I'm thinking almost all of you must live completely alone or else there are going to be a lot of dead houseguests let in by other residents.

Or maybe a lot of you are just FOS.

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Yeah.... I'm an idiot for suggesting a somewhat cautious approach.... meanwhile triggerhappy paranoid people continue to accidentally kill others because they can't make the distinction you just described...

http://www.sptimes.com/2003/02/03/Ta..._he_ente.shtml

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/htm..._twisp20m.html

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news...35/detail.html

http://articles.glendalenewspress.co...lendale-police

http://www.9wsyr.com/mostpopular/sto...LiMVyBu3w.cspx

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/...n/4993293.html

http://www.click2houston.com/news/24143425/detail.html

http://www.prescottaz.com/main.asp?S...rticleID=82939

http://www.wbrz.com/news/man-improvi...ng-wrong-house

I'm amazed at the amount of people that would be ok with someone breaking into their home. Hell, do you even lock your doors at night....I bet 1% of the time those pesky burglars are just there to take a dump and a shower. Let's invite them to hold hands, sing kumbaya, and start them a savings account.

He was in the guys house using his shower for crying out loud....excuse me if I don't buy the whole gee, I didn't know this wasn't my house....well except my underwear drawer isn't where it's supposed to be, that's not my brand of soap, and hell this toilet doesn't feel right????

How many of you believe had the guy not gotten home and caught him that the poor misguided criminal would have just tidied up his mess and left without stealing anything???

... ya take all he's got, and all he's ever gonna have.

I haven’t reread this entire thread but the prevailing opinion I get from it isn’t people saying they wouldn’t use deadly force to protect their families, or that you should but rather that this situation didn’t necessarily warrant the use of deadly force.

Look. Im not paranoid. Im not trigger happy. I have roommates and never drawn on any of them. Im not advocating firing blindly into darkness. What Im saying is i have a right to protect myself. And i will.

Forgive me for not clicking all the links, Im on my phone, and it would take an hour to load all your links. I don't blame anyone for perceiving an intruder as a threat though. Im sure if i had my pc i could find some stats backing up my argument that most people who are shot while in someone else's house are there with criminal intent.

At least half of those links contain a statement similar to "the intruder came at the owner in an aggressive manner" basicly forcing the owner into a "Him or me" situation. Most of those owners had every reason to shoot, even though that would be tough to live with they did not have much of a choice.

You take risks in one direction (waiting to act does entail risk, after all), others will take risks in the other direction. It's not going to always be the 'right' decision either way. Also, some of the links you cited were examples of good shoots.

The way I see it, if you don't want to get shot, don't break into peoples homes. It's really not all the ****ing hard of a concept.

I can sort of see both sides to this one. On one hand people definitely have a right to protect themselves and their families. However, I have an uncle with Alzheimer's and an autistic sister, and I can very easily imagine either of them accidently/unknowingly wandering into the wrong house by mistake. The shoot-first attitude could very easily result in tragedy.

It's just talk. You think you know what you'd do, but you can never truly know what kind of things would go through your head until you live it.

the guy in the article should've taken a shower at Ted Nugent's home.

That Seattle one is terrible. Defending your home is one thing, but killing a guy for mistakenly trying the wrong door at a hotel? Plus the poor guy sat and bled for an hour waiting for the paramedics to arrive. Just tragic.

Hotel is different then your home. Very different. On the other hand its either the intruder or the home owner waiting an hour for help. It can and does take a while for cops to respond to a B&E.

And as for the handicapped and elderly, well my doors are locked so that SHOULD be a sign to even the most confused...

Speak for yourself, PeeWee.