Sunday: Gun shop defends defence 

Greg Carvell, 33, is a firearms dealer and father of two.

He is facing a criminal charge after he shot and wounded a man inside his father's shop.

The man, 29-year-old Ricky Beckham, allegedly entered the shop brandishing a machete, demanding a gun and making threats to kill.

Carvell and shop manager Bruce Motley were in the office at the time working on orders.

"He [Beckham] was waving [the machete] around in the air saying 'I'm going to kill you'," says Motley.

Carvell says he reacted the only way he could. He grabbed a semi-loaded pistol kept in the office drawer and repeatedly demanded Beckham put down the machete.

He eventually shot him in the stomach.

"Then when he [Beckham] started screaming 'give men the guns or I'll kill you' and then he come at Greg and Greg fired. [Greg] lowered his gun deliberately from his chest area to a place where he was going to wound him," says Greg's father and shop owner Ray Carvell.

Ray Carvell, who was not on the premises at the time, believes the ramifications of inaction would have been much greater.

"If he [Beckham] did get out there and he started killing people with these things...it would be terrible. I couldn't live with myself if this happened I can tell you that now," he says.

Motley also believes Greg did the right thing.

"I don't see he had any other option to do what he did otherwise probably both of us would have been sliced up...No doubt at all," he says.

Now almost four months later Greg Carvell faces a criminal charge, which if proven in court carries a possible prison sentence of up to four years. 

He faces a charge under the Firearms Act, not for the shooting, but for unlawfully possessing the firearm which was used in the shooting.

"He has not been charged with the shooting of the intruder, we have found that he was justified in law in protecting himself. He has been charged with the possession of a firearm," says detective senior sergeant Simon Scott.

Police won't comment on why they laid the charge or whether the gun used by Greg, that was sitting in the desk and partially loaded, was a factor.

Arms regulations state that unless a firearm is locked up or being shown to a customer, it must be in a dealer's physical possession.

Ray Carvell says the pistol, which was kept in the office as a safety measure, was in Greg's control. But he says it is a grey area of the law.

"It was still in his control. Control is [physically holding the gun], or control is...'I'm controlling the situation here now, I can get that gun now so it's under my direct and immediate control'," says Ray.

Basically, the police say Greg had every right to defend himself by shooting an armed intruder, but no right to possess the gun in the manner he did.

Ray says the irony is that if the gun had been in the safe, his son may have been killed.

Greg says the incident was the longest 20 seconds of his life but it is a decision he defends.

"It was a dire emergency. What if this guy had gone out with a bunch of guns and started shooting people in street? What would they say about me then?" says Greg.

While Beckham has been charged with assault with intent to rob, Ray believes Greg's court charge is worrying for ordinary people trying to protect themselves from harm.

"Is it not so hard that the police look after the people that are law abiding and not worry about being so bloody politically correct?" he says. 

Greg says he has replayed the event his mind and has tried not to let it affect him, but believes he took the right action.

"There was nothing different I could have done. If I hadn't have done it I would be dead."