Man shoots would-be robber; is arrested on gun charges

[Squatch]

Don't know if this has been posted here already. Seems like a misapplication of justice, IMO.

--------------------
http://www2.townonline.com/allston/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=165431

A would-be robber became a victim of his own crime last week after he was shot in the stomach by a Brighton man he was trying to rob, police said.

Police arrested Sean E. Roisten, 29, of 833 Jette Court, and charged him with unlawful possession of a firearm and assault and battery with a deadly weapon on a robber who was holding Roisten's wife at gunpoint.

The robbery suspect was transported to the hospital for a gunshot wound to the stomach. The suspect is expected to live. Police seized $59.25, three lighters, a set of keys, a box of Newport cigarettes, a tape cassette, a miniature toy gun, steel wool and a glass tube from the suspect. Police also seized a gun shell fragment with human tissue on it that was removed from the suspect.

[Streetdoc270]

1. By the law the homeowner is guilty

this is the kicker
Later, police received a call for a gunshot victim at 1505 Commonwealth Ave. Roisten then claimed he disarmed the suspect with his left hand and shot the suspect with his right as the suspect fled out of the front door, police said.

IF the robber was unarmed and ruining away at the time he was shot then Mr. Roisten was in no danger and had no cause to shoot the robber. To use force as a civilian you have to meet the same standards as the police, you must be in physical danger and the threat has to be imminent.

[iverglas]

2. it's a hmmm

(And shouldn't it be in that <alleged> defensive use of firearms thread?)

... Roisten told police he ran up to the third floor, retrieved his silver Smith and Wesson .40 caliber handgun and took cover behind a kitchen wall. ...

... The gunman began descending the stairs with Roisten's wife, police said. Roisten told police he rushed the stairs, slid down the railing, bent the suspect's right wrist and took possession of the gun.

Later, police received a call for a gunshot victim at 1505 Commonwealth Ave. Roisten then claimed he disarmed the suspect with his left hand and shot the suspect with his right as the suspect fled out of the front door, police said.

If I were the police, I might be going Hmmmmm. Is that your final answer? (And, anyway, asking myself whether shooting someone who is fleeing out the door falls within that "self-defence" excuse thing.)

Especially when I heard this bit:

The friend told police that while on his way to the store, he encountered a man ... who claimed to have lost his keys. When the friend offered to help him find them, the man pulled out a handgun and forced him inside the hallway ... where they were joined by the second suspect, police said.

The first suspect demanded, "Give me Sean's keys," ... .

Hmmmmm. "Sean"? (That's the guy charged with shooting the robber.) Hmmmmm. There might just be more here than meets the eye, I'm thinking.

I won't be second-guessing the police, myself, without a little bit more than this news report to go on. But if I were to offer an opinion, I think it might be that it sounds pretty much like they know what they're doing and pretty likely have a pretty good reason for their decision.

And oh look:

Police found that Roisten's license to carry a gun expired last August and arrested him. Police took custody of Roisten's gun and the black Colt .45 handgun that Roisten claimed he took from the suspect.

Of course, I'm sure he never took the gun out of the house after his licence expired.

[Squatch]

3. I nominate this story for the next episode of CSI

Only question is CSI LV, NYC, or Miami?

[aikoaiko]

4. thats a confusing story...

.. a strange description of events to be sure. I kind of agree with Iverglas that there may be more relevant details than currently reported.

As an aside though, in Georgia, USA, one can use lethal force to defend your life or the life of another. The shooters story was that the robber was decending the stairs with his wife in a choke hold and a gun to her head. But I don't about Massachusetts (this was in Boston, yes?), maybe your supposed to let the bad guy take your wife and you should call 911 and wait for the police to take a report.

Something that may work against a "fear of losing life" defense is whether or not the shooter claimed he removed the robbers gun and THEN shot the robber. Of course, both events may have happened virtually at the same time. Its difficult to tell from the description.

I hope someone can keep this thread updated if new info comes out.


-aiko(hey, i tried to get a defensive gunthread going)aiko

[iverglas]

8. noooo ...

"The shooters story was that the robber was decending the stairs with his wife in a choke hold and a gun to her head. But I don't about Massachusetts (this was in Boston, yes?), maybe your supposed to let the bad guy take your wife and you should call 911 and wait for the police to take a report."

... that was his *first* story -- that he simply disarmed the intruder. And in that version, he *didn't* claim to have shot anyone, in defence of anyone at all, or any other way.

He didn't do that until police received a call about an individual with a gunshot wound at an apparently nearby address:

Roisten *then* claimed he disarmed the suspect with his left hand and shot the suspect with his right as the suspect fled out of the front door, police said.

This guy apparently couldn't even make up a good self-defence/defence of wife story when he'd had all that time to do it. (Guess he never took one of those "self-defence" courses where one learns how to handle the police to one's advantage after injuring/killing someone else.) He claimed to have shot a person who was running away.

I know it all isn't particularly easy to follow from the news report, but that's how it went down. The fellows who reportedly burst into his home when his wife answered a knock at the door actually (according to somebody else, anyhow) had keys to the door. And they knew the male householder by name. And the one who got shot had a glass tube in his pocket. And I'm seeing a bit of an internecine squabble here. And I'm wondering how opportune it is to have drug dealers law-abiding citizens wandering about with licences for firearms, and firearms, and whether that old right to own a firearm for self-defence stuff really works all that well when applied to individuals who are engaged in anti-social activities of the kind that make them rather unusually vulnerable to people doing things to them they might need to defend themselves against. (But then again, a right's a right, and I still haven't figured out why anybody should be rendered unable to exercise his/her right of self-defence just because s/he's a drug dealer.)

If he did indeed shoot at someone who was fleeing out a door, it might be just dumb luck that he hit his target and not the five-year-old walking by on the sidewalk. And it seems to me that if he chose to engage in risky behaviour, the risk was for him to assume, not for him to shift onto anyone who had the bad luck to be in the vicinity. And ditto for pretty much anybody else.


(Edited to fix my faulty memory; the gunshot victim wasn't at a hospital.)

[benEzra]

11. I agree with iverglas...not enough info to say (n/t)

[McKenzie]

5. this is an emotive issue people but...

if it was me, and I had time to load the shotgun, I'd be pointing it at anyone who entered my home illegally. I might squeeze the trigger if there was a possible threat. Wouldn't you?

It's easy to talk objectively from a distance; more difficult to think calmly and rationally if your home was under attack, your wife and kids were threatened and so on.

I'm not condoning using firearms to defend oneself every time but how would YOU repond? You wouldn't know until you were in that position. It's easy to criticise someone from a warm, cozy chair. Maybe if it was YOU your attitude might be different.

I don't like gung ho gun nut aplogists; were it me in the home owner's position though I'd succumb to basic human instinct and defend myself. I get really pissed off when people criticise someone for acting in a stressful situation. The criticisers weren't under threat. The person who fired was.

And someone CHOSE to break into the house.

[iverglas]

6. apparently so

It seems that your own emotion has blinded you to the totality of the facts in the situation that this thread is about.

If you'd like to read my earlier post, you'll find a few of the salient ones there, and also notice some that seem to be missing as yet.

[McKenzie]

7. my post was about the natural reaction

to being attacked. As I said, I do not support gung ho attitudes. However, objectivity, and rationality, are difficult to apply when you, or your loved ones, are threatened in an immediate way. Faced with that scenario I'd find it difficult to apply reason and to sit down and rationalise. That takes time...the sort of time we have when we try to apply calm logic to a situation that requires fight or flight reactions.

I would react, you would react, anyone would react.

[iverglas]

9. that's all very well

But it still has pretty much nothing to do with the facts (what we know of them) in this case.

The issues *I* am seeing in this case are:

- why the individual who did the shooting had a firearm and a licence to have it (expired as it was), and

- why it is in the public interest for someone who -- natural emotional reaction or not -- fires a gun at someone moving through an open door to have a firearm.

Even if his current tale is true, he looks like someone who used a firearm in a manner that was both illegal and dangerous to the public. And if that's how someone can be expected to react when s/he has a firearm in circumstances such as this person was in -- if "objectivity and rationality" are that difficult to apply -- then my preference is that there be no firearm in the situation.

[McKenzie]

10. we seem to be in agreement on one thing

the question of hanguns (that excludes sporting long arms) in private ownership. Should they be available, to whom, against what sort of regulatory framework and so on. Proper regulationary frameworks notwithstanding, people will react when in situations of danger, perceived or otherwise. That was my main point.

Perhaps the likelihood of a reactive response to "danger" casts doubt on universal handgun ownership per se. But's that another emotive issue; one I think we are better to avoid raising here...

A good debate and thank you for your considered comments.

regards

McK

[iverglas]

15. okay

Perhaps the likelihood of a reactive response to "danger" casts doubt on universal handgun ownership per se.

If that's what you were getting at -- that these "natural emotional responses" are good reason to have serious reservations about handguns, in particular, being readily available to members of the public, or at least to consider the issue -- when you said:

It's easy to talk objectively from a distance; more difficult to think calmly and rationally if your home was under attack, your wife and kids were threatened and so on.

I'm not condoning using firearms to defend oneself every time but how would YOU repond? You wouldn't know until you were in that position. It's easy to criticise someone from a warm, cozy chair. Maybe if it was YOU your attitude might be different.

-- they yup, we're in some agreement. Since no one's answer to the question "how would YOU respond?" can be known "until <s/he is> in that position", the real question is "why should WE rely on any assurances or predictions as to how YOU will respond?" That seems to be a more worthwhile and relevant subject than post facto assessment -- criticism or approval -- of anyone's particular actions, or guesses as to what anyone else's attitude might be had s/he been the person in question.

But's that another emotive issue; one I think we are better to avoid raising here...

Well actually, it's an integral part of the discussion here! And there's nothing necessarily more "emotive" about it than there is about any other question of public policy.

And it's central to any discussion of the case in question. Assuming that the facts are known (which of course they really aren't), it makes absolutely as much sense to ask whether the individual in question should have had access to a handgun (and state opinions on that issue) as it makes to ask whether he used it appropriately (and state opinions on that issue).

So feel free to stick around. ;)

[Buster43]

13. A permit

to own a gun is a violation of the 2nd Amendment. The homeowner was protecting his life and the life of his wife. This sounds like another Emerson case in the making.

[iverglas]

14. ah, hard cases

and crystal balls.

The homeowner was protecting his life and the life of his wife.

And NorthernSpy is the Queen of Roumania.

[Buster43]

17. I call it

as I see it. We have a home invasion. A felony. We 2 counts of assault with deadly weapon, 2 felonies. We have holding someone against their will, another felony. We have terroristic behavior, yet another felony. Attempted burglary, another felony. Want me to go on?

All your supercilious statements slide off my back.

[iverglas]

18. we have

the strangely shifting story of someone who first claimed not to have shot anyone at all, whose home was ALLEGEDLY broken into by two guys who, mysteriously, knew his name, and had obtained the keys to his door.

We have what I call something that an ordinary reasonable person would reserve any judgment on until provided with some actual facts.

And all your wishful thinking about, and hyperbolic characterizations of, the alleged facts just doesn't change that at all.

Hell, one of your brethren even agreed with me. Wot a sensible fellow.

[skippythwndrdog]

12. Probably a good shoot.

I expect charges to be dropped.

However, with the lack of information, a full determination can not be made.

[-..__...]

16. Checking my calender...

and I was working that night not very far from where the incident happened. I'll have to ask some of the cops I know about it (assuming even any of them even know).

Some misleading or lacking details...

The article used the phrase "license to carry a gun". In MA, any permit to own or posses a handgun is identified as an "LTC" (License to Carry).

It does not authorize the person to carry a concealed firearm on their person or in public; unless it is specifically authorized by the issuing authority. In this case the Chief of Police (or his designee). I can tell you with full confidence the the Boston Police rarely issues permits to a carry a concealed firearm.

Town on Line is a network of small weekly newspapers that report on local happenings. I'd wager most of their reporters are interns, part timers, journalism students or recent graduates looking to move up to a more prestigious reporting position.

Like most news stories involving "street crime", unless it's a major news story, reporters working the police beat seldom get their info first hand. The info usually comes from reading the booking report, or by talking with someone who wasn't even at the incident. End result... details are lacking, incorrect, sketchy, misleading, erroneous, etc.

An expired "License to Carry" becomes a "license to carry a gun".

How else would you get "factual" reporting like this: "Police also seized a gun shell fragment with human tissue on it that was removed from the suspect".

That must be one hell of a handgun that can shoot a "shell" fragment into a persons body.

Regarding the expired license. This has been an ongoing problem here in MA for at least a few years. Seems like the Firearms Record Bureau hadn't been mailing out renewal notices like they're supposed to.

[MrSandman]

19. Whatever happened...

Wasn't written in that article. Lots of holes in that timeline.

[T Town Jake]

20. Too bad...

...once again the wrong person is being arrested and harassed. I'm glad such a thing could never happen where I'm at.

[iverglas]

24. oh look

The slobbering knuckle-draggers charming liberty-lovers here
http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=81470
agree with you.

Since I looked for some further report on this tale the other day, it's grown legs and the rkba-heads are all over it:
http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=sean+roisten+gun&meta=

But sheesh, even one of these folks has reservations:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1321424/posts

Unless there's significantly more to this story than meets the eye (meaning unless the shooter is a well-known drug dealer, etc.) I am completely disgusted.

No! Surely he couldn't have been a well-known drug dealer! Surely the people who demanded his keys from the third party, identifying him by name, couldn't have had some reason for choosing to relieve him of a little of his personal stuff, like maybe they were just a tad pissed at him personally because ... because ... well, maybe he hadn't paid for his newspaper delivery on time.

Nah! He had a gun, he was a good guy.

[Conservativesux]

21. If you dont like the gun laws where you live, then move!

This man knew he was breaking the law.

[aikoaiko]

22. Whatever happened to civil disobdedience......

... and working to change the law.

Flavor Flav says "fight the power".

[alwynsw]

23. Probably feels as though he lives in Illinois. n/t