Grisly Discovery
In Memphis, some psychopath walked right through a restraining order and murdered some poor woman.
Via Richard Thompson, who notes: If there is any good that comes from Charlene Gaither’s heinous murder, then it’s the increased awareness that restraining orders are basically useless.
February 21st, 2008 at 1:15 pm
As I often tell my female clients getting Orders of Protection/Restraining Orders against their violent spouses/boyfriends, “It’s only a piece of paper with a Judge’s signature on it. It won’t stop a bullet.”
Basically, if you have someone evil or crazy enough to come at you with a gun to do violence on you, the OOP or TRO isn’t going to mean much.
February 21st, 2008 at 5:20 pm
If you take one of those, fold it just right, you can have a paper airplane that could put any eye out.
February 21st, 2008 at 9:18 pm
The only useful purpose they serve is so that when the sonofabitch gets shot dead by the woman he tried to harm, she has proof that she feared for her life and a judge agreed with her that she had cause.
If you need a restraining order, you need a gun.
February 21st, 2008 at 10:36 pm
That, plus the fact that if he only stalks but doesn’t kill her, it’s a little easier to get him locked up for a little while. IOW, these orders aren’t completely useless, they’re just nowhere near enough.
February 22nd, 2008 at 12:59 pm
Because this horse still needs a beating, I wonder what legal pain the family of a hypothetical dead student who had a TRO/OOP and whose right to carry was denied because she was on campus.
Kinda like this woman.
Probably not enough.