Merritt Landry not indicted in shooting of Marshall Coulter

[BDBoop]

I was hoping he wouldn't be. At the time of the shooting, his wife was pregnant, and they had a two year-old.

Shooting of 14-year-old in New Orleans ignites passionate debate - CNN.com

One of his teachers defends him, based on his love of otters holding hands, apparently.

Young, black and shot in the head - Salon.com

And then, in July, he was shot. Unarmed, just a few blocks from home. He remains in critical condition.

The man who shot him, Merritt Landry, says he was afraid Marshall was going to break into his home. According to our local paper, the Times-Picayune, the police declared Marshall was not “an imminent threat” of any kind. The article draws a parallel to Trayvon Martin’s case, not simply because the victims were young and black, but also because Landry is arguing innocence for more or less “standing his ground.” But Marshall’s situation is unlikely to generate the outrage of Trayvon.

For one, Marshall had a criminal record for burglary. For another, he scaled Landry’s fence at 1:40 a.m. Marshall’s injuries have left him unable to speak, so I can’t ask him why he was there. But in the court of public opinion, he seems to have been convicted already. Reading through comments sections for the Times-Picayune and the New York Daily News, it’s hard to find readers outraged by the notion of a homeowner shooting someone on his property in the middle of the night. “I am appalled at this story,” reads one comment. “Why was he only shot once?”

No action is being taken at this time,

Grand jury convenes, take no action in Merritt Landry case | New Orleans - WDSU Home

I guess it's hard to mount a criminal case when the person who was shot is not able to address the matter.

Development expected in case of Marigny homeowner who shot unarmed teen | NOLA.com

Coulter has made some progress in his recovery. He was in a medically induced coma after the shooting.

Coulter's health is slowly improving, but his condition is still a far cry from what anyone might consider normal. In December, his family said he could not get out of bed or walk, without the help of another person. He had to eat and drink everything from a straw. And, while he was slowly starting to communicate again, family members said he was still slow to form sentences.

So. That's where it's at. And personally, I hope charges are never filed, or if they are, he is found not guilty. His pregnant wife and child were in that house, and the kid had gone over a fence to get onto his property. Personally? I would have told him I have a gun, and he should go back the way he came, but I'm sitting in my chair in my room, not actually male with adrenaline pumping and the protection alarm on high alert.

 

[AyeCantSeeYou]

At 1:40am, much less any other time of the day or night, that kid had no business climbing a fence to get in someone's yard. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck. That kid was up to no good. Landry did what many others would have at that hour - shoot first.

 

[BDBoop]

At 1:40am, much less any other time of the day or night, that kid had no business climbing a fence to get in someone's yard. If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it must be a duck. That kid was up to no good. Landry did what many others would have at that hour - shoot first.

I believe the grand jury is seeing things that way, since nobody wants to charge him. Not a winnable fight, IMO. Not with his pregnant wife and baby girl behind door #1.

 

[Delta4Embassy]

Sucks when we come to care more about inanimate property than life, but self-defense is an affirimitive dfense as well it should be. Myself though, I refrain from forming emotional attachments to my 'stuff.' Can always get more stuff, but the prospect of spending the rest of my life thinking about someone I killed or put in a wheelchair to protect my stuff isn't something I wanna have to deal with. So if someone tries, "May I show you something from the back? The computer's older than you are, but the tv's kinda new."

 

[Two Thumbs]

The only reason we even know about this is?