Almost Shot and Killed AirBnB Guest

[Kathy842]

   My neighbor bought a North Dallas home for short term rentals. In addition to the 3 rooms he rents, he converted the garage to a 4th rental in this home.  He chooses not to maintain the outside of this home. His fence is rotten and falling down and it seems he will not cut the weeds until he gets a notice from the city. 

   March 22, I was watching TV in my sunroom when a man entered  the gate in my backyard wearing a mask.  He saw me through the window, then turned around to exit the gate. He stayed by my garage for about 15 minutes, walking around looking for a way to enter my home. He repeatedly tried the keypad on the garage.  

   I called 911. My door was unlocked because I had the TV antenna hanging outside.  I was afraid to open the door to retrieve the antenna to lock the door with him outside. I had my .38 loaded with the trigger back in case he entered. If I had stepped away, preventing him from seeing me, I'm afraid he would have entered the home and he would have been shot and killed.

   After the police left I  reviewed the cameras and deducted this was my neighbors AirBnB guest. My neighbor will not post pics of his rotten back fence, so his guest have no idea what to look for when taking the alley to find the property they booked. The neighbor only sends a pic of his garage door with an arrow pointing to the gate not shown. This picture looks like many other garage doors in the area. Navigation directions will not pinpoint the correct address when entering the alley. I have reported this to AirBnB but they will not get involved to encourage him to post pictures of the back of his property for guest to identify. AirBnB is on notice that this is a serious safety issue and a guest might get killed if they enter my home. I do not want to kill anyone. I don't want this trouble. I will be detained/questioned and sued at the minimum. If someone enters my home I will not have time to research if this is a meth addict or AirBnB guest. I hate being in this position.

   Background: A mile from my home, Dallas is having a growing population of people pitching tents, living in the city and begging for money at the busy street intersections. I hope to never have to take a life but will do so to protect myself and family.

[Sarah977]

@Robin4 My response to Americans' gun culture is to not step foot in the US, even though I was born and raised there, until they enact and enforce sensible gun laws. As it stands, any nutcase can go buy a gun, as has been proven over and over again with innocent people gunned down on a daily basis.

[Robin4]

@Sarah977 

You can't close the gate on guns in the US, the horse has well and truly bolted.

The founding fathers had absolutely no concept of automatic weapons when the 2nd Amendment was written, It was written to protect the public.

Times and circumstances change, you don't have the right to ride a horse and buggy down the centre lane on the Interstate 17, we have moved on!

The time to remove the 2nd Amendment would have been January 16 1919 when the 18th Amendment  (the prohibition amendment) was enacted to curb alcohol and gun violence.

Automatic weapons were starting to become an issue then and that was when the lawmakers should have seen that the 2nd Amendment had outlived its intended purpose.

And on that note, you can remove an amendment! After all, it's an 'amendment'! On the 5th December 1933 the 18th Amendment got repealed by the 21st Amendment. So for those that say you can't touch the 2nd, you can, of course you can but, the reality is you can't. The problem has got to such a huge scale that compliance with any change now is impossible.

Sarah, they have to live with it! 

Cheers........Rob

[Sarah977]

@Robin4  I'm well aware that repealing the 2nd amendment would not be tolerated by Americans in general. I never suggested that. 

What needs to be dealt with is the background checks, the ease of buying weapons, concealed carry, the type of guns allowed to be purchased, the consequences for those who shoot or threaten to shoot innocent and unarmed people, and the attitude that a perceived threat, as opposed to an actual one, is a justifiable reason to point a gun at anyone.

[Melodie-And-John0]

@Sarah977 ,Most states have background check laws but they are toothless, people that are banned from purchase due to their criminal or mental status are not followed up on if they try to buy one and fail.  So then they go the route of how people buy other things that are illegal, black markets exist the world around.   Add to that that the states with the toughest gun laws have the least aggressive punishments for violating them and now were in trouble. 

[Melodie-And-John0]

but @Sarah977 , you live in a place where the murder is 4 times what it is in the USA, how is that better?

[Emilia42]

@Robin4 Let us not assume all Americans would react this way. My response to this scenario would be exactly the same as yours. In fact, this has happened to me before and I helped the confused guest find her correct Airbnb up the road . . . .and I left the gun inside.  

[Robin4]

@Emilia42 

Yes I know you can't make blankets statements Emilia but, what if that confused guest you had on your property had been a young male, would you have been more hesitant?

Women looking lost just cries out for assistance no matter where on earth we live........ roaming young men, I wouldn't think anything of it here, but our perception is that (in general) your attitude would be different!

Cheers........Rob 

[Melodie-And-John0]

Let me guess @Emilia42 , Orono ME is probably a bit like Munnsville NY, most people really dont end up there by mistake and if they are doing something that is out of place, they stick out like a sore thumb.  If thats true, then I would say we both would do the same thing, greet them and ask how we could help (without a firearm in hand unless I was hunting).  Dallas is not Orono or Munnsville,  @Kathy842 had great reason to be prepared and not awfully inquisitive, people kill people at a rate 1000 times that of either of our little towns.  I would not live in places that was normal, not sure how people do it much less why but if you must, I suppose you need to be prepared for what comes.   

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

So, @Kathy842 what you are sayin' is that it's easier for you to shoot someone and bear the consequences than to put a sign on your fence and break your "principles"? Wow! Interesting ... dealing with problems vs. prevention ... reminds me of novels I read as a child about Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp 😄

[Nathalie-Et-Gilles0]

@Kathy842 

I do agree with @Sarah977 

Someone entering in your garden is not an enemy.

To think so is somewhat paranoid.

If the person is threatening, makes threats, tries to break the door or the window (not just knock at the door or ring the bell), you may be afraid but thinking to shooting  someone because he entered in the garden is madness.

Hopefully in my country, there is no gun culture.

It avoids many insane killings.

[Melodie-And-John0]

@Kathy842 , This is a tough crowd here, I'm guessing im one of the few here that will recognize your 2A Rights as legit or reasonable.  I thoroughly understand that when the police are 10 to 15 minutes from responding to a home invasion, they will probably be at least 9 minutes too late to save you or your loved ones life!  Homeless camps, cities, drugs, guns, hundreds of drug cartel members and other seedy characters a month scurrying across the Tex/Mex border illegally are all excellent reasons to be prepared to protect yourself and your family with a firearm actually, I can't think of a better reason.   

One detail, when you say  "I had my .38 loaded with the trigger back in case he entered", don't you mean Hammer not trigger?   If your saying you had your finger on the trigger, I suggest thats not a great idea, its best to keep it on the guard or weapon body until your ready to fire, just my firearm safety 2 cents for what its worth .I'm very glad to hear you didn't need to pull the trigger, its an awesome responsibility to hold someone's life in your hands, there is no forgiveness for a single mistake with a firearm, not even in the gun owning community, you screw up, there are no do-overs, you go to prison for life, thats the way it should be.   

I would suggest a couple things, if you are hellbent on living in an area that you and your neighbors need worry about home invasion, locks and bars providing physical security is your first line of defense in your hacienda not lethal force with a firearm.  Second, maybe a sign on your gate and garage saying private property, do not enter and a gate door that is lockable from the inside to stop "lost" folks from entering.  There are lots of things you can do to protect yourself and guests that fall short of lethal you will sleep with far easier than the memory of killing anyone bad or good.   Stay well, JR

[Kathy842]

     JR. Thank you for the well written advice. Yes, I agree....never draw your weapon unless you are ready to shoot to kill.  Yes I did mean I had the hammer back. This was a scary situation. At the time I did not consider the ABNB next door.  I have talked to the manager of the Abnb but the owner obviously has no respect for his neighbors. It's all about the money. The manager let me know that she "talked to the guest" and told him to never do that again. Of course. He now knows this was the wrong property. Future guests might make the same mistake. I don't think the owner will update his pics, showing the rotten fence or the weeds, at risk of losing potential reservations. 

   Over the years I have added security to my home. Increased lighting outside, 13 exterior cameras and better locks.  An efficient police dept might be 9 minutes late to the scene. Dallas police dept has steadily declined over the years. "The new district attorney in Dallas has announced his office will no longer prosecute those who steal "theft of necessary items" up to $750." Theft and murders continue to rapidly increase. 2020 was the highest murder count and 2021 in on track to top that. 

   I never want to be in the position to take a life. I do not even want to kill a meth addict breaking in to steal. This will bring much trouble on me. I will be arrested and sued by the victims family plus emotional issues. I do not want to be a shut in within my home, scared to live life.  If I am in and out of the house doing chores, it is not always easy to carry keys to lock the door when I am a few feet away. This may never happen again. I may never have to confront a burglar. But if a stranger enters my home without consent, I choose to protect my life in my home. I pray it never comes to that.

[Sarah977]

@Melodie-And-John0  Not a tough crowd, just a crowd that finds feeling one needs to have a gun around to protect oneself as alien a concept as never getting in a car in order to protect oneself from getting in a car accident.

And I'm sure most of us have been in situations that we found scary or potentially threatening at some point, because those things happen in life. Yet here we still are, alive, without ever having had a gun at our disposal or wishing we had.

I have no issue with people using guns to hunt animals they are going to eat, or farmers using one to scare off or even kill a predator that is killing their livestock. 

But that it seems almost every American has a gun in their bedside table, or their glove box or their handbag, that they are fully prepared to use to shoot another human being, is as scary, if not more so, to those outside the US, as some meth heads hanging out in one's backyard.

[Emiel1]

@Kathy842 

https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/656/my-neighbor-is-an-airbnb-host-what-do-i-need-to-know

[Ute42]

.

So far everyone has commented on @Kathy842  , now let's talk about the neighbours airbnb guest.

I'm in Germany and in our country there are almost zero guns in private hands legally. Only criminals have guns and they don't have a carry permit. I understand that that's different in the US and especially in Texas.

If I was a tourist in Texas I would never in my lifetime open the gate to a fenced property and just walk in, knowing full well that practically everyone in Texas is armed, that's not a good idea. And also it is not a good idea to wear a mask in the open when entering a foreign property, this could be misunderstood as if I wanted to hide my identity.

If I was in Texas I wouldn't enter foreing properties at all, especially if I'm not 100% sure that this is the place I ought to be.

@Melodie-And-John0