“What's upsetting to me is, if you look at the month of January, I think we had 18 homicides during that month,” said Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears. “Fourteen of those were being investigated for self-defense, meaning that someone lost their life, and that case might ultimately be cleared. But that doesn't do anything for that family who lost someone."...On Jan. 3, a man allegedly wrestled a gun away from an intruder in his home, then shot and killed the man. On Jan. 5, a woman shot and killed her boyfriend who was allegedly attacking her.... Someone died, but no one was ever charged with a crime."So, we're just seeing a significant increase in the number of self-defense cases because we're seeing too many situations where both parties are armed, where multiple parties are firing their weapons during these very simple disputes," said Mears.The past two weekends, apparent arguments escalated to mass shootings in and outside Indianapolis nightclubs."We have to be better to each other, be better human beings,” said IMPD Chief Chris Bailey. “We're better than this. We have to treat each other better."
I don't think the evidence supports the claim that "we are better than this," or that urging people to be better human beings much reduces the incidence of crime. Perhaps it ought to, but as I understand the purpose of police chiefs and prosecutors, they exist as a recognition that it doesn't actually work.
What do they think 'a better human being' would do when she is attacked in her home by a stronger male in an act of domestic violence? Submit to him?
What would the better man do if an intruder with a gun breaks into his home, once he wrestles away the gun that the intruder brought into his home? Or maybe the better man wouldn't resort to the wrestling, even?
Sometimes violence is how things get put right. If you have a problem with the violence in these cases, shouldn't your lectures on 'being better human beings' be targeted at the abusers and home invaders?
5 comments:
Well, you know. Abusers and home invaders are victims, too. They're just reaching for their ahem just desserts.
Eric Hines
It does seem to be a feelings-based rather than logical argument, doesn't it? Gosh darn it! If only there weren't so many guns and weapons around we wouldn't have these problems, Binky! Can't we all just get along?
I get the impression he's not very articulate.
Suppose what he means is something more along the lines of "Lots of people are looking for trouble, and then claiming self defense when they win the fight."
Does that change the analysis any?
It’s not helpful to the examples quoted from the article, but maybe those aren’t what he had in mind.
North Carolina has a clear legal standard that you have no right to self-defense if you are the aggressor. In that case, you have to take some clear action to de-escalate or retreat in order to regain your self defense rights. I don’t know if Indiana has that.
However, apparently his team looked at these cases with a jaundiced eye, and still couldn’t find any ground to file charges.
Or, just maybe, he was speaking of the abuser/would-be thief. Perhaps he was saying that if they were "better humans" then the situation requiring the use of deadly force in self-defense, in which they would lose their lives, would not present itself in the first place.
Just a little devil's advocate here.... >O;~}
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