Well it really still all boils down to the situation in each case. Possibly even what the criminal is stealing. If I catch someone in my house, and he happens to be stealing one of my guns somehow, I can't just let him go, or he could hurt someone else with one of my weapons...I'll have to kill him if he tries to run a way with that. In this State, I do have the right to stop a felony, and I'd better make sure whatever it is he's stealing is not a weapon that he can use later. Now if it's a kid talking my tools and running away, I'll let him go and report it if I can't catch him, although I should be able to catch him if he's got the entire tool box, it's heavy! LOL!
All depends what's going on. More than likely if I hear noises in the house I'll secure my perimeter, call the cops...and anyone walks through the door of the room where I have secured the perimeter where my wife and I are, they will die. I have all in my favor if I secure my perimeter, if I go looking for a noise and start clearing rooms, I am taking some what of a chance there. It still
all depends on the situation though. Most times maybe when you catch a youngster they might be scared, but you still better be ready, cause there are some young people who are turning into hardened criminals at an early age. So I guess you best use some judgment when you catch someone, and you don't have a a long time to think about it. Of course there is always a possibility that whoever is stealing, might well be armed too...in that case, there is no way he is shooting first, it just takes one lucky shot to put me down. He would have almost Zero seconds to put it down and get down, any length of time that goes by before he puts it down is putting me or someone else in grave danger, and I will assume any thief that I notice is armed and in my house is intending to great bodily harm. Like I said earlier, you don't know what they will do when caught red handed, it might just be up to them how that goes. Seems lots of people are getting shot around here lately, mostly criminals. Last one was a guy broke into someones place of business, little did he know the guy that owned the business lived in that same building. The owner confronted him, the bad guy made a bad move, he moved toward the owner, and he is dead now, no charges pressed against the owner. That's the way it's been going lately in this part of Michigan. The self defense laws are pretty strong here now, a simple lunge or move toward someone during a situation like that is reason enough if it's late, dark, and things are tense.
Not long ago, a good guy chased two bad guys, and shot one in the backside, this bad guy happened to have a gun in his pocket. They got them both, one went to the hospital, the other to jail, no charges pressed against the guy that chased them, and it was not even the guys house where the kids where breaking in...it was a neighbors house, he was just watching out for the neighbor. He was also stopping a felony in progress...legal here.