A senseless killing or defense of property?

This morning's editorial board meeting was dominated by a discussion of the tragic death of 14-year-old Quavale Finnell. Police say the Central Fairmont Elementary School eighth-grader was shot by Bennie D. Hall Jr., 61, of Kennedy Heights after he caught Finnell driving away in his 1994 Ford Taurus. Hall had cranked the car and left it running to warm up while he went back into his house.

I first heard about this story on the drive to work this morning. I'm sad to say that my first reaction was that Finnell would be alive today had he not been trying to steal a car. I don't like that side of me -- the side that defaults to advocating a form of vigilantism when it comes to protecting home and property. And what in the world was a 14-year-old doing at 6 a.m. outside his own neighborhood anyway?

Since then, I've changed my mind.

I'm seeing Finnell's mother cloaked by her infant children when police told her her son was dead. She's lost a son; they've lost a brother. The community has lost someone who possibly could have been reformed.

We haven't figured out whether to write an editorial yet or what we would say if we wrote it. Perhaps you can help. Was Hall wrong to shoot Finnell? Should he have thought it through? Why was Finnell in that neighborhood that early in the morning? As an underage driver in a stolen vehicle, was he wielding a 2,000-pound lethal weapon? Did Hall possibly save the lives of others -- children at a bus stop, perhaps, or early-morning commuters?

Let's hear your comments?