WT Forums

Crime & Courts

Armed Beauty Queen Fatally Shoots Intruder in Florida Home Invasion
By Cristina Corbin
Published March 22, 2011
| FoxNews.com

Florida beauty queen Meghan Brown, right, shot and killed an intruder with her pink .38-caliber handgun during a home invasion March 12 (FoxNews.com).
When a burly ex-convict forced his way into a posh Florida home last week, he had no idea what awaited him -- a 25-year-old beauty queen with a pink .38-caliber handgun.
Meghan Brown, a former Florida pageant queen, shot and killed 42-year-old Albert Franklin Hill during a home invasion March 12 at the 2,732-square-foot house she shares with her fiance in Tierra Verde, Fla.
Hill barged into the home at around 3 a.m. after Brown responded to a knock at the front door, according to a police report. He allegedly grabbed the 110-pound Brown around her nose and mouth and dragged her to an upstairs bedroom.
The woman’s fiance, Robert Planthaber, said in an interview that he was quickly awakened by the altercation and ran to Brown’s side.
\"I attacked him and took a severe beating to the head,\" Planthaber told FoxNews.com. \"But I got him off of her long enough for her to scramble to the room where she keeps her pink .38 special.”


Police say ex-convict Albert Franklin Hill, 42, forced his way into the Tierra Verde home where he was shot and killed by Brown, a former Florida beauty queen.
Brown, who reigned as the 2009 Miss Tierra Verde, snatched her gun from a nearby bedroom and shot the suspect several times – hitting him in the chest, groin, thigh and back, her fiance said. Hill was pronounced dead at the scene.
Panthaber, a 42-year-old arborist, said he believes he and his fiancee were targeted because of their wealth. He claimed a pizza delivery man and possible accomplice staked out the home for three months before Hill attempted to burglarize it.
“We live in a very prominent area and my fiancee wears a $60,000 engagement ring,” he said. “The pizza man knew we had money because sometimes we needed change for a $100 bill when he came to deliver pizza.”
Hill had a criminal record stretching back nearly three decades -- including arrests for burglary, battery, drug possession and grand theft. He reportedly served a 13-year prison term in 1987 and was released in September after serving a fourth term behind bars.
Detectives with the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Robbery/Homicide Unit are still investigating the crime but believe the motive was robbery, according to local press reports. They say they haven’t yet determined the relationship, if any, Hill had with the couple. A police report said the ex-convict demanded money before the altercation between Hill and Panthaber ensued.
Panthaber, meanwhile, said he and his fiancee are lucky to be alive. He said he purchased the pink handgun for Brown last Christmas and that the two had gone to target practice together.
“She was not a good shot at the range,” he quipped.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/03/22/ar ... z1HXgSL4qA

1. Good on her for doing the right thing, although she should have had her gun with her, pink or not, when she went to the door in the first place, or even better, sent her fiancy to the door while keeping him covered, or even better than that, just called 911 when she heard banging on the door and let the cops deal with it.

2. By the sounds of it, they really kind of set themselves up for it, just being typical rich idiots. Who in their right mind asks a pizza delivery guy for change for $100? That is just stupid! However, judging by how much they've flaunted their wealth in the news article, I guess it's to be expected. Maybe they just feel, 'whats the point of being rich if you don't get to rub other people's noses in the fact that you have more than they do?'

So tactically she really screwed up from the start, and if it hadn't been for her luck in getting to the gun, they'd have been dead. As it was, boy friend gets pummeled, she gets roughed up but at least there was a happy ending due to luck.

I don't choose to trust my life to luck.

Good story and thanks for passing this on. I just love reading these stories in American Rifleman in their \"Armed Citizen\" section.

_________________
Slow is Fast, Fast is Slow
Violence may not be the best option, but it IS an option

Great story and good for her, but if i learned anything from watching horror movies, you NEVER answer the door at 3am.

If i was in that situation, and someone knocked on my door at 3am, my boyfriend would not let me near the door.....lol he would have looked and been armed.

_________________
\"I dream of a better tomorrow, where chickens can cross the road and not be questioned about their motives\"

The Armed Citizen is my all time favorite recurring column in any magazine.