Is it legal to shoot a burglar in your own house? Does it matter if their back is turned to you?
In Texas, it generally is legal to shoot a burglar and it doesn’t matter whether his back was turned, inside your house.Someone with his back to you could be picking up something to brain you with, or be heading to the kitchen to get a butcher knife, or going down the hall for your wife or children.According to The Castle Doctrine, he has already demonstrated bad intent towards you and your family by breaking into your habitation while you were in it.Shooting a burglar in the back is sometimes called “Preventative Self Defense”.Not long after The Castle Doctrine was passed, a man in San Antonio found two men in a spare bedroom after having broken in through a garage door.He killed one in the bedroom with a shotgun, while the other pushed past him and ran out a sliding patio door into the back yard.As he was trying to climb over a six-foot wood privacy fence, the homeowner walked out and shotgunned him in the back, killing him too.No charges were filed. I found THAT a little surprising, since the guy was outside, trying to run away.So, “It All Depends”, but history so far is “Yes, it’s legal”, at least in Texas.It should be noted that The Castle Doctrine was passed to keep over-zealous, anti-gun district attorneys from bringing unwarranted charges, and to protect homeowners from civil suits by burglars, or families of deceased burglars. It isn’t a license to knock off your in-laws or something.If you shoot someone who has broken into Your Castle and there’s ANY reason to suspect foul play, murder WILL be suspected and investigated.For instance, if you knew the burglar a detective will start looking for any motive you might have had for murdering him. If they find a motive, you’ll start getting asked some very pointed questions…Or if he (or his dead body) had anything on it which might indicate he was there for a legitimate purpose, THAT will not go unnoticed.The fact that he works for a cable company and has some sales brochures is not going to raise any eyebrows if you shoot him at 11:00pm, but at any time during normal working hours, it will make people wonder things… very inconvenient things for you.So it’s not just a license to shoot people, it’s merely a device to protect homeowners from unwarranted legal problems if they DO shoot someone and it is a justifiable shooting.
Why is it that bullets still use gun powder for the explosive push? Why not use like a drop of nitroglycerin?
Nitroglycerin is highly unstable. But what you really need to know is that smokeless powders ARE NOT explosives. They are propellents. They do not explode, they burn.