On April 20th, two teenagers reportedly burglarized a Louisville, Kentucky home and in the process they killed the family’s and ran encountered the homeowner during the break-in.
“Pop, pop, pop! And there was a pause, and then, pop, pop!” said the family’s neighbor, Charles Graham, who overheard the homeowner shooting the two. “And then a couple seconds later, [one of the teenagers] was running down the street saying his brother got shot.”
The male homeowner shot one of the teenagers in the leg and the other in the back. Police had no information about their condition.
Police arrived to find one still at the residence while the other was found a few streets away.
A few weeks before the incident, other teenagers had reportedly tried to burglarize the same home but neighbor Gary Dickman scared them off.
Dickman says the recent burglaries are encouraging many locals to install security cameras in their homes. “I mean, it’s a shame that you have to protect your house like that, but someone comes in your house like that while you’re home, then I guess you have that right,” Dickman said.
It’s not the first time a homeowner has attacked a suspected burglar entering his home.
The Huffington Post reports that 33-year-old Benjamin Batterham murdered 34-year-old Richard Slater after he allegedly broke into his home on March 27th.
Batterham has since been arrested and charged with murder.
While homeowners in the U.S. have the right to defend themselves during burglaries, other countries have different laws. According to news reports, Slater’s family argues this was not a break-in. Rather, it was a party Slater was invited to.
“They’ve lost their father, their beautiful father that they haven’t seen for years because he was in jail, which has nothing to do with this case,” Beryl Dickson, Slater’s mother, said. “And he got out, and back with his family, traveling between all of his family and my family. Just to think those little kids are going to grow up without a dad now.”
Sassy Liberty