Self defence - what rights do you have if .....
- Thread starter Tony Williams
- Start date
Caporegime
/shrug I know all this already. Sin Chase clearly doesn't however.
I didn't say beating up.... say a single punch to drop it. Wrestling to the ground? That's assault,after all?
Maybe you should read ALL of that post and not pick and chose what you want to read that supports your viewpoint.
I entirely agree with that ENTIRE post and the advice I gave is perfectly inline with it. Don't act vindictively or unreasonably (reasonableness factors in the circumstances, part of which is being under duress)
Ok,enlighten me then.
I was just saying that you were putting words into his mouth by implying he said "you must be threatened in order to tackle the intruder".
Caporegime
No, you gave a list of what in your world were reasonable actions based on situations you made up in your head. The law shouldn't and doesn't work like that.
I don't disagree with the spirit of Meridian's post either, though I'll point out that in the heat of the moment you might not realise that the assailant you're defending yourself from has stopped moving. In that situation I'd say no police action should be taken unless there was evidence that unreasonable force had been used. What say you?
Hitting someone JUST because they burgled you is not a legitimate use of self defence or reasonable force.
If someone enters your home, is stealing from your kitchen when you come across them only to find them leg it to the door and trip you are in no way empowered to stick a boot in "Because he burgled my property"
If he grabbed a bottle from the side and brandished it, now you have reasonable grounds to use force in self defense/preemptive strike.
well,this quote to me sounds like that's exactly what he's implying,but I may be wrong.
Hitting someone JUST because they burgled you is not a legitimate use of self defence or reasonable force.
If someone enters your home, is stealing from your kitchen when you come across them only to find them leg it to the door and trip you are in no way empowered to stick a boot in "Because he burgled my property"
If he grabbed a bottle from the side and brandished it, now you have reasonable grounds to use force in self defense/preemptive strike.
well,this quote to me sounds like that's exactly what he's implying,but I may be wrong.
He is saying that just because somebody has "merely" burgled you is not enough to use force against them. That is distinctly different to saying you must be threatened in order to "tackle an intruder".
Soldato
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Well not illegal.
They are perfectly legal, if you happen to be a trained firearms officer, and on duty at the time, then one can partake in such actions as tazing blind men who are trying to take a walk in the park
Man of Honour
Well not illegal.
They are perfectly legal, if you happen to be a trained firearms officer, and on duty at the time, then one can partake in such actions as tazing blind men who are trying to take a walk in the park
You don't need to be a authorised firearms officer to get trained to use taser.
Man of Honour
We have a legal precedent and widespread popular support for someone who tried very hard to beat someone to death as revenge, after getting weapons and accomplices, i.e. not only premeditated but not even defence. They didn't even claim it was defence because it so obviously wasn't. It was revenge.
Getting an impromptu weapon from another room to use in very obvious direct defence upon being woken by someone having invaded your house is rather unlikely to be "not OK". If it goes as far as a trial, it's hardly likely that 12 strangers would convict except on the same basis as any other case - obviously, psychotically excessive force.
If you grabbed a rolling pin from your kitchen and used it with reasonable force to stop the intruder being a threat, stopping when they stopped being a threat, you should be fine.
If you use it to smash their knees, elbows and hands as revenge after you've overpowered them, you shouldn't be fine. Although in this day and age, with the baying mob calling for blood and death for their own enjoyment and calling it "defence", you might be OK even with that. After all, Munir Hussain tried so hard to beat his victim to death (purely as revenge, absolutely no question of defence being involved) that he left his victim brain-damaged. Many people wanted him acquitted. He got a suspended sentence. A suspended sentence for conviction for an extreme case of GBH with intent, and that charge was a bit light to begin with since it was attempted murder.
Man of Honour
Likely, my arse.
The CPS are well aware that a person claiming defence will probably only be convicted if they used deranged levels of force, so far beyond reasonable that a bona fide sociopath would be able to see the distinction.
As a result, it's very far from likely that you will face prosecution for standing up to an intruder unless you torture or kill them after they're no longer a threat, i.e. torture or kill them for your own enjoyment.
Arrest is quite likely if there's any doubt, but not prosecution.
An example from someone I know. They were directly involved in this incident:
The police are called to a disturbance in a house by someone nearby.
When the police turn up, they find a wounded man lying on the floor bleeding and an uninjured man, apparently under the influence of drugs of some kind, holding a machete in a threatening manner.
The police order him to drop the weapon. He says he won't drop it, talking somewhat incoherently about needing to keep it. The police make him drop it and arrest him.
When questioned at the police station, the machete-wielding man claims he used reasonable force in defence.
The police investigate and determine that the evidence indicates that his claim is true - he was defending himself from someone who attacked him with a machete and managed to take the machete of the guy who attacked him with it (who was injured in the process). He was still in fight mode (flight was impossible - one door, guy with machete between him and it), jazzed up on adrenaline and not thinking at all clearly and still fixated on "I must have control of that machete so it can't be used on me", when the police rushed in just after that happened.
He was released without charge, i.e. not prosecuted.
Next time you read some of the usual ranting about how criminals have all the rights and victims will be jailed forever if they even look threateningly at the criminal stealing from them and threatening to kill them, blah, blah, blah, bear in mind that it's cases like the above. Man arrested for defending himself when attacked by machete-wielding madman! Then even that gets exaggerated ridiculously until some people really believe that UK law only allows a victim to say "Please desist from stabbing me, that's a good chap", and then only if the victim also offers to help the burglar carry the stuff they've stolen.
Permabanned
I find your reasoning pretty unreasonable. When someone breaks into your home basic psychology comes into play. Flight or Fight!
The problem is, what is reasonable is not always considered so.
Soldato
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The law allows you to use as much force as needed to protect and recover your property.
Even if they run off, you are allowed to chase them and still use as much force as needed to recover the property and make a citizen's arrest, the website below quotes a rugby tackle or single blow would be reasonable, through I would think a few more blows would be needed depending on how much fight they put up.
Once the thief has "given up" the fight, anymore force other then "holding him" would be over the top and land you in trouble.
All this information can be easy be found on websites instead of debating what you can or can't do.
http://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/prosecution/householders.html
Man of Honour
I think that the problem is that what is considered reasonable is not always so.
For example, I don't consider attempted murder in revenge to be reasonable force, but many people do.
Where do you draw the line of "reasonable", roughly? Murder? Torture? Crippling? Maiming? Scarring, to give them a permanent reminder? If you want to go further than the current law, you want to go into punishment of some kind.
Soldato
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The above link draws a little on what is reasonable and what is not, for example, here is a little quote from it.