Prowler in my area.

[red_oktober78765]

Seems to be that my next door neighbor, Will, saw someone in a dark hoody lurking around our home(s) on Monday night (into Tuesday). Then again last night his wife caught the same fellow standing flat up against the neighbors car port across the street from us both, Terry is his name at that residence. BG was wearing a hoody, again, while seemingly trying to avoid the motion sensors from Terrys floodlights. What can one do short of "capping" this fellow if we do catch him "lurking" around late at night? Crime in my immediate area is relativley low to non-exsistant but about 2 miles away in the more populated area there is somewhat of a gang. As to the use of lethal force, I would have to have a DAMN clear shot to even consider it, not to mention, a DAMN clear intent of harm from this "perp". There are quite a few homes in my area that if a shot went errant, innocent people can get hurt. Will and the fellow next to him (on the far side from me) both have their LCTF's and they do carry hard core. They might even be on here, I dunno. Will did chase him off (gun in hand) last night.

[CPratt]

Couple options I would consider. Call the police, say hi to him to let him know you see him, let him see you doing a perimeter check of the property with a flashlight. There are many things you could do besides 'capping' him.

How do you know he's a threat he may me a new neighbor or some new boyfriend to a neighbor that's smoke like a chimney.

[tonyfac]

if he is on private property, detain him, call police and have him arrested for trespassing. this way you will have all his info, so i doubt he would come back to the area.

[gummy jones]

just call the police

[PennsyPlinker]

You can't really "cap" someone unless you are in fear for your life or serious injury. But nothing sends a cockroach on its way like light. A strong light directed on the individual and a hearty, "Is there something I can help you with?" lets him know he has been spotted and the neighbors are watching. You can call the cops, but I doubt it will do much good.

[red_oktober78765]

I definitly know this perp isn't a new neighbor. We know all our neighbors if not by name, at least by sight and we all know not to "prowl around" each others property. Too many guns live here. This fellow should not have been where he was found at that time of night. We did have a whacko hanging around a couple of years ago but he was arrested when our friendly Constable got ahold of him during a routine sweep. Maybe it is the same whacko. That fellow was seriously tourqed out on drugs, by what I heard. There was a drug-dealer house a couple of doors up, across the street. They got found out and were taken by the police, never to grace our community again. But, that was all before I had our little one to worry about. Our baby adds another chip to the pot. I feel like I just want this fellow found and gone, arrested or otherwise, it's all the same to me. I just hope he doesn't try something stupid. I would hate to be the one explaining to the police why I felt the need to end someone. I will do what I have to, nothing more, nothing less.

[GunLawyer001]

Oh, just leave poor Trayvon alone.....

Actually, get a decent camera with a telephoto lens and a powerful strobe, get some good pics of the perp from a safe distance. Use a tripod if you must.

We have swarms of felonious meth heads around these parts, you can't bluff them, the cops usually refuse to get out of the patrol cars so they seldom catch them (it's really easy to spot a patrol car with hi-beams on 100 yards away, it's really hard to catch furtive human beings in dark clothing in cluttered alleys at night), so all that's left is identifying them for the sake of the forlorn hope of contacting their parole officers.

As has been pointed out, you can't cap someone for loitering, and you can't provoke them into attacking you (ask George Zimmerman about the low threshold for what could be considered "provocation" in some PC venues.) Unless he breaks into your home and comes at you, or uses a weapon against you outside, using deadly force will cost you far more than whatever he might steal.

It's not the way things should be, but it's the way things are.

[ChemDave]

Above posts are all good advice. I would add talking to you neighbors. Do you have a neighborhood watch? No need to get in a situation anything even remotely like the mess in Florida.

But the advice is solid: make this creep know he's watched and unwanted.

Lots of subtle ways short of crossing any lines or putting yourself at risk.

Good liuck!

[bluedog46]

You can't really "cap" someone unless you are in fear for your life or serious injury. But nothing sends a cockroach on its way like light. A strong light directed on the individual and a hearty, "Is there something I can help you with?" lets him know he has been spotted and the neighbors are watching. You can call the cops, but I doubt it will do much good.

Especially if its on an ar-15 or a glock. I am not sure if that would be legal but i have been told that if someone is on your property you wont get in trouble for drawing, but it seems very gray to me.

[jaseman]

What type of neighborhood do you live in? Of it's even a moderately 'affluent' or desireable area, a call to the local PD might get you nightly patrols for a week or so. Here in the South Hills of Pgh, the cops are very agressive about keeping the riff-raff out (it's both a good thing AND a bad thing). But a mile a way, inside the city's jurisdiction, it takes a few break-ins to get a patrol car.


I also second the idea of letting him know, subtlety or otherwise, that the neighborhood has eyes. In my old my old neighborhood, we had an issue with kids hanging out in the back alley, drinking and getting high. Me and a few other guys on the street made it a point to hang out in each others back yards with the lights on every night for a week or so. We'd walk our dogs from one yard to the other to say 'hi' to each other, or work on our cars in the alley, with the headlights conveniently pointing at them. We were very subtle for the first couple of days, making ourselves more and more obvious as the week went on. Didn't take them long to realize that there were four or five big guys in the neighborhood who were watching out for the locals.

This is one of the things I miss about living in the city. It might have been tight quarters, but everyone knew each other, and there was always someone on their porch, coming and going, and the neighbors were always talking since we were all living on top of each other. Not so much since we moved out into the 'burbs a little bit. Not that my neighbors and I don't see each other and talk, but it's a little different when you have more that 10 feet between houses.