Drunken teen stumbles into wrong home

[Koyaanisqatsi]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I have had a drunken college student enter my room, and climb onto my roommates bed and go to sleep. I tried to prod him awake for a while, before calling the college fellow (college student in charge of that section of rooms).

JM

That happened to me once. I carried him to the girl's wing and took his clothes.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Flubber
where do you get that ? The quote from the homeowner says he grabbed the kid by the throat and then the kid "dropped" to the floor. Sounds like he was standing to me. Do you have another source?

Oh and ages are irrelevant in this since there are 16 year olds much larger than many 30 year olds

It was what was said on the CityPulse snippit on the news where I saw it originally.

[Wezil]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Drunken teen stumbles into wrong home

Originally posted by Sava

But then again, we need to protect the rights of jerkoff teenagers when they break into other people's houses, right?

Where in the article does it say he broke in? Trespass is not the same as B&E.

I think jaywalkers should be struck at will (turn the wipers on) but the law doesn't agree.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Asher

What, you didn't beat the **** out of him and pound his head on the ground?

What kind of man are you?

Totally different situation. When I was in a college dorm we "broke in" to each others rooms all the time to pull pranks. Also you have no one else to worry about but yourself and in a college room you can see everyone who is there


In my home I would want to debilitate the first intruder as quickly as possible for fear that there were more

[Flubber]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Drunken teen stumbles into wrong home

Originally posted by Asher

So did the home owner. The kid is facing some kind of charges, the home owner currently is not.

You are permitted to use reasonable force. From this guys description, it is anything but reasonable.

The public at large needs to know it is not okay to go ape**** on anyone who goes into your home. ESPECIALLY if you don't lock your doors.

I don't buy this guys story. If you really care about your family, you lock your ****ing door at night. This guy's just scum. The kid is just dumb.

Charge the kid for underage drinking, and charge the home owner with assault. Both were wrong, the kids was a stupid mistake and the homeowners was aggressive violence. He needs to be sent a message.

I need more about the circumstances to determine things with respect to the homeowner. If he picked a sleeping intruder off the floor and began to throttle him thats different than hearing a dog bark and not really knowing anything is wrong and then suddenly encountering someone.

[Asher]

Given that there was a noisy party next door broken up by the police shortly before the beating...
Given that the kid was drunk and likely smelled of alcohol...
Given that the guy didn't lock his door...

I don't see how one can use the presence of a drunken 16 year old in your basement as a license to lay a beating on him, even after he was pinned. It's just barbaric, something that is not legal in our country.

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Asher
Given that there was a noisy party next door broken up by the police shortly before the beating...

Irrelevant-- we don't know anything this guy know or didn't know about the party next door. I've had neighbors mention a noisy party that I totally didn't notice if I was watching a movie or playing music or whatnot

Originally posted by Asher

Given that the kid was drunk and likely smelled of alcohol...

.

If I encounter someone suddenly and probably in the dark, I am in no position to assess the threat very accurately-- Even if I did smell booze, that doesn't exactly make me feel any safer

Originally posted by Asher

Given that the guy didn't lock his door...

The guy should lock his door-- I always do and usually have the alarm set

Originally posted by Asher
I don't see how one can use the presence of a drunken 16 year old in your basement as a license to lay a beating on him, even after he was pinned. It's just barbaric, something that is not legal in our country.

If its as you seem to paint things, I could possibly agree with you. I agree our law does not allow unrestricted beatings regardless of the circumstances. Force must be reasonable. Its just to me, if I suddenly encounter someone standing in my own home, pretty much anything I do for the next 60 seconds would be "reasonable" (longer if resistence continues)

[Asher]

Turns out the guy who laid the beating took boxing in high school. That's a shocker.

When police arrived, the subdued youth "pretty much the same size as me ... had blood coming out of his ear," Shaxon said.

After backlash from the media and other people, he now changed his story. He "guesses" the guy may've hit his head on the concrete floor...and he "jumped out of the shadows"

http://www.torontosun.com/News/TorontoAndGTA/2006/11/22/2446199-sun.html

[Wezil]

Force must be reasonable. Its just to me, if I suddenly encounter someone standing in my own home, pretty much anything I do for the next 60 seconds would be "reasonable" (longer if resistence continues)

Sounds like a trial issue to me.

[Asher]

The guy may face criminal charges after all: http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/n...31&k=16026&p=1

The grey area of self-defence
Two men may face charges

Natalie Alcoba, with files from Kelly Patrick, National Post
Published: Friday, November 24, 2006

Don Shaxon was drawn to the darkest, quietest part of his home by his barking cocker spaniel.

The 30-year-old father of two thought he might have locked the cat in the basement, as he bounded down the stairs and rounded the bend into the laundry room early on Sunday. A dark figure wearing a hunter's fur hat emerged from the shadows; Mr. Shaxon assumed a defensive position and started swinging.

"I got him on the ground," the Burlington man recounted yesterday. "We stopped fighting for a second and I was standing overtop of him and I said: 'Don't move. The police are on their way. I've got two kids in the house. If you move, I'll kill you.' "

Mr. Shaxon did not kill him, but he delivered a serious beating on the 16-year-old boy, who later told police he was so inebriated that night he "mistakenly" stumbled into the wrong house.

Now, it turns out, Mr. Shaxon may face criminal charges for his defensive manoeuvres.

And his isn't the only recent case of a man visiting violence upon an intruder -- the fate of an Alberta man who this week stabbed a robber to death while trying to protect his girlfriend is also still to be decided.

Police in Calgary have not yet laid any charges against the man because they believe he acted in self defence. But the case has been handed over to the Crown prosecutor for review. A 16-year-old was stabbed to death in the Falconridge neighbourhood in north east Calgary on Monday night after he tried to rob a man and his girlfriend, who were standing at a bus stop. The man, who is in his twenties, turned himself in on Tuesday.

Sanjeev Anand, a University of Alberta law professor who is working on a textbook about criminal law, says that even the Supreme Court admits the Criminal Code provisions outlining self-defence are confusing.

But he said the provisions can be distilled down to two basic principles: self-defence applies when a person has a reasonable belief he or she is in danger of serious injury or death and when the force he or she uses to repel an attack is not "excessive."

"When Parliament uses the word 'excessive' it doesn't mean you have to measure to a nicety the amount of force you use," Mr. Anand said.

"So for instance if someone is coming at you with a knife and saying 'I'm going to kill you,' you don't have to shoot them in the hand. You can shoot them in the chest."

On the other hand, if a victim knocks out an assailant and proceeds to kick the attacker to death, that could be considered excessive, Mr. Anand said.

In the Calgary and Burlington cases, Mr. Anand said it would likely be left to a jury to weigh whether the force each man used crossed the line.

"Essentially what it's going to come down to in both these cases is was the force used extraordinary? In other words, was the force used clearly excessive?"

Mr. Shaxon, a venture capitalist who founded organizedinvesting.com, and his wife, Melissa, were getting ready to go to bed when they heard a group of six to 10 young men fighting outside their Centennial Drive house. With five-month-old Summer and 10-year-old Brittany sleeping upstairs, the couple slipped outside and watched the crowd move down the street. They went back in and minutes later, from the depths of the basement, Mr. Shaxon yelled out: "Melissa, call the police. Someone is in our house."

A Halton Regional Police spokesman said officers responding to the call found a 16-year-old youth who was in an "intoxicated state."

Mr. Shaxon said he heard the young man admit to having a "few shots of vodka" and a criminal record.

He does not buy the young man's explanation: that he mistakenly wandered into the wrong house while he was looking for a party next door.

The 16-year-old was charged under the Provincial Offences Act for underage drinking and released to his mother. The Criminal Investigation Bureau is reviewing whether further charges are warranted.

"Anything and everything is still open for consideration and review," including charges against the homeowner, said Halton Regional Police Sergeant Peter Payne.

It is a possibility that seems remote to Mr. Shaxon, but is disconcerting all the same. He hopes to amass a list of supporters (who can e-mail his Web site) if he must defend his actions in court.

He is already having to defend them in Burlington. While he thinks 90% of people "are fully behind me," others consider him to be the "bad guy" for having beat up a minor.

"There are some people out there saying that I belong in jail," said Mr. Shaxon, who in July helped save the life of a man who had fallen over a balcony by blocking a bleeding artery. He addresses his critics with this question: "What would you do in the same situation?"

"You see someone who doesn't belong, they come at you, your wife is three to five feet behind you, instinct takes over."

[DinoDoc]

Re: Drunken teen stumbles into wrong home

Originally posted by Asher
The cops should be charging the home owner for assault.

Do you politely ask people who break into your home to leave?

[Krill]

...The issue depends on what the kid did when he was discovered; if he was attacked for just being there, then I think the guy deserves some hassle. A court case with a possible prison sentence though? OTT. If the kid moved in a way that suggested that he was about to flee or attack, then the guy did what was right by detaining the kid, but it does seem like he used excessive force.

The next question is what injuries did the kid have when he was arrested? So long as no broken bones, no bad hits to the head, it is probably OK. But why smash the kids head to the floor? The guy could have permenantly disabled the kid, and then he would have deserved a jail term.

[Wezil]

Re: Re: Drunken teen stumbles into wrong home

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Do you politely ask people who break into your home to leave?

I'll say it again - He didn't "break in".

[DinoDoc]

Should that matter? Or is there a prescribed reaction when he "breaks in" and a different one when you don't lock the door?

[Asher]

Re: Re: Drunken teen stumbles into wrong home

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Do you politely ask people who break into your home to leave?

1) He didn't break in
2) It shouldn't be very hard for two adults to detain a drunken 16 year old without beating his face and smashing his head on the concrete floor.