As reported, Theodore Turcott’s Wasilla, Alaska home had recently been broken into twice. When he saw an unfamiliar car pull into his driveway, reportedly he grabbed a gun and hid in his bathroom. A woman allegedly broke into his home, and then proceed to his bedroom where he stored his money. Turcott allegedly confronted the woman with his gun drawn, and detained her until the police arrived. While they were waiting for the police to arrive, the woman’s 4 year old daughter is said to have walked into the home. The woman has been identified by police as Diana Palin, the half sister of Todd Palin, who is the husband of 2008 vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. The 4 year old girl told police she’d been to the house a couple of days earlier, an affidavit stated. Diana Palin, however, said she had never been there before, and mistakenly thought it was a friend’s house.
Gun ownership led to a good resolution of this alleged home invasion, as it often does. The home owner, the small child, and even the alleged home invader were all unharmed. Had this man not had a gun, it is possible that he may have been harmed, or may have needed to use physical force against the alleged home invader to defend himself. In either situation, the outcome would have been especially sad, given the presence of the young child.
It is also worth noting that this self defense gun use, like the majority of self defense gun uses, did not result in anyone dying or even a shot being fired. The flawed but still famous anti gun rights “study” which found gun owners were 43 times more likely to be killed with their own gun that to use it in self defense didn’t take the many cases like this into account, leading to its long since discredited finding. For the record, gun owernship has been shown to save 65 lives for every 2 lives lost, and the majority of lives lost are due to the intentional actions of criminals, who likely wouldn’t obey a gun control law anyway.