Retired Green Beret Gets Court Martial After Shooting Intruder

[Felix The Assassin]

Retired Green Beret Gets Court Martial After Shooting Intruder

BREVARD, Jan. 19, 2008 - Retired Army Green Beret James T. (Smokey)
Taylor got his court martial this weekend and came away feeling pretty good
about it.

Taylor, at age 79, is one of the oldest members of Chapter XXXIII (The Larry Thorne Chapter) of the Special Forces Association. He was placed on trial by fellow Chapter XXXIII members under the charge of "failing to use a weapon of sufficient caliber" in the shooting of an intruder at his home in Knoxville, TN, in November.
The court martial, of course, was very much tongue in cheek. The event itself was deadly serious.

Taylor had been awakened in the early morning hours of November 5, 2007,when an intruder broke into his home. He investigated the noises with one of his many weapons in hand.
"It was just after Halloween, on Monday morning at 4:30," Taylor said. I heard this commotion at the door and grabbed my fishing gun, a little 22 revolver, to see what was going on. I got to the front door and this fellow had ripped my security door out of its frame. He said, 'you're going to have to kill me. I'm coming in.'"
When a warning to leave went unheeded, Taylor brought his .22 caliber pistol to bear and shot him right between the eyes.

"I was about four feet away from him when I shot," Taylor said. "Looking back now, I'm glad he didn't die, but that boy had the hardest head I've ever seen. The bullet bounced right off."

The impact knocked the would-be thief down momentarily. He crawled out of the house then got up and ran down the street. Taylor dialed 911 and Knoxville police apprehended the wounded man about 200 yards away, hiding in a hedgerow.Complicating the case, as well as the court martial, the offender was released on bail but failed to appear for his court date. Knoxville police said the man was homeless. They did not know his whereabouts or why he had been given bail.
The charges brought against Taylor by his fellow Green Berets were considered to be serious. He is a retired Special Forces Weapons Sergeant with extensive combat experience during the wars in Korea and Vietnam.

"Charges were brought against him under the premise that he should have saved the county and taxpayers the expense of a trial," said Chapter XXXIII President Bill Long of Asheville, NC.

The trial was held at the Hampton Inn in Brevard, part of the group's regularly scheduled quarterly meeting. Long appointed a judge, Bert Bates, a defense counsel, Jim Hash, and a prosecutor, Charlie Ponds. All are retired Special Forces non-commissioned officers with extensive combat and weapons experience.

Ponds outlined the case against Taylor, emphasizing that the citizens of Knox County were going to be burdened with significant costs to again apprehend, and then prosecute and defend the would-be burglar. "Proper choice of a larger caliber gun would have spared the citizens this financial burden," Ponds said, "while removing one bad guy from the streets for good. He could have used a .45 or .38. The .22 just wasn't big enough to get the job done. Hash disagreed. He said Taylor had done the right thing in choosing to arm himself with a 22.

"If he'd used a .45 or something like that the round would have gone right through the perp, the wall, the neighbor's wall and possibly injured some innocent child asleep in its bed. I believe the evidence shows that Smokey Taylor exercised excellent judgment in his choice of weapons. He
clearly remains to this day an excellent weapons man."
Hash then floated a theory as to why the bullet bounced off the perp's forehead. "He was victimized by old ammunition," he said, "just as he was in Korea and again in Vietnam, when his units were issued ammo left over from World War II."

Taylor said nothing in his own defense, choosing instead to allow his peers to debate the matter. The jury, consisting of all the members of the Chapter, discussed the merits of choosing a larger caliber weapon as well as the obvious benefits to society of permanently deleting the intruder so he would never again threaten any private citizen.

The other side of the coin, that of accidentally causing injury to a completely innocent citizen if a more powerful gun had been used, also gained considerable support.
Following testimony from both sides, Judge Bates determined the charges should be dismissed. The decision was met with a round of applause. In fact, there was strong sentiment expressed that Taylor should receive an award for not only choosing wisely in picking up the 22, but for the accuracy of his aim under difficult and dangerous conditions.

After the trial Taylor said the ammunition was inde ed old and added the new information that the perp had soiled his pants as he crawled out the door.

"I would have had an even worse mess to clean up if it had gone through his forehead," Taylor said. "It was good for both of us that it didn't."
Meanwhile, back in Knox County, the word is out: Don't go messing with Smokey Taylor. He just bought a whole bunch of fresh ammo.

Tribune Editor Bill Fishburne is a member of the Larry Thorne Chapter XXXIII of the Special Forces



http://bluestarchronicles.com/greenberet.html

[Firestormalpha]

I'd say that was beautiful. Still it IS a pity he didn't manage to "remove" the issue completely.

I still can't get over the one I heard about where the invader filed a lawsuit against the homeowner for shooting him in the butt, and won. I always thought that was largely why right to bears arms was put in place.

[Bungleau]

LOL! That'll teach 'em to mess with the "old" guys...

[Harkoliar]

abit study to waste thier time debating on this issue on what weapon to use. sigh.

[Elif Godson]

thats awesome, good on him, still a shame the perp didn't get popped. Harkoliar, if you were 70+ years old and still messed with ammunition and fire arms on a regular basis, wouldn't you debate with your colleges of like mind on which source is better? My poor wife has to hear me talk about swords and such with my friends, and I'm no where's near 70 yet, God help when I am hehe

[Iron Greasel]

Bah, the society can afford to find and look after one more homeless guy. I wonder why he tried to break in. Tearing a door off its frame and telling a gun-wielding retired green beret that he's going to have to kill you because you are coming in is not what I can imagine a normal person doing without some kind of reason.

[dplax]

So basically they're saying that instead of wounding and having the guy captured he should have killed him...and here I was thinking that if you could solve a situation without use of deadly force you should...

[Balintherlas]

What're you nuts? Deadly force isn't used often enough, look at our population growth. Haha that being said, how the heck did the shot not pierce that intruder's head? Even a .22 caliber round shoulda gone through that guy's head at 4 feet, does he have like a 5 inch thick skull?

[dplax]

Originally Posted by Balintherlas What're you nuts? Deadly force isn't used often enough, look at our population growth.

So next time the Chinese or anyone else makes a policy to curb population growth it shouldn't be a one-child policy, but maybe a bullet in the head for every second citizen according to that reasoning? Would surely solve the problem for a couple of years...

[Felix The Assassin]

Originally Posted by dplax So basically they're saying that instead of wounding and having the guy captured he should have killed him...and here I was thinking that if you could solve a situation without use of deadly force you should...

Deadly force is the *LAST* resort. However, these guys are like minded, *IF* you must revert to deadly force, then it should very well be just that. The Police have no idea why he was granted bail. Only the presiding judge can answer that. Now he is loose, back on the streets, and thinks that hmf, what's the law gonna do. Maybe somebody not like minded as "Smokey" will be his next target. Then what? He had "ripped the security door out of it's frame", that to me says two things: One; he is rather large and violent. Two; he's on some serious mind and body enhancing drugs. Either of which is not going to allow for a reasonable ending.

The decision to squeeze the trigger on another human being is one that will be relived forever, irregardless of the outcome, so you might as well make the nightmare one in which society as a whole is the beneficiary!