IL: Should Victim who Disarms Robber get to Keep the Weapon?

In a small percentage of cases, a victim disarms an attacker.  The attacker usually runs off.  In one case, they even asked for the gun back!   My experience is that disarms by victims are considerably more common than disarms by attackers.   It is not hard to understand why.  The victim has a lot more to gain from a disarm; the attacker a lot more to lose if he continues the fight.   Sometimes the victim turns the gun on the attacker, as happen in this case in Chicago.   It happened in the 6600 block of South State Street, one of the most dangerous areas of the city.   From DNAinfo.com:

After the victim handed over an undisclosed item, he made a move for the gun, Antonietti said. During a brief struggle, the gun went off and Esper was shot in his back, court records show.

Esper ran off, and the victim gave the gun, a .22-caliber Taurus Ultralight, to police. Antonietti said officers recovered six live rounds and two spent rounds.

In a science fiction novel, the Probability Broach, people who disarm their attackers get to keep the weapons.  It seems a reasonable idea, once it is determined that the weapon is not legitimately claimed by another person.  There is no reason to destroy a finely crafted self defense tool like the little Taurus shown.   The victim took a serious risk in obtaining it. He accomplished a significant amount of societal good by preventing numerous future crimes to be committed by the attacker.  It only seems just that he should have it, after due process, of course.

 ©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
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