Is "He" worth the headaches?

[BucsWin31]

Folks:

Let's get the FACTS of the story straight - his SISTER is getting ASSAULTED by her BOYFRIEND 'Billings' who has two outstanding records for violence against Talib's SISTER.

She CALLS Talib and he rushes over there.  He shows a weapon and during the altercation tries to pistol whip Billings (the attacker) INSTEAD of SHOOTING him.

Billings wrestles away the gun from Talib and then in POSSESSION of Talib's gun starts running. 

Talib's Mother then fires 3 shots at Billings who STILL has the weapon, at which point Talib (allegedly) took the gun and fired two more shots.

Here is the thing:

To add:

On March 27, 2007, Governor Rick Perry signed Senate Bill 378 into law, making Texas a “Castle Doctrine” state which came into effect September 1, 2007.[290] Residents lawfully occupying a dwelling may shoot a person who “unlawfully, and with force, enters or attempts to enter the dwelling”, or who removes or attempts to remove someone from that dwelling, or who commits or attempts to commit a “qualifying” felony such as burglary, arson, rape, aggravated assault, robbery or murder. In addition, a shooter who has a legal right to be wherever he/she is at the time of a defensive shooting has no “duty to retreat” before being justified in shooting; the “trier of fact” may not consider whether the person retreated when deciding whether the person was justified in shooting.

Billings satisfied the requirements:  he committed an aggravated assault on his sister,  and he was in possession of Talib's gun.  At this point he has the right to defend his property and does NOT have to retreat.

Notice that Billings was arrested, NOT Talib.

However, since the discharging of a firearm is illegal without proper cause (you can't just shoot the mailboxes across the street) the cops and prosecutor have to investigate.  That is what is happening now.

He is a person of INTEREST and NOT a SUSPECT.  Big difference...

Everyone needs to take a BIG breath...   So far - according to the police report we have some thug attacking Talib's sister and him defending her.

Well said.

[Scholty]

 He shows a weapon and during the altercation tries to pistol whip Billings (the attacker) INSTEAD of SHOOTING him.
 

Haha I love it....

Give Talib a break he wasn't going to shoot the guy just pistol whip the **CENSORED** out of him! haha.

I'm making fun but it was actually a very informed and knowledgable post, if what you say is true.

On another note something tells me that Aqib did not know about the law that was passed in 2007, but it may work in his favor.

I wonder if Gerald McCoy is pistoling whipping people? Talib is just not a good decision maker.

Yes, legally he would have been authorized to KILL Mr. Billings, so he is LUCKY he just pistol whipped him.  Texans take the right to defend themselves VERY serious and the main words to remember are, 'You FEARED for your life'.

My guess is that 90% of folks in Texas know about the Castle doctrine and just cause he is a football player he doesn't have a concealed license?

Getting a license means you take a weekend course and then file the paperwork.  For someone like Talib surely not to hard to do.

Does it apply to an individual sprinting away from the residence?  YES!!! 100%.   At the time Billings was STILL in possession of Talib's gun. 

Talib is allowed to defend his property and the doctrine very clearly states that he does NOT have the duty to retreat.   For instance, if someone steals your car and drives away from your driveway, you are allowed to fire in order to defend your property.

It is however, very important about WHAT he said to the cops.  Since it looks like he kept his mouth shut and let his lawyer do the talking, he 'should' be okay.

Remember,  there were already TWO - not ONE but TWO - assault charges pending against Mr. Billings before Talib defended his sister.

Now,  I wasn't there and that is my Monday morning qb'ing - keep in mind though, that if the cops thought Talib was 'guilty' they WOULD have arrested him.

It's on the prosecutor etc. though to follow up on the shooting.

--  I'm neither a lawyer nor do I play one on TV - so this is MY understanding how it works, by talking to folks that know.

[JasonOfthetower]

Folks:

Let's get the FACTS of the story straight - his SISTER is getting ASSAULTED by her BOYFRIEND 'Billings' who has two outstanding records for violence against Talib's SISTER.

She CALLS Talib and he rushes over there.  He shows a weapon and during the altercation tries to pistol whip Billings (the attacker) INSTEAD of SHOOTING him.

Billings wrestles away the gun from Talib and then in POSSESSION of Talib's gun starts running. 

Talib's Mother then fires 3 shots at Billings who STILL has the weapon, at which point Talib (allegedly) took the gun and fired two more shots.

Here is the thing:

To add:

On March 27, 2007, Governor Rick Perry signed Senate Bill 378 into law, making Texas a “Castle Doctrine” state which came into effect September 1, 2007.[290] Residents lawfully occupying a dwelling may shoot a person who “unlawfully, and with force, enters or attempts to enter the dwelling”, or who removes or attempts to remove someone from that dwelling, or who commits or attempts to commit a “qualifying” felony such as burglary, arson, rape, aggravated assault, robbery or murder. In addition, a shooter who has a legal right to be wherever he/she is at the time of a defensive shooting has no “duty to retreat” before being justified in shooting; the “trier of fact” may not consider whether the person retreated when deciding whether the person was justified in shooting.

Billings satisfied the requirements:  he committed an aggravated assault on his sister,  and he was in possession of Talib's gun.  At this point he has the right to defend his property and does NOT have to retreat.

Notice that Billings was arrested, NOT Talib.

However, since the discharging of a firearm is illegal without proper cause (you can't just shoot the mailboxes across the street) the cops and prosecutor have to investigate.  That is what is happening now.

He is a person of INTEREST and NOT a SUSPECT.  Big difference...

Everyone needs to take a BIG breath...   So far - according to the police report we have some thug attacking Talib's sister and him defending her.

Excellent points, Scholty. I was not aware of the Castle doctrine. That certainly changes things. Talib was well within his legal rights to defend himself and his family - especially after the BF wrestled away the weapon.

The question I ask any of these holier-than-thou posters is - if someone was attacking your sister and threatening your mother - would you not defend them with every means at your disposal?

[Chaos]

Well regardless he needs to think before he does anything. When you are in the public eye you need to think before you act. I like him, best cb I have seen in a long time but this stuff is out of hand.

So he should have just stood there and watched his sister get her butt whooped? lol     I bet you didnt feel that way when he was swinging punches and ready kill someone when Clifton Smith got knocked out vs the Panthers !!

[JDog]

Talib was well within his legal rights to defend himself and his family - especially after the BF wrestled away the weapon.

I'd say the dude had the right to wrestle that gun away from Talib since Talib was pistol whipping him with it.   LOL!

[AlstottUpTheGut]

Folks:

Let's get the FACTS of the story straight - his SISTER is getting ASSAULTED by her BOYFRIEND 'Billings' who has two outstanding records for violence against Talib's SISTER.

She CALLS Talib and he rushes over there.  He shows a weapon and during the altercation tries to pistol whip Billings (the attacker) INSTEAD of SHOOTING him.

Billings wrestles away the gun from Talib and then in POSSESSION of Talib's gun starts running. 

Talib's Mother then fires 3 shots at Billings who STILL has the weapon, at which point Talib (allegedly) took the gun and fired two more shots.

Here is the thing:

To add:

On March 27, 2007, Governor Rick Perry signed Senate Bill 378 into law, making Texas a “Castle Doctrine” state which came into effect September 1, 2007.[290] Residents lawfully occupying a dwelling may shoot a person who “unlawfully, and with force, enters or attempts to enter the dwelling”, or who removes or attempts to remove someone from that dwelling, or who commits or attempts to commit a “qualifying” felony such as burglary, arson, rape, aggravated assault, robbery or murder. In addition, a shooter who has a legal right to be wherever he/she is at the time of a defensive shooting has no “duty to retreat” before being justified in shooting; the “trier of fact” may not consider whether the person retreated when deciding whether the person was justified in shooting.

Billings satisfied the requirements:  he committed an aggravated assault on his sister,  and he was in possession of Talib's gun.  At this point he has the right to defend his property and does NOT have to retreat.

Notice that Billings was arrested, NOT Talib.

However, since the discharging of a firearm is illegal without proper cause (you can't just shoot the mailboxes across the street) the cops and prosecutor have to investigate.  That is what is happening now.

He is a person of INTEREST and NOT a SUSPECT.  Big difference...

Everyone needs to take a BIG breath...   So far - according to the police report we have some thug attacking Talib's sister and him defending her.

Excellent points, Scholty. I was not aware of the Castle doctrine. That certainly changes things. Talib was well within his legal rights to defend himself and his family - especially after the BF wrestled away the weapon.

The question I ask any of these holier-than-thou posters is - if someone was attacking your sister and threatening your mother - would you not defend them with every means at your disposal?

Nice info Scholty.

Also you have to wonder that if we weren't having these CBA problems, would Aqib be staying out of trouble by working out in Tampa and keeping close contact with Raheem? I would think so. And I know he probably could have gone home to Texas for a short amount of time if the CBA stuff wasn't going on, but he would still probably have Raheem in his ear.

[JasonOfthetower]

Talib was well within his legal rights to defend himself and his family - especially after the BF wrestled away the weapon.

I'd say the dude had the right to wrestle that gun away from Talib since Talib was pistol whipping him with it.   LOL!

Damn, I thought I had you on ignore. I'll fix that in a sec. Before that though - the dude was attacking his sister. The police arrested the DUDE, not Talib. So you tell me who was in their legal rights?

[JDog]

I have to admit that I can relate to this situation.   My sister dated some real losers at times.   I used to always tell her "I don't even want a guy like that to know I exist, let alone you date the jerkoff".   

If he was really defending the honor of his sister, I can understand that.

[Booker Reese]

Scholty, i think you make some decent points, but....

You are also making some assertions, and confusing them with facts:

-  We don't know that he was committing "aggravated assault" on the sister (under the statute, I think Talib just has to believe that an assault is imminent though, but those are matters yet to be determined, not facts).  We just know that they were arguing. The word "imminent" also has meaning. How have Texas courts interpreted "imminent" in the past? These are all areas of uncertainty.

- We don't know that he entered unlawfully, which is a key element in the statute.

- We don't know whether Billings had the gun or not at the time he was fired upon.

- Do we know if Talib provoked the guy prior to the use of deadly force? That's also an element of the Texas statute (I'm looking at the actual statute, not the blurb above) that must be met to make the use of force lawful (i.e., he can't have provoked Billings first). 

- It's not exactly clear to me that you can continue to shoot at the fleeing guy - this language from your post -  "the “trier of fact” may not consider whether the person retreated when deciding whether the person was justified in shooting," is not what the statute says. The statute says: "...in determining whether an actor described by Subsection (c) {that would be Talib, in this case] reasonably believed that the use of deadly force was necessary, a finder of fact may not consider whether the actor [again, Talib] failed to retreat."  In other words, Talib isn't required to attempt to retreat before resorting to deadly force. There may be other parts of Texas law that cover the fleeing guy, but this statute appears to be silent on the issue.

- The article isn't crystal clear, but Billings appears to have been arrested because he was a suspect in prior assaults, not because of his activity on that day.

There's a lot of moving parts to this one. I'm not a lawyer either, but I have had some law school (no criminal law), and know my way around a statute a little bit.

I'm not convicting him, but I don't think he's coming out of this smelling like a rose either. The problem for me is that Talib has a way of finding himself in situations like this repeatedly, and even if he's legally clear, is he clear of the NFL. I know that there is one view that says that the NFL can't touch him because of the lockout. I wouldn't bet on that yet - it's still an issue to be bargained and I can't imagine a union spending a ton of effort to bail out the handful of guys like Talib who keep screwing up.

[Kerrigan2011]

Could not have picked a better state to try to pistol whip and shoot at a home invader.

His sister's first call should have been 911, not to Talib IMO.

Judging by the whole general mentality and intelligence of that family, do you honestly think that they want to involve the police? It might have incriminated them instead of him for all we know.

That whole family provides why players are thugs in the league.

Its kind of sad that Pacman Jones has finally quieted down but Talib just can't stay out of bad situations. Its more then enough of a headache and hes pissing away his career for stupid thuggish choices.

Say what you want, I know a bunch of people are trying to defend him for whatever reason (this isnt the first time for him in the least) but I have had enough of his BS. Its not worth the hassle and aggravation of dealing with a problem on the team. Because it lingers in the lockerroom and it needs to be effectively taken care of (Severe punishment like 4 games suspended or drastic like trading or cutting him for the good of the team). Talib is NOT a team player. Ronde Barber, DB55, Alstott, Lynch, all never had anywhere near the problems this guy has.

Either shape up or ship out. Thats my feeling on all of this.

[Chaos]

Could not have picked a better state to try to pistol whip and shoot at a home invader.

His sister's first call should have been 911, not to Talib IMO.

Judging by the whole general mentality and intelligence of that family, do you honestly think that they want to involve the police? It might have incriminated them instead of him for all we know.

That whole family provides why players are thugs in the league.

Its kind of sad that Pacman Jones has finally quieted down but Talib just can't stay out of bad situations. Its more then enough of a headache and hes pissing away his career for stupid thuggish choices.

Say what you want, I know a bunch of people are trying to defend him for whatever reason (this isnt the first time for him in the least) but I have had enough of his BS. Its not worth the hassle and aggravation of dealing with a problem on the team. Because it lingers in the lockerroom and it needs to be effectively taken care of (Severe punishment like 4 games suspended or drastic like trading or cutting him for the good of the team). Talib is NOT a team player. Ronde Barber, DB55, Alstott, Lynch, all never had anywhere near the problems this guy has.

Either shape up or ship out. Thats my feeling on all of this.

Ray Lewis was involved in a double murder...lol...does that make him not a team player?

[Tampa Bay Todd]

Exactly, Sunny, exactly. The culture these days of people who think like Talib is "I'll handle my own business" and "take care of it myself, my way." Too many people reach first for a gun instead of the phone.

[bwcpete]

An Important thing to remember in this case is that defense of a family member is a valid legal defense and can be used to justify the use of force, even deadly force.

BUT the use of force is justified in a legal sense only when there is the possibility of harm to the family member and the level of force used is appropriate to the situation.  So once the boyfriend runs away from the house the use of deadly force(firing the gun) could be seen as no longer legally justified under defense of a family member. I am not saying Talib is guilty or that this wont eventually be called defense of a family member as we don't have all the facts of the case but he may be charged and that is something to keep in mind.

[bent09]

- It's not exactly clear to me that you can continue to shoot at the fleeing guy - this language from your post -  "the “trier of fact” may not consider whether the person retreated when deciding whether the person was justified in shooting," is not what the statute says. The statute says: "...in determining whether an actor described by Subsection (c) {that would be Talib, in this case] reasonably believed that the use of deadly force was necessary, a finder of fact may not consider whether the actor [again, Talib] failed to retreat."  In other words, Talib isn't required to attempt to retreat before resorting to deadly force. There may be other parts of Texas law that cover the fleeing guy, but this statute appears to be silent on the issue.

I'm not convicting him, but I don't think he's coming out of this smelling like a rose either. The problem for me is that Talib has a way of finding himself in situations like this repeatedly, and even if he's legally clear, is he clear of the NFL. I know that there is one view that says that the NFL can't touch him because of the lockout. I wouldn't bet on that yet - it's still an issue to be bargained and I can't imagine a union spending a ton of effort to bail out the handful of guys like Talib who keep screwing up.

Good point

Honestly watching the news and having several friends that are attorneys it seems to be a moving target (no pun intended) by the judge but all facts are considered.  It might hurt that after his mother was unsuccessful he then took the gun and fired more shots while the guy was running away.  Plus the proximity to their property could be a factor.  Even though we like our guns in Texas we still have some common sense.

I hate this because six months from now she will be back with the boyfirend calling Talib once again. 

[Scholty]

Scholty, i think you make some decent points, but....

You are also making some assertions, and confusing them with facts:

-  We don't know that he was committing "aggravated assault" on the sister (under the statute, I think Talib just has to believe that an assault is imminent though, but those are matters yet to be determined, not facts).  We just know that they were arguing. The word "imminent" also has meaning. How have Texas courts interpreted "imminent" in the past? These are all areas of uncertainty.

- We don't know that he entered unlawfully, which is a key element in the statute.

- We don't know whether Billings had the gun or not at the time he was fired upon.

- Do we know if Talib provoked the guy prior to the use of deadly force? That's also an element of the Texas statute (I'm looking at the actual statute, not the blurb above) that must be met to make the use of force lawful (i.e., he can't have provoked Billings first). 

- It's not exactly clear to me that you can continue to shoot at the fleeing guy - this language from your post -  "the “trier of fact” may not consider whether the person retreated when deciding whether the person was justified in shooting," is not what the statute says. The statute says: "...in determining whether an actor described by Subsection (c) {that would be Talib, in this case] reasonably believed that the use of deadly force was necessary, a finder of fact may not consider whether the actor [again, Talib] failed to retreat."  In other words, Talib isn't required to attempt to retreat before resorting to deadly force. There may be other parts of Texas law that cover the fleeing guy, but this statute appears to be silent on the issue.

- The article isn't crystal clear, but Billings appears to have been arrested because he was a suspect in prior assaults, not because of his activity on that day.

There's a lot of moving parts to this one. I'm not a lawyer either, but I have had some law school (no criminal law), and know my way around a statute a little bit.

I'm not convicting him, but I don't think he's coming out of this smelling like a rose either. The problem for me is that Talib has a way of finding himself in situations like this repeatedly, and even if he's legally clear, is he clear of the NFL. I know that there is one view that says that the NFL can't touch him because of the lockout. I wouldn't bet on that yet - it's still an issue to be bargained and I can't imagine a union spending a ton of effort to bail out the handful of guys like Talib who keep screwing up.

All good points.  However, he was arrested because of TWO prior assaults against the sister.  So there is - evidence - that she felt she was in 'danger'.  Add to that - that she called her brother and mom for help... And if you know anything, then you know that domestic cases can get REALLY messy REALLY quick.  There was a case here in Arlington, where a rookie police officer was suppose to take a report and got killed when the perp returned with a gun.

Keep in mind that Billings was the one, who showed the cops where he disposed of Talib's gun.  Which was NOT in the area of the shooting (according to reports it was in a trash can around the corner).  So he must have HELD on to the gun when he ran.

Obviously, we don't know nearly enough to know WHAT really happened.

My main point for posting all of this,  was to caution folks and wait to see how this plays out....