Woman shoots husband......

[chindogg]

Hope this is not a dupe. Woman shoots abusive husband with her gun, claims he mad a move for his gun, grabs his glock and shoots him 6 more times. Gets off of murder charges but is convicted of weapons charges for possessing his gun. Does this mean my wife can't use one of my guns ( she is licensed) if someone breaks into my house?

Heres the article http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/13/nyregion/barbara-sheehan-is-jailed-after-weapons-conviction.html .

As far as the woman goes I guess the old adage goes if you are going to do something better to do it right. She is quite thorough- lol

 

[terraformer]

In NY it is illegal to posses a gun not on your permit unless supervised by the owner (who clearly couldn't consent or supervise her). No trading or borrowing... This is eminently appealable as the law is ABSURD and then there is the self-defense exception where acts committed in the heat of lawful self-defense (which apparently the jury decided this was lawful), she should never have been convicted. The DA is kicking themselves for not offering manslaughter as an option right now...

However, this is also one of those times where the mallum prohibitum law is doing exactly as intended. Backstopping a weak case so they can punish the person anyway. I am not confident that any appeals court in NY will rule in her favor and I doubt SCOTUS will take this because of the facts of the case. Her hubby was a cop too IIRC.

Anyway, none of this applies to MA.

ETA:

The reasoning, the jurors said, was that Mr. Sheehan was already very badly wounded and no longer posed a threat when Ms. Sheehan shot him with the second gun. Ms. Sheehan could face a sentence of 3 1/2 to 15 years.

Even the jurors understood the power of the mallum prohibitum law. What they are saying is they wanted her punished but not too badly. This may backfire.

Even the trial judge sees the issue here:

The judge indicated that the fact that Ms. Sheehan did not appear to have harbored the second gun for a prolonged period could potentially be an issue on appeal.

In other words, that she used the gun solely for the self-defense event and for no longer, this may be covered by the exception.

 

[Zappa]

This sounds a bit like the Bernie Goetz case.
He was in fear of his life and shot his attackers, the jury acquitted him on the attempted murder charges, but convicted him on the gun possession charges and he spent nearly a year on Rikers Island.
The mixed message here was basically the jury understood why he shot his attackers, but penalized him for possessing the means to defend himself.

 

[terraformer]

Unlike goetz, she didn't posess the gun for very long.