The latest from Demand Action… resuscitating Zombie Lies
That awful law did the NRA supported that would allow Johnny Crackhead shoot and kill at Billy Goodcop as he tries to stop the one-man crime wave? Hysterical Outrage must ensue! BRING ME THE HEAD OF WAYNE LAPIERRE!
Not quite. See, Indiana took a momentous step on making sure his citizens do not get screwed by a police mistake or bad intention:
(i) A person is justified in using reasonable force against a public servant if the person reasonably believes the force is necessary to:
(1) protect the person or a third person from what the person reasonably believes to be the imminent use of unlawful force;
(2) prevent or terminate the public servant’s unlawful entry of or attack on the person’s dwelling, curtilage, or occupied motor vehicle; or
(3) prevent or terminate the public servant’s unlawful trespass on or criminal interference with property lawfully in the person’s possession, lawfully in possession of a member of the person’s immediate family, or belonging to a person whose property the person has authority to protect.
If you are in the other 49 states, at home enjoying the peace and quiet after a long day at work when suddenly, you hear the back door being torn open and people screaming. You retrieve your weapon thinking you are being invaded by criminals, use you weapon and happen to shoot the intruder. But , Ooops! They were cops. You are now, if not dead, in your way to prison for a very long time….even if the cops screwed up and served the warrant on the wrong house or individual.
Yes Little Timmy, through no fault of your own, you are gonna be screwed. Maybe some tired secretary wrote the wrong house number, maybe some heroin-infested stool pigeon desperately looking for a deal decided to make up some bullshit story to the arresting narc who being to tired after chasing your arse, does not do the minimum effort to see if he is being given the true skinny but instead bullshit some paperwork and gets SWAT to serve the warrant at full tactical mode. The end result is the same: you are screwed and the police has immunity because they were serving what they thought to be a legal warrant. About the only thing that could be done to “penalize” the department for hiring substandard idiots in a world full of fully papered ones is to sue them for millions of bucks, a process that can drag forever, you may not see because you are taking a long vacation in Potter’s Field and even if your descendant win the lawsuit, the money comes out of the taxpayers.
OK, so what happens if you are not in the privacy of your home but a public place? You are also screwed even if the cop is off duty, drunk out of his mind and beating you brutally as it happened to this bartender:
She eventually got a settlement for $ 850,000 and the officer got probation, anger management classes (paid by the taxpayer) and 130 hours of community service, (like we want him around the community) and kept his job as Chicago Police Officer.
Now, imagine yourself present in a situation like that. You see this huge man beating this slender female with a brutality that is so shocking, you cannot think but say “I need to stop that crap!” you draw your handgun and deliver a couple of well placed shots to the brute, stopping his attack. Next thing you are on your way to jail and a new set of orange rompers because the brute has been issued a shield and is immune from consequences from his actions and it is divine dictum that you let them do what they want or pay the piper. If no shield was present, you’d be lauded as the hero who saved a woman in deadly distress and the brute would be the one spending time in jail after a visit to the local ER.
Sorry, but this Indiana law has to be duplicated all over the US or police departments get their manure together and start to cull the herd of idiots that bring shame to the uniform…then again in the case of Chicago, it would mean give 99% of the force permanent vacation.
Update: Somewhat related but a great example of the abuse of immunity by LEO and or prosecutor: Circuit Court Overturns Immunity For Law Enforcement Officials Who Sent An Innocent Man To Prison For 22 Years
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And once again, they only tell part of the story unless the ‘what if’s’ work in their favor. These folks are only consistent in their inconsistencies.
Cops engaged in criminal activity should, if anything, be served with HARSHER sentences than ordinary citizens. That includes what happens if one of those citizens decides to stand up to them and stop them from breaking the law.
Your job is to set an example for the regular citizenry. If you fail to do so, an example should be made of you.
Yep, great law against typos and lazy police work. In Indiana if you make a negligent mistake on a warrant you could pay with your life, and the department will stand behind the victims, not the negligent cop.
That’ll get some cops thinking.
Also an an aside, there is some sick realism that that poor woman was beaten so severely by an inebriated to Johnny Cash singing “Sunday Morning Coming Down”.