Posted on 01/17/2014 6:10:16 AM PST by Anton.Rutter
You do realize that police witness statements stating that Reeves threw the first kernel of popcorn are in the hands of the court.
They've already been sworn to.
Yes. Apparently an angry man threw popcorn as a way to provoke a response from another and irrationally used that response as sufficient provocation to use deadly force.
Exactly what I suggested the texter might have been doing.
Apparently, both Reeves and Oulson.
Of course, only ONE of them violated the theater rules on "no weapons", and on society's laws against murder...
“Is it perfectly permissible to shoot?”
If you feel the woman is about to be killed, or is facing grave bodily harm, yes.
Of course, it’s really not that simple. There is no way to unshoot a bullet. There’s the possibility you might be found at fault to consider. There’s also the fact that you’d have to live with ending someone’s life, never something to be taken lightly. It’s impossible to know ahead of time if the assailant is a hardened criminal with no redeeming value, or a good person who’s having a bad day. In fact, that consideration appears to apply to the incident this thread discusses.
Resolving the situation without shooting is almost always better. I’m pretty sure Reeves feels that way now.
I would recommend that you focus completely on whether the person being attacked is about to suffer great bodily harm or death.
Even if the assailant is a good person having a bad day, the victim could be dead in an instant. A lot of people don't realize just how deadly knife wounds are, for instance. The victim could be just a single knife wound from death. While you are warning, the victim could be killed immediately.
My biggest concern if presented with a deadly situation involving strangers is that one must make a determination as to whether or not the attack is justified.
How do you know, for example, if the woman being attacked attempted to kill another person and the person fighting with the woman has only barely been able to disarm her. Should you shoot the person who appears to be the aggressor only to find out later that you shot a good Samaritan who chose to get involved? Is the person who appears to be the aggressor an undercover cop? Are the people involved actors in a movie production?
I would be slow to act in the defense of a stranger, not because I have empathy for the aggressor, but only because it is not always an easy determination as to who is the guilty party.
I would add another complication to consider.
Unfortunately, people get involved in conflicts all the time and many become physical confrontations. During such it is possible for the legal justification for self-defense to alternate between the parties. An effort to withdraw from a battle, assuming the other party can reasonably determine that it is happening, removes the right of self-defense from the other party. If such other party chooses to continue the battle, the one who chose to withdraw can gain a right to self-defense.
Another way to describe this situation is that it is not always the initial aggressor who is at fault. The one initially attacked can be at fault if he acts outside the bounds of justified self-defense.
Link worked fine for me.
Shades of Zimmerman.
Way too much debate and rancor before the actual facts are available, with links to numerous and purportedly reliable news sources.
This stuff is blowing in the wind for years.
My opinion is the retired cop has a touch of dementia and the resultant anger associated with that condition. That condition coupled with a career as an LEO created his mindset on that fatefull day.
YMMV but the facts will eventually see the light of day and rational discourse can then, and only then, be possible.
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