inspired by this pit thread, involving a staged kidnapping that freaked a lot of people out. The question was raised as to the consequences if an armed bystander were to shoot/kill one of the faux-kidnappers.
So here’s the factual question: when person A kills a kidnapper with the intent of preventing the kidnapping of person B, is this a justifiable homicide? Not looking for opinions here. I’m wondering whether this has actually happened in the past and what the legal outcome was, or whether there are laws on the books that specifically permit the use of deadly force by a third party to prevent a kidnapping.
Defense of Others can be used as an Affirmative Defense (in some, but possibly not all, jurisdictions); that’s how such a situation would need to play out. I think it would simply be a question of convincing a jury to see it that way.
I have no idea if existing case law has any such examples, though.
IIRC the chief of police I saw interviewed on TV said someone would have been justified in shooting the person. Now, he could have meant something like “I’m not saying it’s right, but I understand”, but I’m pretty sure he said it would have been justified.
I think those people were also doing fake armed robberies. A few years back my store was held up at gun point. The gun was hidden inside a bag. I asked the officer if I would have been in the clear if I would have shot the person. He said that since he implied he had a gun and he threatened to shoot it didn’t matter that the gun was in a bag. You would have been just fine to shoot him and this, FTR, is going on the books as an armed robbery. The never did catch the guy, but if they did and even if they never found a weapon, it still would have been ‘armed robbery’.
He would have been much better off sneaking up behind the cashier with the ski mask on (which was all it took to scare her) and demanding the money, leaving the gun concealed, and only using it if necessary.
Going back to the OP. If you had a gun on your person and someone tried to abduct you, would you be justified in shooting them to get away? If you would, then you would be justified in shooting a kidnapper when they abduct another person. That’s basically what the defense of others comes down to.
Legal or not, with all the stunts they’ve pulled I’m very surprised they haven’t been shots or beaten yet.
Imho, unless the kidnapper announces “I’m here to kidnap John Q. Smith!” a bystander wouldn’t know what is going on. You can imply more if a guy wearing a ski mask pulls a gun in a bank. Simply wearing a ski mask in public doesn’t mean people can shoot at you at will.
He wasn’t “simply wearing a ski mask in public” he ran out of a minivan, grabbed a kid from behind, tossed the kid in the back on a minivan and the masked getaway driver took off. That’s a far cry from just being moderately over dressed for the weather.