Point of clarification:
In Texas it is perfectly legal to shoot a fleeing perp to protect life or property if there is no other way to stop the perp.
Thus, an old feeble man can shoot a young fleeing perp, but a young healthy man cannot shoot an old perp in a scooter as he absconds at 4 mph.
A man named Joe Horn taught me that the day he shot 2 burglars, one in the back and one in the side, as they burgled his neighbor’s house, all in front of a police detective who witnessed the entire thing.
He killed the perps. He did not break the law.
Well, Texas is special.
The Common Law of Texas (to the tune of The Yellow Rose of Texas)
They buy their bourbon by the case, and never shun the cup,
They ride around in Cadillacs, and smash each other up;
And when they litigate the case, it’s the weirdest ever seen,
Because the poor benighted courts try to follow Leon Green.
It’s the damnedest jurisdiction
This country ever saw,
It has the queerest people,
The most peculiar law.
They have some nuts in Ioway,
And some in Tennessee,
But the common law of Texas is
A thing of mysteree.
They enter into arguments, and then they have a fight,
They call each other dirty names, and brood on it all night,
They lie in wait for sixteen hours behind an old rail fence,
And shoot the fellow in the back, but it’s all in self-defense.
It’s the damnedest jurisdiction
This country ever knew,
And all its jurisprudence
Is twisted like a screw.
Connecticut’s a crazy place,
And so is Arkansaw,
But Texas has, of all the states,
The most peculiar law.
They raise an oil well derrick in the city hall front yard,
And when the damn thing blows to hell they take it mighty hard.
Petroleum and rocks and mud are strewn all o’er the sod,
It makes a most unsightly mess, but it’s just an act of God.
It’s the damnedest jurisdiction
This country ever had,
It has ten thousand cases,
And all of them are bad.
Oh, Minnesota’s off the beam,
And so is Idaho,
But Texas has the wildest law
Upon this earth below.
A widow seeks indemnity upon a policee,
And she recovers double, with her attorney’s fee,
For when she loaded arsenic into her husband’s beans,
The late lamented met his death by accidental means.
It’s the damnedest jurisdiction
There is from coast to coast,
There’s crazy law all over,
But Texas has the most.
They’ve lunatics in Michigan,
Also in Delaware,
But the common law of Texas
Will really curl your hair.
A loyal son of Texas goes out upon a spree,
And perpetrates six murders, some rape and burglaree;
He ends upon the gallows-it’s a proper end, of courseBut
the reason that they hang him is, the bastard stole a horse.
It’s the damnedest jurisdiction
In the entire U.S.A.,
And what will happen next there
No man alive can say.
They do strange things in Maryland,
Likewise in Oregon,
But Texas has the wildest law
That e’re the sun shone on.
They ask the jury questions, which may number twenty score,
Instructions that they give them take seven days or more,
And when the case comes on appeal the record grows and grows,
And what the last opinion holds, alas, God only knows.
It’s the damnedest jurisdiction
Upon this planet sad,
Its whole judicial process
Is absolutely mad.
There’s schizophrenia in New York,
Also in Illinois,
But the common law of Texas is
A psychiatric joy.