Mary Vallis, National Post Published: Wednesday, December 05, 2007
More On This Story
* Texas shooting: Joe Horn's 911 call http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/posted/archive/2007/12/05/texas-shooting-joe-horn-s-911-call.aspx
Pasadena, Tex., police stand by the body of one of the two men shot by ...Kar Hlava, Houston Community NewspapersPasadena, Tex., police stand by the body of one of the two men shot by ...
At first, Joe Horn appears to be doing his neighbourly duty. When he sees two men allegedly breaking into a home on his street in suburban Pasadena, Tex., in the middle of the day, he dials 911.
But the 61-year-old's call quickly takes a decidedly unneighbourly turn.
"I've got a shotgun. Do you want me to stop 'em?" he asks the emergency dispatcher less than 20 seconds into the call.
"Nope, don't do that," the dispatcher replies. "Ain't no property worth shooting somebody over, OK?"
Moments later, Mr. Horn defies the dispatcher and steps outside.
"Move, you're dead!" he can be heard saying on the Nov. 14 audio recording.
Then comes the sound of several shotgun blasts. Mr. Horn returns to the telephone.
"Get the law over here quick," he says. "They came in the front yard with me, man. I had no choice."
Police arrived soon afterward to find two men with gunshot wounds; both died.
That was three weeks ago, but Mr. Horn has not been charged with any crime. Police are waiting for a grand jury to decide whether to indict him. The case has divided Texans into two camps: Those who support the shooter's apparent vigilantism and argue his actions were reasonable under the Second Amendment; and those who say he is a murderer whose actions may have been racially motivated.
Mr. Horn is white. The two dead men -- Miguel Antonio DeJesus, 38, and Diego Ortiz, 30 -- were black.
Pasadena Police expect the grand jury to be convened in the next few weeks. Meanwhile, tension is mounting.
The New Black Panther Nation, a black activist group, led nearly 200 protesters to Mr. Horn's otherwise quiet street for a rally on Sunday. They were met by a roughly equivalent number of his supporters; bikers revved their engines to drown out Quanell X, the New Black Panther Nation's leader, when he tried to speak.
"We don't condone anyone breaking into anybody's home and stealing. But we also don't condone a citizen becoming the police, the judge, the jury and the executioner, all at the same time," Quanell X said in a telephone interview.
"We believe that a system of law is in place, that every human being is granted due process in the system of law. Mr. Horn circumvented that, abandoned that and literally threw that whole due-process system away."
Local newspapers and radio talk shows have also been deluged by responses from Mr. Horn's defenders.
"If we had justice like this for all criminals, this would be a much safer country," one supporter wrote on YouTube.
"I believe what Joe did was right and I applaud him for it. And if you're some worthless human being that has to go steal other people's hard-earned possessions, you deserve to die."
On the 911 recording, which is widely available on the Internet, Mr. Horn repeatedly tells the dispatcher he is not going to let the men get away. At least 11 times, the dispatcher advises him not to leave his home or shoot.
An investigation is still under way, but a spokesman for the Pasadena Police said it appears Mr. Horn shot the two men after he turned a corner and found them in his yard.
Police estimate he was two to three metres from the men. One was hit in the chest, another in the side.
The victims began running in opposite directions, but both soon died, said Captain A. H. "Bud" Corbett. He described Mr. Horn as sounding "aggressive" in the recording.
"If Mr. Horn had just walked out and blown away two people walking by on the sidewalk, he'd have been locked up, and he probably would have been charged," Capt. Corbett said. "But that is not the case."
Tom Lambright, Mr. Horn's lawyer, insists his client was simply defending himself because the men "made lunging movements."
"He's trying to protect his own life," Mr. Lambright said recently. "He's scared."
The recording also indicates Mr. Horn keeps up to date on his rights. At one point, he lectures the dispatcher and reminds him he has the right to protect himself, and "the laws have been changed in this country since Sept. 1, and you know it and I know it."
This is thought to refer to a new state law strengthening Texans' right to defend themselves in their homes, vehicles and workplaces. The so-called "castle doctrine" took effect on Sept. 1.
Guns are easy to acquire in Texas and most are unsympathetic to the plight of criminals. The state leads the U.S. in executions: 405 since the death penalty was reinstated in the 1970s.
"Texas is a frontier state. It has a lot of tradition in terms of people being able to protect themselves," said Fred Moss, a professor of criminal law at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
"What disappoints me is that the vocal minority gives the image of Texas as being a bunch of gun-toting, chest-thumping, macho types who think you ought to be able to gun burglars down as they run away."
If the grand jury decides not to indict Mr. Horn, Quanell X will lead another march back through the quiet suburban neighbourhood and directly to his door.
He expects it will be necessary. "We live in the deep South," he said. "And in the deep South a white man killing a black men is as common as apple and cherry pie."
m*s@ nationalpost.com
------------------------------ -- Triad Productions-FantallaAr~EZine~ParaNovel National Association of Assault Research (http://boblacasse.150m.com/htmlconc .html)
-- Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com
Junkman
2007-12-13 20:55:31 EST
He is a hero !!
Ron
2007-12-23 20:10:42 EST
Howdy from Texas: Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens. Our school and emergency rooms are being over run, with only us legal residents footing the bill. You have to understand, we Texans don't condone needless violence. However, a growing number of us are starting to feel that we are being pushed just a little too hard. Before you condemn us, try to understand, it's not easy to see the place you love getting trampled. What ever the reason, social, economic or whatever; This country needs to do something about this problem. Those of us who live in the border states have the right to not have our way of life destroyed. Ron
Anon
2007-12-24 01:45:00 EST
"ron" <capncapn2000@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:68idneCAko5lm_LanZ2dnUVZ_tijnZ2d@trueband.net... > Howdy from Texas: > Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens. > Our school and emergency rooms are being over run, with only us legal > residents footing the bill. You have to understand, we Texans don't > condone needless violence. However, a growing number of us are starting to > feel that we are being pushed just a little too hard. Before you condemn > us, try to understand, it's not easy to see the place you love getting > trampled. What ever the reason, social, economic or whatever; This country > needs to do something about this problem. Those of us who live in the > border states have the right to not have our way of life destroyed. > Ron
This is an all too familiar Swan Song, Ron. One of my friends retired and moved to New Mexico a few years back to bask in the warm climate and enjoy his retirement. That did NOT happen. He and his wife opened a small floral shop and over the course of their first six months in business, they were broken into more than a dozen times. Illegals sneaking over the border did it and the ones that were caught (by him) were given nothing more than a slap on the hand and released. He also complained of small things, such as the Illegals opening his outside faucet to get a drink and then leaving the faucet running. Water is costly in these areas and his bill went up immensely. He said they also broke into his outside storage shed and shit all over the floor. He said it got so bad that his wife was afraid to walk down their short driveway to get their mail. Also, his car had been broken into several times and he got to the point that he'd leave the windows rolled down so the Illegals wouldn't break them out when they broke in to steal whatever was inside. He showed me many photos of the damage the Illegals caused and he ended up selling his home (took a loss) and moved back up north.
I cannot condemn the Texas man who confronted those two. Nor should anybody else. Was he right? Wrong? Who can say. I do know one thing, however. Those two thieves will never again violate the sanctity of someone's home. And who is to say that they would not have injured or killed someone who might have been in the house at the time? What that Texas man did can be called crime control. Scratch two scumbags.
Now, if only Pres Bush would get out of the pocket of the Mexican president and pardon those two Border Patrol officers....
Anon
2007-12-24 01:51:09 EST
"ron" <capncapn2000@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:68idneCAko5lm_LanZ2dnUVZ_tijnZ2d@trueband.net... > Howdy from Texas: > Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens. > Our school and emergency rooms are being over run, with only us legal > residents footing the bill. You have to understand, we Texans don't > condone needless violence. However, a growing number of us are starting to > feel that we are being pushed just a little too hard. Before you condemn > us, try to understand, it's not easy to see the place you love getting > trampled. What ever the reason, social, economic or whatever; This country > needs to do something about this problem. Those of us who live in the > border states have the right to not have our way of life destroyed. > Ron By the way. These Illegals are taking a huge toll on our local hospitals up here in the Midwest. Our local hospital posted documentation that Illegals seeking medical assistance cost the hospital NINE MILLION DOLLARS last year. And guess who pays for that? We do, via increased insurance costs while they, the Illegals, give false names and walk away without spending a penny.
Bo Raxo
2007-12-24 03:17:08 EST
On Dec 23, 10:51 pm, "anon" <anon@anon> wrote: > "ron" <capncapn2...@yahoo.com> wrote in message > > news:68idneCAko5lm_LanZ2dnUVZ_tijnZ2d@trueband.net...> Howdy from Texas: > > Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens. > > Our school and emergency rooms are being over run, with only us legal > > residents footing the bill. You have to understand, we Texans don't > > condone needless violence. However, a growing number of us are starting to > > feel that we are being pushed just a little too hard. Before you condemn > > us, try to understand, it's not easy to see the place you love getting > > trampled. What ever the reason, social, economic or whatever; This country > > needs to do something about this problem. Those of us who live in the > > border states have the right to not have our way of life destroyed. > > Ron > > By the way. These Illegals are taking a huge toll on our local hospitals up > here in the Midwest. Our local hospital posted documentation that Illegals > seeking medical assistance cost the hospital NINE MILLION DOLLARS last year. > And guess who pays for that? We do, via increased insurance costs while > they, the Illegals, give false names and walk away without spending a penny.
Do they not teach economics in Texas? Apparently not.
Well, you're living in the middle of a lesson anybody who took freshman Econ 101 can figure out:
You have a market for unskilled labor. The jobs don't require legal status, they pay too little to afford a place to stay, and the hypocrisy of their status technically being illegal while employers routinely and on a mass scale hire such workers creates a market for people who are there to work and don't have a place to live.
Or even the most basic health care - so things that could have been fixed for under a hundred bucks with a clinic visit ends up costing the taxpayers a thousand dollars or more of services at an ER, where everything costs several times as much due to the different delivery model - oh, whoops, that's a second economics lesson, I should slow down before I lose you.
Offer jobs right across their border that pay ten times what they can make at home, and be incredibly lax about enforcing laws against hiring undocumented workers, letting entire swathes of your economy routinely use illegals (agriculture, unskilled construction and gardening, janitorial, etc.). That's an economic formula for all of those people being there. Blaming them is like blaming people for creating a traffic jam around a store that offered goods for 90% off.
Shooting people might make you feel good - or other people doing the shooting for you, whatever - but it won't change the economic reality. That's your democratic society that's creating that economic opportunity - blame your neighbors who hire them and your government that mostly looks the other way when they do
Come back if you're ever serious - that would mean either the jobs start paying enough afford a place to live, or you start building some very, very low cost subsidized housing for itinerant workers.
Guess they don't teach much history in Texas, either. 'Cause it shows that in the long run capitalism is a powerful thing, more powerful than guns. Despite a lot of idiots with guns, capitalism managed to make this country wealthy and strong. Blaming someone who doesn't have access to a toilet for taking a shit is refusing to acknowledge the reality of biology as much as it is denying the capitalist reality that puts him in your town.
Bo Raxo
RD The Sandman
2007-12-24 12:02:05 EST
"ron" <capncapn2000@yahoo.com> wrote in news:68idneCAko5lm_LanZ2dnUVZ_tijnZ2d@trueband.net:
> Howdy from Texas: > Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens.
Mr. Horn did not know that.
-- RD (The Sandman)
War is absolute hell.....but to give in to terrorism is much, much worse
Ron
2007-12-25 11:35:07 EST
Hey Bo It's one thing to sit in front of a computer and pontificate your brilliance, try living with this mess.
The reasons we are in this situation is well known to everyone. What we need are solutions not condemnations of things like our democratic society. It is eventually going to be our democratic society that fixes this problem. When the problems we are experiencing down here in Texas start to be felt in the northern states, I think you will see a changer of attitude and politics-as-usual.
Robert LaCasse
2007-12-28 02:12:05 EST
On Mon, 24 Dec 2007 11:02:05 -0600, "RD (The Sandman)" <rdsandman(spamlock)@comcast.net> wrote:
|>"ron" <capncapn2000@yahoo.com> wrote in |>news:68idneCAko5lm_LanZ2dnUVZ_tijnZ2d@trueband.net: |> |>> Howdy from Texas: |>> Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens. |> |>Mr. Horn did not know that.
He might have had an (insight), .........but that is not the real issue here is it, .......these guys were trespassing in his property and possibly causing property damages.......
Mr Horn got nailed for defending his "homeland" property, which is all there is to realize....they did not heed his word/warnings, so they got hurt in the process of justice.
Maybe the illegal alien status will be a good point in Court sessions, but the fact is he is going to get burnt ($) by his lawyer and the courts,.....for defending his right$.....
We all know this stuff, but we keep on following the ATC/CCW rules and hope that someday it will overshadow the illegal aliens guns, as far as self protection of life and property is concerned.....
All the big gang wants is mo money for their gang coffers. -- Triad Productions-Fantalla~EZine~ParaNovel National Association of Assault Research (http://*remove*members.fortunecity.com/vampire34/htmlconc.html)
Jerry
2007-12-28 14:44:42 EST
In the State of Texas, as of 1 Sep 07, Castle Domain took affect. You no longer have to "run" away from a fight, you can use deadly force to protect yours or your neighbors life/property, etc, and you CANNOT be sued by the perp or his family. What a state.......
"Robert LaCasse" <The_Smoking_Man@MJ12.cid> wrote in message news:6d89n3papg44hmddsr5mkcn6urbn8e19b5@4ax.com... > On Mon, 24 Dec 2007 11:02:05 -0600, "RD (The Sandman)" > <rdsandman(spamlock)@comcast.net> wrote: > > |>"ron" <capncapn2000@yahoo.com> wrote in > |>news:68idneCAko5lm_LanZ2dnUVZ_tijnZ2d@trueband.net: > |> > |>> Howdy from Texas: > |>> Mr. Horn is a hero. The two criminals were illegal aliens. > |> > |>Mr. Horn did not know that. > > He might have had an (insight), .........but that is not the real > issue here is it, .......these guys were trespassing in his property and > possibly causing property damages....... > > Mr Horn got nailed for defending his "homeland" property, which is > all there is to realize....they did not heed his word/warnings, so they > got > hurt in the process of justice. > > Maybe the illegal alien status will be a good point in Court > sessions, but the fact is he is going to get burnt ($) by his lawyer and > the > courts,.....for defending his right$..... > > We all know this stuff, but we keep on following the ATC/CCW rules > and hope that someday it will overshadow the illegal aliens guns, as far > as > self protection of life and property is concerned..... > > All the big gang wants is mo money for their gang coffers. > -- > Triad Productions-Fantalla~EZine~ParaNovel > National Association of Assault Research > (http://*remove*members.fortunecity.com/vampire34/htmlconc.html)