USC student shot entering wrong house

Jmoser

Jmoser

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Senseless tragedy and we can assume he may have been impaired, says found on front porch so not sure this will be ruled justified or not.
If he got shot banging on the door it's going to wind up with charges against the shooter.

'A sophomore student was shot and killed when he tried to enter the wrong home in a neighborhood near the University of South Carolina early Saturday morning.

Nicholas Anthony Donofrio, 20, was found dead on the front porch of an off-campus home by Columbia police officers after they received a call of a reported home burglary.

nypost.com

University of South Carolina student fatally shot while trying to enter wrong home: police

Nicholas Anthony Donofrio, 20, was found dead on the front porch of an off-campus home by Columbia police officers after they received a call of a reported home burglary, the department said in a p…
nypost.com nypost.com
 
Will come down to the hind sight "reasonable person" standard. DA's rarely even consider how the home owner perceived the situation in the moment.
I CA,NY,MA etc, the homeowner would be in jail without bond already.
 
Jmoser said:
Senseless tragedy and we can assume he may have been impaired, says found on front porch so not sure this will be ruled justified or not.
If he got shot banging on the door it's going to wind up with charges against the shooter.

'A sophomore student was shot and killed when he tried to enter the wrong home in a neighborhood near the University of South Carolina early Saturday morning.

Nicholas Anthony Donofrio, 20, was found dead on the front porch of an off-campus home by Columbia police officers after they received a call of a reported home burglary.

nypost.com

University of South Carolina student fatally shot while trying to enter wrong home: police

Nicholas Anthony Donofrio, 20, was found dead on the front porch of an off-campus home by Columbia police officers after they received a call of a reported home burglary, the department said in a p…
nypost.com nypost.com
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It is an unfortunate situation but no one’s fault but his. From this article it is ruled justified and he did a lot more than just bang on the door.

www.foxnews.com

Shooting of South Carolina college student who tried to enter wrong house was justified, police say

Nicholas Donofrio, a University of South Carolina student from Connecticut, was fatally shot on Aug. 26 after he apparently tried to enter the wrong house.
www.foxnews.com www.foxnews.com
 
Derek8404 said:
It is an unfortunate situation but no one’s fault but his. From this article it is ruled justified and he did a lot more than just bang on the door.

www.foxnews.com

Shooting of South Carolina college student who tried to enter wrong house was justified, police say

Nicholas Donofrio, a University of South Carolina student from Connecticut, was fatally shot on Aug. 26 after he apparently tried to enter the wrong house.
www.foxnews.com www.foxnews.com
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Yes. Reading that article leaves little doubt.

I'm interested in how they knew it he went to the wrong house? They are making it sound like a mistake. Is it possible he intended to break in?
 
Damn what a disparity of info between the two.
 
Yeahhhhh....there's a whole range of possibilities between "I am drunk and being stupid and want to do stupid things like break into someone's house" and "I am drunk and this house looks exactly like the other ones but I think I belong here."
 
Bocephus said:
Supposedly had just moved into a house on that street and was coming home from a night out. Probably more than a little drunk, missed his home by a couple doors and thought his roommates weren’t awake or purposely not letting him in, would be my guess
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I’d be more that willing to bet that’s exactly what happened. I don’t think he had any nefarious intentions, but was blasted out of his mind and hell bent on getting into (what he thought) was his house.
 
There was a report he kicked the crap out the door, best on it, broke a window and tried to unlock the knob that way when he got shot. It’s a terrible tragedy, but I think it was completely justified. It sucks for his family, but what would you have done as the home owner in that case?
 
Everyone seems upset about a young 20yr old kid getting himself killed when breaking and attempting to enter the wrong house,
meanwhile a 14-year-old was among the 7 killed and 33 wounded in Chicago weekend gun violence.
 
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Sadly, Chicago is like L.A. New York and a number of other big cities, even though I grew up in L.A. The reason I left there almost 30 years ago is because the shootings and violence were buried on page 20 ,so to speak and nothing was really done about it, if you tried to protect yourself you became the one charged for a crime. Truly not a place to live or raise a family. This still goes on day after day in these cities but it doesn't fit the agenda so you don't hear about it.
 
‘Donofrio allegedly broke through a glass window on the front door and attempted to unlock the doorknob through the broken window, at which point the male resident fired a single shot, fatally hitting the 20-year-old man in the chest.

Police found Donofrio dead on the front porch upon arrival.’

Ya - breaking glass and reaching in was the dealbreaker. This detail wasn’t in day 1 article.
Read between the lines - he closed down the bar and was mad drunk or otherwise under the influence. There but for the Grace of God . . .
 
CNN article even said it would be sometime before the toxicology reports come back to see what he was intoxicated on and at what level. It ls apparent he was torn up from the floor up and made a fatal error. I feel bad for the shooter, because he made a judgment to protect his family and it obviously was the correct legal choice. Thst being said, it won’t make it easier for him to sleep at night
 
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I guy I wrestled with in high school got ripped on some magic mushrooms and did basically the same thing a couple doors down from his house. He didn't get shot, but he broke into a cops house. The cop came down the stairs gun drawn as he opened the door. Cuffed him on the spot. No one blamed the cop.
 
11B CIB said:
The deceased had been banging on the door and jiggling the handle trying to force his way in, and ultimately broke the window by the door and reached in and tried to unlock the door through the broken window when an occupant finally shot him once
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Yeah that's about as long as you can wait before shooting, realistically.
 
fieldgrade said:
As the father of a victim of a violent home invasion, who wished in retrospect he had a gun at the time, my view of this is...

Good shoot.

Next?
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I was discussing this with my wife who is a non shooter. I decided if it were me I might have handled it differently. If it was my wife or one of my daughters I want them to shoot. Without being there I can‘t really judge the man harshly. But it still just kinda sucks.

in the words of Jack Pardee. “Nothing good happens after midnight.” I kinda wonder why this kid was alone. At the age I remember running in packs or at least pairs. Can’t remember ever being out alone at a bar.
 
CZfool68 said:
I was discussing this with my wife who is a non shooter. I decided if it were me I might have handled it differently. If it was my wife or one of my daughters I want them to shoot. Without being there I can‘t really judge the man harshly. But it still just kinda sucks.

in the words of Jack Pardee. “Nothing good happens after midnight.” I kinda wonder why this kid was alone. At the age I remember running in packs or at least pairs. Can’t remember ever being out alone at a bar.
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At the risk of sounding judgey and insensitive, I ran with a rowdy crowd in high school and the first couple of years of college. Much of the high school crowd either got kicked out, didn’t finish, or if they did that’s as far as they got (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

A fair number of some of the early college crowd got ejected as well. Interactions with LE were a regular occurrence, especially in high school, although I personally managed to get through without any arrests or convictions. Same could not be said for all the rest of the crowd.

It just seems to me that of all the stupid crap we did, that pounding on a door, then breaking out the glass and reaching in to break in, is just orders of magnitude dumber.
 
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fieldgrade said:
At the risk of sounding judgey and insensitive, I ran with a rowdy crowd in high school and the first couple of years of college. Much of the high school crowd either got kicked out, didn’t finish, or if they did that’s as far as they got (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

A fair number of some of the early college crowd got ejected as well. Interactions with LE were a regular occurrence, especially in high school, although I personally managed to get through without any arrests or convictions. Same could not be said for all the rest of the crowd.

It just seems to me that of all the stupid crap we did, that pounding on a door, then breaking out the glass and reaching in to break in, is just orders of magnitude dumber.
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We just drank and chased skirts. Guess we were tame.
 
CZfool68 said:
We just drank and chased skirts. Guess we were tame.
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Likewise, after I hit 19-20.

Prior to that I had a lot of stupid to get out of my system.
 
Crazy situation. Happens all the time. Drunk people walking into the wrong house. Some of these places are nearly identical.
Even Uriah Faber had some drunk chick wander into his house and shit and puke all over his bathroom floor. Anthony Smith woke up with some dude in his house, and could barely contain the guy.

I like to think I wouldn't use a firearm unless my door was actually breached. Unless it was two different doors being smashed at the same time. Would hate to shoot some drunk kid. Terrible.
I was so stupid as a youth. People get black-out drunk and really don't know what they are doing. I know its common to say that getting drunk just tends to show someone's true colors. But I have seen complete transformations of humans on alcohol. As if they became a different person. It really effects people differently. I would be surprised if he were sober.
 
Bocephus said:
Supposedly had just moved into a house on that street and was coming home from a night out. Probably more than a little drunk, missed his home by a couple doors and thought his roommates weren’t awake or purposely not letting him in, would be my guess
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Exactly.

I can’t imagine being that afraid as to shoot someone thru the door.

“Hey man you got the wrong house”
 
Tailhunter said:
Exactly.

I can’t imagine being that afraid as to shoot someone thru the door.

“Hey man you got the wrong house”
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He pounded on the door, then broke out the glass beside the door, and reached in to try to unlock.

Assuming those facts were reported correctly here.
 
This isn't a cure all, but some sort of restricted access before you get to the front door could be useful. Both for those folks up to nefarious things, and those who are confused.
 
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