HOFSTRA STUDENT WAS SHOT, KILLED BY COP TRYING TO RESCUE HER

MINEOLA, N.Y. (TheBlaze/AP) — Authorities say a police officer’s bullet killed a New York college student during the response to a home invasion at an off-campus home.

Nassau County homicide squad Lt. John Azzata said Saturday night that Andrea Rebello was killed by a police officer as she was being held in a headlock by a masked intruder.

Azzata says the police officer opened fire as Dalton Smith made a motion to fire at the officer early Friday morning.

Azzata says the officer fired eight shots, hitting Smith seven times and Rebello once in the head, killing her.

Earlier Saturday, police said Smith had an extensive criminal history dating back nearly 15 years and was wanted on a parole violation related to a first-degree robbery conviction.

Dalton Smith of Hempstead, N.Y. On Saturday, May 18, 2013, police identified Smith the alleged home invader involved in the fatal slaying of a New York college student early Friday morning. Police say that Smith, who was currently on parole for robbery in the first degree, was the person attempting to rob the off-campus home where Andrea Rebello was shot and killed. (Credit: AP)

Smith was identified using fingerprints just hours after funeral arrangement were made for Rebello, 21, a popular public relations major who was with her twin sister Jessica and several other students in an off-campus house at the time of the break-in. The other students were unharmed.

Smith, of Hempstead, Long Island, had been arrested for robbery in the first degree in 1999, promoting prison contraband in the second degree in 2000, robbery in the first degree in 2003, assault in the second degree in 2003 and robbery in the second degree in 2003, police said.

Azzata said in a statement that a warrant was issued for Smith on April 25 for absconding from parole.

The campus has been shaken by the incident.

“Today is the last day of finals and this should be a happy day on campus; but it’s not,” said Hofstra freshman Scott Aharoni of Great Neck, as he passed through the area rife with yellow crime-scene tape Friday. “It’s really sad.”

Wow, I feel terrible for the family of the victim and for the officer who’s round went astray. Damn.

FEARLESS MOM IGNORES GUN-WIELDING HOME INTRUDER, RETRIEVES HER SHOTGUN AND FIRES THREE BLASTS

A mother in Mandeville, La. woke up in the middle of the night to find an armed home intruder standing in her bedroom doorway. The intruder pointed the gun at the woman, likely expecting her to cower in fear and obey his every command.

That didn’t happen.

The fearless mother instead screamed at the armed criminal, seemingly startling the man and sending him retreating from the bedroom, The Times-Picayune reports. The woman then retrieved her shotgun from her closet.

Shotgun in hand, the mom first went to check on her children to make sure they were safe. Then she went after the man who broke into her home, who has been identified as Joseph Hall Rogers.

When she got to the doorway, the woman fired three rounds at Rogers as he scrambled to escape with his life.  Luckily for the home intruder, all three rounds missed their target.

Police and a K-9 unit later searched the neighborhood and eventually located the drunk man. Rogers reportedly resisted arrest and was tased prior to being taken into police custody.

Rogers has been charged with home invasion and resisting an officer. His bond had not been set as of Tuesday afternoon, according to police.

NO SHOTS FIRED: HOME INTRUDERS DECIDE NOT TO STICK AROUND AFTER SEEING THEIR ‘VICTIM’ HOLDING AN AR-15

Two home intruders, one holding a handgun, broke into a New York apartment on Tuesday and waited at the bottom of the stairs for a potential “victim” to come down. While their intentions are unknown, it is clear they were criminals up to no good.

After hearing some noise coming from the basement, Christopher Boise, a student at Rochester Institute of Technology, went to check it out.

“They were waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs,” Boise told WHAM-TV. When they saw him, the man with the gun pointed the barrel towards him.

Relying on pure instinct, Boise let out a blood-curdling scream in order to alert his roommate, Raymond, who is also a RIT student.

“It wasn’t like a, ‘I stepped by stepped on a piece of glass’ kind of scream,” Raymond said.  “So, I instinctively went to my gun bag.”

In that bag was a AR-15 semi-automatic rifle, one of the very guns at the center of the current gun control debate.

About five seconds after he retrieved his gun, one of the intruders began opening the door to the room where he was waiting. But he was ready.

“By the time I had it out and ready, one of the men came at my door, slowly opened it, saw that there was a barrel on the other side and from there backed out,” Raymond recalled.

After seeing the barrel of an AR-15 staring them in the face, the two men fled from the apartment. No shots were fired and no one was injured. In fact, the rifle wasn’t even loaded at the time of the incident, Raymond said.

It’s not the kind of story that always makes national headlines as bullets never went flying, but it certainly shows why so many Americans are adamant about protecting the Second Amendment as it is written in the U.S. Constitution. It also shows that, in some cases, a gun doesn’t even have to be used in order for it to protect its owner and others.

“I’m happy he saved my life. I was very thankful he had his (gun),” Boise said of his roommate.

Rochester Police Chief James Sheppard said Raymond’s gun was legal and effectively protected his property.

“We’re thankful that no one was injured,” he said.

Police reportedly found BB rounds near a broken glass window. It’s unclear if the handgun used in the home invasion was a BB gun.