Don't...uhhh...I dunno...have crazy neighbors?

[KD5NRH]

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent ... dd429.html

Fatal Plano confrontation leaves few answers

12:00 AM CST on Monday, December 10, 2007

By SCOTT GOLDSTEIN / The Dallas Morning News
sgoldstein@dallasnews.com

PLANO – Police are investigating what set off and ultimately killed a 25-year-old Plano man who assaulted his wife and broke into the home of an armed neighbor who tried to intervene.

Qwame Lombardo was pronounced dead at a local hospital shortly after he collapsed in the 3000 block of Bandolino Lane, police said.

Police said the altercation early Sunday morning between Mr. Lombardo and his wife began in the 3600 block of Big Horn Trail, where the couple lives.

It was unclear how or why the couple ended up several blocks away, barefoot, near a creek behind Rob Herrington's home.

Mr. Herrington's wife woke him about 7:30 a.m. after she spotted Mr. Lombardo attacking his wife on the edge of the creek, Mr. Herrington said in an interview Sunday night. The Navy veteran ran outside and shouted at Mr. Lombardo to stop as the woman screamed for help.

"I told him to quit it, and he basically just growled at me," Mr. Herrington said.

Mr. Lombardo then apparently shifted his ire toward Mr. Herrington, who went back into his house and retrieved a handgun and a cellphone to call for help. By the time Mr. Herrington got back outside, Mr. Lombardo was approaching the black metal gate leading to the Herringtons' back yard.

Barefoot and wearing only a red T-shirt and gray shorts on a chilly morning, Mr. Lombardo continued after Mr. Herrington, now armed with the handgun. Mr. Herrington said he kept three or four paces in front of Mr. Lombardo as he came through the gate and approached the rear of the home.

Mr. Lombardo's wife attempted to restrain him, even as he continued to assault her as he approached. Mr. Herrington never fired his weapon.

"If I had shot him, I would have killed her too."

Police didn't identify Mr. Lombardo's wife.

Mr. Herrington backed into his house, locked the door and told his wife and his mother-in-law to leave, which they did.

"I locked the back door, and I told him 'Do not come in this house,' " Mr. Herrington said.

Mr. Lombardo briefly stopped and sat down on a green bench just outside the back door, Mr. Herrington said. But within seconds, he stood up and rammed his shoulder into the door, bursting through and falling on the living room floor.

"He even entered this house with a person holding a handgun," said Officer Rick McDonald, a Plano Police Department spokesman. "That in itself makes you wonder what he was thinking."

Mr. Herrington said Mr. Lombardo "looked like a wild animal. , He said several times he was going to kill me."

His gun drawn, Mr. Herrington backed toward the front of the home and out his front door, he said. Mr. Lombardo followed him until he tripped over an extension cord powering Christmas lights on the home.

Plano police officers arrived as Mr. Lombardo crawled to the sidewalk in front of the house and collapsed on his side, Mr. Herrington said. Officers questioned Mr. Lombardo before he was taken to the hospital, where he was pronounced dead, Officer McDonald said.

The frightening portrait of Mr. Lombardo in his final minutes was a stark contrast to how a neighbor remembered him Sunday night. Rena Wilkins said Mr. Lombardo and his wife moved into the home next door with their two young children over the summer.

Ms. Wilkins said she last saw Mr. Lombardo on Saturday afternoon, when he stopped by to invite her husband to go bowling.

"The time we spent with them was always pleasant," said Ms. Wilkins, who described Mr. Lombardo as a "really calm, low-key kind of guy."

Ever notice that the neighbors never say, "well, yeah, he was a completely psychotic loser. We were just waiting for somebody to have to shoot him?"

[TX Rancher]

It’s possible it was a reaction to medication, even a prescription. Maybe he mixed alcohol, maybe he inadvertently took to many, maybe his metabolism just didn’t respond well…There could be any number of reasons.

Of course, he could just be a wacko, but this is pretty bazaar behavior, especially sitting down outside a locked door, then standing up and breaking through the door while the home owner is on the other side with a firearm. Then essentially driving the homeowner through his house and out the front door, all the time facing a weapon in the owners hand, and then just collapsing in the front yard. The medical folks arrive, but the guy ends up dead by the time he reaches the hospital…all this and the home owner never fires a shot, or strikes the guy in any fashion.

According to the news account, the only potential injury to the guy was when he tripped over an extension cord and fell to the ground…not typically thought of as life threatening.

Give it some time, maybe the coroner will come back with some additional information.

Illegal drugs aren’t the only ones that can mess your life up…

[kdom]

Okay, how many of us would have continued to retreat out the front door after the guy broke down the back door? I'm thinking the sound of my back door being broken down would have been immediately followed by BANG, BANG...

[BobCat]

If you can get him to focus on you, so you can lead him away from your family and out the front door, that's a good tactic.

As long as he is not an *immediate* threat, you have time and don't absolutely *need* to shoot him.

Not sure I'd have such presence of mind in the situation described.

[PAR]

Okay, how many of us would have continued to retreat out the front door after the guy broke down the back door? I'm thinking the sound of my back door being broken down would have been immediately followed by BANG, BANG...

I doubt that there are that many people out there that would have let get to the point were he's chasing you out the front door.

[PAR]

If you can get him to focus on you, so you can lead him away from your family and out the front door, that's a good tactic.

As long as he is not an *immediate* threat, you have time and don't absolutely *need* to shoot him.

Not sure I'd have such presence of mind in the situation described.

Backing him out the door might be an option but not so sure about backing yourself out of the house is a good tactic, too many things could go wrong and it might be you that trips over the extension cord or something else.

As for immediate threat, we all have our own levels/views but crashing through a locked door, chasing you through your house and threats that he's going to kill you even though you are armed is pretty high up there on the list.

[TX Rancher]

Bobcat:

I had written earlier that I thought drugs, possibly a legal prescription, could be involved…but that doesn’t change the situation much for me. I’m afraid if a guy forced his way into my house through a locked door and came at me even though I was aiming a firearm at him, I would pull the trigger until his forward momentum stopped. But that’s a key point for me, if his forward motion stopped, in other words he’s no longer advancing on me, I probably would not pull the trigger and would try to further deescalate the situation.

If I read the article right, the homeowner said he didn’t shoot since he thought he would hit the guys wife, who apparently was hanging on and trying to stop her husband. This may well have given me reason to pause also.

For one thing, her physical location could be important. If she was in front of the guy, I certainly wouldn’t shoot through her to hit him. Also, being in front, she would be a natural barrier to his forward motion that he would have to go around, so I would have more reaction time.

The only thing I can say for sure is the situation ended with nobody dead but the guy, and the homeowner did not have to fire his weapon…I certainly can’t say he was wrong in this particular case.

[DoubleJ]

Here's the original post on this story
here

[rm9792]

I am starting to want a crazy nutball neighbor. These quiet, unassuming neighbors are just too dangerous!

[kdom]

Backing him out the door might be an option but not so sure about backing yourself out of the house is a good tactic, too many things could go wrong and it might be you that trips over the extension cord or something else.

As for immediate threat, we all have our own levels/views but crashing through a locked door, chasing you through your house and threats that he's going to kill you even though you are armed is pretty high up there on the list.

That's along the lines of my thoughts on this...You retreated to the house for safety, leaving the house entails a whole new set of "complications" that will let the BG close distance on you quickly. Tough choice to make, but obviously the home owner in this case made a good decision.

[dukalmighty]

"I told him to quit it, and he basically just growled at me," Mr. Herrington said.

I"m guessing he encountered a werewolf,and he woulda needed silver bullets to stop this threat

[Rex B]

"I told him to quit it, and he basically just growled at me," Mr. Herrington said.

I"m guessing he encountered a werewolf,and he woulda needed silver bullets to stop this threat

LOL and I thought I was the only one that thought that way

[lawrnk]

"I told him to quit it, and he basically just growled at me," Mr. Herrington said.

I"m guessing he encountered a werewolf,and he woulda needed silver bullets to stop this threat

LOL and I thought I was the only one that thought that way

My kid and I growl at each other. Of course he is a toddler and he finds it hilarious. Now I know I should not have laughed, but when I read the growling, I did laugh a little.