A teenage mother shot and killed an intruder after a 911 operator said she was allowed to defend her infant son and herself with force.
Sarah McKinley, 18, killed Justin Martin with a single gunshot wound on New Year's Eve when he forced his way into her Blanchard, Okla. home and came at her with a long hunting knifeShe also holed up in her bedroom with a 12-gauge shotgun and a pistol, while she put a bottle in her three-month-old son's mouth.
"I've got two guns in my hand -- Is it okay to shoot him if he comes in this door?" McKinley asked the 911 operator.
"I can't tell you that you can do that, but you do what you have to do to protect your baby," the dispatcher told McKinley when she asked a second time. The call went on for 21 minutes as the men powered their way into McKinley's house.
Eventually, Martin kicked in the door and charged at her with a knife, but McKinley fired before he could injure her.
A twenty-one minute response time? Sounds like they have the same staffing problem we do. The offender was dead on the scene and his accomplice surrendered later, so it was a happy ending all around.