Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

November 21, 2011

Last September, 90-year-old Willie Williams was startled to see armed men outside his Lubbock, Texas home. One of them shattered a window and apparently fired a gunshot.  The elderly man grabbed a shotgun and returned fire. In the ensuing exchange he received a gunshot wound in his throat.

Had the prowlers been common thieves, they most likely would have been driven off, thereby permitting the wounded man to call for emergency medical aid. Unfortunately, they were police officers ? which meant that the already-wounded Williams was further traumatized by being handcuffed so tightly that he endured a second injury on the way to jail. That injury was compounded by the familiar and inevitable perjury committed by the officer in the police report, which claimed that Williams had fired the first shot ? despite the fact that the original call sheet indicated that the police had shot first.

Williams, who acted in self-defense, was within his rights to use lethal force to defend himself. Yet he was charged with ?aggravated assault on a public servant.? Fortunately a grand jury declined to indict the elderly man on that charge. The police officer who shot Williams should be prosecuted, and the prosecutor who filed the charge against the victim should be removed from office.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.