Riverton Man Shoots Pantsless Home Invader- UPDATE

zRiverton Utah Shooting

Running around a neighborhood with no pants on is never really advised. At best you’ll likely be a cringy YouTube star within an hour or so. At worst you will be arrested. However, if you add a knife to your pantsless party, you’ll likely be in for even worse than that.

This is what happened last month in Riverton. The full story of the incident that has already been covered here on Utah Concealed Carry told the story of the drunk 36-year-old Derrick Palmer and his attempt to not only expose himself but also flash a knife at the armed homeowner.

The situation ended with what appeared to be a cut and dry case of a defensive gun use. However, local authorities still had some questions about the incident, and in continuing their investigation a more perfect picture was painted of the events of that night.

While it was known that there was a struggle between the homeowner, it was not made clear to reporters until now that there were actually multiple scuffles and that each one was won by the homeowner who gave Palmer the chance to leave following each “round”.

He states that he got in front of the male, later identified as Derek Palmer, and pushed him away. Palmer kept coming back at him, he kept pushing him away. When the male would not leave, (the father) took him to the ground and put him in a headlock,

That is text from the Riverton Police warrant that in the time since the incident has been published for the public to see.

On top of that, according to the same warrant’s text, it appears that the homeowner gave EVEN MORE warnings to Palmer about his intent to use deadly force if Palmer did not leave by his own choice.

(The homeowner) stated that he chambered a round into the gun at this point to show that it was loaded. Palmer then pulled out a knife and asked him if he would shoot him if he stabbed (the man) with the knife. (The homeowner) replied that he would, 

So it appears that after an even closer look into the case, we find that the defensive shooter was even more in the right for doing what he did. Not many people in that situation would have had the patience to handle the situation that our defensive shooter did.

It goes to show that this shooter, like many others did not want to have to pull the trigger. It was a case of a defensive gun use, yes, but this new information has shown that even in a case of defending your family and property from someone meaning it harm, pulling the trigger is not something that is done easily and without thought. But between the psychological toll of shooting someone versus the psychological toll of seeing a family member hurt or worse, it looks like this homeowner made the right choice.

So given the new updates to this story, would you have acted the same way as the homeowner did? Would you have had his level of patience with the belligerent threat that Derrick Palmer was that night? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

And if this case interests you, it and many DGU’s like this from around the country are covered every week in the Concealed Carry Podcast available on iTunes and the Google Play Store.

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