Folks: The purpose of this list is to provide helpful
information to list members for the purposes of their academic work.
It's thus especially helpful if people's comments focus on subjects on
which they have expertise. At least, if people want to express
tentative opinions on subjects on which they don't have expertise, they
ought to flag their opinions as tentative opinions, rather than just
making flat assertions that others on the list might erroneously think
are indeed accurate.
Consider, for instance, the item below. To begin with, use of
deadly force is not always illegal unless someone's life is in danger.
In most states, it's permissible to use deadly force to prevent not just
death but rape, kidnapping, or serious bodily injury. In many states,
it's permissible to use deadly force to stop robbery; in some, to stop
residential burglary; in at least one, to stop theft. Nor do those
states simply presume that people who are being raped, robbed, or
burglarized are also feeling a threat to their lives -- while this might
be one of the reasons why the law allows deadly force in such
situations, the laws apply even when the defendant candidly admits that
he felt no threat to his life, but was only reacting to some other
crime.
Second, it is just not the case that "legal 'duty to rescue' is
limited to cases where you are somehow responsible for the conditions
that placed the life in peril." Generally speaking, the duty also
applies when you have a special relationship (e.g., parent-child or
spouse-spouse) with the victim, plus a few other situations. And, most
relevant for our discussion -- it's the item that prompted the article
that started the discussion -- several states do impose a broader duty
to rescue on everyone (subject to various constraints, such as the
duty's not applying when the rescue would be risky).
Now perhaps the poster knew this, but if that's so, then the
post was a pretty substantial oversimplification, to the point that it
was, I think, mistaken. And if the poster didn't know this, that
highlights the dangers of making flat assertions about what the law is
without sufficient expert knowledge of this area of the law. In either
case, posts such as this make the list less useful rather than more.
The list custodian
> I thought the question of an armed individual "duty to
> rescue" too narrow for just a discussion in the legal context
> since "duty to rescue" laws explicitly exclude the "duty"
> when acting would place your life in danger (even Jewish law
> has similar exclusions
> http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/kitveyet/assia_english/kirschenbaum.htm ).
>
> Since use of deadly force (e.g., threating some one with a
> gun) is illegal unless someone's life is in danger, unless
> you were in the situation of relative safety and viewed an
> attack endangering the life of a third person, you would have
> no legal "duty to rescue" by threatening deadly force. Even
> in those circumstances, legal "duty to rescue" is limited to
> cases where you are somehow responsible for the conditions
> that placed the life in peril.
>
> So, if we are limited to legal questions, the circumstances
> for an armed private person having the legal "duty to rescue"
> should be limited to cases where the person has created the
> peril somehow -- perhaps by knowingly allowed thugs to use
> his property for illegal activities and an attack is made by
> one of those thugs on his property. Then, if he sees this
> attack while he is armed, he might have the legal "duty to
> rescue" if he can do so from conditions of relative safety.
>
> In a nut shell, if you are armed and close enough to an
> attack that your life is in peril, you can legally respond to
> protect your life (or not if you want), if you are far enough
> from an attack that your life is not placed in peril by your
> respond, you still have no legal "duty to rescue" unless you
> are responsible for the circumstances leading to the life
> being placed in peril.
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