So pithy, so pertinent, so funny.
I just had to repost it.
You’re kidding, right? Since when does being sprayed with water by a known automated sprinkler system while uninvited on someone else’s property considered “assault”? That’s like sneaking on to someone’s property, crouching in front of a door, and then complaining when someone opens it and hits you in the head- good luck suing somebody for that. You did something stupid, and took the easily foreseeable (and extremely minor) penalty.
Man-traps are illegal in most localities (even “straw-man traps” like you mentioned), but automated sprinkler systems are not- they have a legitimate use and are quite common. One might even say a reasonable and prudent person would be aware of the possibility of automatic sprinklers and avoid them. Even motion-activated sprinklers have the benefit of gently discouraging unwanted dogs, cats, etc. on the lawn. They are not unheard of.
A rational person does not expect landmines when to go to knock on a door (in most neighborhoods). They should expect other hazards such as barking dogs, loose roller skates, and even automated lawn sprinklers. Of these, the sprinkler is the least damaging. How can anyone reasonably believe that they have a “duty of care” that extends to making sure uninvited, amply warned trespassers don’t get their feet wet?
So imagine that someone has a motion sensing alarm and a “No solicitors” sign, and a salesman comes on the property. The alarm goes off, startling the salesman and spills coffee on his pants. Has he been assaulted? According to the quoted argument, yes.
And how is a salesman that passes a clearly visible "No solicitation/trespassing/proselytizers/whatever sign is “going about his lawful business”? His “right” to be there has clearly been rescinded, and he has already been informed of this by the sign. “admitted liability” and “undeniable proof of premeditation”? Any reasonable and prudent person would quickly ascertain that they are unwanted and forego the essentially harmless pant-leg soaking that would ensue if they insisted upon acting like a boor.
Naturally there would have to be a ‘safe’ path to the house for the use of the household, invited guests, meter readers, and etc.
Why would anybody install a ‘motion-actuated’ sprinkler anyway. There’s no legitimate reason for inventing such a device. Do you actually want to have to run around the lawn in order to water it?
Knightrunner you have managed to misunderstand every single post in this thread. Well done.
We are, and have only ever been, discussing intentionally wetting people. That point has been made repeatedly by the OP and several othe rposters including myself. Go back, read the thread again bearing that in mind and if you still have any questions get back to us.
As it stands your posts are nonsense. For example:
"Since when does being intentionally sprayed with water by a known automated sprinkler system while uninvited on someone else’s property considered “assault”? "
Since forever. Read the links given. It was never not considered assault. Defintion of assualt varies by jurisdiction, but as rule of thumb if you intentionally cause someone harm, fear or distress by acting agianst their physical person, it’s assult. There is no law on the planet that says that automating the act is a defence.
For you to believe otherwise is ridiculous for the reasons already given. The rest of your posts are equally ridiculous.
Or better yet. Do it, then tell the officer that you admit you intended to wet the victim, but aren’t guilty because you set up the trap to be automatic.
Let us know how that works out for you.:rolleyes:
Good one. That made me laugh out loud.
I’d truly love for someone to explain why it’s so impossibly difficult to open the door and say, clearly, forcefully and straightforwardly “I am not interested, I will not ever be interested. Leave, and do not come back, and tell whomever dispatched you to not send anyone else here.”
In the case of both JW and Mormon doorknockers, it works.
That’s interesting and I wasn’t aware of that. My dream home would be far away enough from the road that I could not be contacted unless you call me on the phone and I am expecting you.
On what terms are those laws normally coached?
I don’t want them to leave when I tell them, I want them not to knock on my door at all. It took me a whole lot more than good luck, but I have finally managed. They think I am a jerk and throw resentful looks at my house when they go by, but they don’t knock anymore.
Well, I should. Those reckless bastards.
ETA:
This was basically what did the trick for me with the JW. It hasn’t done squat for that rag of the local free newspaper. The assholes walk on my lawn to drop their stupid paper which immediately is scattered away by the wind and I have to pick every page from every corner of my yard.
Doesn’t the fact that the intruder has entered onto someone’s property come into play at all? Would it make a difference if there were “No Trespassing” signs up? Or if the property owner first asked them to leave and they did not? And if you can’t legally spray someone with a hose if they are trespassing on your property, what on Earth can you do to them?
I’ve only seen two actually written, but I’ve been told by reliable (or atleats not normally unreliable) source that they exist in many places.
Of the ones I’ve seen one was simply along the lines of “You must allow clear access personal from a public road to the normal point of entrance to the building”. No other detail on exactly what that meant was given that I can recall, but it did specify that it precluded keeping savage dog in your front yard. It was quite possibly written for exactly that purpose.
The other was along the lines of “Any occupant within a dwelling must be able to be contacted at all times by any person via the nearest public road”. IIRC the thrust of it was that the bailiffs, cops and fire wardens need to be able to contact anyone in your house any time of the day or night, but that the lawmakers acknowledged that anyone could use it.
As for how these laws apply in acrages ike your dream home, I don’t know. They may not apply outside urban areas. A lot of laws don’t.
The entire reason the automatic sprinkler was considered okay was because the salesman *knowingly *put himself in the path of the sprinkler. For him to cry foul at that point would be disingenuous, at best.
Also, the OP’s second post (the one I specifically responded to) doesn’t say anything about ‘intentionally’ wetting anyone. It is talking about deterrence. I thought the fact that he talked about putting up a sign (or having the sprinklers already on when they arrived) would have made that clear.
Everyone had pretty much agreed that you couldn’t simply hose the guy down. But, with an automatic system (with a sign posted) he could make an informed choice. Any reasonable person would make the obvious choice. If he gets wet- he did it to himself. Claiming otherwise is like backing your car into someone, and then claiming they are at fault because you were hit in the rear.
By the way, you misquoted me. Please don’t paraphrase my words and put them in quotation marks. Anything will look like ‘nonsense’ if you quote it incorrectly. I wouldn’t mind so much if your changes hadn’t altered the entire meaning of the post.
To Mk VII
The main legitimate use for a motion-activated sprinkler would be to startle pests (dogs, etc.) away from a garden or flowerbox. Presumably one would turn it on manually for actual watering purposes.
I’d like a bowl of pudding and a night on the town with Zachary Quinto. We can’t always get what we want when we want it.
No, because they aren’t an intruder. They are a person in the cours eof their legal business.
See the previous thread linked to by Kimmy_Gibbler.
To whether you could be charged with/sued for assault? No.
And before you ask you can’t knife the paperboy for ignoring your “No Junk Mail” sign either. Putting up a sign doesn’t allow you to commit assault with impunity. It might allow you to undertake a civil action against someone who infringes.
See the previous thread linked to by Kimmy_Gibbler.
If you ask someone to leave and they don’t, then your options open up a lot more. IANAL but even I know it varies way to much with jurisdiction to generalise. In some places I know you can then use reasonable force to eject them. However I don’t think that wetting them with a hose would be considered as contributing to ejecting them. So you still can’t hose them down.
Sue them.
That’s why we have civil justice systems in the civilised world. It’s for settling cases where there is no liklehood of physical harm. If you think you’ve been wronged then convince the jury. If you can’t convince the jury then the “injury” is probably all in your head.
Or if that will take too long call the police. If you are seriously to the point of assaulting someone, the cops will come along and ask them to move. Cops don’t want escalating violence either and in the worst case scenario they’d probably charge them with breach of the peace, invasion of privacy or similar for refusing to leave.
But wetting someone with a hose? Jeez, do you people really think that it’s acceptable or productive to settle a dispute where neither you nor your property are in any danger by physically attacking someone?
Even in cases where you can physically eject someone from your property you are still only allowed to use reasonable force towards a specific goal. You can’t wet them with a hose because they pissed you off. The intent of the law is to enable you to enforce your rights. Not to humiliate, torture or injure people who annoy you.
At the risk of editorialising, some people need to stop reacting like 3rd garders. Civilised adults don’t slug someone for annoying them. They don’t throw their lunch across the room. They don’t shoot spitballs at them. And they don’t spray them with water. They ask them to refrain from the offensive behaviour, if they don’t refrain then they either walk away and seek legal redress or they call the authorities. In the worst case scenario they use minimum effective force to prevent the behaviour from taking place.
I can never see a circumstance where irritating someone by wetting them with a hose could be remotely justifiably. And I mean it’s unjustifiable legally and it’s unjustifiable socially. The behaviour is either purile and the result of arrested development or it’s antisocial assholery and the result of pathological maladjustment. Neither speaks well of anyone who would actually do it.
I’ll repeat:
You are joking, right?
Dude, you can not assault someone for going about their daily business. It’s unprovoked assault. It’s a crime. Nowhere in the entire civilised world is “He knew I was going to assault him for going about his lawful business” a defence for assaulting someone for going about their lawful business.
AFAIK in the entire history of the western world ““He knew I was going to assault him for going about his lawful business” has never been a defence for assaulting someone for going about their lawful business.
Why in the world would any adult outside of mental institution believe it possibly could be a defence. Unprovoked assault is a crime. Letting someone know in advance that you are going to assault them doesn’t lessen the crime. If anything it’s an aggravating factor.
Jeez, I can’t believe people actually think like this. Dude, if you want to stay out of jail don’t try it. At this point I’m a hair’s breath away for starting a pit thread just for people who come up with these pitifully weak justifications for why they should be able to attack people who annoy them.
Uh, did you actually read any of this thread?
The thread is not about whether it is legal to install a motion operated watering system. The thread is about whether , when confronted with undesirables, you can “flick a switch and bathe them without fear of repercussions”. It is quite undeniably about whether you can install a motion operated watering system in order to wet someone.
Sapo, who asked the question, clearly does not dipute this and accepted the answers given to that proposition. The fact that you are the only person who reads it otherwise should tell you something.
But shit, if you really want to know either you can install a sprinkler system that accidentally wets people, of course you can. What is not legal is doing so with the intent to wet people.
:rolleyes:
I honesty can’t tell whether you really believe this or if it’s a joke.
In case you are being serious, go back re-read the thread. It’s all connected, not a series of disconnected posts.
As Sapo, the originator of the scenario, clearly understands it is about whether, to deter undesirables, you may “flick a switch and bathe them without fear of repercussions” using the argument “ that I have the right to water my lawn whenever I want” or the argument that “I have a sign saying ‘Warning: Motion activated lawn watering system’?”>
Comprehending mildly complicated conversation requires reading for context.
If you want to stay out jail you really need to understand this point:
The only thing that matters is whether you intend to assault the guy. Whether he is warned in advance of your assault is completely irrelevant. I’ll repeat what I said earlier:
This really is like the thinking of an 8 year old. “I’m going to walk across the room with my eyes closed swinging my fists. If you get hit it’s not my fault ‘coz you were warned”. If your mother didn’t buy that one you can be damn sure the jury won’t buy it.
Jimminy Cricket, do adults really think the law works this way? I warned you, so now I can do whatever I want without any ramifications?
Yep, try that one sometime and let us know how it works.
“Sure I knifed the kid for putting junk mail in my letterbox. But I had a sign up saying I would do it. Any reasonable person would have made the obvious choice not to deliver any more junkmail.”
“Sure we lynched the Nigger for walking down our street. But we had a sign up saying we would do it. Any reasonable person would have made the obvious choice not to walk down our street"
Do you honestly not see how ridiculous this is? It’s not your place to give people a choice about which legal activities they may and may not engage in. If you set out to assault someone for going about their lawful business it’s a crime. It doesn’t matter how often you warn them, it’s still a crime.
WTF? How I that even remotely comparable? It’s a total non sequitur.
I never did any such thing. If you believe I have done so then contact the moderators as it is against the rules of this board. I’m quit happy to cop it on th echinif the Mods decide I have done so, but if you make this allegation again I will be the one making a complaint.
Implicit in your post is the idea that if you turned a fire hose with a heavy blast of water on someone, then that would be considered assault.
So, the police and the justice system have a certain psi of water pressure that constitutes assault? It would seem like that pressure, -.1psi, would be the most popular type of hose nozzle sold at Home Depot. I know I would buy five of them 
Very well, since you asked.
In post #24 you quote me as saying
"Since when does being intentionally sprayed with water by a known automated sprinkler system while uninvited on someone else’s property considered “assault”? " (emphasis yours)
In post #22 I actually say:
“Since when does being sprayed with water by a known automated sprinkler system while uninvited on someone else’s property considered “assault”? ”
The difference may seem small, but it does substantially change the meaning of the sentence.
I admit that my posts on this subject have been slightly off the general topic, not unusual since I specifically replied to post #5. They have been entirely devoted to the 2 ideas mentioned in post #5. The OP specifically stated that he didn’t want the JW’s to knock at all- this implies (and please correct me if I’m wrong, Sapo) that deterrence is the primary goal.
I also haven’t advocated hosing unwanted visitors. I am usually exceptionally polite, even to unwanted guests, until they begin to be rude to me. As mentioned previously, most of these people respect the signs and, of those who don’t, a simple “Not interested, thanks” almost always does the trick.
The entire point of what I have said is that (in most jurisdictions) a system can be set up so that it would not be considered assault. Actually, considering posts 15 and 16, it wouldn’t be considered assault even if done purposely, but possibly battery, depending on circumstances. Given a full set of applicable laws for a given locality, I have little doubt that a fully legal system could be constructed in most areas. It might even be a fun thought experiment.
This is a far safer and more reasonable deterrent than other common deterrents such as barbed wire. If a salesman ignores the sign and climbs a barbed wire gate (fairly common for some rural/farm households) and cuts his hand, did the homeowner assault (or batter) him or batter him?
It’s unreasonable to be afraid of sprinkler water, and sprinkler water doesn’t cause damage. So I’d imagine that enwettening someone with a sprinkler system (not a huge blast host) wouldn’t even provoke a police response. Legal? Not legal? You need a court to really decide that, but first you need a cop that will arrest you, and prior to that you need someone willing to file a complaint.
A bigger factor is, how likely is someone to get wet with a sprinkler system? There’s a natural aversion response. If you stand there like an idiot every time the head comes around, then you’re contributing to your own problem. You have a responsibility to get clear. You’re not even going to get a thorough soaking unless you run around the sprinkler following the spray. So, even a less chance of causing damage.
The biggest factor, though, is how many people really waste water by watering the non-vegetal parts of their yards? I only have about 6 inches of overspray, but the altitude of the water at the extremity of the grass is very, very low, because water’s thrown in an arc. The most anyone could possibly suffer is wet shoes. Not soaked shoes, through and through, but just wet shoes, i.e., normal use for footwear. Good luck trying to prosecute for that.
There’s always a chance it will rain, anyway. Not getting misted is in no way something one should ever expect.
How about, scaring animals away? Let’s say you have a lot of very pretty ornamental shrubs, and deer are nibbling on the plants and ruining their appearance. You’re not always home (or awake) to scare them away, so you install something like this, a noisy, motion-sensing sprinkler that emits only a short burst of water, to scare them away when they come around.
Question: if the sprinklers are on does that mean there is not “clear communication with my house to the road”? I don’t water my lawn often, but when I do, it definitely sprays through and across the path to my door, that’s just the configuration of the front lawn. Anyone can still walk right up to my door, although they may not want to because they might get harmlessly wet.
At my old apartment building, smokers from the bar across the street used to sit on our steps and make a huge mess. Our superintendent, a really nice elderly lady, chose “late at night” as the time to water all the huge planters out front and hose down all the street grime from the steps. That kept the drunken losers from sitting on our steps because they’d end up with wet asses if they sat there. She never hosed a soul, she just washed down the front of the building at a time when it would be the least disruptive for residents. (Yes, the real motivation was to keep the drunken losers from smoking/littering/puking on our steps.) SHe never left on sprinklers or anything, she just made sure teh steps were always too damp for anyone to want to sit there.
However, it is a defense to state that you have installed a motion activated sprinkler system to “deter unwanted animals” from entering your property. Putting up a warning sign isn’t stating that you intend to assault the salesman, it’s warning the salesman that there is a legal device operating on your property that he would be affected by.
How is it legally different than simply starting the sprinklers running when you see the salesman on the sidewalk? If he comes onto your property then, for his lawful business, he’s going to get soaked/assaulted, yet it is ridiculous to think the property owner would get in trouble for wetting the salesman who walked deliberately into the path of a running sprinkler.
Like I said, I’m no lawyer, but most laws have a reasonability reading, and if not then most legal systems hinge on the “reasonable man” idea. IOW the state can’t be unreasonable in prosecuting. They couldn’t for example prosecute you because you were moving a new firdge into you rphouse and it blocked the front steps for 15 minutes. That wouldn’t be reasonable. The same would presumably apply to sprinklers, they can’t stop you mainataining your gardens in a reasonable manner.
The important distinction between this and Sapo’s suggestion is that it’s temporary. If someone wants to come back in a few hours to serve you a summons or invite you to join their church they can do so without fear. You aren’t trying to prevent someone from ever approaching your door by wetting them.
I’m not sure why you directed this at me. I covered this in my very first post and several times since. But isnce you seem to have mised it I’ll repeat:
Can someone do such an arseholish thing and get away with it? Probably. People can and do get away with a lot of crimes, especially if they’re big enough dicks to hurt innocent people and barefaced lie about it to the police. There are all sorts of methods that someone could use to disguise intent if they are a big enough prick to hurt innocent people and barefaced lie about it to the police. In most cases they’ll get away with it. But that still doesn’t make it legal. It just makes the person a lying, criminal arsehole rather than just a criminal arsheole.
The question was whether such behaviour was legal. Not whether you could do it and get away with it by lying.
Because in one case your intent is to wet the person in order to deter them, and in the other case your intent is to deter them without wetting them. In the first case it’s assault. In the second case it is at absolute worst threatening behaviour.
Once again, I covered this above. It’s exactly the same as the distinction between having a 7’ foot fence topped with barbed wire and whipping someone with barbed wire when they enter your property. It should be clear why one of those things is legal and the other is not despite the fact that any injuries recieve will be identical.
The fact that the fence in your example is topped with water a rather than barbed wire makes no difference to the facts, just the seriousness of the asault. You simply can not attack someone’s physical person. Whether you do it by proxy or not is irrelevant.