I have a question..

I know of 2 cases within the last couple of years where people ended up dead from a single punch to the face.

One was in Kenosha WI., Someone (a teacher I think) tried to interveine in a fight outside of a bar. He got punched and fell back and hit his head on the concrete killing him.

http://journaltimes.com/news/local/article_afbaea96-ff11-11de-abff-001cc4c002e0.html

The second was I think in Milwakee outside a bar...

http://www.jsonline.com/news/crime/84998787.html

Just do a search for "one punch kill" or "one punch kill Wisconsin....

My question is.. Could these case's be used as a defence if a carrier shot someone before any unarmed BG physical contact...

To be clear... I am totally aware of the law on the use of deadly force and would not myself or condone anyone else to shoot so quickley, but just curious of a "good" lawyer could use these cases as a defence...

Outdoorsman1

a "good" lawyer could use anything as a defense.. I suppose technically any lawyer could use anything as a defense. If i would work or not is a whole different matter. And in my opinion the only answer to that is it depends on who is in the jury.

Well, as a guy that teaches martial arts as well as firearms, I would have to say this:

Does a person who attacks you physically intend to cause great bodily harm or death, my thought is yes, simply because when a person attacks their thoughts are not of stopping, they are just attacking. That means the ability to stop before great bodily harm is caused does not exist yet. In a majority of these cases (Like with that lacrosse player some months ago) there is no concepts of what great bodily harm is during an attack. Even with the lacrosse player, the boyfriend told police several times that he had not done anything that could have hurt her that bad. However she ended up dead.

Also, a majority of people who attack you will not stop once you hit the ground, so that turns the pavement into a weapon that can be used against you. There are billions of studies out there that refer to the intentions of an attacker. Most of them say that at the point when they decide to attack, their primary goal is to do as much damage as possible.

If someone is willing to physically attack me, or someone near me, my immediate assumption is that they have intent to cause great bodily harm. As a "Reasonable Person" I can safely exclude certain persons from this, but I also have reason to use such force or threat of force as is "Reasonably Necessary" to stop the threat.

There are of course exceptions to every situation, but as a general rule if someone commits to a physical attack, it is safe to assume that they intend to cause great bodily harm. And while you can WHAT IF this to death, the key to this is Reasonable Force or Reasonable Threat of Force.

Outdoorsman1 said:

My question is.. Could these case's be used as a defence if a carrier shot someone before any unarmed BG physical contact...

Click to expand...

Why should someone have to take a beating, then somehow recover enough to stop the beating with their firearm? And how do you know for sure in advance the aggressor is unarmed? All you know is someone is threatening to hurt you. You can't know the depth of their unarmed combat skill, or what weapons they might have on them.

I have no practical fighting skill, and I don't intend to magically find any in the heat of the moment. Chances are, if I take a punch, I'm at their mercy. They can punch or kick again and again and again until they feel like stopping. They'd probably even have an opportunity to grab a nearby makeshift weapon and continue the attack.

If I feel like someone intends to hurt me, and I can't retreat or diffuse the situation with words, I'm drawing my gun and telling them to stop. At this point, hopefully the threat stops. If not, it has to stop somehow. And that somehow might mean I have to stop it with force. The only force that will keep me out of reach of the threat is my gun. I don't intend to narrowly win a fight. If I fight, it's not going to be close. But I vow to only fight as a last resort. That last resort, however, does not include me taking the first punch.

Only my opinion, which I realize is not based on any legal precedent. Only on my moral views.

Shooting a single, unarmed person puts you in great legal jeopardy UNLESS you can prove a "disparity of force". If the aggressor is a trained martial artist and you are not, if you are disabled and the aggressor is not, if you are old and feeble and the aggressor is young and fit, if the aggressor is male and the potential victim is female, if you know for certain the aggressor has a history of severe violence and beating people to a pulp, you weight 120 lbs and the aggressor is a 250 lb weight lifter, multiple aggressors versus one person, are examples of disparity of force.

If not for the requirement of disparity of force, every fist fight could legally be escalated into a shooting. I don't think any of us want to go there.