Crazy Jerome
First Post
Jury members read the newspapers and watch the news. So what is "serious" to them moves around quite a bit, even when the law is static. Prosecutors know this.
For example, sometime around the late '70s, early '80s (I forget exactly when), in North Alabama, there was a noticable rash of purse snatchings from cars stopped at red-lights. No doubt, a lot of it was copy cat, because at first it was working well for the criminals.
In Huntsville, there were several cases where the victim resisted and was injured in the struggle. There were rumors of knives, though I don't know if they were true or not. Most people weren't in the habit of locking their car doors when they drove, and it was taking awhile for that message to get out.
So a guy with a rough beard comes out of the bushes and tries this, at a car stopped part way up Montasanto mountain (which is a good ways). The lady sees him at the last minute, she manages to slam the door back and lock it, catching his jacket. The light turns; she panics; and starts down the hill. By the time the guy managed to rip the jacket lose and roll into the bushes, he was hurt pretty bad--bad enough he wasn't moving. The only thing that kept him from being drug under the car was that section of road is winding and doesn't move very fast in rush hours. Fortunately for him also, this was within a few hundred yards of Huntville hospital.
If a middle-aged man had done that to a teen snatcher before the rash started, he would have probably have at least been charged. I doubt the grand jury would have let it go any further, but you never know. But the way it happened, this lady didn't see "purse snatcher". She saw, "guy that might knife me or worse."
So getting back to the OP and what people could do in this situation without being in trouble, I think it gets back to the nature of the threat that one could reasonably expect. Naturally, that is going to vary by area and time. (I'm sure there are legal terms for that, but IANAL.) If one of your coworkers comes walking casually by with a hammer and a squirt gun, but hasn't done anything yet--and you respond with deadly force because of an intuition--you are assuredly in trouble. OTOH, if there has been a rash of brutal murders involving a blunt object and people being sprayed in the eyes with acid, and you see a stranger where he shouldn't be with that same equipment--then you can probably shoot immediately in some workplaces and not be charged. According to the law, you can't. According to reality, you can.
