This story is close to home for me. Franconia is a town I know well. From The Boston Globe, “Feud Turned Deadly In NH“:
New Hampshire authorities said yesterday that they will not press charges against a former Marine who stepped into a deadly shooting and killed a 24-year-old high school dropout who had moments earlier fatally shot a police officer…
Kenney pulled out a .45-caliber handgun and shot McKay four times. As McKay stumbled across the road, bleeding, Kenney ran his vehicle over the dying officer…
The elder Floyd drove his Tahoe into a spot between McKay and Kenney as a shield and told his son, who is in his late teens, to run to the officer’s cruiser and radio for help.
The elder Floyd picked up McKay’s gun from the ground and ordered Kenney to drop his weapon. Kenney refused, and Floyd saw Kenney appear to be reloading, Conte said. Floyd then shot and killed Kenney.
What’s slightly unnerving is the assumptions underpinning the Bostonian reporters’ opening paragraph – that somehow a quick-witted citizen-hero is the guy who has some splainin’ to do. Mr Floyd is exactly the kind of fellow you want around when trouble strikes. He seems not to have been armed himself, but he figured out what was happening very quickly and managed to retrieve the one available weapon from the dead officer. Rather than talking about “not pressing charges”, the state of New Hampshire ought to be thanking him for his bravery and improvisation.