The Gas Station Was Closed but What a Man Apparently Saw Rigged Up Inside the Store Had Him Taking Pictures

Someone pulled up to a closed gas station, peeked through the convenience store's glass doors and saw something that had him taking photos.

The images showed strings attached to the front door and the door of a beverage refrigerator. On the refrigerator, waiting to swing open toward anyone who broke through the front door, was a shotgun, another string attached to the trigger ready to pull.

"Southern hospitality I guess," the person who posted the photos on Imgur quipped, saying that his brother took them in Mississippi.

Welcome to Mississippi.

Now, there's always the potential that these photos were part of a setup, but even so, they've sparked a conversation about the legality of booby traps. In a Reddit thread about the photos, the top comment says that such booby traps are "illegal because the trap is indiscriminate, and could kill someone with a legitimate need to enter the building (like a fire fighter.)"

The International Code Council's International Fire Code prohibits "pitfalls," which are the "intentional design or alteration of buildings to disable, injure, maim or kill intruders."

According to USLegal.com's definition, people who set up a booby trap on their property that can inflict harm on a person could be liable for the injury or death that occurs, even if that person were entering the property illegally.

A case in 1999 involving a Wisconsin man who booby trapped his cabin after it was burglarized three times saw both the shot suspect and the cabin owner who set the trap getting jail time.

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Front page image via Shutterstock.