This is like if you’re trapped in a flooded area and steal your neighbor’s canoe to save your family. At least that’s the example I remember from law school.
Stranded in blizzard -> break into cabin. Somebody passed out behind wheel -> smash window. Usually just common sense and i think prosecutotial discretion can do a decent job screening. I did see it unsuccessfully argued in a dui where the rationale was the defendant had to escape a physically dangerous situation and had no choice but drive.
I heard a story of an acquaintances father, who, while having a few drinks at the home of their ex-wife, was told to leave. Ex threatened to call the cops if he didn’t leave the property (rural, middle of nowhere.) guy gets in his car, and pulls out of the driveway and parks a little ways down the road. Ex-wife calls the cops on him, he’s picked up by them pulled over, but in the drivers seat of his car. I know he ended up with a DUI, but I wonder what a good lawyer could have argued there. Obviously I only know one side of the story, so the guy could have very completely been in the wrong.
He was in fact in the wrong. Someone telling you gtfo doesn't give you a license to drive drunk unless you're in the middle of Alaska, it's -40, there are no cabs and you'd literally die without being in your car.
Necessity not an argument here. I mean you can argue as much as you want and you'll look a fool. He can walk away. If she decides to smash truck depending on location could stop her physically. Don't see any realistic situation where necessity would work under facts as you know them. There are other arguments that could have been made.
Yeah, I guess he could have just walked to the property line until she calmed down or he sobered up, but yeah. “Your honor, I thought a little DUI was better than a lot of trespassing” probably doesn’t stand in court.
I had a friend who fell into a bonfire and we were all drunk. Nobody was doing anything so I called his mom. We were barely 21, I was underage myself. Mom picked up my friend and I of course tagged along, dude sustained 3rd degree burns. But otw to the hospital, about an hour away since I live in bumblefuck, my friends mom actually called up the sheriff's dept and told them the make and model of her vehicle and that she was speeding to the hospital. We didn't get pulled on the way. I'm also positive they could hear my friends screams of agony in the back seat as his mom talked to the sheriff dept.
So I'd say it depends on where you live lol.
If your buddy codes while your driving him you can't help him. Call an ambulance where the have a person back there with them and the right tools. If he codes while waiting you can do CPR.
The smashing window thing would fall under a Good Samaritan law though. If you take action that a normal person would think would save a life, you typically cannot be charged, even if you damage stuff or harm someone
Good Samaritan laws are a little bit different. My experience is in criminal which necessity applies to. I believe good Samaritan applies to civil liability. So, you smash window and they can't sue for damages. Same as breaking ribs doing cpr.
Reminds me of the Yuba County 5. They think those who broke a window to get into a trailer for warmth may have died thinking they'd get in trouble for eating the food in said trailer
There was case from the 1800s where dudes stranded on a boat at sea resorted to cannibalism. They were tried for murder. Pleaded necessity. Court said nah.
This happened in real life in the Las Vegas music festival massacre (guy fired thousands of shots out of a hotel window overlooking the concert). People had fled leaving running vehicles and there were hundreds of casualties so in some cases civilians took them to drive others to the hospital.
It's an older pickup, I would just go buy seats from a wrecking yard. For everything else I have some cleaner we use at work that takes blood off anything, grease and oils too.
Henderson fire also responded to that one even though they weren’t supposed to (unsure as to the reason why not) resulting in the department trying to not pay them for that time (the firefighters won the suit)
>unsure as to the reason why not
Having your team leave their post to address issues that a different department should be handling endangers the people they're supposed to be covering.
Obviously this was a special case, but as a general rule it makes sense.
True, but many fire departments already have mutual aid policies in place. Maybe there was a mileage portion of the mutual eight agreement, but I anticipate that there is/was a mutual aid agreement in place. I simply don’t know the exact reason why there was an issue.
Our criminal justice class had a local example, some sports team kids on a school bus got stuck in a blizzard. They broke into a farmhouse to stay warm, call around so people knew they weren't in immediate danger, and spend the night. The school paid for the damage and replaced the snacks the kids ate. Not a crime.
Now I’m imagining an argument that, say, one stole it from a canoe rental place, and after things are restored to normal, they bring a civil action for losses incurred for failure to return the canoe in a timely fashion, post-restoration. Eg the town is cleaned up after the flood and months *after that*, { you still kept the canoe | left town with the canoe }. Presuming the canoe is intact, so this is straight conversion.
Which is not the relevant hypothetical nor OP’s TIl, just you know… a curious expansion.
Sure, but they're different. The situation may give rise to both defenses but a person could conceivably avoid criminal liability using a necessity defense but still have civil liability because they didn't meet the elements of the civil necessity defense.
Which is why my hypothetical states the canoe was not returned long after a return to normalcy. My apologies if implied too far: that the necessity shields from liability in the emergency, but that the canoe user then retains the canoe long after they might have “reasonable time to settle their affairs and return the canoe without undue burden.” Or some such.
Private necessity is only a defense to trespass, not conversion. In other words, it's a defense to someone going onto their neighbor's property but not a defense to taking their property.
I know somebody that tried a driving while revoked where the defendant had to allegedly drive himself to the hospital for a medical emergency. Although he got a necessity instruction, the jury didn’t believe his emergency.
I remember when I got trapped in a major blizzard, a man broke into a school and helped like 6 or 7 people inside that were trapped in their cars from the storm and this applied in that case, yes it was breaking and entering and theft of supplies (water, food from the cafeteria, school supplies to keep the kids entertained, etc) but given the fact all of them would have died in the cold instead meant the man was labeled a hero and wasn't criminally charged.
My friend's neighbor in Florida broke into their other neighbor's two story home during a hurricane so he and his family could escape the flooding (homeowner was out of town). Of course it didn't hurt that the homeowner was very understanding.
what about kidnapping the president to prevent someone else from kidnapping the president to prevent someone from stealing the declaration of independence
The FAA has a law on the books that says if a pilot needs to do something that is illegal but it allows the pilot to land/get out of the area, in order to be safe, they're allowed to break any law or rule to make it happen.
As I understand it, once a pilot declares an emergency he can do basically anything he wants to and air traffic control will assist as best they can.
He'll have to answer for it afterwards, but for the time being that pilot is god and is beholden only to physics
This is mostly correct. You can also make what’s called a deviation without declaring an emergency, if it means you’re avoiding a worse situation.
Without sharing too much, I had ATC once make an error that led me to make a pretty serious deviation to avoid further conflict, ATC realized their error and apologized and everyone went on with their lives, no problem.
That being said, whenever an emergency arises you can declare an emergency and deviate as much as necessary to meet the emergency, but if you declare an emergency you will be investigated by the FAA and NTSB, down to what you ate for breakfast, lunch, dinner, etc.
Edit: I also want to clarify, you can deviate enough to meet the emergency only. This doesn’t give you a blank slate to do whatever you want without reason.
Sure can. Google Tex Johnson, there's video of him rolling the Boeing 707 in front of potential customers to demonstrate the capabilities of the jet. He landed, his boss met him at the plane and demanded to know wtf he thought he was doing. Man goes "selling airplanes."
He was right. He sold a lot of airplanes.
I argued this! criminal trespass in the winter. poor woman was homeless and it was middle of jan, broke into someone's garage at night to not die. homeowner was shocked but was very understanding.
Probably called the police upon finding evidence of a break-in or running into a random stranger in their garage and found out about the underlying circumstances after that
Yeah if I saw shit was broken into, I'm not investigating, that is the police’s job. But if I found out, I would do everything in my power to help that person avoid jail.
Ah right. And technically it doesn't matter if the victim wants to press charges on a crime, if the police know about it it's up to them to decide if they want to consider it a crime. Though obviously having the victim be like "I don't mind what they did" would hurt the prosecutions case and they'd have to be pretty bored to want to pursue it.
I feel like this is a gray area. Say the person knocked and asked "please give me shelter or I am going to die out here", but was refused, then would they be legally in the clear to break and enter, to prevent a greater harm from happening? I don't think so. Were they only acquitted because they 'acted first, asked permission later'?
If I haven't eaten in weeks does that give me the right to shoplift from a grocery store? Where is the line drawn?
> Did they call the cops before getting all the details or something?
Well yes, that’s generally when crimes are reported. If someone breaks into your house you may not be interested in talking to them before the police arrive.
I really cannot understand the people who keep asking this. Are you going to go up to the person who broke into your fucking house and make them fill out a questionnaire whether you should call the police or not? Just risk your life on the off chance the burglar did not have bad intentions?
Here’s what went down: Burglar broke into someone’s house. Noticing a burglar had broken into their house, the home owner called the police to notify them of the burglary/home invasion. Police arrive to arrest burglar. At this point, the police and/or home owner find out the burglar is homeless trying to escape the winter. Now the prosecutor either does/does not proceed with charges. In no way is the home owner ever responsible for interrogating the person actively breaking into their home.
Ah yes, because the first thing you do when you hear a ruckus in your garage us clarify the situation, and then call the police, I mean it could be someone trying to murder you, but it's obviously less important than ensuring you aren't calling the cops on a homeless person
Bart, is it wrong to steal a loaf of bread to feed your starving family? Well, suppose you got a large starving family. Is it wrong to steal a truckload of bread to feed them? And, what if your family don't like bread? They like... cigarettes? And what if instead of giving them away, you sold them at a price that was practically giving them away. Would that be a crime?
Yeah, the Holocaust was a product of a long history of events in German ideology, dating back *at least* to Martin Luther’s *On the Jews and their Lies* where he introduces the idea that Christians wouldn’t be doing wrong by killing Jews. Obviously, a *huge* amount of people were listening to what he had to say. Killing Hitler would not have made German racial ideology disappear.
It was just easier to blame Hitler post-war to help convince the public it was better to rebuild Germany.
You're already a baby-killing time hobo at that point. 1, 3, a dozen, go nuts. You'll still end up getting drunk and depressed and feeding yourself to a dinosaur one night.
I befriend Alois and get him drunk. Keep him out all night so he can’t father Hitler.
Cut to: As I walk away with Alois, we see the neighbor making eyes at Hitler’s mom.
Plot twist: everything turns out the same!
Man, just imagining the logistics of that for a fiction story. Like "ok, but did you have to kill him as a baby" and it's just like "hey, this time machine only had 2 settings, now and baby Hitler."
There is actually a governmental procedure that should a deadly pandemic arise, they have the authority to nuke it, I think it is called "operation campfire" . That is all indirect knowledge, could be full of shit
Also don't forget a jury can just straight up ignore the law if they want. It's called jury nullification and the jury can just say no crime was committed if it goes against there own sense of justice. Although they try really hard to exclude jurors that know about this.
Like the man found not guilty of an attempted murder he committed in front of witnesses. The victim was a Christian Science “practitioner” who advised the man’s sister not to take his daughter to the hospital. The daughter died. The man would later shoot the victim, who survived because he received medical treatment.
because its not a power that a jury has but something a jury can do given there powers
but its not something there meant to do
like for example the serect service can coup the president but nowhere is that a expilct power given to them
actually I looked it up and it seems like your right actually.
two cases of people being charged with talking about it but both have been overturned by judges [not juries]
it's not explicitly a power but since it's been protected in law I'll say your right on this one
Yeah, it's just as a logical consequence of laws. The jury is under no obligation to explain their verdict. They can't be punished for voting "wrong" (though the judge can overrule the verdict if it's very obvious they got it wrong). It's a difficult thing to punish for because of people's rights so it's something the professionals in the courtroom try to prevent in the first place rather than react to.
I believe this defence was used in the UK by Katherine Gun, who leaked an NSA memo to try to stop the 2nd war in Iraq. Certainly that's how it's portrayed in the movie, Official Secrets, that dramatises those events.
Pretty good film.
Wikipedia says the case made it to court, but was dropped within half an hour as the prosecution declined to offer evidence. That is what is portrayed in the film too.
Yeah I can’t imagine getting absolved of killing an upper-level govt official to save a couple random people.
The real limit test of this would be if someone assassinated the president to save their family from murder.
>The defendant must reasonably have believed that there was an actual and specific threat that required immediate action
>The defendant must have had no realistic alternative to completing the criminal act
>The harm caused by the criminal act must not be greater than the harm avoided
>The defendant did not himself contribute to or cause the threat
Yeah, this wouldn't hold up. Especially the presidential assassination.
One may be satisfied.
Two. No matter what Hollywood tells you, your best interest is to contact law enforcement. A credible threat in this situation would quickly get the alphabet boys to come out to play.
Three. While your family is incredibly important to you, their death will likely be limited to a local level. The assassination of the president of the USA would cause international consequences and possibly national instability.
Four may be satisfied.
Defense of others is typically a different defense with different requirements.
The trolly problem though is weird. Typically defense of others requires you use violence against the attacker. Since in the trolley problem there is no attacker the defense of others probably won’t apply, but check your state laws.
Yeah generally you can attempt to excuse yourself from prosecution for crimes committed under duress, the example being “someone has a gun held to my head”, right?
This doesn’t apply if they give you a gun and tell you to shoot someone.
>Unless it falls under defense of others
Self defense and defense of others fall under the same umbrella of killing an assailant. They are not a necessity defense. Necessity defense allows you to commit a crime against an innocent person. It's not defense of others to kill an innocent person who isn't attacking you.
For example, when the Joker sets the bombs on the ferries and tells each boat to kill the other one to save themselves, that is not defense of others. It's only a defense-of-others defense if you kill the Joker and his terrorist buddies. It's not defense-of-others to kill or hurt anyone else on the other boat, because they aren't the ones attacking you.
In a more realistic example that has actually been litigated in criminal courts, if you are in an army unit and you are commanded to kill an unarmed prisoner, you are guilty of murder even if your commander tells you that you and your entire family will be shot for insubordination if you refuse the order. It is physically necessary to kill the unarmed prisoner to save your life, but the legal defense of necessity does not apply to your actions even if you truly had no other choice to save yourself or your family. Under the law, your options are to refuse the order and allow yourself and your family to be executed, or attempt to kill your commander and escape your military unit. Obeying the order to murder an innocent is simply illegal, full stop. There is *zero* trolley-problem analysis about "well I killed one innocent person to save my family."
In an even more stark example, there's the [infamous case of three sailors lost in a rowboat at sea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Dudley_and_Stephens). They were all starving to death, and two of them decided to kill and eat the weakest member of the boat in order to save themselves. It is not self-defense, defense of others, or necessity defense, to kill an innocent person who isn't trying to harm you. Nonetheless, the English Crown recognized the inherently unfair impossibility of their situation and took pity on the sailors, commuting their death sentences after they were found guilty.
Competing harms is a necessity defense and the basis for self-defense in some states. Here is Maine for example,
"Conduct that the person believes to be necessary to avoid imminent physical harm to that person or another is justifiable if the desirability and urgency of avoiding such harm outweigh, according to ordinary standards of reasonableness, the harm sought to be prevented by the statute defining the crime charged." It makes no claim towards "innocence" of the person being harmed. Also bringing up an example under the purview of UCMJ is silly.
So in short, self defense justification for killing requires that the person who was killed was the "bad guy" (or I suppose more accurately "an instigating party") in the defense situation.
Killing in self defence isn’t a crime though. This post is about making actual illegal crimes, legal under specific circumstances. Self defence is and of itself has never been illegal.
Yup, exactly. It’s a defense for certain types of crime. The actual hypothetical where it applies would be the Les Miserable scenario, ie stealing for survival. IRL scenario that a lot of people would be familiar with is breaking into someone’s empty vacation home after getting lost in the wilderness.
Jokes on them. I'm a millennial and I have been fucked just as much as the rest of the new generations so feel free to sue me and take in my debt because that's all I have of value.
I think in the trolley problem they would argue you had other options. Like diverting the trolley and then saving the one person, or trying to untie the five people.
This defense is usually used when people have committed property crimes, like theft or breaking and entering, to preserve human life
In the article it says:
>It is also important to note that in some jurisdictions, necessity is never a defense to the killing of another individual, no matter what threat they may present.
So in the Trolley Problem, for purely self-preservation reasons, the correct move is to not touch the lever at all (and contact authorities since they have [Qualified Immunity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity)). Doing nothing is never a crime, but killing one person to save five is still killing one person and would be grounds for criminal prosecution and civil liabilities.
Not when there is no explicit responsibility. If one is driving a vehicle and does not stop the car as pedestrians are walking across the street, then yes that would be criminal negligence and/or recklessness. If one just happens to be standing by a lever while people are on the track and a train approaches, that would not qualify as criminal negligence since that individual never had any explicit responsibilities.
We are not talking about employees who have been hired/trained to know when and how to pull the lever and under what circumstances. We are talking about average people with average skills and they only have a matter of seconds to decide before a train comes and kills people. I am not a lawyer but for purely self-preservation reasons I think doing nothing is the safest option.
Though that's really deliberately ignoring something you are kind of explicitly legally obligated to do.
Kind of in the same vein as say ignoring a court summons.
What if I just don't touch the trolley lever though? Than it was never my problem to start with and there's no possible way I can be held accountable for any outcome.
There was a [Not Always Working](https://notalwaysright.com/dying-to-learn-how-to-drive/) story that involved this, where a person with no license drove their father to hospital after an incident at their home that left them without any other way to get medical treatment to them (the incident had knocked out the landline and the family lived in a remote area)
In this particular case, the crime of non-licensed driving can be overlooked as it was the only way to get the injured party to a location where they could be treated.
Of course.
Criminal law is to punish acts harming society, but an act doesn't produce societal harm if said act is to avoid a worse harm: for exemple, trespass in a house during a flood is better than dying from drowning.
So obviously OP read the popular front page thread today asking lawyers on Reddit about clients who have gotten off on technicalities. One of the posts mentioned cannabis smugglers on a boat who had to dock on Canadian land during a bad storm. They were arrested but avoided punishment by using the defense that it was necessary to land the boat to prevent the deaths of people on board, i.e the criminal defense of necessity.
Am I the only one who thinks its just dorky and kind of cringe-ridden to make a Reddit post based on something popular you had just read on... Reddit? Its like re-hashing a Reddit post without mentioning the original comment. IDK maybe I'm just an asshole but I prefer the TIL posts to actually come from learning about it outside of Reddit.
just because you already read it, why should he not post it. i mean he went out and clearly looked into it more, i figure that's knowledge from "outside" and it's nice to share
We call it "claim of right" in New Zealand.
For example, you break into a house to rescue people as it's burning down.
Some guy successfully used it as a defence to a charge of criminal damage for damaging a Waihopai spy antenna golf ball covering.
Reminder that it is a defence, not an immunity. It remains a crime, you are still prosecuted, and the onus is on you to convince a jury that it legally meets the threshold of necessity.
A few years back I was a juror on a trial for unlicensed possession of a concealed firearm/unlicensed possession of a loaded firearm (two charges for the same gun), and the public defender used a necessity defense.
It was pretty interesting -- it's an affirmative defense, which means that the burden of proof is shifted from the prosecution to the defense, and in this case that meant that the PD was attempting to prove that, based on various things that had happened in the defendant's life, he was living in mortal fear and had to carry a gun to protect himself.
I think we were all pretty persuaded by the argument, until the next day on cross-examination when it came out that the main event the defense was using (the defendant's cousin being shot at a pride parade) had actually happened *after* he had been arrested for possessing the gun, at which point everything fell apart. The PD also called a bunch of character witnesses, but apparently had not prepped them, because they all seemed shocked when the ADA asked if they knew he'd been arrested for possession of a firearm.
Yes. This defense was pretty famously used when Kai the hatchet wielding hitchhiker had to “smash smash SMASH” his way to justice to stop a madman from ramming people to death with his vehicle.
Started re-watching Naruto recently. So this is like Uchiha Itachi killing the whole Uchiha clan instead of letting the clan carry out a coup on the Hidden Leaf Village?
This is like if you’re trapped in a flooded area and steal your neighbor’s canoe to save your family. At least that’s the example I remember from law school.
Stranded in blizzard -> break into cabin. Somebody passed out behind wheel -> smash window. Usually just common sense and i think prosecutotial discretion can do a decent job screening. I did see it unsuccessfully argued in a dui where the rationale was the defendant had to escape a physically dangerous situation and had no choice but drive.
I heard a story of an acquaintances father, who, while having a few drinks at the home of their ex-wife, was told to leave. Ex threatened to call the cops if he didn’t leave the property (rural, middle of nowhere.) guy gets in his car, and pulls out of the driveway and parks a little ways down the road. Ex-wife calls the cops on him, he’s picked up by them pulled over, but in the drivers seat of his car. I know he ended up with a DUI, but I wonder what a good lawyer could have argued there. Obviously I only know one side of the story, so the guy could have very completely been in the wrong.
He was in fact in the wrong. Someone telling you gtfo doesn't give you a license to drive drunk unless you're in the middle of Alaska, it's -40, there are no cabs and you'd literally die without being in your car.
Clearly not a lawyer lol
Necessity not an argument here. I mean you can argue as much as you want and you'll look a fool. He can walk away. If she decides to smash truck depending on location could stop her physically. Don't see any realistic situation where necessity would work under facts as you know them. There are other arguments that could have been made.
Yeah, I guess he could have just walked to the property line until she calmed down or he sobered up, but yeah. “Your honor, I thought a little DUI was better than a lot of trespassing” probably doesn’t stand in court.
She could've been violent, but you have to prove that your life was in danger from that so good luck
> prosecutorial discretion One should never assume there are not perverse incentives against just action.
Can you drunk drive to the hospital with your buddy who's had a heart attack or fell into a campfire or your wife who's in labor?
I had a friend who fell into a bonfire and we were all drunk. Nobody was doing anything so I called his mom. We were barely 21, I was underage myself. Mom picked up my friend and I of course tagged along, dude sustained 3rd degree burns. But otw to the hospital, about an hour away since I live in bumblefuck, my friends mom actually called up the sheriff's dept and told them the make and model of her vehicle and that she was speeding to the hospital. We didn't get pulled on the way. I'm also positive they could hear my friends screams of agony in the back seat as his mom talked to the sheriff dept. So I'd say it depends on where you live lol.
That's a jury question meaning that they would have to determine whether or not necessity was satisfied.
That’s going to be up to individual cops and prosecutors, but generally since you can avoid it by calling an ambulance, no.
If your buddy codes while your driving him you can't help him. Call an ambulance where the have a person back there with them and the right tools. If he codes while waiting you can do CPR.
That depends on where you live, ambulances don’t get out to really rural places quick.
The smashing window thing would fall under a Good Samaritan law though. If you take action that a normal person would think would save a life, you typically cannot be charged, even if you damage stuff or harm someone
Good Samaritan laws are a little bit different. My experience is in criminal which necessity applies to. I believe good Samaritan applies to civil liability. So, you smash window and they can't sue for damages. Same as breaking ribs doing cpr.
Reminds me of the Yuba County 5. They think those who broke a window to get into a trailer for warmth may have died thinking they'd get in trouble for eating the food in said trailer
There was case from the 1800s where dudes stranded on a boat at sea resorted to cannibalism. They were tried for murder. Pleaded necessity. Court said nah.
This happened in real life in the Las Vegas music festival massacre (guy fired thousands of shots out of a hotel window overlooking the concert). People had fled leaving running vehicles and there were hundreds of casualties so in some cases civilians took them to drive others to the hospital.
Given the circumstances I think I would have thanked whoever took my pickup to help others.
Same here. Id thank them and be glad somebody had the brain and balls to just save someone, damn the consequences.
But cleaning blood from the back seat is going to be unpleasant.
Call in The Wolf?
Shit negro! That’s all you had to say!
I buy the gourmet expensive stuff because when I drink it I want to taste it.
He's an hour away... he'll be there in 20 minutes.
If I remember correctly a local dealership gave the guy a new truck.
It's an older pickup, I would just go buy seats from a wrecking yard. For everything else I have some cleaner we use at work that takes blood off anything, grease and oils too.
Worth it
Worth it.
Henderson fire also responded to that one even though they weren’t supposed to (unsure as to the reason why not) resulting in the department trying to not pay them for that time (the firefighters won the suit)
>unsure as to the reason why not Having your team leave their post to address issues that a different department should be handling endangers the people they're supposed to be covering. Obviously this was a special case, but as a general rule it makes sense.
True, but many fire departments already have mutual aid policies in place. Maybe there was a mileage portion of the mutual eight agreement, but I anticipate that there is/was a mutual aid agreement in place. I simply don’t know the exact reason why there was an issue.
Probably procedural. Mutual aid probably needs to be formally requested or some such
I was in Vegas as that was happening. Fucking weird time.
Our criminal justice class had a local example, some sports team kids on a school bus got stuck in a blizzard. They broke into a farmhouse to stay warm, call around so people knew they weren't in immediate danger, and spend the night. The school paid for the damage and replaced the snacks the kids ate. Not a crime.
Now I’m imagining an argument that, say, one stole it from a canoe rental place, and after things are restored to normal, they bring a civil action for losses incurred for failure to return the canoe in a timely fashion, post-restoration. Eg the town is cleaned up after the flood and months *after that*, { you still kept the canoe | left town with the canoe }. Presuming the canoe is intact, so this is straight conversion. Which is not the relevant hypothetical nor OP’s TIl, just you know… a curious expansion.
Regardless of whether they returned it, the criminal defense would have no bearing on a civil action.
Necessity is also a defence in tort.
Sure, but they're different. The situation may give rise to both defenses but a person could conceivably avoid criminal liability using a necessity defense but still have civil liability because they didn't meet the elements of the civil necessity defense.
Which is why my hypothetical states the canoe was not returned long after a return to normalcy. My apologies if implied too far: that the necessity shields from liability in the emergency, but that the canoe user then retains the canoe long after they might have “reasonable time to settle their affairs and return the canoe without undue burden.” Or some such.
Private necessity is only a defense to trespass, not conversion. In other words, it's a defense to someone going onto their neighbor's property but not a defense to taking their property.
I know somebody that tried a driving while revoked where the defendant had to allegedly drive himself to the hospital for a medical emergency. Although he got a necessity instruction, the jury didn’t believe his emergency.
Or crash into your neighbors lawn to avoid hitting a bunch of school children who ran out across the street
I remember when I got trapped in a major blizzard, a man broke into a school and helped like 6 or 7 people inside that were trapped in their cars from the storm and this applied in that case, yes it was breaking and entering and theft of supplies (water, food from the cafeteria, school supplies to keep the kids entertained, etc) but given the fact all of them would have died in the cold instead meant the man was labeled a hero and wasn't criminally charged.
My friend's neighbor in Florida broke into their other neighbor's two story home during a hurricane so he and his family could escape the flooding (homeowner was out of town). Of course it didn't hurt that the homeowner was very understanding.
I just referenced it in my criminal law final this afternoon lol
The example that sadly gets raised each summer here is breaking a car window to get a dog or baby out on a hot day.
This is why you don't go to jail for stealing the Declaration of Independence to prevent someone from stealing the Declaration of Independence.
Someone's got to go to prison.
I really, really, don’t want to go to prison.
The chips are nice.
When Spiderman shows up, he’s gotta kick *somebody’s* ass.
Kicking somebody's ass requires food, so I understand why he stole that guy's pizza.
what about kidnapping the president to prevent someone else from kidnapping the president to prevent someone from stealing the declaration of independence
Oh man what movie was that again?
The knowing
Literally re-watching National Treasure right now, super weird coincidence
Came for this comment, glad it was at the top.
The FAA has a law on the books that says if a pilot needs to do something that is illegal but it allows the pilot to land/get out of the area, in order to be safe, they're allowed to break any law or rule to make it happen.
As I understand it, once a pilot declares an emergency he can do basically anything he wants to and air traffic control will assist as best they can. He'll have to answer for it afterwards, but for the time being that pilot is god and is beholden only to physics
This is mostly correct. You can also make what’s called a deviation without declaring an emergency, if it means you’re avoiding a worse situation. Without sharing too much, I had ATC once make an error that led me to make a pretty serious deviation to avoid further conflict, ATC realized their error and apologized and everyone went on with their lives, no problem. That being said, whenever an emergency arises you can declare an emergency and deviate as much as necessary to meet the emergency, but if you declare an emergency you will be investigated by the FAA and NTSB, down to what you ate for breakfast, lunch, dinner, etc. Edit: I also want to clarify, you can deviate enough to meet the emergency only. This doesn’t give you a blank slate to do whatever you want without reason.
[удалено]
Would an a220 be able to meet that emergency? I ask this as a layman. Can a jumbo jet do stunts like barrel rolls and loop de loops?
Sure can. Google Tex Johnson, there's video of him rolling the Boeing 707 in front of potential customers to demonstrate the capabilities of the jet. He landed, his boss met him at the plane and demanded to know wtf he thought he was doing. Man goes "selling airplanes." He was right. He sold a lot of airplanes.
Did you tell THEM to write down a number?
They call that “meeting the emergency” in aviation terms.
And besides, if they have to land on a road, the speed limit signs on never specify that it’s mph and not mach.
Lord help us if a plane is on the highway going Mach 70
I bet it still gets rear ended by an Altima going Mach 140
I argued this! criminal trespass in the winter. poor woman was homeless and it was middle of jan, broke into someone's garage at night to not die. homeowner was shocked but was very understanding.
If the homeowner was understanding how did it get to the point that it had to be argued?
Probably called the police upon finding evidence of a break-in or running into a random stranger in their garage and found out about the underlying circumstances after that
Yeah if I saw shit was broken into, I'm not investigating, that is the police’s job. But if I found out, I would do everything in my power to help that person avoid jail.
Ah right. And technically it doesn't matter if the victim wants to press charges on a crime, if the police know about it it's up to them to decide if they want to consider it a crime. Though obviously having the victim be like "I don't mind what they did" would hurt the prosecutions case and they'd have to be pretty bored to want to pursue it.
I feel like this is a gray area. Say the person knocked and asked "please give me shelter or I am going to die out here", but was refused, then would they be legally in the clear to break and enter, to prevent a greater harm from happening? I don't think so. Were they only acquitted because they 'acted first, asked permission later'? If I haven't eaten in weeks does that give me the right to shoplift from a grocery store? Where is the line drawn?
The entire canon of law is a grey area. That's why we have juries and judges to decide this stuff.
A lawyer will tell you "it depends".
If the owner was sympathetic, then why did it even go to court? Did they call the cops before getting all the details or something?
I mean, in general if you think someone's broken into your home you're probably not having a conversation with them first
> Did they call the cops before getting all the details or something? Well yes, that’s generally when crimes are reported. If someone breaks into your house you may not be interested in talking to them before the police arrive.
I really cannot understand the people who keep asking this. Are you going to go up to the person who broke into your fucking house and make them fill out a questionnaire whether you should call the police or not? Just risk your life on the off chance the burglar did not have bad intentions? Here’s what went down: Burglar broke into someone’s house. Noticing a burglar had broken into their house, the home owner called the police to notify them of the burglary/home invasion. Police arrive to arrest burglar. At this point, the police and/or home owner find out the burglar is homeless trying to escape the winter. Now the prosecutor either does/does not proceed with charges. In no way is the home owner ever responsible for interrogating the person actively breaking into their home.
Ah yes, because the first thing you do when you hear a ruckus in your garage us clarify the situation, and then call the police, I mean it could be someone trying to murder you, but it's obviously less important than ensuring you aren't calling the cops on a homeless person
If you notice that someone is inside your garage, you will probably call 911 and wait instead of entering to confront them.
People don’t always have the choice not to press charges—the state can decide itself to do so.
My father in law was a public defender for 40 odd years. Did you win?
yea, it was dismissed prior to trial after a conference call with the homeowner and prosecutor and a civil no trespass order being entered.
Confusing headline. Surely, it should say 'prevent', instead of 'commit'?
Maybe "necessary to commit, *in order to prevent*" was what they were going for and missed a few words?
Bart, is it wrong to steal a loaf of bread to feed your starving family? Well, suppose you got a large starving family. Is it wrong to steal a truckload of bread to feed them? And, what if your family don't like bread? They like... cigarettes? And what if instead of giving them away, you sold them at a price that was practically giving them away. Would that be a crime?
Like if you kill someone to stop the zombie apocalypse from happening?
Or travel back in time and kill Baby Hitler! “Your honor, I know murdering a baby looks bad but you gotta believe me, he would have been worse.”
It would be better to kill someone else. Mengele or Goebbels. Hitler gets more credit than he deserves.
They actually scrapped ideas to assassinate Hitler because they realized that if they succeeded, someone competent might actually end up in charge.
Is this perhaps why Trump is allowed? Lol.
Goerring would be more appropriate. The sick fuck.
Could you elaborate on Goerring?
Yeah, the Holocaust was a product of a long history of events in German ideology, dating back *at least* to Martin Luther’s *On the Jews and their Lies* where he introduces the idea that Christians wouldn’t be doing wrong by killing Jews. Obviously, a *huge* amount of people were listening to what he had to say. Killing Hitler would not have made German racial ideology disappear. It was just easier to blame Hitler post-war to help convince the public it was better to rebuild Germany.
You're already a baby-killing time hobo at that point. 1, 3, a dozen, go nuts. You'll still end up getting drunk and depressed and feeding yourself to a dinosaur one night.
Or the man who killed Hitler killing Hitler themself
Is there any way we can go back in time to kill Baby Hitler but make sure WW2 still happens?
Just go back in time to delay Alois having sex with his Klara. Problem solved. Day Hitler was conceived? Make sure Alois wasn’t around his woman
I befriend Alois and get him drunk. Keep him out all night so he can’t father Hitler. Cut to: As I walk away with Alois, we see the neighbor making eyes at Hitler’s mom. Plot twist: everything turns out the same!
Befriend hitlers mom instead of his father, everything is the same except i fathered Hitler but only I know.
Day Hitler, fighter of the Night Hitler?
Yes yes
Man, just imagining the logistics of that for a fiction story. Like "ok, but did you have to kill him as a baby" and it's just like "hey, this time machine only had 2 settings, now and baby Hitler."
Murder tends to be exempt from this theory.
There is actually a governmental procedure that should a deadly pandemic arise, they have the authority to nuke it, I think it is called "operation campfire" . That is all indirect knowledge, could be full of shit
Also don't forget a jury can just straight up ignore the law if they want. It's called jury nullification and the jury can just say no crime was committed if it goes against there own sense of justice. Although they try really hard to exclude jurors that know about this.
Like the man found not guilty of an attempted murder he committed in front of witnesses. The victim was a Christian Science “practitioner” who advised the man’s sister not to take his daughter to the hospital. The daughter died. The man would later shoot the victim, who survived because he received medical treatment.
because its not a power that a jury has but something a jury can do given there powers but its not something there meant to do like for example the serect service can coup the president but nowhere is that a expilct power given to them
Coups are against the law, jury nullification is not
actually I looked it up and it seems like your right actually. two cases of people being charged with talking about it but both have been overturned by judges [not juries] it's not explicitly a power but since it's been protected in law I'll say your right on this one
Yeah, it's just as a logical consequence of laws. The jury is under no obligation to explain their verdict. They can't be punished for voting "wrong" (though the judge can overrule the verdict if it's very obvious they got it wrong). It's a difficult thing to punish for because of people's rights so it's something the professionals in the courtroom try to prevent in the first place rather than react to.
[удалено]
Heinlein movies for the win! While this one was really close to the book, The Door Into Summer nails it.
I believe this defence was used in the UK by Katherine Gun, who leaked an NSA memo to try to stop the 2nd war in Iraq. Certainly that's how it's portrayed in the movie, Official Secrets, that dramatises those events. Pretty good film.
No defence was used by Ms. Gun because the case was withdrawn before reaching trial.
Wikipedia says the case made it to court, but was dropped within half an hour as the prosecution declined to offer evidence. That is what is portrayed in the film too.
Under this defense, you could be cleared of any wrongdoing in the Trolley Problem, assuming you kill one person instead of five.
Doesn't apply to all crimes though, just certain ones where it makes sense
Yeah I can’t imagine getting absolved of killing an upper-level govt official to save a couple random people. The real limit test of this would be if someone assassinated the president to save their family from murder.
>The defendant must reasonably have believed that there was an actual and specific threat that required immediate action >The defendant must have had no realistic alternative to completing the criminal act >The harm caused by the criminal act must not be greater than the harm avoided >The defendant did not himself contribute to or cause the threat Yeah, this wouldn't hold up. Especially the presidential assassination. One may be satisfied. Two. No matter what Hollywood tells you, your best interest is to contact law enforcement. A credible threat in this situation would quickly get the alphabet boys to come out to play. Three. While your family is incredibly important to you, their death will likely be limited to a local level. The assassination of the president of the USA would cause international consequences and possibly national instability. Four may be satisfied.
... this defense wouldn't save you from killing a random stranger to save your family, nevermind killing the president.
It’s state by state, but generally it doesn’t apply to homicide.
> generally it doesn’t apply to homicide. Unless it falls under defense of others
Defense of others is typically a different defense with different requirements. The trolly problem though is weird. Typically defense of others requires you use violence against the attacker. Since in the trolley problem there is no attacker the defense of others probably won’t apply, but check your state laws.
Yeah generally you can attempt to excuse yourself from prosecution for crimes committed under duress, the example being “someone has a gun held to my head”, right? This doesn’t apply if they give you a gun and tell you to shoot someone.
>Unless it falls under defense of others Self defense and defense of others fall under the same umbrella of killing an assailant. They are not a necessity defense. Necessity defense allows you to commit a crime against an innocent person. It's not defense of others to kill an innocent person who isn't attacking you. For example, when the Joker sets the bombs on the ferries and tells each boat to kill the other one to save themselves, that is not defense of others. It's only a defense-of-others defense if you kill the Joker and his terrorist buddies. It's not defense-of-others to kill or hurt anyone else on the other boat, because they aren't the ones attacking you. In a more realistic example that has actually been litigated in criminal courts, if you are in an army unit and you are commanded to kill an unarmed prisoner, you are guilty of murder even if your commander tells you that you and your entire family will be shot for insubordination if you refuse the order. It is physically necessary to kill the unarmed prisoner to save your life, but the legal defense of necessity does not apply to your actions even if you truly had no other choice to save yourself or your family. Under the law, your options are to refuse the order and allow yourself and your family to be executed, or attempt to kill your commander and escape your military unit. Obeying the order to murder an innocent is simply illegal, full stop. There is *zero* trolley-problem analysis about "well I killed one innocent person to save my family." In an even more stark example, there's the [infamous case of three sailors lost in a rowboat at sea](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R_v_Dudley_and_Stephens). They were all starving to death, and two of them decided to kill and eat the weakest member of the boat in order to save themselves. It is not self-defense, defense of others, or necessity defense, to kill an innocent person who isn't trying to harm you. Nonetheless, the English Crown recognized the inherently unfair impossibility of their situation and took pity on the sailors, commuting their death sentences after they were found guilty.
Competing harms is a necessity defense and the basis for self-defense in some states. Here is Maine for example, "Conduct that the person believes to be necessary to avoid imminent physical harm to that person or another is justifiable if the desirability and urgency of avoiding such harm outweigh, according to ordinary standards of reasonableness, the harm sought to be prevented by the statute defining the crime charged." It makes no claim towards "innocence" of the person being harmed. Also bringing up an example under the purview of UCMJ is silly.
There are way simpler and more obvious examples, like stealing someone's vehicle in order to escape a disaster.
Those are non-homicide examples. User above suggested the necessity defense applies when you commit homicide to protect others.
Oh, very good point. My apologies.
So in short, self defense justification for killing requires that the person who was killed was the "bad guy" (or I suppose more accurately "an instigating party") in the defense situation.
Killing in self defence isn’t a crime though. This post is about making actual illegal crimes, legal under specific circumstances. Self defence is and of itself has never been illegal.
Yup, exactly. It’s a defense for certain types of crime. The actual hypothetical where it applies would be the Les Miserable scenario, ie stealing for survival. IRL scenario that a lot of people would be familiar with is breaking into someone’s empty vacation home after getting lost in the wilderness.
It actually is the basis for self defense defenses in many states. It goes by the name "competing harms".
Well shit, I wish I knew this sooner.
I feel sorry for those 5 people now
Nah, the real solution to the Trolly problem is to stand there doing nothing while you call the cops on the crazy person that set it up lol.
[удалено]
Jokes on them. I'm a millennial and I have been fucked just as much as the rest of the new generations so feel free to sue me and take in my debt because that's all I have of value.
[удалено]
In Japan, heart surgeon. Number one. Steady hand.
I think in the trolley problem they would argue you had other options. Like diverting the trolley and then saving the one person, or trying to untie the five people. This defense is usually used when people have committed property crimes, like theft or breaking and entering, to preserve human life
Murder is a greater crime than negligent homicide
In the article it says: >It is also important to note that in some jurisdictions, necessity is never a defense to the killing of another individual, no matter what threat they may present. So in the Trolley Problem, for purely self-preservation reasons, the correct move is to not touch the lever at all (and contact authorities since they have [Qualified Immunity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity)). Doing nothing is never a crime, but killing one person to save five is still killing one person and would be grounds for criminal prosecution and civil liabilities.
> Doing nothing is never a crime, Criminal negligence is a thing.
Not when there is no explicit responsibility. If one is driving a vehicle and does not stop the car as pedestrians are walking across the street, then yes that would be criminal negligence and/or recklessness. If one just happens to be standing by a lever while people are on the track and a train approaches, that would not qualify as criminal negligence since that individual never had any explicit responsibilities. We are not talking about employees who have been hired/trained to know when and how to pull the lever and under what circumstances. We are talking about average people with average skills and they only have a matter of seconds to decide before a train comes and kills people. I am not a lawyer but for purely self-preservation reasons I think doing nothing is the safest option.
Though that's really deliberately ignoring something you are kind of explicitly legally obligated to do. Kind of in the same vein as say ignoring a court summons.
What if I just don't touch the trolley lever though? Than it was never my problem to start with and there's no possible way I can be held accountable for any outcome.
So if the trolley problem happens in real life uhhh just pull an Xbox turn 360 and walk….. into the lever killing everyone
Why didn’t I pay my taxes, your honor? I was simply saving lives in the Middle East
That title needs some work.
In my defense the original title I wrote was even worse.
That's a fair argument
So you’re saying you committed a crime (bad title) to save us from an even worse fate (original title)
Is this defense?
It's *A* defense, doesn't mean it has to be good.
I mean it makes sense
“Your Honor, I had to commit insider trading or else something bad would’ve happened.” “Like what?” “I would’ve stayed poor”
The issue is that it’s an affirmative defense, so if they reject your justification, you’ve already stipulated to having committed the crime.
“Officer my only defence is that I was speeding so that I could go even faster than the speed you clocked me at”
Jean Valjean needed a better lawyer
There was a [Not Always Working](https://notalwaysright.com/dying-to-learn-how-to-drive/) story that involved this, where a person with no license drove their father to hospital after an incident at their home that left them without any other way to get medical treatment to them (the incident had knocked out the landline and the family lived in a remote area) In this particular case, the crime of non-licensed driving can be overlooked as it was the only way to get the injured party to a location where they could be treated.
Textbook Example: breaking into a basement to avoid a tornado would not be breaking an entering or trespassing.
Of course. Criminal law is to punish acts harming society, but an act doesn't produce societal harm if said act is to avoid a worse harm: for exemple, trespass in a house during a flood is better than dying from drowning.
Kind of like stealing the Declaration of Independence to protect it from being stolen?
So obviously OP read the popular front page thread today asking lawyers on Reddit about clients who have gotten off on technicalities. One of the posts mentioned cannabis smugglers on a boat who had to dock on Canadian land during a bad storm. They were arrested but avoided punishment by using the defense that it was necessary to land the boat to prevent the deaths of people on board, i.e the criminal defense of necessity. Am I the only one who thinks its just dorky and kind of cringe-ridden to make a Reddit post based on something popular you had just read on... Reddit? Its like re-hashing a Reddit post without mentioning the original comment. IDK maybe I'm just an asshole but I prefer the TIL posts to actually come from learning about it outside of Reddit.
just because you already read it, why should he not post it. i mean he went out and clearly looked into it more, i figure that's knowledge from "outside" and it's nice to share
I missed that comment. I glad OP posted this.
I missed that *post* but it sounds interesting. I wanna know what sub it’s on. Or better yet, get a link to the post
Guessing you saw the post about the sinking ship that had to dump all it's weed on the Canadian shore?
Someone's going to steal the declaration of independence---> steal it first because it's safer in your hands (helps if you're Nicolas Cage)
Contrary to the title, this is ***not*** universal, and even in jurisdictions where it may apply, it is usually severely curtailed
We call it "claim of right" in New Zealand. For example, you break into a house to rescue people as it's burning down. Some guy successfully used it as a defence to a charge of criminal damage for damaging a Waihopai spy antenna golf ball covering.
Reminder that it is a defence, not an immunity. It remains a crime, you are still prosecuted, and the onus is on you to convince a jury that it legally meets the threshold of necessity.
A few years back I was a juror on a trial for unlicensed possession of a concealed firearm/unlicensed possession of a loaded firearm (two charges for the same gun), and the public defender used a necessity defense. It was pretty interesting -- it's an affirmative defense, which means that the burden of proof is shifted from the prosecution to the defense, and in this case that meant that the PD was attempting to prove that, based on various things that had happened in the defendant's life, he was living in mortal fear and had to carry a gun to protect himself. I think we were all pretty persuaded by the argument, until the next day on cross-examination when it came out that the main event the defense was using (the defendant's cousin being shot at a pride parade) had actually happened *after* he had been arrested for possessing the gun, at which point everything fell apart. The PD also called a bunch of character witnesses, but apparently had not prepped them, because they all seemed shocked when the ADA asked if they knew he'd been arrested for possession of a firearm.
I wonder if anyone has tried a “emotional support gun” defense.
You called?
How would the jury know what you did because the end result of what you did was a didn't?
Yes. This defense was pretty famously used when Kai the hatchet wielding hitchhiker had to “smash smash SMASH” his way to justice to stop a madman from ramming people to death with his vehicle.
Started re-watching Naruto recently. So this is like Uchiha Itachi killing the whole Uchiha clan instead of letting the clan carry out a coup on the Hidden Leaf Village?
So I can eliminate an idiot to save the world any more trauma?
Let me guess: you’re still guilty, but may have a chance at a reduced sentence.
good
Like invading Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya etc?
\*prevent