I think in general, once you're no longer in danger anything you do to the attacker becomes assault instead of self-defense.

Depends strongly on the jurisdiction. Some states are "duty to retreat" states. Some are "stand your ground" states.[1] Big ongoing controversy over this, because it affects when it's legal to shoot somebody.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stand-your-ground_law

IIUC - and I'd be interested to be corrected if I don't - the difference between "duty to retreat" and "stand your ground" is all around what happens while you still (reasonably?) perceive a threat to be present. If you're confident that you are safe, and you (say) shoot someone in retribution, you're guilty even in a stand-your-ground state. At least theoretically - what can actually be shown at trial is possibly another question.

This is much discussed on gun sites. If you shot someone trying to steal your car, in some states you would probably not even be charged, while in others you'd go to prison. An intro for Texas.[1]

[1] http://www.kcbd.com/2018/12/27/experts-discuss-texas-state-l...

Texas is the sole exception to this rule, at least when it comes to laws (but there's a separate question of how laws are enforced in other states... in some places, the sheriffs might look the other way in practice, and it's easy to fudge). It has nothing to do with stand-your-ground.

SYG by itself only removes the duty to retreat in the face of danger if you can. It does not allow to use lethal force when you're not in danger, merely to prevent a commission of a crime.

That's still a question of defense of property, though, right? You may be able to shoot someone to stop them from stealing your car. You can't ever shoot someone because they tried to steal your car. The circumstances in which a self-defense justification extends to property presumably also differs per-state, but it's not the same question as "stand your ground".

It's maybe worth noting that "defense of others" is often also a thing.

I think some people like you here are not understanding what "carjacking" is. This isn't simple car theft; it's a violent crime where attackers frequently use weapons to force people out of their car and take it. Victims are frequently killed or injured in the process. It isn't like someone breaking into your car when you're not in it. Carjacking is a really scary crime.

The discussion, since about 5 posts up, has been about what is and is not a part of "stand your ground" - carjacking is only vaguely, incidentally relevant anymore.

Yes, in a carjacking, the victim likely has reason to fear for their life. At some point, that ceases to be true. Actions taken after that point (... in those circumstances where actions can be taken by the victim after that point) are what was under discussion.

(I did read Animats' "If you shot someone trying to steal your car [...]" as referring to more general auto-theft - if it was meant to refer specifically to car-jacking then amend my earlier comment to "That's still at least a question of defense of property [...]")

IANAL, but I think you are allowed to respond “in kind” to an assault, or attempted crime against you.

For example, if someone points a gun at you, you are legally allowed to draw your own weapon. The response was “in kind”, i.e. the same level of force. It’s different if someone pointed a gun at you, then you pointed one back at them, they ran, and you shot them in the back. In this scenario, it would be retaliation, and you could be criminally prosecuted for that.

Okay, but the presence of an attacker implies you are in danger (from the attacker) and thus are justified to assault them until they leave or are no longer willing/capable of assaulting you back.

If you can't safely defend yourself then, why not just become a criminal yourself? You already might become one sooner or later due to circumstance, so just turn to the dark side and start jacking cars! (This is sarcastic, do not turn to the dark side and start jacking cars!)

Also, pro-tip, outside of the US it's also not always legal to claim self-defense for any levels of violence. In a lot of countries (including Canada) the correct response in a situation like this is to -leave-, abandon the car to the carjacker and call the police from safety. Possessions aren't worth your life.

This line of reasoning is insane to me. For the most part, police act as a deterrent against crime, not as an actual barrier. Police tactics are geared toward making them more of a deterrent, making their presence felt by everyone around as much as possible. So calling the police because you've just been robbed is not likely to achieve anything (I've had two cars stolen, and in both cases the police never achieved anything).

If police aren't a deterrent from car theft (as carjacking is a pretty common crime), then we are encouraging that behavior by doing nothing and calling the cops. Conversely, if the average person, during an attempted carjacking, opened fire on the attacker, it would be a major deterrent. There would be almost no repeat offenders (I have been shot at, and it is terrifying).

The police are almost never around to intervene in a crime in progress. They show up in the aftermath and investigate what happened, gather evidence, and eventually may refer a suspect to the prosecutor for charges.

Agreed. Their main value is as a deterrent presence, a chilling effect on criminal conduct. They do gather evidence, etc, but the vast majority of their work is driving around and being seen.

I mean, the other line of reasoning is insane to me. If you can safely escape a situation why should you risk escalating and possibly getting shot yourself?

Report the item as stolen and move on with your life.

Because that requires you to be able to judge whether it's safe for you to escape or not, while under significant stress, and with the consequence of making the wrong choice being your limb or life. And then a bunch of people sitting in a comfortable room will carefully go over the evidence and your statements, and decide whether you decided correctly.

And all that solely to spare the attacker the consequences of his choices. I'd rather err on the side of the victim here - they didn't choose to be in that position, they were placed in it by actions of the attacker.

Note that this all only applies when the person defending themselves is in a position where they reasonably believe that they're in danger. It's generally not legal to defend your property with lethal force in US, if you are not endangered yourself; the sole exception is Texas.

Hrm, and yet in this discussion there are quite a few examples of people glorifying defending themselves with a weapon or lethal force. It is romanticized in the US and that's going to tip the balance on whether someone will preserve themselves or attempt to "take justice into their own hands". I think judges are in the position, and have generally proven quite able, to rule on cases where someone was legitimately uncertain if there were other options, but it's also a bit scary how glorified responding with force seems to be.

In my country of birth, there are quite a few cases where people are convinced on "excessive force used in self-defense" even in situations where they were literally being shot at. So no, it's not at all a given. I'd rather not have that possibility.

A more important question is why. We're discussing a situation with a premise that we have already firmly established that the victim was violently attacked, or had a credible threat of the same (if we haven't, then it's not self-defense by legal definition). At that point, why would you accommodate the attacker at the expense of the victim, so long as victim remains threatened (again, if they're no longer threatened, then it's legally not self-defense)?

I often hear truisms such as "every life is valuable", but that goes both ways, and there's no way to avoid judging the relative value of victim's life versus the attacker's in this situation. Since it was attacker's choices that create this contradiction in the first place, I believe that they're fully responsible for it - i.e. the victim has no obligations whatsoever to think about the attacker's safety, only about their own and that of bystanders. Which means removing the threat by the most efficient way possible, rather than the most humane towards the attacker. Once attacker is no longer a threat, then considerations of the value of their life etc are back in force, because it's no longer at the expense of danger to someone else.

If somebody tells you "your money or your life," it's pretty obvious that the safer option is to give them the money.

> If somebody tells you "your money or your life," it's pretty obvious that the safer option is to give them the money.

Safer for you, right then (unless you, you know, actually need that money, for food). Unsafe for all of their future victims, whom you have just chosen not to help. This is true for the same reason that evolution and game-ification works... Applying positive feedback to an action increases the likelihood of that action being performed again. By giving in, you choose not to stop them, and communicate to them that what they are doing is okay.

How about not trying to steal my things? I'm glad to live somewhere where I can react with over-the-top force to defend my possessions.

Because if you don't do anything, the thief will have their actions validated. That theft will no longer be an isolated, one time occurrence... It will be their new full time job. That means that they are much more likely to end up robbing someone again, be it you, a close relative, a loved one, a person who can't afford to "move on with their life", as you said. I'm trying very hard not to use the word "sheeple" here, but you haven't left me many options. If the average person protects themselves, then the group or community, on average, will be protected.

Because sometimes you only have seconds or milliseconds to decide how best to potentially save your own life and/or the lives of your family.

Sometimes "safely escaping" is not something you have the time or option to even consider.

It's simply about the human right to defend one's own life.

You mean, "If you think you can safely escape".

>>Conversely, if the average person, during an attempted carjacking, opened fire on the attacker, it would be a major deterrent.

It would also be a major incentive for the carjacker to carry a gun and possibly use it.

Well, bring it on I guess. I can't imagine wanting to live in a world where it's illegal to defend yourself from thieves.

I would think the incentive is that they don't want to die for a car or they don't want to commit a crime someone will actually investigate (a murder).

>>I can't imagine wanting to live in a world where it's illegal to defend yourself from thieves.

It's not illegal to defend yourself, but it might be illegal to defend your property, yes. I think it's an complicated moral question whether or not it's fine to shoot someone stealing your TV, but there are lots of practical reasons I think it's probably best to have it generally not be legal.

Technically you already do. Most jurisdictions around the world impose a duty to retreat, often quite strictly. The United States is an exception, largely an artifact of our frontier history and Wild West lore.

There's a reason why the United States is such a violent country, and one of the most violent where law & order haven't broken down. I'm not saying I disagree with your sentiment that one should be given some liberties in meeting aggression with aggression. It's how I feel, too. (And I'm not shy around guns, FWIW.) But that feeling was nurtured by our violent culture. In most other countries people don't feel a compunction to buy a gun or otherwise arm themselves after being burglarized or carjacked. A predisposition to resort to violence isn't universal, not among developed nations, not even for defense. That took me awhile to wrap my head around, but IME (Ecuador, Mexico, Malaysia) it's true, even in countries with significantly more violent crime than we have.

>There's a reason why the United States is such a violent country, and one of the most violent where law & order haven't broken down.

The big problem I see is the easy availability of guns, which has turned into an arms race of sorts. So victims (such as for carjacking, the subject here) have very good reason to fear that attackers are armed with deadly weapons, and so many people want to carry guns themselves to defend against this, and so the criminals carry guns too.

In other developed nations, there's generally no easy access to guns, so a victim doesn't have such a large reason to fear for their life. The worst thing they have to worry about is usually being stabbed with a knife, which is generally much more survivable. So these countries generally have much less deadly crime, though they have more petty street crime (pickpocketing or purse-grabbing for instance).

Countries where they have more violent crime like Mexico, El Salvador, etc. are ones where law and order really have broken down, and these aren't "developed nations" either; poverty and crime are both rampant there.

The problem with gun control in a country that already has a high number of weapons per capita, as well as a constitutional right to carry them, is that people will refuse. No one likes to be helpless, and the manufacturing technology is pervasive. But what if we made all guns illegal, and the US citizens actually complied? End result: only criminals will have guns. That is a problem the police cannot possibly cope with. As a carjacker, I would feel way more comfortable in this situation.

With regards to guns, I agree. We're a violent society that suffers violent crime and a violent response to crime. And I don't know how to untangle things other than to first appreciate the complexity of the situation.

I just think it's important to understand that ours is a rather unique culture. Arming oneself is a reasonable response given our cultural values, and I support Americans' right to own firearms for self-dense (albeit with more regulation than commonly required). I hesitate to say it's reasonable in light of our violent crime. Middle-class Americans suffer very little violent crime. The ones who suffer the most, such as in inner-city ghettos, are communities that most vociferously support gun control and the most skeptical of self-defense arguments. But in any event most other cultures take a polar opposite view--that even aggression in self-defense is to be disincentivized--and I appreciate that it's also reasonable.

The major disincentive to this is that if they do and get caught, the penalties are far more significant. In fact, many laws specifically demand harsh penalties for merely carrying a gun while committing a crime, not even for using it.

They already carry guns, or at least some form of weapon. No one mugs someone without knowing they have overwhelming force. Knowing that the person you're about to rob is likely to have a gun, and is likely to use it against you, makes you consider safer forms of employment. It's not like they only have to steal one car... It has to be regular or it's unsustainable, and if you are regularly getting shot at while trying to carjack... You won't be carjacking for long!

In all likelihood, the carjacker is already armed. No one tries to mug someone without an advantage. But assuming they are not, it forces the carjacker, who is a human being, to wonder if his/her line of work is worth having some crazy asshole open fire over some stupid car. Most people would say no, and the ones who decide it is worth it, they won't last long if half of the jobs they pull end up with bullets coming their way.

Not possibly use it, assuredly use it. They wouldn't hesitate. Why risk themselves by giving the victim a chance to respond, if they're prepared to use deadly force in the first place?

I used to study martial arts a fair amount. I have been warned that in many places use of that knowledge to hurt someone can be seen as "escalation" -- in other words escalating a simple fist fight to something involving weapons.

It's tricky and I think many people's idea of what they are and aren't allowed to do in a violent confrontation doesn't match the law where they live. I've had a few close calls in my life. I once had a couple of incredibly drunk guys try to mug me. I think... they were so drunk that they could barely stand up, so I laughed and walked away. Another time someone in Paris tried to pickpocket me. I put his hands back in his own pockets and told him not to touch. I've never seen someone run away so fast... But these kinds of things could have ended in a very different way and I suspect I would have been blamed.

I was brought up similarly and do know how to defend myself in a pinch but... I'd only resort to it if I thought the situation was going to inevitably going to end in violence, which usually only involved intoxication, most people trying to steal something don't want any trouble either - it's only those guys who went out looking for a fight or who are intoxicated to the point of not being able to let things go that I'd consider in that category where I am legitimately fearing for my life and have no alternatives.

It's just like burglars, if you come home and your door is broken and you hear sounds inside then just move a safe distance away and call the cops, there's no need to charge in rambo style.

Never conflate "what is legal" with "what is moral" or "what is rational". Doing so will make so sorely disappointed.

You absolutely will, because very few people's personal moralities align with our societal ethics. Laws _generally_ align with what we have found to be ethical, but they lag behind and there are plenty of cases where they've diverged.

> I have a hard time imagining how someone can be "too vigorous" in defending their very life from someone who is actively trying to murder them.

You're assuming the person's life was in danger continuously throughout the incident.

If an attacker is using a deadly weapon in the commission of a crime, that seems to indicate that the victim's life really is in danger continuously, as long as the attacker is armed.

Not necessarily.

AFAIK the common case where your logic falls apart is when an attacker takes flight. At that point, it's really hard to argue (under the law of every country I've ever lived in, including the US) that your life is in danger.

If they run away while still holding the weapon in a ready position, you could reasonably argue that, and there were cases when people did, and convinced the jury.

And I think it's reasonable - why should you try to guess whether it's retreat or merely changing position? And even if it's retreat, it doesn't mean that they won't shoot back as they do so (indeed, "fighting retreat" is a military term). The whole point of firearms is that they can do harm at a considerable range, after all. If the attacker wants to make their intention to stop being a threat clear, they can drop the weapon. If they don't, I'd rather err on the side of not second-guessing the victim.

"In war, the victors write the history." I can see how this would apply to the above situation.

Yes, this is why I'm saying it's the "common" failure case, rather than the absolute failure case.

To illustrate, there are very few cases in US law where you can shoot someone in the back.

>To illustrate, there are very few cases in US law where you can shoot someone in the back.

Unless you're a police officer. Then it's generally OK, and at worst you'll get suspended or maybe fired.

> Perhaps, but the very nature of carjacking is that it's a violent crime against you, not just your car.

It is possible to use excessive force in response to a threat that would justify some force in self-defense, which supports prosecution for assault or similar crimes.

> These crimes should be treated as attempted murders

The generally are not factually attempted murders, and if we just decide to willy-nilly ignore the actual elements of crimes in deciding how acts should be prosecuted, then, well, it's hardly possible to stand firm that the case you are complaining about shouldn't be prosecuted as assault. Or genocide. Or conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Whatever.

I would imagine this quote had something to do with that:

> pro-tip: never take the public defender.

I don't think taking somebody's property is an attempted murder, nor is mugging.

You sound like someone who's never had a gun pointed at your face.

If cooperating with the aggressor leaves you alive, and not as an accident, it wasn't attempted murder.

It might be violent, immoral, terrifying, and any number of other things, but if the intent wasn't that you end up dead (even if there was a serious risk of that happening), it's not attempted murder.

It's a bit more complex than that, because (in most of the United States) intent becomes irrelevant once there is an actual death.

If you bring a gun to a mugging and it ends up killing someone - even if it went off accidentally - it's considered first degree murder. No matter what your intent, you willfully created the circumstance that led to someone's death.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felony_murder_rule

From a purely technical legal perspective, robbing someone with a gun isn't attempted murder until they get shot, and then it was premeditated willful murder.

You're using 20-20 hindsight. That if you lead with is a big if.

> You're using 20-20 hindsight.

No, I’m not.

Obviously, the victim won't often be able to tell with any certainty (except with some idea after the fact) whether it was attempted murder.

That the difference may be hard to perceive from a particular viewer's perspective doesn't mean that the difference doesn't exist.

You're talking about intent, but the parent poster is talking about reasonable belief.

In US courts, the latter is (generally) what matters for self-defense claims. Courts don't expect victims to have perfect knowledge of a situation.

So in a certain sense, US courts recognize that things like armed carjackings should be treated as attempted murders.

> You're talking about intent, but the parent poster is talking about reasonable belief.

I'm talking about “attempted murder”, which is a crime defined by intent, and is entirely irrelevant to self defense analysis, where legality of the threats action only matters to the extent of it being unlawful, not as to what particular law is violated.

> So in a certain sense, US courts recognize that things like armed carjackings should be treated as attempted murders.

No, they don't, they recognize that the specific identity of the crime or other violation of the law involved on the part of the attacker is generally immaterial to self-defense analysis, which isn't “armed carjackings should be treated as attempted murders” except in the sense that it is also “simple assault should be treated the same as genocide” or “tortious, but non-criminal, battery should be treated the same as torture”.

In other words, if you don’t get shot, it wasn’t attempted murder.

If I am in the desert, and have only 1 litre of water, and someone takes it by force, they may have just killed me. If I need my car to support myself financially, and it is stolen, my life might well be ruined. Regardless of what the law states, if someone tries to damage my livelihood, for whatever reason and in whatever way, I am morally justified in damaging them to protect myself, and in doing so I stop them from repeating that damaging behavior in the future. This, generally, makes the world a better place to live in, as long as you don't engage in predatory behavior.

You're only morally justified in a proportionate and necessary response.

If your boss fires you, that's a pretty real threat to your livelihood. Is that attempted murder? Are you going to respond by assaulting him?

Any time you think the world is black and white, you're wrong.

You might have reason for last water, but not for stolen car. Stolen car is not sure death nor attempted murder. Even if stolen with gun.

You just rationalized killing someone by refraiming his action as something more deadly as it is. Which is literally reason why these laws about limits of self defense exists.

And that's the issue. Where do you draw the line of having people take your stuff? At what point is it going to completely ruin your life to have something stolen? I draw the line at having anything stolen, because to some degree I rely on all of my property, and anyone who tries to illegally acquire it will not likely try the same again.

There is far way from "to some degree I rely on it" and "stealing it is effectively trying to kill me. The self defence laws exists literally because of people who rationalized murders with far fetched reasoning like that.

These self defense laws are loose, inconsistent, and use 20/20 hindsight instead of intent. You can believe you are doing the right thing in the moment, but still be convicted because you necessarily acted on imperfect information. You can say the same about many laws, I imagine. My point is that it doesn't matter what someone is trying to steal. They can't know what impact it will have on you; they don't care what impact it will have. By choosing to violate you, they are inherently choosing to make you an enemy, an opponent, a victim. I firmly believe that this means they have chosen to give up the protections of our legal system in favor of brigandry. I can't see how a murder can occur in these circumstances, with one party forsaking the law to victimize another... No law, no murder.

Yes, it certainly is when the criminal is using a deadly weapon to commit the crime.