The biggest downside to this will be exactly what this guy is saying unfortunately.
whereas the cops can shoot anyone and the worst that happens is they sit at a desk for a couple months.
The downside to not passing it may be that the police will feel more empowered to do illegal entries with increased levels of violence.
You think you have a right to resist?
Think again, comrades.
/s
Well, if existing Indiana law allows the homeowner to use deadly force against an illegal entry, why would someone under the new law have to say they didn't know it was the police? It sounds like the key factor is if it is an illegal entry.
I don't see any good coming from this, but the morons brought it on themselves.
When law enforcement doesn't take the time and trouble to be absolutely sure they are breaking into the right house, they're asking for trouble.
From the stories that commonly come to light, they barely bother - and then an innocent party is at best paying for the damages, and at worst getting buried.
Top this off with the possibility of a real bad guy-intruder busting in screaming "Police!" as a ruse - if I've done nothing wrong and someone comes in that way, I've already decided to shoot first and ask to see a badge afterwords.
It may get me killed in their returned fire, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let someone do harm to me and mine without defense unless I damn well know they're the law.
“The biggest downside to this will be exactly what this guy is saying unfortunately.”
What you say is possibly true, however the pendulum has swung so far the other way that it’s necessary at this point.
Perhaps it will curb some of this no-knock search BS, which is the only place where it might be an issue...
I would say, at least from my observation, there are a lot more innocent people killed by cops than the other way around.
The thing is, most people don’t stay holed up in their houses all the time.
A little surveillance will tell you when a suspect goes out and where you can find him, usually. Seems to me like it would be safer to conduct a search of a premises while you knew the suspect wasn’t there.
Heck, the ATF had multiple opportunities to nail David Koresh when he went out and about on his regular rounds in town, but passed them up. Maybe they preferred the “shock and awe” of an assault. It has been speculated that had they arrested him in town, you’d might never have heard about David Koresh.
My question is, before all these “home invasion” type of arrests, how did police officers do their job?
I’d guess if police thought there was a chance they’d be met with deadly force if they didn’t do things by the book, then maybe these “home invasion” types of arrests would be a little less common, as they should be.
But, if you have all that SWAT gear lying around, you have to justify it somehow I guess...
They should name this bill after the fellow that was gunned down by a SWAT Team in his home near Tucson a year or so ago.
Well, I guess if you're an Indiana cop and you don't like this law, you shouldn't have gone to the Indiana Supremes and claimed homeowners had no right to resist you even if you were entering illegally (the court AGREED!!!!). Best be careful what you wish for. D'oh!
““Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer’s life if necessary.” Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306. This premise was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529. The Court stated: “Where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction, when the officer had the right to make the arrest, from what it does if the officer had no right. What may be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed.””
If cops would stop doing no knock raids on the wrong address then this wouldn’t be an issue.
And if one of these (suspects) gets wind that they may have a defense saying, ‘I didn’t know it was a police officer,’ and can kill him, we don’t have any ramifications there.
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Maybe if they dropped perceived from the wording? It would cause the police to make darn sure they had the correct address. I am tired of police getting the wrong address and shooting people, pets yada. Once is too many times and I’ve read or watched news reports of this all too much.
Maybe that would be bad law but something needs to change because the police are getting it wrong too much. That isn’t acceptable.
As a firmly law-abiding citizen, I retain all rights I am endowed with by my Creator-namely the right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness-and to bear arms in defense of same. If a LEO wants to discuss something with me, I am available during normal operating hours.
If a police raid gone wrong happened upon my residence (unbeknownst to me), I retain the stated rights. Since the raid would be patently illegal, not just a “mistake” (unreasonable or negligent attempt at search/seizure for whatever reason), I am under no obligation to wait and see who the raiders are or are not.
There is no reasonable restriction incumbent on a law-abiding person under such circumstance (when awakened at zero-dark-thirty by the sound of a door being broken down-even if some announcement was allegedly made 15 seconds before the ram was applied); I will reasonably assume as a law-abiding man, that the actors represent grave harm to myself and to those I am entrusted to protect, as well as an affront to essentail liberty which should never be tolerated.
To be required to assume that a door being broken down is being done so by honest but mistaken officers of the law is a silly notion, devoid of reason.
Now, If I was a criminal, then I would not be justified morally or legally in defending against a warranted and legal assault.
The burden is on the actors initiating such an assault to be 100% correct in thier actions, not on me. I know, I may fail and even die, but I will not sacrifce essential liberty while hopefully awaiting for confirmation that the lethal assault in progress is indeed just wayward stooges of the state that have misread my house number or whatever and will stop short of grave injury or death of innocent housemembers. I know that my survival in an active assault depends on me gaining the upper hand as quickly as possible, rather than awaiting for some flash of recognition to cross some adrenaline-pumped officers “oh, poo, wrong house guys, stand down and lock wepoans he’s a good guy”.
That burden is on them, not me.
To think otherwise would require the sacrifice of all essential liberty in deferment to the noble but perhaps misguided efforts of the state.
All this said, I would risk my life to assist an officer of the law in time of hazard, as any other American capable of rendering such assistance should be morally apt to do.
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/25/police-officer-pleads-guilty-to-robbing-drug-dealers/
Two big problems with letting someone who yells “Police” break into your home with guns.
#1) they might be criminals not the Police, and they are there to victimize you.
#2) as the story above shows, they might criminals AND the Police, and they are there to victimize you.
I completely support the Senate’s version of this bill, and think the House should pass it as is. Afterwards, the Supreme court judges should be removed from office, that made this idiotic decision.
There is no downside to this unless you consider the status quo for employing SWAT tactics, acceptable.