The armed citizen
By 
This exercise of a white man’s God-given Second Amendment rights probably wouldn’t even lead to an arrest if not for the insidious influence of social media:
Kansas City police are working to quickly prepare evidence for the Clay County prosecutor in the shooting of a Black teenager who was trying to pick up his younger brothers from a friend’s house Thursday.
“I want everyone to know that I am listening,” Police Chief Stacey Graves said Sunday at a news conference at Kansas City police headquarters downtown, “and I understand the concern we are receiving from the community.”
The Kansas City Star reported the 16-year-old boy, who family members have identified online as Ralph Yarl, was hospitalized Thursday night after he was shot while trying to pick up his younger twin brothers. Police said he went to the wrong house and was shot there. . .
Yarl meant to pick up his brothers from a friend’s house on 115th Terrace. He ended up ringing the doorbell at a home on 115th Street, Faith Spoonmore, the teen’s aunt, wrote online.
She wrote that her “nephew Ralph Pual Yarl was on his way to pick up his twin younger brothers from their friend’s house a few blocks away from his house. He didn’t have his phone. He mistakenly went to the wrong house, one block away from the house where his siblings were. He pulled into the driveway and rang the doorbell. The man in the home opened the door, looked my nephew in the eye, and shot him in the head. My nephew fell to the ground, and the man shot him again. Ralph was then able to get up and run to the neighbor’s house, looking for help. Unfortunately, he had to run to 3 different homes before someone finally agreed to help him after he was told to lie on the ground with his hands up.”
Sounds like a real friendly neighborhood.
Thirty-two percent of U.S. adults say they personally own a gun, while a larger percentage, 44%, report living in a gun household. Adults living in gun households include those with a gun in their home or anywhere on their property.
Private handgun ownership is illegal in the UK. Totally coincidentally, UK police — who are not exactly known for their enlightened attitudes and commitment to non-violence — killed a total of three people in 2019, the most recent year for which there are data. Last year US police killed 1,096, in part because if THEY ring the wrong doorbell they could easily get shot as well. So better to lay down a suppressing fire as soon as you see a gun, which will be often, because America:
Farmington, New Mexico, police officers discussed whether they were at the right house moments before the door opened and they fatally shot an armed homeowner, body camera video released Friday appears to show.
The officers were at the wrong address in the April 5 incident that left the homeowner, 52-year-old Robert Dotson, dead, Police Chief Steve Hebbe has said. . .
The video released Friday shows an officer knocking on the door at the wrong address three times and announcing they are police.
The officer knocking on the door and another officer not shown are heard discussing the address in one of the videos, titled “officer 1.”
“It’s not 5308? That’s what it said right there, right?” the officer who is knocking is heard saying in the video.
“No, it said 5305, isn’t it?” the other officer is heard saying. The officer knocking asks in his radio to confirm the address, and is told 5308.
The knocking officer appears to laugh after being told the correct address, and then says an expletive as the door starts to open. The video shows the officer backing up and shining a flashlight at the now opening door.
“Hey, hands up!” the officer says before police open fire at the person in the doorway, later identified as Dotson. A portion of the video slowed down by police appears to show what looks like the homeowner raising a gun.
In one of the videos released Friday, titled “officer 2,” the slain man’s wife can be heard screaming “Oh my God,” before shots ring out. State police have said that she shot at officers, who also fired, before she realized they were police. No one was hit.
The officer in that video is heard saying that she picked up the gun that Dotson had and pointed it at them.
The video records her pleading for help, saying “somebody shot my husband” and her children are upstairs. Someone on police radio says there are three children in the home upstairs. The video shows Dotson on the ground in a robe inside the home, and a handgun on the floor next to him.
Maybe we need armed guards at the doors of all private residences. Or maybe houses need more doors. Or maybe we should think and pray harder.