Neighborhood watch story follow-up

[GattlinGun]

My first point is, I guess I don't get Photoman 44's point. Anyone shooting someone while on neighborhood patrol whether as part of a watch group or walking their dog, will come under scrutiny.

Just because citizen patrols may be CCW holders does not mean it is the wild west. If they report suspicious activities and happen to be armed, what is the problem? If they report suspicious activities and then are confronted and find their own life in danger, isn't that why anyone who goes through the CCW process carries?

You can always not carry. You can also always not participate. What is the problem? If you don't understand the risks involved in being an armed citizen in public, then don't be.

 

[photoman]

My first point is, I guess I don't get Photoman 44's point.

Any time you go armed "playing" cop, you're asking for legal trouble. I don't care how in the right you are or how right you do it, it is highly likely you will end up in a law suit at best and charged criminally at worst. And all to defend someone else's property? No thanks!

If you want to be a cop, join the force or become an armed security guard. Otherwise, leave the gun at home if you want to participate in a neighborhood patrol.

p.s. Armed neighborhood patrols are illegal in Texas.

 

[GattlinGun]

Who says a neighborhood patrol is "playing cop"? You have the ability to make the decision to be involved or not, and if being armed in Texas in a patrol is illegal, then don't be in it.

You have total control over your actions and if you can and want to be involved in an area where you can be a neighborhood watch person (again, not differentiating them from someone walking their dog on a lazy afternoon who happens to be armed) then you should understand the risks that come with that. They are no different if you pull a weapon regardless, either way. If you do not want to be exposed to those risks, then you are free to not participate, again in either case.

According to M&P's information that I can see, we don't know that he is in Texas.

 

[photoman]

Who says a neighborhood patrol is "playing cop"? You have the ability to make the decision to be involved or not...

Once you join the patrol, you have already made the decision to get involved. Add to that, all your neighbors know that you're armed and will expect you to use deadly force to defend their property. That is a recipe for legal disaster.

Are you, being armed, willing to stand by and let thieves clean out your neighbor's house while you wait on the cops to show up? If those thieves run away, are you going to chase them? If your neighbor goes hand to hand with one of the thieves, are you going to get involved?

 

[mc5aw]

Who says a neighborhood patrol is "playing cop"?

"Playing cop" has a negative connotation to it, but participation in a neighborhood patrol is, for the most part, a quasi-law enforcement activity. What one does with the responsibility of being part of a patrol (especially an armed one) is another matter. Are there some neighborhood patrol holster heroes who are LEO wannabes? Absolutely, and those are the people who sully the intent of honest and conscientious citizen patrols.

There's enough anti-gun sentiment in the country to cast a dim view over armed citizen patrols, and that view is too often one falling between self-annointed avenger and vigilante. As far as history goes, yes, armed citizen patrols have been around for some time, but the past is not the present, and there have never been more lawsuits waiting to happen than in the present. And anyone one uses a firearm in self defense is going to be in for a long legal hassle ... but that hassle will assuredly be magnified against the armed citizen patroller than the armed dog walker.

 

[jaykellogg]

I would say if you were on a citizens patrol and you saw a vehicle parked at a house where you were aware that the homeowners were away that the ONLY proper response would be to call law enforcement and give them the address and a description of the vehicle. If you try and confront the people involved you have stepped over the line and are not acting as a watchman (which means someone who watches), but as a vigalante. In that case you cannot expect any degree of appreciation from the police and legal action becomes a very real possibility.


You won't even have the castle doctrine to back you up. Those do not apply if you initiate a confrontation.

 

[MaximumLawman]

I would take a good hard look at the crime stats, assuming you can even get access to the real numbers, before you assume that the causation for the drop in crime is the neighborhood watch program. A typical tactic for local law enforcement is to piggyback a neighborhood watch program or other crime reduction effort onto an already existing downward crime trend in order to take "credit" for it.

Citizens have almost zero arrest power.

Huh? The only arrest power the cops have that non-cops don't is the authority to arrest for misdemeanors. The local neighborhood patrol shouldn't even THINK about arresting someone for a misdemeanor. You absolutely have the right to arrest someone for a felony. But like the other poster said, that gets back to training. Do your typical neighborhood watch members even know the difference between a felony and a misdemeanor? Do they know the elements of burglary vs. entering without the owners permission?