Mississippi 'Castle Doctrine' Self-Defense Bill Signed Into Law

[Filuwaúrdjan]

A good example of bad law that a lot people will support in a knee-jerk way due to fear and for sentimental reasons. If you can't see what is fundamentally *wrong* about it (ignore the principles involved for a minute... and this is probably the biggest problem with this sort of issue) then you clearly need to get out more...

O/c it was the defacto law anyway, so it's not as though anything has actually changed...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

This bill does not allow the owner to kill anyone who breaks into his property. The relevant part of the bill provides:

"The killing of a human being ... shall be justifiable ... [w]hen committed by any person in resisting any attempt unlawfully to kill such person or to commit any felony upon him ... in any dwelling, in any occupied vehicle, in any place of business, in any place of employment or in the immediate premises thereof in which such person shall be..."

You seem to have missed this bit out...

A person who uses defensive force shall be presumed to have reasonably feared imminent death or great bodily harm, or the commission of a felony upon him or another or upon his dwelling, or against a vehicle which he was occupying, or against his business or place of employment or the immediate premises of such business or place of employment, if the person against whom the defensive force was used, was in the process of unlawfully and forcibly entering, or had unlawfully and forcibly entered, a dwelling, occupied vehicle, business, place of employment or the immediate premises thereof or if that person had unlawfully removed or was attempting to unlawfully remove another against the other person's will from that dwelling, occupied vehicle, business, place of employment or the immediate premises thereof and the person who used defensive force knew or had reason to believe that the forcible entry or unlawful and forcible act was occurring or had occurred. 

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Yes it does

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The key word here is "presumed." The person using defensive force is presumed to have feared the commission of a felony whenever someone else breaks and enters into his home. I would assume that, like other presumptions--such as the presumption of innocence--this presumption can be overcome by the prosecution.

That sort of presumption is just about impossible of overcoming in a criminal trial. And that is quite clearly the intention, and that is why this is a Godawful piece of legislation.

Presumption of innocence is a bad example; a better one would be to presume consent in a rape trial becuase the victim was wearing a short skirt.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

However, different standards should apply when one's own home has been broken into.

Why?

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Breaks into your home when it is quite obvious that you or someone else is there... then yes, I can understand why someone might think that (despite that, it is still wrong to give a homeowner a bit of a blank cheque to blow the brains out of anyone who tresspasses. If the homeowner, or anyone else legally in that house, has a *reasonable* fear that whoever has broken into the house intends to kill them, then I don't actually have a problem with him/her shooting the intruder. But this all goes much further beyond that than is safe or fair).

But breaks into your property? Don't be silly.