Scenario - Hot Dog

[Glenn E. Meyer]

I'm going to try my hand at a scenario. It has some hidden aspects.

One evening you are driving in the country. It is the dry time in TX. You have read of a sicko who is seating fire to dogs.

Thus, you see a man tying a cute doggie (image it yourself) to a tree. He is dousing the dog with gasoline and holding a lighter.

You stop and yell at him to stop. He replies to go mate with yourself and moves towards the dog with a lighter.

You have the TFL gear - gun, OC, phone, knife, extra mag, BUG, AR or shotgun in the vehicle.

What do you do and what is your legal justification? What is your moral justification?

[Eghad]

is a burn ban in effect?

[Glenn E. Meyer]

You getting hot.

[oldbillthundercheif]

I would grab the fire-bottle from my trunk and prepare to hose the dog... and the doofus when he sets himself on fire trying to light a gas-soaked dog with a cigarette lighter.

I bet the dog would not stand still and gasoline is unpredictable.

[fisherman66]

I'd shoot the dog rather than have it die from flame.

[Groundhog]

is a burn ban in effect?

ROFLMAO - that'll get the cops sicked on him for sure!

OK, I'll throw in my $.02 worth.

I'll have to start with a personal belief that will factor into what I'd do here. Animals do not have the value a human life does. I know this 'cause I eat 'em! Seriously though, I don't believe they do, so...

1. If family was with me, wouldn't have stopped in the first place. Gone on til out of sight and called Police. Fido is toast.

2. If I was alone and had stopped, per your narrative, I only hope I would have been sane enough to keep a lot of SA and make sure he was alone. Now, taking from the point in your narrative, I'm already involved as I told him to stop. He proceeds toward dog with lighter. I'm going to stand right where I am and watch him. Either he goes through with it with a witness or he backs down. Lets take the first. Fido flambe. I'm sick that he did it, dog is screaming, he's sick because he did it. If he leaves, render aid to, or put down dog. Call cops, give statment, go on way, mourn fido. If he sticks around, I leave, call cops, tell them I'll go to scene of crime once I meet them at some nearby point. Then I'll give them statement and be a good witness etc.

A. I would not intervene further. This dude is sick and who knows if hes armed or may have other sick friends hiding in the weeds. At this point I'm OK with defending myself if aggression appears from the other(s) but I'm not going to start it. He hasn't threatened me.

B. I would not get on my cell to call cops at the scene. For one, we're in the country. They are many minutes away. For another, he might find that act provocative. I'm sure flame boy would know I was calling the cops on him. I'd rather attempt to leave gracefully.

My actual reaction would have been to drive on by and call cops, meet them there, be good witness, etc. There are some things I'd risk getting shot over but a dog that isn't mine is not one of them. Some of this also depends on the odds. If it were me and 5 buddies and just him alone then hell yeah I'd have done more. It'd be risky even then and I know it's stupid, but at least we could have come at him unarmed first to try to stop him. It would be a risk I'd be willing to take with enough backup. One on one, too dangerous, period.

Oh, I suppose the bit about the burn ban could give you justification to draw down on the SOB since he could conceivably be getting ready to start a brush fire that could kill people. I honestly don't know if I would have even thought about that at that moment though. Given that I wouldn't have probably thought about that, I doubt my actions would be different.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Fire bad - do you have justification for lethal force in this situation?

Is it arson?

[torque]

I love dogs, so I would have to stop it, shoot the guy in the leg to stop him, and if he brandishes a weapon I would ventilate him.

[Edward429451]

I'm not a cop, no human life is in danger, not my business to engage the man in any way. Depending on the fire conditions, I may or may not call it in on the cell after I pass.

Besides, how would I know if the guys dog didn't have the plague or something and needed to be burned for the sake of the community's health? Maybe he was going to put it down quickly and hadn't pulled the pistol yet?

Things aren't always as they seem at first glance. Be extra careful if people are not involved.I perceive no legal justification for lethal force in this instance. I do not think it's arson either, isn't arson only commited against property?

[Ozzieman]

Tell him what I am doing and wait for them to show up and at any time he comes over to where I am and in any way threatens my life I will defend my self.
I too eat meat but they don’t set fire to cows when there alive. I have been to a slaughter house so the two are not the same. We kill cows for food not for fun.
I would stay off his property but where I can watch him. I always carry a camera so I would also photograph what he is doing. (this I have done before, when I saw some one trying to steal a car, the flash made him poop his pants I think and he ran away to be caught later that night).
What he is doing is illegal in all states even though it’s probably not considered much of a crime it is still illegal.
And I would hope one of those really old timer policemen would show up. You know the kind that would beat some intelligence, or just beat on him for refusing to be arrested.
Which I would then back up the officer in court.
Any person that would cause this kind of pain to an animal is also an animal and wouldn’t hesitate to hurt a person.
Best a bullet in the head but that’s illegal.

[ohioleadslinger]

Hmm I would have to ask PETA what I should do....

[restlessnomad]

I'll have to start with a personal belief that will factor into what I'd do here. Animals do not have the value a human life does. I know this 'cause I eat 'em! Seriously though, I don't believe they do, so...

I don't understand the logic when people use this reason or justification for their treatment and attitude towards animals and life. You should value those animals more then anything because they sustain you day to day and provide you with absolutely everything you cant live without; your air, water, tolerable temperatures and food (speaking ecologically). An animal has never done a thing it hasn't had to, thats why I respect them so much.

As for the scenario, I would have taken the dog out of there by any means nessecary. If it meant beating him silly w/ my baton, brandishing my weapon, a warning shot or a round to the body. I know what my priority would be in that situation and jail time would be nothing to me over seeing that dog lit up.

[The Biker]

The man would not burn the dog. I would not allow it. I have taken dogs by force from people who were abusing the animal and the cops pretty much turned a blind eye - they're people too.

Biker

[kgpcr]

I have a question. Why do people worry or even think up weird scenarios like this?? what are the chances of this ever hapening?? what am i missing?

[The Biker]

Ya know, you're right?

Biker

[ohioleadslinger]

The very crux of the problem restlessnomad is , every day we give animals more and more rights and every day we have more of our rights taken away.
Those same courts that give those rights to animals would put our a**es in prison if we used any kind of force on that guy to stop him. Fix the courts and stop giving rights to animals, then give those animals the respect they deserve as a creature but not as an equal, without rights. The constitution and bill of rights says the people, not the people and fauna!
I don't advocate the torture of anything man or animal. I do advocate common sense. If we see that then if we stop that freak don't drop the legal hammer on us!
Common sense seem to fade every day in or country...

[chris in va]

This scenerio has nothing to do with firearms.

[Eghad]

Arson in Texas is a crime in which deadly force can be used to stop. Arson is a threat not only to property but the lives of other individuals. I think setting a dog on fire is probably a violation of the burn bans that over 250 Texas counties have and could be considered arson in this situation. The burning of a dog is probably not a legitimate activity during a burn ban. A wildfire could easily cost a county and the taxpayers millions of dollars and the loss of lives.

[restlessnomad]

I empathize with the view ohioleadslinger, but what I'm speaking of doesn't really have to do with animal rights, it has to with peoples perception of the world around them. Most don't see an inherit "natural" law in everything.We've created are own, and participate in actions contradictory to every other bundle of organic matter on this planet, but we really shouldn't get into any of that.

Cant we talk about something with a little more immidiate worth? Such as, responses, movements, fields of view, etc. What this section needs is a simple program where we can set up "blueprint" drawings of buildings or any area really, mark them up, post them and discuss courses of action and actually implement them in training. I don't know just a suggestion, something like that would be quite useful, especially for LEO.

[Groundhog]

I don't understand the logic when people use this reason or justification for their treatment and attitude towards animals and life.

You may be making a bit of an assumption about "my logic" in this situation. Everyone naturally has a right to their own opinion. In my opinion, human life is of the greatest value. Animals are also highly valuable to me, but they don't hold a candle to the value of a human being. And since we're talking about opinions, my opinion is that anyone that holds the value of an animal equal to or greater than a human, has grave issues. But hey, that's just my opinion!

I have animals. I love my animals. But! They are still animals and do not equate to a human beings value or worth. In the scenario given, if you replaced the dog with a human being, I guarantee you I would be going in to try to stop it. Still probably not a smart idea but none the less, it's what I'd have to do. If the animal in question was MY dog, I'd probably not have the self control to stay out of the situation either. That, however, is because I have an emotional attachment to my animals. There is no denying that the animal in question should try to be saved. The question is, how much risk are you willing to take to save it? No dog is worth my life. Some dogs I 'might' risk my life for though. It's not like it would be easy to drive by knowing fido was gonna get torched either.

As I see the scenario given. No crime has been committed, yet... Explaining your way out of shooting a guy who happened to only have a lighter might, just might, be a little tricky. You are out in the country, alone. You know nothing of the situation except what you can see. Given that, the risk that the situation could devolve into life or death over a dog is just too much for me. As to the arson part, one, I don't go around thinking about who has burn bans or not or what the conditions are most of the time. I don't smoke so I'm not generally a fire hazard. We don't know enough about the location here to say, but if you are in a rural area, even if he started a fire, chances are people could be warned in time to get out of the way. Unless you just flat out wouldn't get involved at all, which is not how I said I'd react.

Damn, I just love opinions. They make me prattle on so about things that are extremely relevant in my life.

[ohioleadslinger]

Cant we talk about something with a little more immidiate worth? Such as, responses, movements, fields of view, etc. What this section needs is a simple program where we can set up "blueprint" drawings of buildings or any area really, mark them up, post them and discuss courses of action and actually implement them in training. I don't know just a suggestion, something like that would be quite useful, especially for LEO.

I agree its turned into quasi zombie killing scenarios.

I get your point though. I used to be a firefighter, and we would set up scenarios on fire attack and search and rescue. Same for this forum.
The software would be killer pardon the pun.

[RedneckFur]

Having grown up and lived with dogs my entire life, I like the average dog more than i do the average person.

I love dogs, and to me, somone who would stoop so low as to tie one to a tree and set them on fire is undeserving of life. If i see somone doing it, and I'm armed, they will eat lead.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Good morning - this has actually happened. There was a dude doing such. There was no gun slinger intervention though. What does it do with guns?

It is a scenario about how you would act as legit as any. The TX Penal code allows use of deadly force against arson. Now is it worth it on the practical level or the moral level? The burn ban is irrelevant - it is starting a fire that counts.

People who do that to a dog aren't really upstanding citizens and probably a greater threat for horror than the Stop and Rob guy.

BTW - there was a guy going to do this to his ex awhile ago and was stopped by an armed citizen. Good witness then?

Is there a dividing line about property vs. such an attack on a person? I would opine that I would stop the ex - burner and probably the dog guy.

Property I don't care about.

[DesertDawg]

HMM! Cruelty to an animal! Arson! Both are CRIMES! In your scenario, you have verbally tried to stop the idiot from committing those crimes, but that was met with a harsh, aggressive verbal response from the idiot. If you DID shoot the idiot, and could articulate your reason for doing so well enough, it might be looked upon as being justifiable! Of course, you'd need to "enhance" your story a bit, by saying that you "feared" that the act of arson during the dry season could lead to a massive, out-of-control blaze that would possibly kill PEOPLE! The poor dog wouldn't be the main concern, even though most folks would understand your concern.

SHOOT the idiot, SAVE the dog (and the dry forest)! Adopt the dog, and re-name it "Lucky"!

[Groundhog]

Is it just me or does anyone else here see that shooting this guy could easily end up with you being in prison? I mean, I understand the sentiment but holy crap, explaining that seems rather fraught with peril to me.