy. in the year I’ve been here I’ve had to draw my firearm 3 times on a homeless dude trying to hurt someone else or myself. When I lived on the east side before I moved to ballard I didn’t even own a gun. So trying to say there is no crime here means you’re either an idiot, or a troll. I’m hoping for the ladder but betting on the former.

        1. Nobody said there is no crime. You’re using a fake name to call people idiots and trolls based on a false accusation.

          There were close to 7,500 burglaries in Seattle in 2016. In 2006 there were 7470 or so. In ’02 there were just under 7,300. The population rose from 570,000 to 685,000 in that time. So the burglary rate dropped from 12.7 to 10.8 per 1,000 people.

          Go back to 1987 and there were 17,200 burglaries. SEVENTEEN THOUSAND! When the population was only 500,000. Almost 35 per 1,000 people. Three and a half times the rate.

          So I don’t know what your cigarettes and your dog has to do with it. The sky is full of cranes, retail space doesn’t stay vacant for five minutes, people are moving here in droves. Unemployment is low, and there’s piles of data from the police showing crime is not rising out of control.

          It is especially the case that in neighborhoods where people have cried the loudest about crime on Nextdoor and in groups like Safe Seattle, in Magnolia or Ballard, crime is particularly low compared to other neighborhoods. Large numbers of homeless people have appeared, and yet we see that crime has NOT increased at the same time. Blaming them for crime is nonsensical.

          Nobody said there is no crime. What everyone has been saying is that you can’t make generalizations based on single incidents like one home break in. Moving to one of the most affluent and safe neighborhoods in the city and then freaking out and running out and buying a gun is evidence of a poor grasp on facts and on reality.

          There’s a lot of evidence that people who listen to right wing talk radio, watch Fox News, and spend too much time on paranoid cult communities like Nextdoor.com have a poor grasp of facts. Look right here. You don’t have to do any research at all except read the web page right in front of your face right now. No where on this page does any one say “there is no crime”. And yet: listen to yourself. You’re stating the opposite of what’s right in front of your face.

          You’re going to hurt somebody with that gun, whipping it out like a crazy man. Stop before it’s too late.

    1. Unfortunately guns in the home are not as good as we would like to think.

      • For every time a gun is used in self-defense in the home, there are 7 assaults or murders, 11 suicide attempts, and 4 accidents involving guns in or around a home.

      Yes, guns work in some cases but there are plenty of negatives. Statistically a gun is used on a family member much more often than used on an intruder.

      1. Statistically, soy consumption causes urbanites to become too soft to defend their homes and loved ones. Go visit a farm or ranch, Genius. Ya know, the people who produce the food we eat. Unarmed means unable to defend yourself or your FAMILY.

        Any ideas on the risks associated with allowing drug addicts to take over the entire city, Genius?

        1. I agree we should not allow drug addicts to take over. If we choose to own guns that is fine.
          Just be aware of the statistics that guns in homes are 7 times more likely to be used on a family member than on an intruder.

          1. Liberal cities are 7 times more likely to be filled with grievance-grinding psychopath criminals expecting freebies and easy targets.

  3. I hope this tweaker gets a chance to sue everyone involved for standing in the way of a golden opportunity to recycle this homeowner’s property into narcotics!

    Somebody call Kshama.

    1. Why do you keep making up these new fake names? We all know it’s you. You say the same things, in the same way. Your fake names all sound the same.

      You are very unpopular. Sockpuppetry doesn’t fool anybody. It just demonstrates how unpopular you are that you have to resort to these pathetic games.

      1. Elenchos: Why do you think you’re so important that you get to post 20% of the comments on this thread? You must think you’re very important and smarter than the rest of us. You sound like a narcissist.

        1. Maybe that’s why the guy posting 40% of the comments uses six different names instead of one.

          Pro tip for you Harley: if hearing from me makes you sad, don’t page me. You’re the one who invited me here to witness your glee and bloodlust. I guess you imagined you’d come out looking a lot better.

          1. I think you should stop using the interwebz for a bit elenchos and go get some therapy. you got issues.

    1. Haha, no don’t you know this guy could always “rehabilitate” and become a scientist or a maybe a City Council member or “community activist”?

  4. Homeowner defends himself and property from a home invasion but our nutter SJW is all sad – should the homeowner have welcomed him and his band of thieves in to help themselves to his stuff or harm him or a family member?

    Why would you stick up for a scumbag thief?

    1. I don’t think anyone has said anything sticking up for any thieves. Do you? Who? Where?

      All I can see is that a lot of people who think your snide commentary is moronic. All the macho posturing, celebrating a shooting, all that? Nobody seems to like it. Go figure.

      1. Elenchos only approves of guns in the hands of violent professional athletes. She doesn’t care about the potential sexual assault that might have been prevented by this shooting. Probably if it was some Ms-13 thugs she’d be organizing a solidarity march on their behalf demanding a big lawsuit payout. She’s a classic turncoat.

      2. so if you aren’t sticking up for thieves, what are you posting about? why so upset? why the multiple posts all triggered and stuff?

        i’m not celebrating anything – yet another bunch of home invaders in ballard – nothing to cheer about.

        i like how you have your lil SJW troll army voting down any sane commentary on this story. get a life e “c is for see you next tuesday” barnett….

        1. MY army? My SJW army? Not mine, silly. George Soros is the one cutting those sweet, sweet secret leftivist army checks. Five dollars each, every time you downvote a Trumper. Pick yours up in the usual place, comrades.

          (psst: you are unpopular. Everyone hates you. So sorry)

          1. elenchos did mommy and daddy not pay enough attention to you when you were younger. so now u feel the need to come on here and try to sound educated and important. I feel bad for you, but hey being its seattle im sure there is a city program where you can get the psychiatric care that you need at no cost to you. Now if you would please leave the library and remove your tent.

  5. What if it was his kid? a relative? a neighbor? Shooting thru a door, not being able to see who is there, is a recipe for disaster and lifelong regret. What happened to the shooter? Why is he not in custody as well? If I was his neighbor I’d be seriously worried about him and his gun

    1. What if there was a KID IN THE HOUSE who be a victim of sexual assault?
      Lay off the soy milk, it lowers testosterone.

      1. For those who haven’t been to many Trump rallies, and don’t spend much time on 4chan or stormfront or breitbart, the reason Harley keeps talking about soy for no reason is that the new online white nationalist right wing has this paranoia about soy and hormones. Seriously, look:

        https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/soy-boy

        It’s an alt-right MRA thing. Men’s Rights Advocacy, is what that is. They’re angry that feminism has upset the equal distribution of women to men. No, really. They are. It sounds crazy when you say it out loud, doesn’t it?

        Sometimes they go on shooting rampages or drive cars into crowds but the in no way should reflect on Harley here. He only calls people soy boys because he spends 23 hours a day listening to Alex Jones and Infowars. Which is totally legitimate. Right?

        1. So you voted for the corrupt, money grubbing, serial lying, treasonous ssscumhaag whose greatest achievement is her marriage to a disgraced and impeached ssslut who was disbarred in his home state (by his own Party) for being an unethical ssscumbag?

          And now, you have morphed from a ghetto morals voter to a whiny loser?

    2. Homeowner stood his ground as the law allows. Good for him, I am proud to say I live in the same neighborhood as this fellow American. I’ll take him as a neighbor any day over the junkies in tents who break into cars and homes and leave needles on playgrounds.

    3. Actually, I believe it is illegal to shoot someone through a closed locked outer door – for just the reasons you describe. The homeowner could be libel for reckless behavior at the least, attempted murder at the worst. Best case scenario would be to arm yourself and shout (that is shout not shoot) “The police have already been called”. Only if the miscreant gains entry through the door are you justified in discharging your weapon – and NOT if the individual is running away from you once he or she sees you are armed. This is my understanding of the law.

      1. Apparently, no one read the actual report. The thief was already in the guys house! He had breached an outer door and was in the mudroom. Where, through a window in the inner door, the homeowner could see who he was shooting.

        1. We know, although thanks for your insulting statement. It depends on which door was the stoutest exterior door. If the mud room is actually a porch with a light screen then things might be different. This will also hinge on the extent to which the intruder was armed. The general rule of well-trained gun self defense is “do not shoot through a closed door”.

        2. If he had actually identified who or what he was shooting, he would have been able to give the police a description.

          I recommend reading any of those cases where the well-regulated militia shot their son or daughter or spouse or a tourist asking directions. Do a search and you’ll find a dozen examples in 10 seconds.

          The hyperbole of TV news and paranoia of Nextdoor and Safe Seattle makes you fearful and trigger happy. It’s not healthy.

    4. The homeowner “fired a gun through the window of the door and into the mudroom” so, I believe, he could see the burglary in progress. https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/ballard-homeowner-fires-gun-at-burglar/791247319

      I wish that people living in dense, urban areas would think twice before discharging a gun, even when doing so is legally allowable (as is probably the case with this home invasion). Guns don’t just shoot the distance their handlers wish them to; they often have longer ranges. When a shot misses it’s intended target it keeps going and can become a community hazard. Google “accidentally shot neighbor” to see just how commonplace it is for someone to miss an intended target and hurt someone else. There are non-lethal defensive devises that are much less dangerous to your neighbors; bear spray, tasers, stun guns can all disable burglars without accidentally harming innocents.

      That being said, I think the shooter was probably within his legal rights to shoot someone actively engaging in home invasion. I don’t fault him for protecting himself.

      I do, however, find it strange that the burglar’s compatriots, found with a car full of stolen goods, are not in police custody. Why are accessories to burglaries not arrested???

      1. They were not arrested because they are our valued “vulnerable community members” who can’t be held to account because they’re “homeless.” Of course, were anyone else to do that kind of an act cama it would be a different story.

  6. I’m glad I don’t have such fancy stuff that I’d try to kill a guy so he doesn’t take it.

    Was the burglar shot in the back? The homeowner should be charged– especially if he didn’t utter a warning. Dumbass shooting a gun through a door could’ve easily killed his neighbor, too

    1. Join the discussion… What a sad comment to make. Do you feel criminals really care about your “fancy stuff”? How intellectually lazy of you. What if what if what if……. What if this prep had a job, putting INTO the kettle instead off taking from it? What if you knew about all the crimes stopped due TO people having a gun? I’d Take this guy as a neighbor any time. We have WAY too many “you’s already.

  7. Why is it that elenchos has so many thumbs up while most others receive thumbs down? How is it this happens? Let’s talk about this person stacking these decks for us all. No different than Sawant and her rabble rousing are you. Just own this mess of a city. I am so glad this homeowner protected his S. When seconds count, cops are minutes away, or more. 2nd amendment is here to stay, no matter what our city council says/does. No matter WTF comes out of elenchos’ BFM.

    1. What? But I got you such a nice participation trophy!

      *** S E C O N D *** P R I Z E ***
      https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/97/Battle_flag_of_the_Confederate_States_of_America.svg/200px-Battle_flag_of_the_Confederate_States_of_America.svg.png
      *** Y OU *** SHOWED *** UP ***

      Talk about your sour grapes. Next time no participation prize for you!

      Here’s a theory: nobody is blessing you with the coveted thumbs up for the same reason nobody voted for Catherine Weatbrook or Scott Lindsey or Harley Lever. Nobody votes for law-n-order candidates and nobody listens to those who promises to kick crime in the ass because they’re not all that worried about crime.

      See what a neat theory that is?

      Here’s your theory: people get their houses and cars broken into, and they’re too damn lazy to make a police report. Not only that, they’re too damn lazy to even vote for anybody who is going to hire a bunch of cops and crack some skulls until the riff riff shapes up. There’s a huge silent majority of fed up taxpaying homeowners, but they’re too damn lazy to even click a thumbs up button when one of their compadres gets all Dirty Harry on a punk like Jesus intended. THAT lazy!

      If that theory is true, then do these lazy homeowners really deserve to be saved form the urban apocalypse?

      So I believe the first theory: You. Are. Unpopular. (and wrong)

      But if you don’t like that one, then help yourself to the second theory: You. Are. LAZY.

        1. I propose a Minimum Basic Upvote.

          Everyone deserves a small dopamine rush from online ‘likes’. Everyone gets an automatic ‘like’ for everything they post, no matter how inane or racist or self-servingly disingenuous. We shall pay for these free ‘likes’ with a progressive tax on the ‘likes’ garnered by the filthy stinkin’ liked. The ruling class of commenters who sit on their mansions of likes rolling in their swimming pools filled with thumbs up, toasting champagne flutes bubbling over with ❤️s ought to give a little for the downtrodden odious comments.

          Here’s a 👍 for your trouble, and take this ✅ green checkbox too. Don’t spend it all in one place.

          1. While I think it is usually better to just ignore the trolls and/or sock puppets, your argument for a more egalitarian distribution of tokens of Internet affection is pretty great. 🥇

      1. I wouldn’t be so smug, Elenchos. You might be in for a rude surprise in November 2019. Even longtime democrats and liberals are starting to reach the end of their patience with this crap. We saw that with the stunning repeal of the head tax. And can I just say, I had so much fun taunting and mocking Sawant’s little mob of malcontents as they screamed and cried avout it. And now people are more aware of what’s been going on down at City Hall. But go ahead, comfort yourself with the message of our illustrious city council that voters were simply “brainwashed” into signing the referendum petition.

        1. Aaaaaaaand… on the other hand?

          If AGAIN the voters tell you guys in no uncertain terms that they’re not buying what you’re selling? If Seattle hands your right wing, law & order, tough guy MAGA ticket another crushing defeat?

          You won’t learn a damn thing, will you? See, reality doesn’t make you change course. All the facts in the world, and they get run through your reality filter, and you make up some convoluted conspiracy to explain away the obvious facts.

  8. I hope the suspect sues the homeowners insurance company for medical bills, it happened on the homeowners property. The homeowners responsible for what happens on his property.

    1. I’m sure he’ll be applying for victimhood status any minute now. That homeowners is not ust an evil priviledged NIMBY for defending his property and his family, he’s a NIMFD too. (Not in my front door). He should have just invited the poor soul inside and asked him what he needed, give him a hug, and then send him on his way.

    2. Insurance companies don’t cover intentional acts, BAM. However, maybe the homeowner will say he was cleaning his gun and it went off, accidentally. Either way, I’m with the homeowner. Maybe word will get out among the tweaker – thief community some of you morons defend, and these break-ins will stop. Or, maybe it’s time for another homeowner to defend their property and themselves, and get the job done completely, and save us all some money. Didn’t this jerk already have an outstanding arrest warrant? Exiting the gene pool early ought to be added to the City strategy for dealing with druggies and thieves in Seattle.

    3. Hey @BAM, it was noted this suspect was in a car with two other people – one of whom had an outstanding arrest warrant. Are you assuming this person, who wasn’t, you know, knocking on the door or ringing the doorbell, had good intentions? Have they interviewed the homeowner yet? How do you know he didn’t say “back off I’m armed”, and how do you know the intruder assumed the homeowner was lying, and was continued trying to break into the person’s home? Sure, a homeowner is ‘responsible’ for what goes on on his property, but, he also has the right to defend himself from unlawful entry by a non-property owner. So…none of that registers with you? You go right to defending the guy who got shot assuming he’s an innocent victim in all this?
      If you walked up to my home and tried to break into it, that doesn’t make you an innocent victim – it makes you a criminal. Because that’s the way the cops would likely see it, if you actually managed to break into my home. Once you cross certain thresholds, how the law views you changes. I hate to say it, but you might be too far gone up the compassion tree to ‘get’ common sense any longer.

  9. Wow, it makes me really sad that neighbors are this crappy to each other when they’re anonymous.
    I can’t imagine you all talking to each other this way if you’re in the same room.

    Why not have a discussion instead of throwing nasty snarky comments at each other.

    If you were all even the least bit interested in learning anything from the discussion you would open your minds and listen to what the other has to say.

    If not, why even be in a discussion cuz it’s not a discussion it’s just a snark fest that perpetuates the hate human beings are feeling for each other right now in this country.

    I don’t get it.

    1. These snarky comments aren’t coming from caring neighbors who want to improve the fabric of our community. They are coming from a handful of prolific trolls looking to cause drama and “trigger those libtard SJW soyboys” or some such nonsense. They are not driven by any coherent principles, just misanthropic sadism.

      Best just to ignore them, I think.

  10. Seems that there are some that make excuses continually for the “poor downtrodden” who steal. Or blame everyone else because these people have nothing and have to then steal. Life choices put in in them in the places they are, doing the illegal things they are. Those of you who write one comment after another waxing poetic defending them simply want to excuse and enable them. If the crimes were done to you it is quite likely you would not be so forgiving.

  11. The first best way to rob someone one is to share your things with each other and become a society where we can ask to borrow whatever of course with our annoying your neighbor

    The second best way to rob someone is to have the best compassion, empathy and sympathy towards a person. Become friends with them and have fun, do things you’re both passionate about. Have some genuine fun and be friends for years and when it comes time to rob them you go to their house a couple years after being best friends and you say, (sarcastically) can I have that ______ (item you desire) and your new best friend of about 4 years says, “YES!! you’re my best friend! There’s no way I’m not giving you this and besides I don’t need it anyway I have too much crap I want to be a minimalist because you taught me there’s more to life than just collecting crap but having a genuine human relationship is best so take it!!”

    Yeah, and that’s how you rob someone

  12. “A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball, and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be your constant companion of your walks.”
    -Thomas Jefferson

    “Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas.”
    -Joseph Stalin

    “No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms.”
    — Thomas Jefferson

  13. Wow! Reading the comments here, it becomes clear why you have whackjob politicians and have reserved parks for junkies and not children.

    Siding with scumbag thieves over a hero who is man enough to protect his family is depraved and sick. No wonder most of you are confused over concepts as simple as marriage.

  14. Should have shot into the ceiling or some other harmless direction to scare the burglar off. That would have saved taxpayers some hospital bills.

    1. Great idea – chase him off to steal or rape, or kill someone else.

      A stunningly selfish and self centered idea. Shame on you.

  15. Not too long ago I blew a hole through a scumbag robbers’ leg. Just recently I sold my house in Ballard and made a KILLING off it, so to speak. If these are the individuals living there now, thank god I sold

  16. Bravo, good shooting. We were burglarized last week and if it happens again and I’m home, Swedish will be receiving more emergency room customers.

  17. This was completely fucked and all tell you why let’s start  freaking it down ok. There are at least 7 different versions of this so called burglary and the details are very vague to say the least. So doesn’t say if the homeowner
    Turned on the lights coming down the stairs? But I’m going to make a pretty educated guess he did not because if someone was breaking in and a light popped on they would run flat out. So let’s say this man had I’ll intention home owner should have turned the lights on mad his presence known that he was armed and will shoot.. this man could have suffered from number of things like  mental illness ,intoxicated, elderly with dementia considering he didn’t know his age at the time. Should have called 911 from the first sight of danger? Phone on speaker in one hand gun in the other. One of the reports I read said he was aiming for center mass that would be a kill shot meaning the lungs heart neck or head. Clearly he can’t aim.. so discharged a firearm 45 calb maybe missed him and om its way next door food for thought. And the man was in the mud room not yet gained access to the main domain of the house correct? Or who knows maybe the was not even in the house just in line of sight of the door last you have to establish Does the intruder have the ability to cause you grave bodily injury. If not, meaning if you are of equal physical ability then no . . . if you are not then proceed to next step.

    Can the intruder use their ability to cause grave bodily injury? If they are on the other side of a locked door then they cannot. If they are unarmed and you are, then no. If they are too far away from you then no.

    Is this happening now? Right this instance? If yes then maybe.

    Although most states do not require you to retreat when you use Self-Defense as your reason for shooting another person one of the jury instructions will be, did you have any other option other than shooting. This means could you have barricaded yourself someplace, could you have locked a door, could you have escaped.

    Of the 34 states I reviewed they were consistent in that you can only shoot to prevent grave bodily injury. Of the states I reviewed you cannot shoot someone to prevent them from stealing your property. Additionally, if you had the chance to protect yourself from harm yet you chose to go get physical to prevent someone from stealing your TV and you end up shooting them, you could be charged with murder …. all reports said man was shot through door ..

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