Grumman wrote:Simon_Jester wrote:...As a result of this (plus of course people just plain lying), you can get situations where a man who's just killed someone says "He was threatening me, I defended myself," when what the security camera will show is that after an exchange of insults, he tackled the guy from behind, then stabbed him twelve times with a knife....
Then
that man should be punished. That's not an excuse for zero tolerance bullshit where finding an innocent man guilty of attempted murder against the armed robber who had just shoved a gun in his face is considered acceptable collateral damage to protect a lie you've built your legal system on.
Except that if someone shoves a gun in your face,
and then leaves, deciding to kill them out of revenge is not okay.
Once you set a legal precedent that it
is okay, what comes next? Is it okay to follow the guy home and ambush him? Or stalk him, work out where he leaves, break into his house and kill him? Is it okay to get three or four of your friends to come along and make a family feud of it?
Where, and more to the point
on what legal grounds, do we draw the line?
The best we can say about Mr. Pierre's actions is that they were done "in hot blood-" That he had understandable psychological reasons to be angry and to act without considering the nature or consequences of his actions. Thing is, ripping someone's arm off "in hot blood" is still illegal; you don't get permission to mutilate people just because you're angry and the "scared" neurotransmitters are still flooding through your veins.
So the standards for what reasonably should constitute "self defense" for legal purposes have to be quite restrictive, because there's a huge category of frankly criminal violence, certainly undesirable violence, which starts with a threat to someone's "pride." Me hitting someone with a car after they are walking away from a successful armed robbery is not me "defending myself," it is me acting to salve my pride.
Doing so defends every single one of Sam's future victims. Sam is not merely an innocent man thrown into perilous situation where he made a split-second, arguably incorrect decision. Sam deliberately forced Pierre into that situation for his own criminal ends. Whether Sam's gun jammed or he simply decided not to murder Pierre in cold blood because he handed over the shoes, there is no guarantee that the next time he does it will have the same result.
Sam goes to jail anyway. He's behind bars. Likely would have been anyway in this case, because the transaction between them is a matter of record and Pierre could easily have identified Sam to the police.
Or are you saying Mr. Pierre's actions were justified because they inflicted (possibly fatal) harm on a criminal likely to commit future crimes?
And again, where do we draw the line, and on what legal grounds?
Is it legal to wait for the armed robber to start walking away, then draw a gun and shoot him in the back? Is it legal to follow him home and shoot him there? Is it legal to shoot a criminal who attacked
someone else? Is it legal to do so on the strength of the accusations of the alleged victim- because we call that "lynching" and there is a profoundly ugly history in the US of what happens when 'ordinary citizens' are able to lynch accused criminals with impunity.
Before you say this is a slippery slope argument, consider. If I'm not misunderstanding you, you have just argued "it's okay to commit assault, battery, mutilation, and presumably death as long as your target is a criminal who poses a future threat to other citizens, and it doesn't matter whether
you personally are in any danger at the time you launch your attack."
Once you accept that as a valid legal argument... honestly, where does one draw the line about which homicides are 'justified' because the target 'needed killing?'
But on the other hand, you can also argue that Mr. Sam didn't hurt anyone physically, and that the total extent of his crime was the theft of a pair of shoes. Whereas Mr. Pierre tore someone's arm off, an injury that will cripple them for the rest of their lives. Mr. Pierre's motives may be easier to understand, but the nature of the offense is very grave. Assault with a deadly weapon is a serious crime, armed robbery is a serious crime... but so is attempted vehicular manslaughter.
Society can live with a man like Pierre. If every single person in the world was like Pierre society would still function, and function well. As long as you don't make a living out of threatening to murder innocent men so you can steal their shoes, Pierre has given you no reason to fear him.
You can't know that.
You only know that Pierre tried to kill someone for committing a crime against him. He had good reason to know a crime had been committed... but lots of people think crimes have been committed against them. Some of the acts in question aren't actually illegal.
Maybe Pierre would also have hit someone with his car for wronging him in some other way. Would it be safe to be his ex-girlfriend? His ex-girlfriend's new lover? Would it be safe to evict him from a home for failing to pay his rent? For posing a public nuisance? Would it be safe to fire him from a job? What if he shows up drunk to work and you're harming him by firing him- his capacity to restrain violent impulses is diminished,
and you have just harmed him,
at the same time. And we already know he has a history of committing extreme violence against people who 'wronged' him in his own mind, regardless of whether the law permitted it or not.
Again, I understand Pierre's motives. But that doesn't make his actions legal.
A person who feels entitled to use violence against people who have wronged him, regardless of whether they pose a present danger or not, is a threat to innocent bystanders, just as much as an armed robber is.
There are more ways for crime to become a problem for society than just the stereotypical "brutal young mugger."
