Warning shot fired after road rage incident

[Hershmeister]

Interesting headline by the paper of course.....


http://www.lebanondemocrat.com/article/crime/739416


Road rage incident leads to gun being fired into ground


Mt. Juliet police say a road rage incident escalated in a neighborhood, where a man fired a shot from a handgun into the ground after being threatened with a club.


On Wednesday about 2:45 p.m., officers responded to the 700 block of Bench Lane in the Providence Landing neighborhood in reference to an argument with possible gunfire. Officers arrived to find two adult men arguing in the street.

Police say the two individuals first had contact on Hobson Pike, where a motorcyclist, identified as Larry Seigfried, 53, of Michigan, followed a 38-year-old male motorist to his home on Bench Lane and threatened him with a club. The motorist. who said he was in fear of Seigfried, pulled out a gun and shot into the ground.

Seigfried was charged with aggravated assault and disorderly conduct. The other man was issued a citation for discharging a firearm within city limits.

[Oh Shoot]

.....

Police say the two individuals first had contact on Hobson Pike, where a motorcyclist, identified as Larry Seigfried, 53, of Michigan, followed a 38-year-old male motorist to his home on Bench Lane and threatened him with a club. The motorist. who said he was in fear of Seigfried, pulled out a gun and shot into the ground.

Seigfried was charged with aggravated assault and disorderly conduct. The other man was issued a citation for discharging a firearm within city limits.

 

Sounds fair enough to me I guess. Sucks a bit regarding the citation, and ya wonder if simply showing the heater wouldn't have sufficed,  but better than having to shoot the guy, and of course I wasn't there.

 

- OS

Edited November 6, 2015 by Oh Shoot

[chances R]

Sort of stupid to bring a club to a gun fight.

[BigK]

I'm surprised they gave the man a citation for discharging his weapon in the course of self-defense.

[Randall53]

I'm surprised they gave the man a citation for discharging his weapon in the course of self-defense.

Really. Especially since if he'd shot the guy with the club he probably wouldn't have been charged from the sound of it. I would think.

[BigK]

Really. Especially since if he'd shot the guy with the club he probably wouldn't have been charged from the sound of it. I would think.

 

I hope he fights it and wins.

[rmiddle]

I'm surprised they gave the man a citation for discharging his weapon in the course of self-defense.

 

Because he wasn't in fear for his life when he fired.  If he was truly in fear he would have shot to kill.  The law is pretty clear you can only fire your weapon if you feel your life IS in danger.  If you are firing a warning shot your life is clearly not in danger.

 

Thanks

Robert

[10-Ring]

This happened a few hundred yards from my house.  I'm not usually an advocate of warning shots but everyone went home or to jail unharmed so I guess all is good.  Oh yeah, and I'm really getting tired of people from places like Michigan that want to come here and cause all sorts of trouble.

[Hershmeister]

Seriously - What is with all the michiganers coming to middle TN?

[FortKnox]

Seriously - What is with all the michiganers coming to middle TN?

One word: Hemlock. At least here in Clarksville.

When Hemlock promised they would be 500 jobs they were right. Except alot of them went to people working with Hemlock in Michigan, who transferred down here.

Of course, the last laugh was on them when they did layoffs and couldn't get their old jobs back.

[K191145]

Because he wasn't in fear for his life when he fired.  If he was truly in fear he would have shot to kill.  The law is pretty clear you can only fire your weapon if you feel your life IS in danger.  If you are firing a warning shot your life is clearly not in danger.

 

Thanks

Robert

 

We can't know how he felt, maybe he was trying anything to keep from killing him first. No good deed goes unpunished, I would bring that up at a Mt. Juliet town meeting, I would advise someone not try to stop a life threatening situation by warning someone, just go ahead and kill them.

[Oh Shoot]

....  The law is pretty clear you can only fire your weapon if you feel your life IS in danger.  ..

 

TN law doesn't say any such thing. Firing your weapon into the air or ground and using deadly force are certainly not the same thing.

 

" "Deadly force" means force that is intended or known by the defendant to cause or, in the manner of its use or intended use, is capable of causing death or serious bodily injury "

 

Even unjustified intimidation with a firearm, which can be aggravated assault, does not rise to the level of using deadly force. Which would be the difference between that and attempted murder.

 

- OS

[K191145]

TN law doesn't say any such thing. Firing your weapon into the air or ground and using deadly force are certainly not the same thing.

 

" "Deadly force" means force that is intended or known by the defendant to cause or, in the manner of its use or intended use, is capable of causing death or serious bodily injury "

 

Even unjustified intimidation with a firearm, which can be aggravated assault, does not rise to the level of using deadly force. Which would be the difference between that and attempted murder.

 

- OS

 

Maybe someone could feel there is a "potential" for bodily harm or death and decide to use the Threat(warning) of deadly force to end a situation before it even starts? 

[TMF]

Should have driven to the police station. I have no issues with him firing warning shots, or even killing this lunatic with the bat, but don't drive back to your house. You don't want someone like that to know where you live.


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[Oh Shoot]

Maybe someone could feel there is a "potential" for bodily harm or death and decide to use the Threat(warning) of deadly force to end a situation before it even starts? 

 

Not sure what you're trying to say.

 

In TN, self defense allows "... threatening or using force against another person when and to the degree the person reasonably believes the force is immediately necessary to protect against the other's use or attempted use of unlawful force." This would include everything from slapping someone on the wrist to blowing his head off, depending.

 

In this case, I guess they decided the guy wasn't justified in shooting into the ground. If not, they could have charged him with a higher crime, such as assault or reckless endangerment or whatever, but chose to say "tsk tsk" with a tacit wink by hitting him with the city ordinance only.  Or they could just be plain ole el stupido about the whole affair and shouldn't have charged him with anything. Guess that will sort out in court.

 

- OS

Edited November 6, 2015 by Oh Shoot

[K191145]

Not sure what you're trying to say.

 

In TN, self defense allows "... threatening or using force against another person when and to the degree the person reasonably believes the force is immediately necessary to protect against the other's use or attempted use of unlawful force." This would include everything from slapping someone on the wrist to blowing his head off, depending.

 

In this case, I guess they decided the guy wasn't justified in shooting into the ground. If not, they could have charged him with a higher crime, such as assault or reckless endangerment or whatever, but chose to say "tsk tsk" with a tacit wink by hitting him with the city ordinance only.  Or they could just be plain ole el stupido about the whole affair and shouldn't have charged him with anything. Guess that will sort out in court.

 

- OS

 

I wasn't there either but if the dude prevented a death by firing that shot, motivating the raging dude to change his plans it was the right thing to do in that situation, in my book, maybe not the laws book. 

[TMF]

. Or they could just be plain ole el stupido about the whole affair and shouldn't have charged him with anything. Guess that will sort out in court.

- OS

I'll go with this. My uncle was involved in an SD shoot back in the '90s. Similar situation, where the guy followed him home, only it was late at night and the bad guy attempted to run him off the road several times (mistaken identity). After the third attempt to run him off the road, my uncle put his pistol out the window and fired several warning shots into the engine block (this is out in the country, dirt road). The pursuit continued until my uncle reached his property. Bad guy follows him onto property, gets out of his truck and proceeds to yell at my uncle that he's going to kill him. My uncle answers his remarks by shooting him three times. Bad guy makes it back to the truck and is able to drive his drunk ass to a hospital.

Uncle calls Sheriff's Department, they put two and two together, conduct their investigation and recommend no charges for my uncle, and several charges for bad guy. DA gets ahold of it, does not pursue any charges against the bad guy, proceeds to charge my uncle with unlawful discharge of a firearm. Charges were eventually dropped after MADD got ahold of this. Bad guy had a BAC three times the legal limit when he made it to the hospital, admitted to driving and the trespass. This is the danger of liberal Yankee DAs who hates people who defend themselves.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Edited November 6, 2015 by TMF

[Monkeyman2500]

... 

 

Edited November 6, 2015 by Monkeyman2500

[felinesNfreedom]

Seriously - What is with all the michiganers coming to middle TN?

 

 

This has been going on for 20 + years. Two of my best friends families are from Michigan. One came here to work for Saturn the other came here to start a heat treat and metallurgical plant. 

[btq96r]

I'd have to flip through the TCA, but I recall being told in my HCP class that warning shots were a no-go from a legal perspective.

 

In practicality, they can be useful, but only in specific circumstances.  I'm not a big fan of them because of what could happen to the round and the responsibility therein to the shooter. 

 

I agree with OhShoot, they are basically slapping this guy on the wrist to do "something" when they probably could have gotten a big hammer to drop on him.

Edited November 6, 2015 by btq96r

[Oh Shoot]

I'd have to flip through the TCA, but I recall being told in my HCP class that warning shots were a no-go from a legal perspective.

 

In practicality, they can be useful, but only in specific circumstances.  I'm not a big fan of them because of what could happen to the round and the responsibility therein to the shooter. 

 

I agree with OhShoot, they are basically slapping this guy on the wrist to do "something" when they probably could have gotten a big hammer to drop on him.

 

Reasonable justification of self defense is the key, at all levels of force. There's no specific state crime that firing a weapon into ground necessarily rises to. 

 

But yeah, if he wasn't justified in doing that, then he probably wasn't justified in showing a firearm in a threatening manner period, in which case either would be aggravated assault. But logic would say that since the other guy was charged with that, one would assume then that shooting the firearm into the ground at the least was justified.

 

Then again, there's nothing in TCA regarding this sort of thing that says you can't be charged for some bs local ordinance regardless of your lack of culpability for state level charges.

 

- OS

Edited November 6, 2015 by Oh Shoot

[TMF]

Yep, anyone in this circumstance should be in reasonable fear for their life. If someone follows you home, then comes at you on your property with a bat, chances are he isn't there because he wants to toss the baseball around. If the aggressor wasn't deterred after the victim pulled out a handgun, the next reasonable step would be shooting him. Understanding that most people would do anything to avoid killing another human being, firing a warning shot into the ground would be the next "reasonable" step to avoid taking someone's life. Whoever is responsible for recommending charges and filing them is an idiot. Cases like this only encourage people to kill in self defense when a completely acceptable option to avoid that exists.

I'm assuming the guy with the bat didn't take the victim seriously until he fired the shot.


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[Oh Shoot]

....Whoever is responsible for recommending charges and filing them is an idiot. Cases like this only encourage people to kill in self defense when a completely acceptable option to avoid that exists.

 

Well, far as that goes, same idiot could still have charged him with the firearm discharge even if he had killed the guy in justifiable shoot. Justifiable self defense of yourself or another removes you from any charges within the weapons section of TCA, but doesn't cover local ordinances.

 

Logic. Right.

 

- OS

Edited November 6, 2015 by Oh Shoot

[TMF]

Well, far as that goes, same idiot could still have charged him with the firearm discharge even if he had killed the guy in justifiable shoot. Justifiable self defense of yourself or another removes you from any charges within the weapons section of TCA, but doesn't cover local ordinances.

Logic. Right.

- OS

So there you go. Sounds like the DA is another pro-crime douche nozzle, who doesn't like it when victims defend themselves. Unless there is something left out of the story, the victim should be facing no charges, regardless of how trivial the actual charges are.


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[K191145]

So there you go. [b](Sounds like the DA is another pro-crime douche nozzle, who doesn't like it when victims defend themselves.)[/b] Unless there is something left out of the story, the victim should be facing no charges, regardless of how trivial the actual charges are.


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You mean a "liberal"? Well even a liberal DA would have time arguing against the "BIDEN DEFENSE", But Joe told me to fire a warning shot. Now the liberal DA may argue that you are only allowed to do that with a double barrel shotgun.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIuk3G9Xixc