What would you do in this situation? Woman murdered in broad daylight

[.455_Hunter]

What you do if you witnessed the following events? My father just happened to be a few blocks from here when this was occurring.

Witness: Man who killed ex-girlfriend 'had tunnel vision'

WHEAT RIDGE - He thought she needed some help with her car, nothing more. He didn't expect to see a murder and have the killer look right at him.

"I thought that maybe she had fallen asleep or dozed off," he told 9NEWS on Wednesday. "I saw her veer off the road, off the right shoulder of the road and then hit the fence. I went over to try and help her."

9NEWS has chosen to not release his name because of what happened next.

The moment he got out of his car near 35th Avenue and Wadsworth Boulevard on Tuesday night, he noticed another man walk up to 34-year-old Amber Kathleen Cremeens' car and fire three shots.

"I looked up and then I saw him shoot her at point-blank range," the witness said. "He had tunnel vision. He had an agenda. He was out to kill this person."

"He was very nonchalant about it," he said. "I saw him turn toward me after he shot her. He looked right at me and he had no interest at all."

Wheat Ridge Police are now actively looking for Tyler James Martin, 35. They believe he's the man who killed Cremeens, his ex-girlfriend, along the side of Wadsworth Tuesday night.

"He's balding. He's got dark hair and brown eyes," said Lisa Stigall, the spokesperson for the Wheat Ridge Police Department.

She is hoping someone will be able to tell them where Martin is. She says he drives a green four-door Mercury Mystique with Colorado license plate No. 720-SXA.

"Often times the public is a big help in these situations," Stigall said.

The murder is something the witness will never forget.

"It's just terror. You see someone is in danger. You want to be able to help them and then there is nothing you can do about it," he said.

"I was just driving home from my mom's house," the witness said. "People say to me, 'Don't you feel lucky?' No, I don't feel lucky. That isn't how I see this at all."

Police say Cremeens was on the phone with a current boyfriend when all of this was starting to materialize. He called police shortly before the crash.

"He advised us that he was on a cell phone with her and she was telling him that her ex-boyfriend was following her and trying to run her off the road," Stigall said.

The boyfriend, who was talking with Cremeens, was trying to help her, trying to get her to turn onto side streets according to police, but apparently she was not able to shake her pursuer.

Court documents show that when Cremeens neared 35th and Wadsworth she "became hysterical and then the line (with her current boyfriend) went dead."

Police believe victim and Martin had been dating upwards of eight years. They also believe that the two had broken up back in August. Although there are no records of a restraining order in this case, court records suggest the victim had become increasing worried about her ex-boyfriend's behavior. The victim's current boyfriend has told police that "he had put (the victim's) bills and telephone in his name so that Tyler could not find her."

"My thoughts go out to the victim's family. It's just awful that any of us had to be a part of this," the witness said.

http://www.9news.com/news/local/article.aspx?storyid=110203&catid=222

 

[shootistpd27]

Aim, fire, repeat.

Wait for police to arrive and spend the next few months praying for the grand jury to be conservative and return a no true bill for premeditated murder.

 

[Rockwell1]

I would think rendering aid to the victim would take priority. But now that the newspaper article has identified the man that the killer got a very clear look at as the star witness, I would very definetly be on high alert.

 

[Jeff White]

Exactly what the unnamed witness did. He's under no obligation to intervene (sounds like it happened to fast to make intervention possible) and under no obligation to apprehend the shooter.

No state issues a badge and peace officers commission with a CCW permit. You don't get a red cape and blue tights either. A CCW holder is a private citizen with no duty to take any action.

Wait for police to arrive and spend the next few months praying for the grand jury to be conservative and return a no true bill for premeditated murder.

What gives you the right to shoot the man? Just because he committed an aggravated battery with a firearm in front of you, you don't have any legal right to gun him down in some Charles Bronson movie inspired act of revenge. The argument that he might shoot someone else is pretty lame. Who else was there to shoot?

Think you could take him into custody? How do you propose to do that? "Stop or I'll shoot!" ? So he turns and walks away. Gonna shoot him in the back?

"Drop the gun!"? What do you do if he turns to face you and holds the gun at his side? "Yes, officer I told him to drop the gun and he just stood there so I shot him."

http://www.michie.com/colorado/lpext.dll?f=templates&fn=main-h.htm&cp=
Colorado law authorizes a private person to make an arrest:

16-3-201. Arrest by a private person.

A person who is not a peace officer may arrest another person when any crime has been or is being committed by the arrested person in the presence of the person making the arrest.

Source: L. 72: R&RE, p. 199, § 1. C.R.S. 1963: § 39-3-201.

But the annotations refer us to a 2002 Colorado Appellate Court case:

An arrest must be first authorized under this section before a private person can use physical force to effect the arrest. People v. Joyce, 68 P.3d 521 (Colo. App. 2002).

So first we must get into the law library and find out what that case actually says about a private person using force to affect an arrest. This is the applicable part of that opinion:

http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=co&vol=2002app\3347&invol=1

Defendant, James C. Joyce, appeals from a judgment entered on a jury verdict finding him guilty of attempted second degree kidnapping, assault, and false imprisonment. We affirm. Defendant and his son woke the victim from his sleep, hit him multiple times, and took him from his room, allegedly intending to take the victim to jail. At some point, the victim was handcuffed. The victim broke free and ran out of the apartment. Defendant�s son pursued and seized the victim and brought him back to the apartment, at which point police arrived.

Defendant asserted self-defense. However, the trial court refused to allow defendant to argue as an alternative defense that, because he believed the victim had previously been involved in a robbery, he was effecting a citizen�s arrest.

I.

Defendant contends that the trial court erred in refusing to allow him to assert an affirmative defense alleging use of physical force necessary to effect an arrest by a private person pursuant to � 18-1-707(7), C.R.S. 2002, and in instructing the jury that the defense did not apply as a matter of law because defendant had not witnessed the victim�s alleged crime. We disagree.

Section 18-1-707(7) states:

A private person acting on his own account is justified in using reasonable and appropriate physical force upon another person when and to the extent that he reasonably believes it necessary to effect an arrest, or to prevent the escape from custody of an arrested person who has committed an offense in his presence . . . .

However, � 16-3-201, C.R.S. 2002, provides that "A person who is not a peace officer may arrest another person when any crime has been or is being committed by the arrested person in the presence of the person making the arrest."

Defendant does not dispute that the plain language of � 16-3-201 authorizes a private person to arrest another when a crime is committed in his or her presence. Nonetheless, defendant argues, in � 18-1-707(7), the phrase "who has committed an offense in his presence" only applies to the second clause, "to prevent the escape from custody of an arrested person," and does not apply to a person simply effecting an arrest. Thus, he maintains, he was entitled to assert the use of physical force as a defense. We disagree.

The goal in interpreting any statute is to determine and give effect to the intent of the General Assembly by looking first to the language of the statute itself. A statutory scheme must be read as a whole and interpreted so as to give consistent, harmonious, and sensible effect to all its parts. State v. Nieto, 993 P.2d 493 (Colo. 2000); People v. Garcia, ___ P.3d (Colo. App. No. 99CA2360, Jan. 17, 2002). Moreover, when interpreting two statutory sections, we must attempt to harmonize them to give effect to their purposes and, if possible, reconcile them so as to uphold the validity of both. Norsby v. Jensen, 916 P.2d 555 (Colo. App. 1995).

Here, the two statutes serve related, but different, purposes. On the one hand, � 16-3-201 concerns the authority of a person who is not a peace officer to make an arrest in certain circumstances. On the other hand, � 18-1-707(7) is part of the article codifying affirmative defenses including, inter alia, the use of physical force. Whereas the former statute explains who can make arrests and under what circumstances, the latter sets forth when a person lawfully effecting an arrest is permitted to use physical force.

Thus, read in proper context, � 18-1-707 applies to persons otherwise authorized to make arrests, namely peace officers, and, pursuant to � 16-3-201, private persons. Hence, contrary to defendant�s contention, an arrest must first be authorized under � 16-3-201 before a private person can use physical force to effect it under � 18-1-707(7). Furthermore, when a person already under arrest has attempted an escape, the second clause of � 18-1-707(7) similarly permits a private person to use physical force but, again, only when the attempted escape is committed in his or her presence.

Here, defendant concedes that the victim did not commit a crime in his presence. As a result, defendant was not authorized to make an arrest and, therefore, was not justified in using physical force against the victim. Thus, the court did not err by precluding the affirmative defense. Likewise, the court correctly instructed the jury that the defense did not apply.

The crime was committed in his presence so it appears that our unnamed witness would have been permitted to use force to affect a citizen's arrest under Colorado law. But this gives you some idea about all of the complications involved with making a citizen's arrest.

Then we get into Part III of the opinion:

III.

During jury selection, defendant mentioned a publicized incident in which two people were killed trying to stop a crime. Defendant stated that, although it was "tragic," it was also an example of someone trying to effect a legitimate citizen�s arrest. In closing argument, the prosecutor referred to defense counsel�s discussion of that incident, stating, "Those are the kinds of things that happen to people when they try to take the law into their own hands. And this outcome is what happened to [the victim] when the defendant and his son took the law into their own hands."

Defendant argues that the prosecutor�s statement was prejudicial and constituted reversible error. We disagree.

Because defendant did not object to the comments during closing argument, we again review for plain error. A prosecutor�s misconduct is plain error if it is flagrant or glaringly or tremendously improper. See People v. Constant, 645 P.2d 843 (Colo. 1982).

Here, defendant initially discussed the incident during jury selection, casting a citizen�s arrest in a positive and heroic light. See People v. Vialpando, 804 P.2d 219 (Colo. App. 1990)(reviewing court should consider whether defense counsel invited remark). Moreover, because defendant could not use the defense of citizen�s arrest, both parties� statements were tangential and could not have prejudiced defendant as to any legitimate issue in the case.

In any event, overwhelming evidence of guilt was presented at trial, including the testimony of defendant�s son, his son�s girlfriend, and two police officers, as well as defendant�s own testimony that he conspired with his son to take the victim to jail. Hence, the prosecutor�s remarks had little, if any, effect on the reliability of the judgment of conviction. See People v. Vialpando, supra (plain error only where prosecutorial misconduct affected verdict).

So the next time you think that because you have a gun that you have some kind of civic duty to take action when you see a crime committed, think about how murky things can get. Take action and maybe you'll die or be seriously injured for your trouble. Take action and maybe you'll be charged criminally and even if you prevail, you're out thousands of dollars or tens of thousands for your defense.

In this case they have an eyewitness, a good description of the shooter and his name and address.

The moment he got out of his car near 35th Avenue and Wadsworth Boulevard on Tuesday night, he noticed another man walk up to 34-year-old Amber Kathleen Cremeens' car and fire three shots.

"I looked up and then I saw him shoot her at point-blank range," the witness said. "He had tunnel vision. He had an agenda. He was out to kill this person."

If he had been armed, what do you reasonably think he could have done?

To act or not to act....Only the person on the scene can make that call. We don't know how far away he was from the shooter. We don't know although it appears it happened to fast to be prevented, the witness doesn't say he walked up to her car with a gun in his hand. Who knows, maybe the witness had dropped his crystal ball and cracked it and he couldn't see in advance that the guy he probably thought was trying to give aid would shoot her.

Would the suspect have fired on you if you tried to take him into custody? Who knows? Why take the chance?

Would you you have been in legal trouble if you had shot the suspect down? Again who knows? You're betting an awful lot on your knowledge of the law and current case law, and the local legal environment. Why take the chance?

One must take a whole lot of things into consideration in the fraction of a second that you have to react. Get it wrong and you could be seriously injured or worse or you could be spending your retirement money trying to stay out of prison.

No one can tell you what to do. But you shouldn't go into the situation totally blind to the possible consequences.

 

[Ragnar Danneskjold]

Jeff, I think you're getting to caught up in the legal aspect and you assume anyone speaking of "duty" must be speaking about a "badge or commission" or some other sort of official or legally defined duty.

I think you're forgetting that some people feel inside themselves a personal duty to right and wrong that supersedes concerns about their own legal status.

There doesn't have to be a red cape and tights, a goofy CCW badge, or any other witty item you associate with "Charles Bronson inspired acts of revenge". There are some people who simply cannot watch a murder take place and do nothing. Some people, upon seeing a young woman get shot multiple times in front of them, think about other things than lawyers and statutes.

Of course those are things one can thing about. But how much priority one places on them is up to the individual. I'm not going to fault someone for saying they wouldn't act against the murderer. But I also won't take a condescending and belittling attitude towards someone who says they would act.

 

[Rockwell1]

Who else was there to shoot?

The unnamed witness?

I still think getting to the victim and getting EMS rolling are priority one but had I even a thought that our shooter was about to eliminate witnesses I would have taken measures to defend myself

 

[Mp7]

...

Shout "Freeze" ... "Drop your weapon, NOW!"

act accordingly from there, depending on his actions.

In german law it would be possible to make a citizen´s arrest.
But since we don´t have CCW for normal citizens
it would usually never happen in this scenario.

 

[Duke of Doubt]

I try pretty hard not to get involved in matters not my concern.

On the facts, all the bystander knew was that a man shot a woman. For all the bystander knew, that woman had murdered the man's infant child in a microwave oven a few months prior, and skated on a phony post-partem plea. For all the bystander knew, the woman had just shot the man in traffic.

I'd have kept out of sight, and kept my eyes and ears open. I wouldn't even call police, though if I later learned of an investigation premised on the facts described, I'd have come forward as a witness. Reluctantly.

 

[qwert65]

Depending on how close I was, and how close the shooter was and how the shooter acted to me giving aid I would
a call 911, try and help the woman

b shoot the guy, try and help woman while calling 911

c call 911, try and help the woman, while keeping eye on shooter

Which one I choose would depend on what I saw, who else was there, how the shooter acted, my gut instinct and a lot of other varibles

 

[Duke of Doubt]

qwert65: "Depending on how close I was, and how close the shooter was and how the shooter acted to me giving aid I would
a call 911, try and help the woman

b shoot the guy, try and help woman while calling 911

c call 911, try and help the woman, while keeping eye on shooter

Which one I choose would depend on what I saw, who else was there, how the shooter acted, my gut instinct and a lot of other varibles"

So you acknowledge all the variables, implied admission being that you don't really know what the Sam Hill is going on, and yet you open fire?

The guy could be a Mossad agent taking out an al quaida suicide bomber, for all you know.

 

[qwert65]

Duke- the key is depending on how the shooter acted towards me if he left then i would do a
if he came towards me carrying a gun and I just saw him shoot someone. then mossad agent or not I'm opening fire

 

[Rockwell1]

The guy could be a Mossad agent taking out an al quaida suicide bomber, for all you know.

Foreign agent working on American soil? I would do everything in my power to take him out.

That said, that's a pretty far fetched scenario

 

[Art Eatman]

An actual event in west Texas, on I-20: A man and his son were driving home from a deer hunt. They drove past a Highway Patrolman who was at the driver's door of a pulled-over car.

Via the rear-view mirror, a struggle was seen to occur. Stopping to observe, the stopped driver was seen to get the patrolman down, and then shoot him.

The deer-hunter's .243 ended the affair. The patrol car's radio was used to inform authorities.

No charges were filed, the grand jury issued no indictment, and an honors banquet was held by DPS troopers for the deer hunter.

Separately, Texas law is specific as to shooting a Bad Guy in the back: If a prudent person can reasonably assume that there would be an ongoing danger to the community, such a shot is legal. A murderer with a gun is quite reasonably considered to be an ongoing threat.

This will vary from state to state, of course; there is no "One size fits all." There are jurisdictions where Jeff's caveats are definitely apropos.

Before posting "What I would do is...", be sure you know the laws which apply where you live.

Art

 

[Duke of Doubt]

Rockwell1: "Foreign agent working on American soil? I would do everything in my power to take him out. That said, that's a pretty far fetched scenario"

Um.

A LOT of funny business goes on here and abroad. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Get me started on the Romanian Revolution of 1989, sometime.

 

[Krazeehorse]

Keep in mind most of us are going to have some issues knowing you killed another person. My CCW is for the defense of myself and those close to me. If we're not in danger my gun will stay in its holster.

 

[bikerdoc]

As a very young cop in 1974 I saw the same thing on a crowded downtown street at lunch time.
I chased him, lost him in the crowds.
Retuned to scene and the girlfriend of the deceased identified the shooter as an ex boyfriend. Plainclothes guys got him later that day without incident.

Today, that same scenario, unless he points the gun at me, I call 911, aide the victem and secure the scene.
Different times, different obligations.

 

[Gungnir]

I think you're forgetting that some people feel inside themselves a personal duty to right and wrong that supersedes concerns about their own legal status.

And there's the rub. Without knowing what really happened and why, you might wind up acting in a way that you regret more deeply later than doing nothing. Suppose the situation was as Duke said:

For all the bystander knew, that woman had murdered the man's infant child in a microwave oven a few months prior, and skated on a phony post-partem plea.

You acted, pulled your gun, and shot the guy dead, how would you feel then? Regardless of the legal consequences? For years people burned witches at the stake because they felt it was their personal duty to right a wrong, we now know that most of the people killed were innocent or perhaps only guilty of making willow bark tea. YMMV

 

[scottgun]

This happened so quickly and there were so many unknown variables at the time of the incident that any citizen with a CCW would be foolish to try to intervene.


Tactically speaking, the victim should have been on the phone with the police, not her current boyfriend. This isn't blaming the victim, just reality.

 

[Mainsail]

He thought she needed some help with her car, nothing more...

"I thought that maybe she had fallen asleep or dozed off," he told 9NEWS on Wednesday. "I saw her veer off the road, off the right shoulder of the road and then hit the fence. I went over to try and help her."

The moment he got out of his car near 35th Avenue and Wadsworth Boulevard on Tuesday night, he noticed another man walk up to 34-year-old Amber Kathleen Cremeens' car and fire three shots.

"I looked up and then I saw him shoot her at point-blank range," the witness said. "He had tunnel vision. He had an agenda. He was out to kill this person."

"He was very nonchalant about it," he said. "I saw him turn toward me after he shot her. He looked right at me and he had no interest at all."

Some of you Monday morning quarterbacks are reading this as though there was a luxury of time to weigh the pros and cons of intervening. It sounds to me like there was little time to react for either the victim or the witness. As I read it, this happened unexpectedly and in very close quarters. From the story, the witness was never aware that he was intervening in anything but a woman in minor distress. Are you saying that if you saw a woman drive into a fence, you would have just kept driving?

At the point I bolded in the quote above, I would imagine I would have drawn and fired to stop the threat. Without a crystal ball, it would be difficult to determine that he was only interested in the woman. In hindsight it is debatable whether it would have been better to shoot or not shoot, but in the moment the shooter was a clear and present threat with the means, motive, and ability to kill you.

 

[gossamer]

If my life is not threatened my weapon doesn't give me any special status to intervene. And I'm NOT sure it gives me any special ability to either - I'm still just a guy capable of doing something very stupid, carrying a gun doesn't change that.

I would HOPE that I:
1) kept my wits in check.
2) Made as many mental notes as possible (as my pulse raced and adrenalin pumped).
3) call 911
4) help the victim once the threat was over
5) ONLY used my weapon if my life was threatened

 

[Hush]

No justification to act? How about the former Marine who acted in New Hampshire to shoot and kill the kid who shot Cpl Bruce McKay? If you're not familiar with the story...google it. A NH officer was shot and killed at a traffic stop, a passerby took possession of the slain troopers weapon and killed the assailant. No charges filed. It shouldnt matter that this was a police officer, if you see a murder happen infront of your eyes, and your are so inclined, than act. If you choose not to, then that is also your choice. I personally, could not stand by and witness such an act, while equipped with a CCW, and choose not to do something.

 

[Mainsail]

On the facts, all the bystander knew was that a man shot a woman. For all the bystander knew…

Speculating on what he knew is asinine. What did the witness know at the time? He knew a woman had just driven into a fence. That’s all he knew! He suspected she might have fallen asleep at the wheel and stopped to check on her. What kind of human scum would ignore that? Who here would have just pretended they never saw it? What if it was your wife or daughter who fell asleep while driving? You would prefer everyone drive on by like they never saw it? How many times are you outraged reading a news report about someone ignoring the cries of a woman or child being raped? Sometimes the replies in this forum are frightening.

 

[shootistpd27]

I apologize, I knew not I was surrounded by liberals.

How could you possess a tool to stop a person in a situation like that and not do anything. If you cannot use your right to bare arms in order to protect others as well as yourself, I am truely sorry that you are wasting that opportunity. I am a cop myself. I am trained in how to react in situations like that. But you can bet your kiester that if Im taking rounds from a bad guy on or off duty. I welcome anyone possessing a firearm, ccw or not, to help me arrange a meeting with the bad guy and God.

 

[gossamer]

I am a cop myself. I am trained in how to react in situations like that.

Thank God. It's just that not everyone who carries CCW is.

I welcome anyone possessing a firearm, ccw or not, to help me arrange a meeting with the bad guy and God.

Agreed. Unfortunately our welcoming their intervention may not be enough to keep them from being prosecuted in a lot of jurisdictions because they intervened in a scenario where they had no idea what the facts were. I just don't see myself being able to continue to protect anyone from jail.

 

[scottgun]

What if this woman had just killed or kidnapped someone and was being pursued by an undercover officer? Would you still intervene and possibly shoot? There's a dozen other possible scenarios. Theres at least two or three stories about people being gunned down in the headlines right now. A domestic dispute is the worst type of situation to try to intervene. The gun man in this situation is a crazy stalker who doesn't have any reason to live. Not someone I would want to risk my personal safety to confront.

There was just a case in Boulder where a dimwit held a BB pistol up to his girlfriends head in the drive thru at Taco Bell. Would you intervene and shoot that guy too?

There's countless situations where someone might be in trouble. Having a CCW doesn't give the power to act in other peoples business.

I am not a cop and I don't pretend to be one. I haven't had training. This isn't to sound cold or uncaring. But there's a lot of people out there with serious problems on their hands. In this case a woman with a psychotic stalker and killer. There's just too many risks with the idea of trying to save everyone who might have a problem. I am not equipped or prepared to take those risks. That doesn't make me a bad person, I just know my boundries.