Family Concerns During and After Self Defense

An Interview with Doris, Mike and Alex Ooley

Interview by Gila HayesOoley Family

When armed citizens discuss training, two philosophies emerge: one is the alpha family member training to be the sole protector of the family. The other is collaboratively working to create an all-family safety team with vital roles filled by parents, spouses, children and anyone else sharing the home.

Some months ago, this journal published an Attorney Question of the Month column about statements made to investigators by witnesses, including family members. Commentary contributed to that discussion by attorneys Mike and Alex Ooley alerted me that as armed citizens, firearms instructors and lawyers, the Ooley family has worked through the issues, decisions and preparation needed by many young armed families. I asked if they would chat with me about how families can better prepare for family safety and to weather the legal aftermath if a family member uses force in self defense. I was very pleased when they agreed.

Mike and Alex Ooley are attorneys practicing law in southern Indiana. Doris Ooley, a former Army Captain and bank officer, along with her husband Mike and sons Alex and Ryan, teaches firearms skills and safety through the O2 Gun Group. The Ooleys are graduates of Massad Ayoob Group courses.

Photo: (L-R) Ryan (who could not join us for this conversation), Alex, Mike and Doris Ooley share their experiences as an armed family that trains together to address dangers both during and after an incident.

I thoroughly enjoyed their discussion of both the legal and practical reasons for including spouses and children in defense preparations, and I know members will benefit from sitting in on our visit, too, so we switch now to Q & A with Doris, Mike and Alex.

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President’s Message

Marty eJournal column pix

by Marty Hayes, J.D.

I hope you all are doing well, and if not well, at least okay. Here at the Network we are getting by with all our staff working from home. If you need to contact Gila or me, best way is by e-mail, as the main phone line is answered by William from his kitchen table. We hope to bring everyone back to the home office later in May and get things back to normal.

In the midst of all this doom and gloom, we here at the Network received a nice little pick-me-up (and before you get the wrong idea, I am not talking about day-drinking)! Yesterday a member sent us a little gift with her membership renewal, in the form of a joke book.

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Attorney Question of the Month

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This month’s topic is drawn from a question we are currently being asked by Network members who are concerned, as are so many, with exposure to the coronavirus, we greatly appreciated our affiliated attorneys’ comments on the following:

With the threat of contracting the COVID-19 virus on everybody’s minds, members are asking what is the appropriate response to someone threatening them with exposure to COVID-19? May an armed citizen legally use deadly force to stop such a threat?

The responses were so numerous that we will share the first half of the responses this month and then wrap up the second half of these commentaries in the June edition of this online journal.

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Book Review

Those Who Wander: America’s Lost Street Kids

By Vivian Ho
Hardcover: 220 pages $11.99
Publisher: Little A (September 1, 2019)
ISBN-13: 978-1503903739

Guilt by Accusation: The Challenge of Proving Innocence in the Age of #MeToo

By Alan Dershowitz
Hardcover: 168 pages $19.65
Publisher: Hot Books (November 19, 2019)
ISBN-13: 978-1510757530

Reviewed by Gila Hayes

Staying home during the coronavirus problems should have made April a great month for reading, but for me, it was a month full of nearly double hours at work owing to a gubernatorial Stay Home order restricting my staff to their residences. Instead of tackling a new book, I took the opportunity to finish a couple of books I’d started months ago, and while I doubt these works are essential to Network members’ educational pursuits, each included different viewpoints that may create interest in subjects on which most already have strong opinions.

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Editor’s Notebook

GHayes

The Wrong Question

by Gila Hayes

Think about how we phrase questions. Often, questions contain the seed (and sometimes the entire root and branch) of the answer desired or are couched in terms so far from reasonable as to elicit little more than, “No!” as an answer. I’d suggest that it is a lot more productive to pose questions that leave the respondent open to explore his or her knowledge and apply it to the subject under discussion.

Recently, questions on internet discussions about shooting to avoid intentional exposure to coronavirus, a handful of which percolated into Network members’ queries, missed the point of self defense entirely. Following reports from Missouri, North Dakota and New Jersey of arrests for intentionally coughing on another person to frighten them about contracting the disease, a variation on the question soon began circulating amongst armed citizens that asked: “Can I shoot to avoid being coughed on or spat upon by someone claiming to be infected with the corona virus?”

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About this Journal

Sm ACLDN Inc

The eJournal of the Armed Citizens’ Legal Defense Network, Inc. is published monthly on the Network’s website at http://armedcitizensnetwork.org/our-journal. Content is copyrighted by the Armed Citizens’ Legal Defense Network, Inc.

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