Police have arrested and released an 84 year old man that shot a 16 year old black male who was allegedly trying to enter his home. Fox News. Andrew Lester was in bed when his doorbell rang at 10:00 pm in Kansas City. He retrieved his gun, a .32 caliber revolver, and opened fire on Ralph Yarl, who Lester said was trying to open his door and break in. Yarl was shot twice, once in the head and once in the arm and expected to make a full recovery. Yarl's family claims he was trying to pick up his brothers and was at the wrong address.
My Comment:
After years of false claims of racism in high profile self defense cases, I have zero belief that the media's narrative in this case is at all real. Is it possible that Yarl was really there for the reasons his family says he was? Yes, but I'm not taking the media's word for it. After all, these are the same people that lied about George Zimmerman, Officer Darren Wilson and Kyle Rittenhouse, why would they suddenly care about it now? It's very possible that Yarl and his family are indeed lying about what he was doing there and I won't believe it until we see the evidence in court. That doesn't mean I am pre-judging the merits of the arrest, it just means I am not going to pre-judge the guilt of Lester before any testimony is made or evidence is shown.
That being said what Yarl was doing at that house was pretty much irrelevant. What matters is the Missouri law on self defense. Under Missouri law you can use deadly force if someone is breaking into your house with no duty to retreat. From what I understand there is a reasonable person standard which should mean that Lester will get off in the scenario he describes.
Lester had every right to open fire in the scenario he outlined. A reasonable person would probably think that a stranger showing up at your home at 10:00pm and is currently trying to open a door. That's illegally trying to enter an occupied dwelling and that justifies lethal force. It makes zero difference at all if Yarl was or was not there by mistake and the whole thing was a tragic accident or not.
There are things that could end up sinking Lester's self defense claims though. The first is the second shot, which reportedly happened on the ground after Yarl had already been shot in the head. Doing so might not be justified as Yarl may not have been a threat at that point. It really depends on how long after the first shot the second shot happened. If he was still falling down it might be fine but if it was after a couple of seconds then Lester might be in trouble legally.
The other major question is if Yarl was actually trying to break in. If he was opening the outer glass door then he was indeed trying to break in legally (even if he claims he was doing something else). If all he did was ring the door bell and stand there than Lester was in the wrong. Without knowing the rest of the evidence we might only have the testimony of both Yarl and Lester to determine it and that might come down to the credibility of both. Lester might be harmed by this because he is an elderly and, to be rather rudely honest, haggard looking man while Yarl is a comparatively, attractive young man. If there is video evidence then things might be different.
Finally, since race has to be an issue in all interracial incidents like this (unless the races involved are reversed or don't match the narrative), race might play a major role. Racial bias could indeed effect the case if his motivation wasn't self defense but wanting to kill someone for the color of their skin. So far I haven't seen any evidence that this is the case, other than the prosecutor saying there was a "racial component" to the case. But if there is any truth to it, it could end with Lester going to prison. It has happened before, the defendants in the Ahmaud Arbery case ended partially being convicted because they dropped the n-word after the shooting. It's possible that something like this happened here as well.
Regardless of the details of the case, the really sad thing isn't the shooting, it's the fact that the government and media are hyping it. I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't riots in Kansas City even though we know very little about the case and don't know if the case had anything to do with race at all. Indeed, Joe Biden saying he would meet with Yarl is hugely prejudicial and seems explicitly designed to inflame racial tensions. Will Biden apologize if the story falls apart and it turns out that Lester was legally and morally justified to shoot Yarl? Of course not. Even if that happens I fully expect Biden and his ilk to double down yet again.
It's also a terriblely inconsequential crime. That doesn't mean I don't think it should be examined, but I do think that it's utterly absurd that we are discussing it at all. This should be a local news story at best and a minor one at that. There isn't any pressing need to cover it like it's the biggest story in the world, not when so much else is happening in the world. Nobody even died! But that's not the world we live in right now.
What we do have is the Democrats and the powers that be pushing a largely false narrative that innocent black people are regularly being gunned down by white people. Anyone with even the basic knowledge of crime stats knows that the vast majority of interracial violence goes the other way and though it does happen occasionally it's basically a rounding error.
Why would they do this? Because they think it drives voter turnout and I can't say they are wrong. I do think a lot of people were fired up by the 2020 black lives matter riots and protests and they could be trying to do it again, a little early.
They also like the fact that it demonizes both gun rights and white people, which are popular scapegoats when they wish to distract against other failures. I mean, we aren't talking about the radicalization of transgender people any more. We aren't talking about the pentagon leaks that show our efforts in Ukraine are failing. We aren't talking about the economy failing or the debacle that was Afghanistan. Instead we are talking about an unclear shooting that may indeed prove to be self defense. Of course I am writing about this too instead of those things, but at least I am pointing out the controversy.
Finally, I do have to say that I think Lester made a major mistake in opening the inner door in the first place (assuming his narrative is correct). I think he was right to get his gun given the circumstances but the right move was to not confront the intruder until he was actually in his house. He may have been legally justified in opening the door but doing it was not the right thing to do from a self defense standpoint. This would have never been an issue if he had just stayed inside and called the police. If Yarl had broken in this story would have never gotten the legs it had as there wouldn't be any question if it being self defense. And it's very possible that he wouldn't have to shoot anyone. If Yarl was indeed confused he would have eventually left and if he was trying to get in he might not have been able to if the door was secure. This situation probably could have been avoided had he been a bit smarter about what he was doing.
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