Reasonable force

[shadesofgrey]

A masked man, uninvited in my house at night is a threat to my life whether he is actually stealing anything or not.

You'd want to be careful with this one though. Legally, even in your own home, you generally have to prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that your life or the lives of your family were in imminent mortal danger. Plenty of people have killed an unarmed intruder in their house and gotten in serious trouble for it. The movie "Felon" shows this premise pretty well.

[DavidOdden]

Legally, even in your own home, you generally have to prove beyond the shadow of a doubt that your life or the lives of your family were in imminent mortal danger.

I believe that is false in every state in the Union. For example, in New York the law (as expresses in Penal Law 35.15) says that

A person may, subject to the provisions of subdivision two, use physical force upon another person when and to the extent he reasonably believes such to be necessary to defend himself or a third person from what he reasonably believes to be the use or imminent use of unlawful physical force by such other person

and if

he reasonably believes that such other person is using or about to use deadly physical force. Even in such case, however, the actor may not use deadly physical force if he knows that he can with complete safety as to himself and others avoid the necessity of so doing by retreating; except that he is under no duty to retreat if he is: (i) in his dwelling and not the initial aggressor;

The jury instructions state clearly that the burden of proof rests on the state to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant's use of force is unjustified:

the defendant has raised the defense of justification, also known as self defense. The defendant, however, is not required to prove that he was justified. The People are required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was not justified.

and specifically

On the question of whether the defendant did reasonably believe that deadly physical force was necessary to defend ___ from what he/she reasonably believed to be the use or imminent use of such force by ___, it does not matter that the defendant was or may have been mistaken in his/her belief; provided that such belief was both honestly held and reasonable.

In other words, the law does not require you to lay down and die if attacked.

[shadesofgrey]

the defendant has raised the defense of justification, also known as self defense. The defendant, however, is not required to prove that he was justified. The People are required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was not justified.

Well sure, essentially this is saying that the defendant (homeowner) is innocent until proven guilty, with which I totally agree. However "reasonably" is a word that is constantly objected to by counsel on both sides of the argument. The law is deliberately vague in this sense because the law leaves the interpretation of "reasonably" or "reasonable person" to a jury of the defendant's peers. At which point most of the conclusions are drawn by precedent. I only know this because I had some reasonably long exchanges with a gun rights lawyer and his experiences in representing both aggressors and defendants in Philadelphia (admittedly a city not known for a reasonable approach to gun rights).

The law certainly gives the benefit of the doubt to the homeowner, and there's no way I wouldn't defend myself against an intruder based on the law, but all laws are open to legal interpretation in the courtroom and there have been many cases of homeowners acting their own interests but being found guilty of an excessive use of force. Which obviously is a misinterpretation of the law, but that's why we have lawyers.

[shadesofgrey]

The Hitler example was out of line. Nobody should take any comparison to Hitler seriously unless there IS a REAL comparison, IE with Stalin, Pot Pol, et cetera.

Heh. I have an old rule that if you ever bring up Hitler in an argument you automatically lose.

[sanjavalen]

In an Objectively run legal system, people delegate (they do not give up) their right to retaliatory force. They are not allowed to mete out judgment; however, they are allowed to defend life & property with a reasonable amount of force ("reasonable" being defined here as any force that the weilder thinks is proper, given the fact that they are responsible for the use of it, ie, if you detonate a 1 ton bomb to stop a man from leaving the apartment you leased, your landlord would have a fairly good case against you.)

Your fundamental right is your right to your own life, but your right to your own property is a derivative of that, and cannot be separated from it in principle without abrogating the entire idea of the right to your own life. Therefore, I think it is proper to use force (including lethal force, with the above caveat) to stop someone from attacking you, who is breaking into your property, or who is fleeing with your property. It is not, on the other hand, proper to do so if the bad guy is simply fleeing.