Disarming/disabling != Shooting someone dead.
Just because you have an easy button for homicide doesn't mean it's called for in every hostile situation. Courts agree. Try killing someone for robbing your house.
Just because you have an easy button for homicide doesn't mean it's called for in every hostile situation. Courts agree. Try killing someone for robbing your house.
There is no such thing as shooting to disable. You always aim for center of mass and if you do not feel threatened enough to shoot to kill then you shouldn't be shooting at all.
Now the caveat to this is if you shot an intruder and they're still alive, but now injured to the degree where you can safely disarm them and keep a gun drawn on them; current U.S law makes this a problem. You can get in legal trouble/sued by someone who broke into your home with a weapon intent on killing you, but only if they live.
This means not only are you shooting to kill - you're now dumping an entire magazine into the person to make sure they are dead.
E:
To the people who downvoted, how would you disarm an intruder with a gun? Ask them politely to put the weapon down? Run at them with a baseball bat (and risk getting shot)?
Or maybe shoot them in the arm or leg? Where major arteries are and the shot is still likely to be fatal and also has a higher chance of missing entirely.
Life isn't Call of Duty and shots to the legs/arm don't just "injure", they kill. So I'll repeat myself: there is no such thing as shooting to disarm or disable in real life. Only in fantasy first-person-shooter land.
In either case, their survival puts you in legal trouble under current law. You should be shooting to kill if you feel deadly force is justified. If your intent is not to kill, then deadly force was not justified.
Good luck aiming for a hand. I advise you go to a firing range and see how often you can hit the arm of a moving target without taking time to aim (remember: taking time to aim = you are now the one being shot). You'll have fractions of a second to get someone in your sights and take the shot.
It'll cost $30-40 to use a range, rent a gun, and buy ammunition for an hour. You'll leave with a more informed opinion of how operating a firearm works.
My post was in response to you making it sound like wounds to the extremities would be equally likely to kill as wounds to the center of mass, which is definitely not true.
And thanks, I've already got a range membership.
My point was you should never shoot to harm, only to kill. That means no hand shots. Period. Regardless of the chances of a fatally wounding shot.
My point - furthermore - was that it isn't a guaranteed "disabling" shot. It's still possible to kill. The thought of "shoot to disable" is a misinformed thought educated on nothing but Hollywood movies and video games.
Sorry, I don't care about a violent criminal's life enough to try and take a well-placed shot at a small, moving extremity.
No police officer would attempt this, either, if they're following their training.
Center-mass shots are more reliable, and more importantly, more reliable under stress (larger target).
"Patching up" my aggressor is the least of my concerns morally and legally.
In most jurisdictions this is completely legal under most circumstances. You can't always kill someone fleeing your just-robbed home (state-specific laws), though.
If someone breaks into your home with the intent to felony, in my state, yes, you can use lethal force to stop the threat or apprehend the alleged felon.
In terms of law, case law is critical here, to my knowledge only Texas allows that, after a verbal warning. And like e.g. Oklahoma, I expect judges to eventually nullify that.
Have you ever tried to apprehend a violent felon? They'll typically attack you, resulting in a case for traditional self-defense.