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Home invasion is the crime of entering a private and occupied dwelling, with the intent of committing a crime, often while threatening the resident of the dwelling. It is a legally defined offense in the United States, Australia, and New Zealand, and applies even if entry is not forced. It can also apply if someone is invited into a home and remains on the premises after being asked to leave by the resident.

Home invasion differs from burglary, which is usually defined as unlawful entry into any occupied or unoccupied building, with intent to commit one of a list of specified offenses. Home invasion covers an intent to commit any crime.

Home invasion may be accompanied by other crimes. Home invaders commit breaking and entering, and are sometimes intent on assault, robbery, rape, or murder.

It is commonly held belief that home invasion is a minimal threat to the average person and usually involves invaders who have a personal knowledge of the home and its owner, however the factual basis of this belief is uncertain.

Few statistics are available on home invasion as a crime, because it is not technically a crime in most states. Persons charged with "home invasion" are actually charged with robbery, kidnapping, and assault charges. But law enforcement has been seeing the increase in "home-invasion robberies" since at least June 1995, when "home-invasion robberies" were the topic of the cover story of The FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin. They state the crime is considered an alternative to bank or convenience store robberies, which are getting harder to pull off cleanly due to technological advances in security. In this same article, the FBI recommends educating the public about home invasion. Before the term "home invasion" came in use, the term "hot burglary" was often used in the literature. Early references also use "burglary of occupied homes"^[1] and "burglar striking an occupied residence"^[2]

Gated communities are promoted by property developers as a way of being safe from this crime.

According to an Oxford English Dictionary (OED) draft entry for March 2004, the first published usage of the term in its modern sense is a November 1973 article in the Chicago Sun-Times. The OED also cites a use of the term in the 1989 novel Toxic Shock (ISBN 0-575-04372-5) by Sara Paretsky.

Asian Americans, particularly Vietnamese Americans, are disproportionately represented among victims and perpatrators of home invasion robberies.^[3]

Perhaps the most well-known home invasion of all time is the November 15, 1959 quadruple murder of the Clutter family by Richard "Dick" Hickock and Perry Edward Smith in rural Holcomb, Kansas. The murders were detailed in Truman Capote's world-famous "nonfiction novel" In Cold Blood.

Most recently, two paroled criminals were charged with six counts of capital murder during a home invasion into the Petit family home in Cheshire, Connecticut on July 23, 2007. During the invasion, the mother died of asphyxiation due to strangulation and the two daughters died of smoke inhalation after the suspects allegedly set the house on fire. The men were charged with first-degree sexual assault, murder of a kidnapped person, and murder of two or more people at the same time. The state attorney is seeking the death penalty against the suspects.[2]

Another home invasion occurred on November 26, 2007 when Washington Redskins star Sean Taylor was murdered during an overnight home invasion of his suburban Miami home. Four defendants were charged with this crime.^[4]

Many U.S. states include defending oneself against forcible entry of one's home as part of their definition of justifiable homicide.

Connecticut Congressman Chris Murphy has proposed making home invasion a federal crime in the United States.^[5]

[edit] See also

Castle Doctrine in the United States

[edit] References

1. ^ Lawrence Southwick, Jr., "Guns and Justifiable Homicide: Deterrence and Defense," 18 St. Louis U Pub Law Rev 217 (1999). page 227.
2. ^ James Wright, Peter Rossi and Kathleen Daly, Under the Gun, Aldine 1983, page 15.
3. ^ [1]
4. ^ "SEAN TAYLOR MURDER: Men arrested held without bond". WINK News. 2007-12-01. http://www.winknews.com/news/local/11995026.html. Retrieved 2008-04-04. 
5. ^ "Murphy seeks to make home invasion a federal crime". NY Times Co.. 2008-04-02. http://www.boston.com/news/local/connecticut/articles/2008/04/02/murphy_seeks_to_make_home_invasion_a_federal_crime/. Retrieved 2008-04-04.