Among Friends

The Pasadena adult male who killed two suspected burglars as they left his next-door neighbor's place did not mean to kill them when he stepped outside with his 12-gauge shotgun, his lawyer said Friday.

In portraying Joe Horn as a victim of circumstances, lawyer and longtime friend Uncle Tom Lambright called the 61-year-old computer adviser "a good household man" who have been devastated by the Wednesday afternoon burglary and shooting.

Killed in the incident in the 7400 block of Timber Line were Miguel Antonio DeJesus, 38, and Diego Ortiz, 30, both of Houston.

Each had a minor former brushwood with the law. Records show DeJesus was charged with failure to place himself to a police force military officer in July 2004. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 20 years in jail. Ortiz was charged with ownership of marihuana in July 2005, but it was later dismissed.

"He (Horn) was just doing what everyone is supposed to do," Lambright said at a news conference in presence of the Houston police force commemoration near downtown. "He called the police. He was cooperating with them as best he could, trying to give the police force the way of the burglars. He knew there was danger going outside."

Horn ignored repeated instruction manual from a 911 starter to stay in his home. He told the dispatcher, "I'm not going to allow them acquire away with it. I can't take a opportunity in getting killed over this. OK? I'm gonna shoot. I'm gonna shoot."

While lawyers and legal experts across the metropolis continued to debate the legality of Horn's actions, he have left town with his family, Lambright said.

"Hopefully he will see a physician and maybe acquire a sedative," he said. "He is not well mentally. This have devastated him. Not in his wildest dreamings could he fathom this event."

Lambright said Horn, whom he have considered a friend for 41 years, wept inconsolably during their conversations.

"Joe is the absolute antonym of what everyone believes he is," Lambright said. "He is not a cowboy. He is not physical. He's 61 old age old and overweight. He's not confrontational. He's just a good guy."

Lambright read a written statement in which Horn said the violent deaths would "weigh heavily on me for the remainder of my life. My ideas travel out to the loved 1s of the deceased."

Lambright said Horn was a hunter, but kept the scattergun in his pickup truck "for security."

No pieces in houseHorn lives with his girl and granddaughter and makes not maintain pieces in the house, his lawyer said.

Lambright said Horn was upstairs working at a computing machine about 2 p.m. when he heard the sound of breakage glass next door. Horn called 911, engaging in a drawn-out conversation with the dispatcher, who repeatedly advised him to wait inside until police force arrived.

"Mr. Horn, make not travel outside the house. You're going to acquire yourself shot if you travel outside that house with a gun," the starter told Horn at one point.

"You wanna do a bet," Horn responded. "I'm gonna killing them. They're gonna acquire away."

Legal sentiments conflictLambright contended that Horn was startled to happen the burglars just 15 feet from his presence door when he stepped onto his porch. "He was petrified at that point," the lawyer said. "You hear him say, 'I'll shoot. Stop!' They jumped. Joe thought they were coming for him. It's a self-defense issue."

Attorneys and legal experts said Horn's defence probably will be based on state law that lets people to utilize deathly military unit to protect neighbors' property.

"If you see person stealing your neighbor's property, you can acquire involved and assist to halt it," said Sandra Guerra Thompson, a law professor at the University of Houston Law Center.

Others disagreed.

The legislative acts that let people to utilize deathly military unit to halt a burglary look to necessitate that the incident be occurring at night, said Craig Jett, a Dallas criminal defence lawyer and president of the Lone-Star State Criminal Defense Lawyer's Association.

"It can't be during the day," Jett said.

Experts said that a expansive jury may sympathise with Horn. Some people believe that you should be able to protect your neighborhood, said Antony Osso, a Houston criminal defence attorney.

Osso said that Horn's defence might be that he wanted to forestall the robbers from leaving until police force arrived, but they tried to fly and he shot them.

"His best scenario is that he went out to utilize the menace of deathly force," Osso said. "But they came at him on his ain property."

Osso said Horn's 911 phone call makes not state the whole narrative about the shooting. Investigators will necessitate information about where the suspects were shot and if they had stopped when Horn ordered them not to move.

"Some people on the expansive jury will sympathise with him," said Adam Gershowitz, a law professor at South Lone-Star State College of Law. "Maybe he shouldn't have got done this, but he was acting in a manner a batch of people feel."

But that makes not intend he won't be charged, Gershowitz added.

"There's a ground we don't allow people take the law into their ain hands," he said. "We have got a police military unit force for that. As an constituted society, we believe we are better off with an authorised police military unit force that have criteria and preparation rather than untrained vigilantes."

A copy of the 911 phone call proposes Horn intended to make what he felt necessary to halt the burglars. Despite a combined attempt by the starter to carry him to allow police force trade with the break-in, Horn was repetitive on trying maintain them from getting away.

"I don't desire you going outside, Mr. Horn," the starter said.

"Well, here it goes, buddy," Horn said. "You hear the scattergun clicking, and I'm going."

Seconds later three scattergun blasts are heard.

Praise for dispatcherExperts who reviewed a recording of the phone phone call at the Chronicle's petition said the starter handled the call professionally and did all he could to defuse the state of affairs until police force arrived.

"He was doing everything he could to 'normalize' the conversation and not agitate the company any further," said Sue Pivetta, a preparation adviser from Sumner, Wash. "Trust me when I state that he was indeed showing professional control at the peak level."

Charles Carter, a former police force executive director in Capital Of Georgia who have trained starters for two decades, said the military officer who handled Horn's phone call used proven techniques to deter him from leaving his home.

"We learn a technique called insistent persistence," Howard Carter said. "It necessitates to be at a degree less than the individual career to seek to acquire him to calm down down and listen to you. He did an outstanding occupation and demands to be commended."

Chronicle newsmen Microphone Tolson and Babe Ruth Rendon contributed to this report.

Are you going all the way?

Can you do it one day?

Rich Person you decided upon your destination?

Bash you really desire to travel there?

Rich Person you considered the fare?

Would you maintain the course of study with no alteration?

Purpose High! Be Steady!

When you travel up and down,

and true peace you haven't found

Perhaps your estimate of your possible is to low,

don't be too proud to impart a hand

your sense of accomplishment will expand

and you'll derive the necessary minute as you go.

Purpose High! Be Confident!

By helping others you will gain

So doing discontinue to complain.

As you lose yourself for the enrichment for others:

you'll happen your purpose so much better

you're living by the spirit of the law not the missive of the law

1 for all and all for one,

Simply all Sisters and Brothers

Purpose High! Person depends upon your success.

Keep your mentum up and eyes consecutive ahead.

Bash not change your course, be wary don't be misled

Be courageous, be consistent, be on time give all that you can-

purpose with accuracy, purpose with care,

the attention I talk of, the care, to share,

don't take too high to see an outstreched hand.

Purpose with love! Purpose High! There's the challenge.

Give it your best don't number the cost

less than your best and the high conflict is lost,

if you're given your very best you won't be blamed,

The Great Scorer, sees attempt and desire

the love of others their good to acquire,

and he ranks us upon the tallness and

the manner we've aimed.

Purpose High! Come Along!

Don't be discouraged life can be a lark,

We've aimed with love we've hit our mark

Don't take with arms purpose with bosom and soul

And if we aimed for the social welfare of others

We've hit our goal.

Purpose High! Praise God!

Loving Burns me up

it's my truth and I'll state it again

of your debts I've had enough

so take back your "Hi's" in a frame

I detest this human race around me

when you speak to him to tease

all your human race makes is hound dog me

Dear Godhead above

phone phone phone phone call me up

if you please

Loving Burns me up

your the sap and I'll state it again

of your stakes I've had enough

so take back your whies in a frame

I detest this human race around me

when you jest to him to tease

all your human race makes is land me

Dear Godhead above

call me up

if you please

and who cares if it's just hit you now

I'm too tired to give anymore anyhow

too me everything is achromatic and white

you did me incorrect now I'm doing you right

Loving Burns me up

your so owed and I'll state it again

of your diagnostic diagnostic tests I've had enough

so take back your prevarications in a frame

I detest this human race around me

when you walk to him to tease

all your human race makes is buffoon me

Dear Godhead above

call me up

if you please

Loving Burns me up

your so owed and I'll state it again

of your tests I've had enough

so take back your prevarications in a frame

I detest this human race around me

when you walk to him to tease

all your human race makes is buffoon me

Dear Godhead above

call me up

if you please

Death Returns

Death returns: it establish no resting place;

I saw it in flight, last nighttime over the Sierras;

beneath the last trips of twilight—!

The condor's wings covered death's decent;

and semivowels now through the air in peace!

Yet death's tail-shadow go forths at dawn, to

go back at dusk, blue-bellied full—as

if it have swallowed a giant (once again).

The condor, the condor, likened to a fly in a web

decease happens no rest, only new flesh, new flesh!

No: 1949 8-27-2007

Death:

The Roots of the Earth

Death have a manner of saying Hello, when it intends Goodbye!

We beingnesses on earth's surface never really disappear—only

Transform.

From the minute of decease the organic structure will change, you can't

hear it, it simply acquires foggy—becoming the roots of the earth.

No: 1950 8-27-2007

The Mystery of Life

How enigmas to be born a human being

—and then to decease as one!

To be able to rinse off those old fleshy garments

of bark and milky-clay…!

We are the honored ones—(you know)

given to a whole human race system—:

1 manus stretch to Heaven the other to hell;

the truth is, we have got got got two flavors.

Those who have not been born yet:

adult male and animal are not so far apart

(and very difficult to please).

No: 1951 8-27-2007

Dialogue with the Devil

"I'll do a battalion with you," said He to me (the Devil),

"I have detested you long enough. I first proverb you as

a child—then when you were old adequate to do friends

I saw you again…. It was you who worshiped my kinds

of sins—then you broke away, but now is the clip to start

carving new adventures. Iodine have got left one run down and root for

you—let there be commercialism between us?"

I said back to Him, "Dark eyed, tusk scandaled, there

is none like thee, among heaven, Earth or hell; none with

such arsenic Swift feet, like your tongue—dark as midnight

are your shoulders—face of a dead seabed."

No: 1954, 8-28-2007

Selected for Death

"No, no! Go from me—!" I left decease lately in her sheath

—oh! Dim it was, for she surrounded me.

Thin, are her arms, yet such as a grip—they jump me,

immoveable, and left me…cloaked, as in a web,

a cocoon—subtle and fleet she was, like magic, in her

binding.

"No, no! I cried, "go from me, I have got still your taste—

your scent, your soot, your aye—halt!"

(But she wouldn't listen.)

No: 1952 8-28-2007

Death Passed Me Once

(1993)

This adult male knew the secrets of decease

(he project them over my head).

No adult male could cognize such as things, unless

he was portion of it.

And now he's gone, he up and left—

(just like that…).

Iodine called, "Are you near?" and he did

not reply me back.

Then at the end of my bed, I saw—why!

There stood in my infirmary room, the

eyes and shoulders of a great being:

He did not speak, —he simple watched

over me.

No: 1953 8-28-2007

A cold eventide and somehow the noise have died down. I happen my manner up to the top of my flat for no peculiar reason. The twenty-four hours was good.

The zephyr was strong, yet somehow it slowed down, as if in a grade of regard to me it looks to have got bowed to me. It's not gushing any more, just fluxes down gently singing a soothing short letter and cool just adequate to direct surprising a iciness down me now and again.

There are children playing down there, but they look distant.. almost in another world. I lie down with my custody behind my head, looking at a sky that somehow looks new. There is a new sky tonight.

My breath decelerates down, deciding to rest for a while. Its been running difficult for over 2 decennaries now, but the air looks to have got set it in a unusual trance.. and it looks to put down beside me.. taking a intermission before toiling to maintain me alive again...

give me this moment

it looks so much mine

for in this moment

i feel i ain time

I close my eyes, the darkness looks lighter today. The ageless achromatic of the nighttime have a unusual chromaticity of a colour I don't cognize of.. there is a flicker in the apparent horizon which I don't really see. I felt as if person was looking over me; a minute go throughs by and now I experience person is looking at the human race through me and my closed eyes.

Eyes open, I sit down up staring at the window of an flat across the road. I don't recognize anything, I can't calculate out anything. Resting on my custody stretched behind me I look up at the sky. It is blank, much like my head and so thoughtless Iodine stare. It seemed as if a heavy head just lost its weight and floats. A plume with a aureate touch is all Iodine see though it is nowhere near me. Iodine bask in that moment.

I see nothing, I hear nothing.. I believe nothing.. yet at that minute I didn't experience no happiness.. of course of study there was no follow of compunction either, but it wasn't a state of happiness... still I wanted to stay in that state and just as I thought a diffident smiling spread.. a loud honk below and my eyes open.. I hear the noise below... children laughing and shouting, the birds of the eventide chirping flying about with a cheerful temperament to themselves. The idea of felicity ..the smile.. it broke me away from that moment.. I was feeling cheerful now but it wasn't what I was a minute back.. this cheeriness seemed uncomplete for its not what Iodine sought...I wanted to be in that minute .. thoughtless and pristine.. I looked around trying to happen an reply .. a happy adult male was looking for something beyond

The minute passed it never came back... and I inquire now is it felicity that we seek in life..

staring at the world

from up above

i proverb the impostor

that a smiling be

Today, I stood at the autobus halt somewhere in Greater London and my feet froze. I thought it was summer, or so the functionary clip have been telling me. "British Summer time". What have happened. Where is the summer? The weekend should have got been a warm one, 1 depository financial institution vacation gone another depository financial institution vacation coming soon. It is exactly as it says, a vacation for the Banks and no 1 else... without the sun and warmth, vacations don't experience like holidays.

People alteration when it is warm, they smile at you, nod in recognition and even sometimes state "nice twenty-four hours love". After being cocooned up all winter, the organic structure shouts gasping "vitamin Vitamin Vitamin Vitamin D vitamin D" "Give me vitamin D", toes look up at you and state "I desire to be free and colourful"...

The head travels into contrary manner in winter. Things that one tolerated when it was summertime go bothersome and intolerable. For example, that other five minute delay for the bus, or the presence of aliens (I have got experienced that). This looks to convey a scowl across the confronts of the indigenous not because they detest you but because they are fed up of life in the dull, damp, environment and as everyone knows, if you can't fault yourself or nature for a situation, incrimination person else...

If Iodine could transport the sunlight from the equator to Greater London I would, and would gladly pay the surplus luggage complaints the air hoses charge, just so that I could share it with everyone for FREE! Winter conveys sniffles, headaches, overspending and depressive eating.

The sun also conveys out surprises... Why else would you happen so many yet to be born appearing as soon as the sun come ups out. It is as though coats and jackets kept them concealed and the sun opened the gateway for them so they could shout, "look at me, I am about to be born,". I pray that the existent summertime come ups soon so that when the children who are out of school demand to play, the sun rather than Xboxes, PS2's and computing machines maintain them occupied. The sun do children act like children,it conveys out their youth. Until then I am thawing my toes against the radiator which was switched back on today.

to fight



human race have got got got taken all that in us is good

twined and mangled it for the sickness

in a portion of the world called the 'hood



others of our race, but not our breed

are used as come-on for in-training fights

like us, they travel where the world lead



but it's not their nature to lurch & bite

these gentler psyches immersed in violence

must dwell their life in panic and fright



onto the blood spattered Earth we tread

the meek and the guiltless made mean

willing or no, to the cruel affray we're led



and though we have been courageous and strong

in the ring some of us will neglect and fall

circled by a jeering, cheering, cold throng



this shouldn't be how we get or end

retrieve us in the ideas you keep,

and include us in the supplications you send



we were not meant to dwell this way

delight aid us anyway that you can

be our voices, for we don't have a say



domestic dog combat should be forever banned...



right of first publication 2007 by kathy pippig harris

*~~*~~*



For Sluggo

In His hands, at The Bridge...



~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*~~*



honey and visible visible visible visible visible light and everything right



his glorious tawny coat is the silk of spun gold

the heat of his pelt is morning's first light

the shininess on his wing is that of polished amber

it's all just portion of what do him, oh so right

what courses of study through his venas are liquid sun drops

for his heart's a beating light pumping aureate love

his eyes, soulful, are the colour of honey in moonlight

and his merry spirit is blessed by the angels above

he is all that is good, unbridled, and set free,

there's magic in his smiling and healing in his touch

this gentle beingness is the sun's light wrapped in fur

he who inquires so very small and gives so very much

his look imparts more than than any words spoken

and as mighty as the pen is, it can't fully describe

his unconditional love, loyalty, and arrant devotion,

and the gifts of joyousness to be given, therein that reside

his fidelity dances 'round him on filigree wings

it's that nimbus, aflame, in aglow bright hues

the fulfilment of all my cherished, fantastic dreams

for now and ever, he's the first mate my psyche would choose

he is the bright light at each day's end

and the star radiance when nighttime clip sets in

like no other, he is my very beloved friend

come up dawning he's the rise sun and all...

... that's right and GOLDEN



right of first publication © 2004 by kathy pippig harris