I don’t see a single good reason for bringing charges to begin with in this case.

Lloyd Jamal Whitaker Jr.'s departure on Sept. 29 from the home he had shared with Carolyn Taylor did not go smoothly.

He had made several trips to his car with boxes of belongings from the house in the 1300 block of Enfield Avenue.

But Taylor, 33, told police that he had choked her during one of his trips back to the dwelling, and she had locked the door behind him and put a .22-caliber pistol in her pocket.

When Whitaker, 28, kicked in the door and choked her again, she fired a shot downward to get him away from her, she said. The bullet lodged in Whitaker's pelvis, and he bled to death from what appeared at first to be a superficial wound.

Taylor pleaded guilty in January to involuntary manslaughter, and Richmond Circuit Judge Richard D. Taylor sentenced her yesterday to serve three years and four months in prison.

Let’s go back over that one more time.

When Whitaker, 28, kicked in the door and choked her again, she fired a shot downward to get him away from her, she said.

In other words, she engaged in her HUMAN RIGHT to defend herself from a violent attacker. In a civilized society, what she did is called justice.

I love the comment from this idiotic prosecutor.

Deputy Commonwealth's Attorney Diane Abato told the judge that Taylor could have left the apartment or called police to keep the confrontation from escalating. "But as so often happens in this city, people arm themselves and think that solves the problem," she said.

Yeah, she could have. Doing so would have relegated her to the status of victim, if not corpse. Instead she stood up on her own two feet and decided to be a human being, possessed of the right to be secure in her home. For that she is going to jail.

Ms. Abato, Carolyn Taylor did solve the problem. She put down a violent animal before it could harm her again. She deserves the thanks of society, not its condemnation. You should be ashamed of yourself for contributing to her victimization. And if you are ever attacked, I hope you have made yourself as defenseless as believe Ms. Taylor should have been -- and that you are lucky enough to survive unharmed until help arrives.