Self-defense is regarded as a right deriving from natural law. But that offers no justification to the parents of Michael Grace, Jr. of Charlotte, NC, who was shot to death while attempting to rob a Pizza Hut. CBS North Carolina reports:
It’s been a difficult week for parents Temia Hairston and Michael Grace Sr. Their son, Michael Grace Jr., was shot and killed during an attempted robbery early Sunday morning.
I sympathize. It is a terrible thing to lose a child. That is a wound that will not heal.
“If there was to be a death, it was not the place of the employee at Pizza Hut. That is the place of law enforcement,” said Hairston.
So far as I know, no jurisdiction in the United States has the death penalty for robbery. And police nearly everywhere are extremely reluctant to use a gun on a robbery suspect, owing to the violent protests that have followed police killings of suspects. Ferguson, Missouri, for example.
Hairston and Grace Sr. acknowledged that their son was breaking the law by robbing the business, and said they definitely don’t condone what he did.
“It was an act of desperation, but I do not believe that Michael would have hurt anyone,” said Hairston.
I am sorry, but robbing someone requires at least the threat of violence. If one asks for money without threatening violence, it is called “begging.” I don’t think it ought to be a capital crime, but the risks inherent in threatening violence belong on the sholders of the perpetrator.
I realize that state laws differ considerably as to the justification for a crime victim employing firearms or other violence. In California, for instance, a home can be invaded by thieves, and the residents cannot use a firearm unless they can prove that they legitimately feared for their lives and there was no escape avenue available. To my mind, this sort of law constitutes an incentive to criminals, for it reduces the risk of a home invasion.
I may be an extremist, but it seems to me that if one decides to commit a crime, the victims should have more rights than the perpetrator, especially the right to defend themselves from the presumption of violence that accompanies a robbery, home invasion, or other property crime.
Hat tips: Bearing Arms and Glenn Reynolds, Instapundit
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/02/parents_of_slain_pizza_hut_robber_angry_that_victim_used_a_gun_against_him.html#ixzz56LfZMgjH
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