Break-in. (Exercising the Right).

Fu Tan, 48, acquired the Sun Hing Chinese Food Carryout in West Baltimore, Maryland, about four years ago. He and his wife live in rooms above the restaurant.

In early May of Last year a thief broke into the apartment while they were away and stole about $300 in cash and some $1,700 in valuables. "When I had those items and money stolen from me," Tan told a newspaper, "I felt, well, they just took things from me. I'm not going to make a big deal. Let's just forget about it." But his attitude was understandably different a few weeks later when, on June 3, 2001, another intruder broke into the second floor apartment while Tan and his wife were in the building.

Mrs. Tan was working as a cashier in the store at about 11:45 p.m. when a customer informed her that a man was breaking into the apartment through a window. She told her husband, who grabbed his gun and a flashlight and went upstairs. He confronted the intruder in a dimly lit room and told him to freeze. "I couldn't see his face or who it was," he told the Baltimore Sun, "and suddenly he lunged at me." Tan fired a number of shots, one of which struck the intruder in the upper torso. Howard Augustus Turner, 37, jumped through the window, fell to the ground, and ran about 100 feet before collapsing. He died shortly after midnight at a local hospital.

Tan told Sun reporters: "I feel very bad in my heart that I had to shoot him, but I had no choice."