Just for the record, the judge did dismiss the case, saying, in part,
Regarding Massachussetts, it was the case in the '70s that it wasn’t a defense against a murder charge that the person was in your house illegally unless, basically, you tried to escape and they wouldn’t let you. See Commonwealth v Shaffer (1975).
But Governor Dukakis pardoned that woman and the Mass. legislature changed the law to read:
I agree with GusNSpot that if your life is threatened, or those of your loved-ones, use of deadly force is acceptable (I don’t think anyone is arguing against that). However, I have had cases where people have entered my home accidentally (there was a real estate showing next door, contractors coming to the wrong address, neighbour’s friends coming over at night - but to the wrong house, etc)… I probably wouldn’t shoot on sight, and I assume GusNSpot will use a bit of discretion before his policy of “shoot first, ask later” is put into effect.
That said, if it’s 3am, your doors are locked, and you hear windows breaking, that’s a different matter altogether. If people break into my home under such circumstances, I’d do my best to not “shoot first, ask later”… but realistically such an option might not be available. If I sneak a peak and see a single dude with a visible gun, I’d probably take the first shot with no warning, to be honest.
This is interesting. I’ve always thought that if they “give you an out” then you should be morally bound to take the out, instead of taking their life (provided that it seems reasonable that they just want your money, and no more).
But as for “you have no way of knowing if it will end at the money” part… Usually muggings end there. In the specific case of on-the-street-muggings, how would their demands escalate? They’re not gonna ask for your kidney. What more could muggers want? (I’m willing to make an exception for women, and drunk/drugged/non-rational muggers, obviously… but that’s something you should be able to assess when being mugged - as I detail below.)
True, they can always retreat, so it’s not a forced situation.
My main issue is this:
If the assumption is that it is a straight mugging, then I fail to see how there is any justification for killing the mugger. I can’t find any conceivable moral ground for killing someone due to the fact that they want to forcefully take your wallet.
I’ve never been mugged, I’ll be honest, but I have had friends who’ve been mugged almost a dozen times each. And I can say that the muggings fall into 2 very specific categories:
The perpetrator is drunk or on drugs, or is in desperate need of drugs. This has happened in shitty neighbourhoods. Guns are never shown, but threats of guns abound. Knives are occasionally pointed at the victim. The attacker is nervous, uncertain, belligerent, etc. Sometimes after the mugging, the attacker(s) beat the shit out of the victim. None of my friends have been female, but if they had been, I could see the situation escalating to sexual assault. In cases like these, I’d be tempted to draw a gun and shoot at the first sign of anything but immediate retreat. (Unless of course there’s several attackers.)
The attackers are professionals. They hit victims in upscale neighbourhoods. They may have a car as well. There’s always more than one of them. If they claim to have a gun, they show it immediately. They are not drunk, or distracted, but are fully focused on you and your hands. Usually they demand you get on the ground immediately and they search you for weapons, wallets, phones, etc. A second attacker is usually keeping an eye out. Sometimes there is a 3rd. Once they have your stuff, they either tie your hands, put on a blindfold, and tell you to count to 100 before moving a muscle. They then leave. They don’t try to carve out your kidneys, they don’t try to rape you, they just want your money/stuff, and that’s it.
In case #1 there is reason to believe that no matter what they say, you might end up hurt no matter what. Using a weapon as proactive defence might be okay. But in case #2, I can’t see why anyone would even attempt at drawing a gun. It would be suicide.
My friend worked as a security guard in one of the slummiest neighbourhoods in my city. He was victim of #1 quite a bit. Having a triple blackbelt, he occasionally felt the need to subdue the attackers, and it often worked out well. My other friend lives in a very nice neighbourhood, but walks home late at night often. He’s been the victim of three cases as described in #2. He’s complied with them, because while he felt scared, he also felt sure that his life was never in any real danger, provided he complied with their demands.
I guess this discussion, and people’s opinions on it, are very dependant on what *type *of muggings we’re describing, and people’s personal experiences.
Based on my own personal experiences? I do think this statement reeks of selection bias, yes. By your own admission, you were in a bad neighborhood and on your guard already–how many times did you THINK something bad was going to happen and then it didn’t?
Maybe you get some kind of weepy wuss-thug out wherever you are, I dunno. Everyplace I’ve been, your average thug is either high on macho bullshit or meth, and either believes he can kick your ass (the former) or doesn’t care (the latter), and in either case is substantially likely to have been in more fights than “you” and thus have a much better idea of how to handle himself in them.
It doesn’t matter (the answer is none, the feeling of dread is when you see someone eyeing you up and you know exactly what is going to happen). If nothing had happened when I pulled a weapon, there would be no consequences, except if a cop saw it because handguns are completely illegal in Chicago. But considering the neighborhood at that time of night the chances of a cop being around were near zero.
I could’ve avoided an unneccessary beating if I had brandished a gun at the group that I saw coming down the street 2 blocks away unavoidably with bandanas on their faces at 3am. They also let me go into my own pockets, btw.
South side of Chicago. Gangsters don’t actually fight hand to hand one on one, they either shoot you or they administer beatings because they have a weapon and you don’t and/or they have 5x more friends than you do. Thugs don’t streetfight in duels which is the type of fantasy LARP crap you are talking about.
I don’t know why you would think some gang member is some quickdraw knife expert who will charge a gun, but your scenario is utterly stupid and shows you don’t have the faintest idea about gang members or being mugged.
Why in the Hell are you pulling a gun on someone you don’t intend to shoot? Even I know that the first rule of gun safety is “Never point a gun at anything you do not intend to destroy”. If you’re not intending to shoot, then the proper course of action is to leave your gun in its holster. Or at home locked in a safe, maybe.
Well to be fair, in context, I think he means that he is ready to shoot - but is also willing to give the guy a chance to back off.
You have clearly never dealt with NYC or Philly thugs then, or for that matter the kind of thug who’s robbing you because he feels his high wearing off. I’m comfortable saying you have a pretty wuss breed of thug up there.
Every mugging I’ve ever been a victim of or heard of, the mugger was within arm’s reach. There’s no “charging a gun”, there’s “punching the yokel who thinks he can draw and aim faster than I can take a step in and beat him senseless.”
The question is, anyway, “On average does having a gun increase your chances of getting hurt in a mugging?” The answer is 100% yes.
30 seconds to a minute advanced awareness? Why the hell were you still there? That’s plenty of time to get away from the perceived danger, isn’t it? It’s also plenty of time to pull out your phone, rather than your gun, and call for help. It seems that what might have helped in these three instances was not a weapon, but some common sense.
I find it amusing (literally put a smile on my face) YOU think I don’t have common sense when you think that calling someone on my phone will somehow help. You think a GUN will not help you in a mugging, but a freaking cell phone is?
Consider yourself lucky you live your sheltered little life where you have the liberty of thinking a freaking CELLPHONE will help you in a mugging, because you can “call someone”. :rolleyes:
I like how you take pride in thinking your gang members are somehow superman, but you are buying a myth. There is no such thing as a gang member who regularly fights one on one hand to hand. They lose everytime to someone who pulls a gun and murders them. This is true everywhere in America. I don’t think you should call a Chicago GD a “wuss” to their face since they will probably kill you. It doesn’t make you a “wuss” to use a gun over fists, just a more serious breed of violent criminal.
Life is not a videogame, people do not react instantaneously, especially when someone is a heartbeat away from pointing a gun at you. The natural human reaction is not to throw a punch, which probably won’t keep the person from shooting you in the belly anyway.
The only honest answer to that question without a pre-concieved agenda is “it depends on the situation.”
Uh huh. And the first option I inquired about? What were these scenarios in which you were aware of a threat in advance and unable to get away?
I’m overweight I can’t outrun anyone for two of the muggings, the third was on a moving traincar.
My bet upthread stands. I’ll give you an airsoft pistol (just about the same size as my carry piece, which is why I got it–for practice), conceal it how you like, then I’ll be five feet away from you and only attack once I’m sure you’re pulling the gun and not your wallet. $500, I will be unscathed with your gun in my hand at the end of it 7 out of ten times, and I’m a pudgy white guy and not a gangbanger. If I go for you and you’re handing me a wallet and not a gun, you win the bet instantly.
Look, the fact is, I know I’m right. I’ve played this scenario out, I’ve practiced quickdrawing on a close-range target. It Does Not Work in real life. Call it LARP bullshit all you want, it’s just plain and simple facts. You do not know if you are going to get a gangbanger who’s going to wet himself and flee, or if you are going to get a guy who’s going to beat you into the hospital for being an overweight white guy who tried to step to him.
Question for the legal eagles…
Suppose I get mugged and I have a firearm on me but don’t use it because I deem it too risky.
As the mugger is walking away with my cash, if I pull my gun out and shoot him in the back, would I be in hot water?
Thanks
Gus
Your bet is stupid because no one’s life is on the line, there is no potential jailtime involved, and the aggressor’s attention is fully focused on the wallet or the gun as opposed to Cops, or witnesses. He has no adrenaline from the danger. It’s rock paper scissors. So could you please stop dangling this idiotic Dungeons and Dragons scenario around? It has no parallel to real life whatsoever. Go play Call of Duty. I’m not going to respond to such idiocy anymore.
It’s funny how in your retarded scenario, the gun owner is a bumbling fool and the gang member is some quick draw knife expert and/or boxing expert with one punch knockout power. Stack the deck much?
That’s right Lady Derringer. Convicts have all sorts of rights that citizens don’t have.:rolleyes:
How does he plan to do all this without the back of his head?
Muggers are not all-powerful supervillians. Of course you are better off having a gun IF 1) you are prepared to use it and 2) he isn’t so close to you that 3) he is big enough to wrestle it away from you. I mean it’s not like anyone except the craziest crackhead wants your wallet so bad they are willing to risk death for it.
Dude, in my actual practice of this, both of us were pudgy 30-something white guys arguing if this were a valid gun self-defense scenario.
I lost. So now I report that I lost, and further based on my experiences that I don’t think it’s possible to win.
What’s your cite for this? I don’t recall you saying you had any experience with reacting to muggers with aggression, just for your spider sense.
Do you practice quick-drawing? Do you shoot tactical pistol? Do you have any actual experience with close-quarters pistol use? Have you ever responded to a mugger with the threat of violence?
If not, where do you get YOUR supposed expertise?
Regarding my scenario, I figure any potential challengers can spot me “not looking over my shoulder for a cop” since I’m already spotting them “the entire thread is about whether you’re more likely to get injured, which can easily happen even IF you shoot me”.
I was punched multiple times by gang members and never got even close to losing consciousness, so I would do fine if I pulled a gun and got lunged at with a punch, the mugger would still end up shot if I had a gun.
I’m not going to deconstruct how stupid your scenario is anymore.
So you have no relevant experience with the scenario, either mine or the OP’s, or with the concept of close-quarters fighting with weapons involved.
That’s all I needed you to admit. I’ll let everyone else judge your credibility.
How’d he lose the back of his head? I stipulated a center-of-cross-section shot, not a head shot. Are you claiming that you’re such an amazing quick-draw marksman that you can draw and get a headshot before he gets a shot anywhere into your torso with his already-drawn gun?