user
Accomplished Advocate
At the risk of waxing excessively serious in what has been generally witty and clever, I've got a couple of observations.
1. You can never defend "mere property" with a display, much less use, of deadly force. "Mere property" is personal property (that is not presently subject to a burglary) and real property that is beyond the curtilage. "Stopping a serious felony in progress" is ok (rape, robbery, murder, burglary, and arson) as is "defense of habitation" (popularly, "castle doctrine"), because those imply a threat of serious bodily harm to humans potentially present and an obvious willingness to kill 'em.
2. Never, ever, fire a warning shot in Virginia. It almost always leads to prosecution for crimes even if it was done for a good reason. Unless and until you have a necessity to kill, keep the gun in its holster, don't look at it, don't touch it, don't talk about it, and don't gesture towards it or call attention to it in any way. But as Tuco said in "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly", "When you need to shoot, shoot! Don't talk."
3. Assuming the land is marked, posted, or fenced, and unless you have given prior permission, hunters may not enter with vehicles, bows or firearms to retrieve dogs, prey, etc. 18.2-136. You can prohibit possession of firearms on your own property just as a shopping mall can. I take the position that a person on my land who is not a bona fide licensee (there with my permission) and carries a gun when I've told him not to do so becomes a self defense situation: I have, at that time, a reasonably held, good faith belief, based on objective fact, that he is presenting me with an imminent threat of serious bodily injury while engaged in unlawful activity (hence a presumption of malice). If I tell him to put the gun down and take three steps backwards (no, not into the covered pit of snakes), and he doesn't do it, I'm justified in believing that he intends to kill me.
"And that's all I've got to say about that."
1. You can never defend "mere property" with a display, much less use, of deadly force. "Mere property" is personal property (that is not presently subject to a burglary) and real property that is beyond the curtilage. "Stopping a serious felony in progress" is ok (rape, robbery, murder, burglary, and arson) as is "defense of habitation" (popularly, "castle doctrine"), because those imply a threat of serious bodily harm to humans potentially present and an obvious willingness to kill 'em.
2. Never, ever, fire a warning shot in Virginia. It almost always leads to prosecution for crimes even if it was done for a good reason. Unless and until you have a necessity to kill, keep the gun in its holster, don't look at it, don't touch it, don't talk about it, and don't gesture towards it or call attention to it in any way. But as Tuco said in "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly", "When you need to shoot, shoot! Don't talk."
3. Assuming the land is marked, posted, or fenced, and unless you have given prior permission, hunters may not enter with vehicles, bows or firearms to retrieve dogs, prey, etc. 18.2-136. You can prohibit possession of firearms on your own property just as a shopping mall can. I take the position that a person on my land who is not a bona fide licensee (there with my permission) and carries a gun when I've told him not to do so becomes a self defense situation: I have, at that time, a reasonably held, good faith belief, based on objective fact, that he is presenting me with an imminent threat of serious bodily injury while engaged in unlawful activity (hence a presumption of malice). If I tell him to put the gun down and take three steps backwards (no, not into the covered pit of snakes), and he doesn't do it, I'm justified in believing that he intends to kill me.
"And that's all I've got to say about that."
