Palm City woman shoots home invader

Reported by: Bryan Garner

Email: bgarner@wptv.com

Reported by: Carolyn Scofield

Last Update: 6:07 am



Christopher Reber, home invasion suspect (St. Lucie Co. Sheriff's Office)

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* Suspect in home invasion shot multiple times



STUART, FL - A worker at Guns, Etc. on Dixie Highway says Linda Schultz Russo trained there several years ago to get her concealed weapons permit.



Russo shot a man who was trying to break into her Palm City townhome Thursday morning.



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The suspect was identified as 23-year old Christopher Reber, who used to work at the Russo's pizza shop.



Brooklyn Joe's pizza is just a few doors down in the same shopping center as Guns, Etc.



The gunshop employee says Russo and her husband had even taken Reber in for a while.



Reber remained in critical condition at St. Mary's Medical Center.



Russo was listed in good condition at the hospital Thursday night.



Investigators have not released a motive in the Thursday morning crime.



PALM CITY, FL -- A Palm City woman pulled a gun on an armed man who broke into her home this morning, and after a shoot-out, both the woman and the suspect ended up in the hospital.



Martin County Sheriff's deputies say the confrontation happened just before 9 a.m. in the sleepy Lake Village neighborhood of Palm City.



Neighbors say the attacker, 23-year old Christopher Reber of Port St. Lucie, used a shotgun to blast his way through the sliding glass door of a home on Crossings Circle.



The home owner, Linda Schultz, was prepared to fight back. Neighbors say she had a gun of her own.



"I believe she’s always had one. There are many in this neighborhood who have all gone for concealed weapons courses now," says Linda Smyth, president of the Lake Village home owners' association.



Smyth says as soon as she heard the shots, she rushed to help her neighbor. She found Schultz injured with cuts and a black eye, standing on her front lawn, calling 911.



"She was hysterical," says Smyth. "I did get a towel to hold over her wound and waited with her until the police and paramedics showed up."



The suspect escaped. Deputies launched an intensive search through Stuart and Port St. Lucie.



Then, around 11 A.M., they got a break. One of Reber's family members tipped off sheriff's deputies to where he was.



Deputies descended on the Suburban Lodge, a motel along US-1 in Stuart. They found Reber in room 337.



Rescue crews who tended to hime found him seriously wounded from the shoot-out at the home. They treated him for multiple gunshot wounds, loaded him on to an air ambulance and flew him to St. Mary's Medical Center in West Palm Beach for trauma care.



"Everybody in this neighborhood is cheering, and we’re absolutely elated that she fought back and stood her ground. She’s one tough little woman," says Smyth.



Schultz and her husband own a local restaurant, Broadway Joe's Pizza on Dixie Hwy in Stuart. Smyth says the suspect is a former employee of theirs who has tried to break into their home twice in the past two years.



"They’re just a wonderful family. This is ludicrous, it’s absolutely a sin that someone would target a family that’s this nice," she says.



Deputies say Reber was transported to St. Mary's with "serious injuries."



Schultz is also being treated at St. Mary's, but Linda Smyth says it appeared that her friend's injuries were "superficial."



http://www.wptv.com/news/local/story...qHIsKS0DA.cspx

 

A guy that defended his property from thieves here last month with a shotgun is now facing charges after ramming the thieves off the road, and blasting one with a shotgun. Good for her...

I guess thats the difference between the US and Canada, there you can defend your home, here we are supposed to just roll over and then let the police tell us they are to busy to investigate it..

 

Uhh well you can't run people down and kill them here either. The castle laws in florida are pretty bad *** though. You can pretty much shoot anyone on yer property.

 

Georgia sucks in that regard. They still have to pose a threat to life or health before you can shoot them. They just recently passed a "stand your ground" law where you dont have to try to retreat before you can shoot.

 

Well duh, there is a difference between defending your property and turning a situation into target practice of course.. The wounds the criminal got were superficial, yet they are still going to prosecute the property owner, which is not right IMHO. This happened in a rural setting here, which means, these guys would have gotten away with the guys possessions, and probably never been caught with the useless jobs the police do here with property crimes. And even if caught, would have been back on the streets the next day with no financial penalties issued in the favour of the victim.

Here they are far more likely to issue a stiffer charge and penalty against a victim that defends themselves or uses some sort of vigilantism then against the instigating criminals. Its like the police don't wont want to be shown up for their lack of ability to actually stop or solve a crime.

 

CLIVE, Alberta -- There is a new sign taped up on the gas pump along Highway 12 near Clive that says "due to # of drive-aways, all fuel is now pre-pay only." This is effective as of a few moments ago, when the gas station fell victim to yet another robbery.



"That's $180 so far this week," says the clerk at Clive Corners Confectionary, adding up the losses. Did anyone call the local Mounties? She smiles. You won't get them to turn up for something like this. "Every weekend there's fights" at the local bars, she says, "drunk drivers crashing into the ditch." And there are the thefts that locals say have gotten absurdly out of hand in this corner of Central Alberta.



"Unless you pull a gun, they won't come out," she says of the nearest RCMP detachments-40 kilometres from here, in Bashaw or, serving the east side of Highway 821, Red Deer Rural, a 46-kilometre drive away.



That, as it happens, is exactly what local son, Brian Knight, is alleged to have done, which has earned him both criminal charges and the appellation of local hero.



In the early hours of March 26, Mr. Knight reportedly spotted three strangers prowling his yard, just northeast of here, near Tees, a neighbouring hamlet where the Main Street runs barely 300 metres. Busted, two of the intruders hopped back in their truck and - wisely, it would turn out - fled. The third started up Mr. Knight's all-terrain quad-bike and made a break for it.



Mr. Knight, apparently unprepared to allow this, gave chase in his truck and in the pursuit, crashed both vehicles into a ditch, where he is alleged to have fired upon the stranger, twice, with a shotgun. The wounded man ran off, and Mr. Knight allegedly called in reinforcements. (Between highway 821 north of Tees and Range Road 23-5A, there are, would-be burglars should take note, no less than four separate properties within a five-kilometre range, with mailboxes showing the owner to be a Knight. They are all nice homes with an ample inventory of farm equipment in their yards - assets not likely amassed for the benefit of criminals.)



This posse soon collared the alleged bandit, returning him to the scene of the first accident. Waiting for police to arrive, the suspect - who has not been publicly identified - moved behind the wheel of one of their idling trucks, police say, and fled again, though lost control after 100 metres, allowing Mr. Knight and his band to nab him again. When the Mounties arrived - 22 minutes after they first received a call, according to the RCMP - they arrested and charged the alleged thieves. But they also laid seven charges against Mr. Knight, including criminal assault, criminal negligence causing bodily harm and discharging a firearm.



On the counter of the Clive Corners Confectionary, there is a petition where at least 50 local families have so far signed to show they "support Brian Knight of the Bashaw/Tees area. A man has the right to protect his family and property." There are instructions for donating to a legal defence fund. "I hear there's already $450,000 in it," the clerk says. As implausible as that seems, the public mood must be such that some folks are certain Mr. Knight will easily raise far more than his lawyers require: "What happens to any extra money?" someone has written in pen on the notice. "Does it end up in Mr. Knight's pocket?"



At a court appearance on Thursday-where Mr. Knight reserved his plea, putting the case over until May 28, 130 supporters thronged the Stettler courtroom built for 70. (Mr. Knight has not commented publicly on the incident).



"Some people think he did the right thing," says Mark Cameron, owner of Clive Corners and the adjoining Cameron's Café. "Some people think he went too far."



I find no such critics on this day at Mr. Cameron's cramped eatery, where nearly every one of the dozen, plastic-wrapped tables is filled over the lunch hour, where a group of young men debate creationism versus evolution, and where a harried waitress informs customers she had never before today heard of a chicken quesadilla until Mr. Cameron made it, along with the corn chowder, the lunch special.



"I think the guy deserves a medal," says Harold Busat, who works in the pipeline business. His fellow diners nod approvingly. A welder friend recently lost $1,000 worth of tools to thieves. Mr. Busat has had sizeable gasoline storage tanks drained several times by plunderers, at a loss of $800 or so each time. The RCMP has never come to investigate, he says, and the insurance companies do not easily pay. "How do you claim lost gas?" he says.



Farmers in the area are behind Mr. Knight foursquare, the café owner tells me. Many have, Mr. Cameron explains, lost faith in the RCMP and their ability to prevent or apprehend criminals. Driving around the area, one senses a pervading suspicion of unfamiliar cars, though it might as likely be wariness about the wave of reporters recently as criminals; driving near Mr. Knight's house, a neighbour darts inside to fetch a ready pair of binoculars, then trains them on my vehicle.



Even the RCMP has sent arguably mixed messages about crime in the area. Statistics show property crimes in the area served by Bashaw RCMP soared 107% between 2001 and 2006, but had dropped 30% by last year. Initially, one RCMP spokesman warned victims: "Don't take the law into your own hands. Contact the police as soon as possible, because all you're going to do is get yourself into trouble." Another officer, though, told a radio reporter that residents in an area far from police are right to be vigilant, though, as the reporter noted, apparently not quite vigilante.



Ed Stelmach, Alberta's premier and a farmer himself, publicly sympathized with the Knights. Robbers struck his own acreage, in Andrew, Alta., last year. "I can certainly feel the frustration of the owner," Mr. Stelmach said last weekend. "And that's why I'm sure that the community is rallying behind the gentleman." He declined reporters' hypothetical questions about whether he might employ his own shotgun against prowlers, in the same situation.



Mr. Busat and his fellow diners greet this comment with barely a shrug, as though this were a predictable political response, not realizing, perhaps, that in another province it would most certainly not be. This is the land, after all, where a former premier once suggested that any rancher discovering mad-cow in their herd might have been best to have simply "shot, shoveled and shut up" rather than open the can of worms that came with reporting to health officials.



That kind of maverick attitude often passes for basic horse sense in these parts, where authorities are as likely to be seen as complicating lives as helping them. Mr. Busat, for instance, cannot think of much he would have done differently had he been in Mr. Knight's shoes, though a man flipping through a tractor catalogue at the next table chimes in with one suggestion. The only mistake the property owner might have made, he calls over, is "I wouldn't have called the cops."



National Post

 

Thats the thing about Canada...the majority of people say what he did was completely justified. But there's a small minority of retards who say what he did was dangerous and that he should have just let them go and do nothing even if he was in mortal danger.



This minority are superiorily rich and run the country. Lucky us!